My Palomino Ride

Over the years, in times of stress, I have resorted to visiting a childhood memory that lulls me away from the anxiety of the moment and into a peaceful escape.

An unconceivably beautiful carousel, which had originally been crafted by skillful hands in 1926, was purchased from another city by my childhood home town’s Chamber of Commerce many years later.  It touched the ground in our city park the same summer that I touched down in the maternity ward of the town hospital.

Through the years as I grew I watched the magnificent horses go round and round while the calliope music wafted through the air compelling me to hop on until finally I was old enough and tall enough to ride by myself! I purchased what seemed to me to be a magic ticket and ran to the pony that I had long since chosen as my favorite of them all.  A cream colored palomino with a flowing blonde mane and tail.

“Oh you’ve chosen a fine one!” the carousel man said as he hoisted me up onto the saddle and wrapped the soft leather security belt around my waist which fastened me securely to my steed.

I ran my hands lovingly along the smooth painted surface of the mane and leaned over to look into my pony’s big brown eyes.  “Hi” I whispered and felt we were already good friends.

Then the music started and the carousel slowly moved forward. I reached for the brass pole in front of me with both hands and closed my eyes, around and around and around we flew.  Up and down in a happy world with the rest of the world spinning by in a blur.

These exhilarating and yet peaceful moments in time have morphed into a liberating and centering meditation memory for those frazzled moments when I needed a quick mental break from stress in my later years.

I mentioned in a previous blog that I have trudged through the stressful journey over the last two years since Dale died and I am now finally at a virtual blank canvas ready for me to paint what’s next for my life.

It occurs to me that the realization that I actually have control of this pivotal time of my life is making me lean towards a desire to avoid stress!  Why would I ask for more? Aren’t I entitled to a break from stress for heaven’s sake?  I find that I am even very guarded about letting in the stress of the terror that is happening in the world right now.   Because…for the first time in a very very long time…it’s all about ME now!  And this ME wants peace. What possible good can this ME, all by my lonesome self, do that would be of any use anyway!

I have the flu today. The kind with the deep cough that won’t let me sleep kind of flu. The kind that forces me to stay home today; this rainy day, and think about what peaceful and self-absorbing things I want to plan for myself.  I settle down into the comfy chair by the window and watch the rain hit the window and send droplets slithering down in artistic patterns. I consider drawing a raindrop and then I glance over and spy a magazine I selected (for future use) at the local visitors center.  A travel magazine.  I pick it up and flip through it.  I land on an article by Susan Moore titled  “Stress? Bring it On!”  

Really? I think!  In a travel magazine!!  But I start reading it in spite of myself!  Her first sentence reads: “Stress. The name itself is synonymous with all negativity in our lives”

“You’ve got it right there sister”, I whisper in my froggy voice and I read on. She writes (and I paraphrase here):

“Our lives are the byproduct of our decisions. It isn’t the stress that gets us; it’s our belief that we deserve better. You only deserve better when you work to be better.  Earn your better!” …“We have the ability to change. Every action and every inaction has a consequence. Do not be a victim in your life. Meet your stress head on and do something about it. Realize that some things are out of your control, and that’s OK, but most things aren’t. As Ghandi said, “be the change you wish to see in the world.”

She ends with a suggestion to: “Spend less time trying to be happy and more time trying to be useful”.

I know without looking that a blank watercolor paper is taped to my drawing board and my mind wanders to an idea I’ve had for quite some time of a sequence of motivational images that I have wanted to paint. But then I’m instantly hit with the all too familiar stress of whether I’m good enough; reminding myself that my first attempt at this project was sitting in the shredder pile…

And then, my phone blings.  It’s the Daily Message that I signed up to receive each day and it’s a quote by Kim B. Clark today.  It says simply “We do not have to be perfect, but we need to be good and getting better”.

So, OK, I climb off my safe AND peaceful AND stress free mental carousel ride and start sketching. It will be a challenge but I’m already feeling happy and perhaps even useful.  So…bring it on blank white canvases - both real and metaphorical I prefer the consequences of diligent actions to the consequences of a safe and stress-free inaction.  And that thought alone gives me hope that I can be a part of the change I wish to see in the world. Even if it’s just a small contribution, it can be my widow’s mite.

And so my journey into widowhood continues with new challenges.