Courage My Love - December 22, 2010

Today we are one day into winter, one day past the full moon, one day past the lunar eclipse but more importantly we are one day into the year to come. As the end of a year approaches I think of cycles, the rise and fall of them, the coming and going of them but always the repeating of them. The major life cycles of birth and death, the minor life cycles of marriage, relationships, family and even the cycles of repeated seasons, tides, and taxes. What was that old verse? A wheel within a wheel a turning, way in the middle of the sky.

I was born into a twelve year cycle with the first six of the cycle waxing and the last six of the cycle waning. It is the pattern of the dragon, my birth sign in the Chinese Horoscope. My 12th, 24th, 36th, and 48th end of cycles were low points in my life, surrounded by chaos, turmoil and heavy burdens. I am currently approaching the end of the 5th cycle and it also has been a difficult journey. The high water marks of the cycles are incredible, marked by love, passion, the birth of a child, money and travel. The low water marks are survivable.

We watch the days go by, the weeks go by, the seasons turning one into the other and if we learn anything from this, it is that life endures. There are times when you think, "I can't possibly go on, I can't make it" but you can and you do. You learn to stop worrying, for worry never improved anything. You learn to deal with what is in front of you, because it won't go away until you do. You put one foot in front of the other, work one day after the other, go to bed each night and rise each morning, knowing that you too, are part of the cycle.

Is this starting to sound like the Lion King? Hakuna Matata? Well hell it was good enough for the lions, it's good enough for me. I was musing, just thinking, the wheel within the wheel thing and realized I am probably not part of that, I'm more like the dust in the road as the wheel rumbles by.

I never wanted the house in the burbs, the 2.5 kids and the husband who goes to work everyday. That world was the vision we were given, but as we all know, that vision imploded. I wanted to travel, paint and write, but work got in the way.

Had I an endless supply of money, I would gladly live in a temperate climate and dabble with paint, and generally live a life of the wastrel. I would however be a generous, even benificent wastrel, given goodly sums to the less fortunate, and I would strive to make the world a better place. Just give me a chance. Give me forty million and I'll show you how good I could be at that job.

I would join that Buffet club and give away a goodly portion of my wealth, how much does one wastrel need anyway? All I want is a house, food and an endless supply of paint and canvas and paper and books. Not too much to ask......

The wealthy must have their own problems, none that in my impoverished state I can identify with. They don't have to worry about the basics, so what do they worry about? I mean if they have more than enough money, like a Buffet or a Gates, what is it that keeps them awake at night?

Being rich, takes courage my love...