Our Little Man

Paolo is cute. he told me last night before falling asleep that starting today, he will wake up early and take a bath, and he asked me to buy him Vitamins B1-6-12 so he could grow taller, faster.

Thea told me it's because of his new crush... a little girl named Chelsea, who is just as tall as he is.

He made good on his intention this morning.

I'm buying him his 1-6-12 later today. : )

Life These Days

summer's here, even if technically, it starts when school lets out, or when april 1st comes.

the little ones are outside; they have retrieved their portable pool from storage and filled it up with water. they are frolicking and cavorting in carefree abandon now, as Thea lounges by the sofa watching her current favorite, "Dream Girls", while i take a break from checking exams in between reading chapters of a book/brushing my teeth/ writing on my journal just to break the monotony... it's our usual lazy relaxing Sunday afternoon. : )

i have yet to upload the Peace Journalism 2 training pics and the pics showing the fun we had with our first white water rafting adventure in Cagayan de Oro City, even as i still glow from the memories of the mini vacation.

i have come to certain realizations recently about my dear friends and colleagues with PJ; it's tough and challenging with us 3 firstborn, passionate, stubborn, dynamic women working together; lately, i thought i wanted to give up and let go... but after deep soul-searching and reflection, i realized again how important our work Ideal is, not only to us, but to the bigger world out there, and despite our clashing personalities sometimes, we do love each other so, and i am touched when L tells me how A tries to imitate me in my meditations now, even as i feel for L and all the aggravations she has to go through... my major realization was that i am stepping up now to take my rightful place as true national coordinator, reclaiming my self and power, in that area, so to speak, and stop letting them or others define my role for me, because of my more laid-back laissez faire way of doing things.

i turn 39 in 3 days, even if there's no february 29. and i have already made plans for a special celebration, even so. (i used to not like celebrating much when there's no feb. 29, as i felt like an impostor borrowing some other dates for my birthday. but what the heck, this time, i claim as i wish!)

in the evening of feb. 28, the kids and i go out to some real restaurant (not fastfood) for some fine dining experience. in the evening of march 1, i am going to wear the exquisite tan-colored soft top Mama gave me, complete with pearls and soft black cocktail slacks and gold sandals, to a violin and piano concert of international award winning artists coming to Bacolod for the National Arts Fair.

Thea's coming with me, and we'll be meeting two older (60ish) women friends of mine there for the soul treat. afterwards, i promised them i'd treat them to dinner too somewhere we can relax and converse... richness, simple joys, friends, life's Abundance. what a way to kick off my 39th year!

im growing in the regularity and effects of my almost-daily meditations these days, even as i devour old books (some re-reading, some reading them for the first time) from my personal library, reading 2 or 3 simultaneously. they seem to have taken on a life of their own, though, as if im in some sort of accelerated personalized curriculum, guided and led to certain particular books and chapters and passages cross-referencing each other, as i grow in thought and feeling, and process these all in my journal.

i've just finished Sam Keen's The Passionate Life, even as i'm rereading now Edgar Cayce's Readings on Home and Marriage: There Will Your Heart Be Also, and about to start Ralph Lewis' The Sanctuary of the Self.

im sleeping deeper these days, too, with striking dreams i remember and journalize afterwards, and which reveal to me precious insights about my life and the direction it's taking...

one month more, and my 14-month leave starts. yipppeeee!!!! im just tying up loose ends now, finishing unfinished business from my university work, so i can fully savor my leave.

even so, things are opening up for me now in the direction of my truest Joys.

i have just finished reading my first book, Papa's House, Mama's House, at a poetry-reading session last week (mine is children's fiction, of course, but the organizers thought the sound and sense integrity of my story was poetic too! : > ), and will talk to a class of graduate school literature students in another school next saturday about children's fiction.

M and i are in a settled, quiet time, and i am learning to actually savor and revel in it now, instead of the anxious worrying and fretting i used to do before. Love's timeless ways are moving me in timeless directions, and i am loving it now, once i've gotten past the hurdle of my own fears.

Life is Good.

Thank You, God and The Universe!!! ohhhhhh HUGGGGGGGGGGGSSSSSSS!!!

J Blooms

Santermo

'just got home from a monthly Writers' Circle meeting; it was my first time to attend today although they've been inviting me since it started last November.

i am soo glad i went there, despite my earlier reservations-- caused by quite a day that began with a meditation session that turned scary (because i was led, without my knowing it, to touch my deepest fear...) but worthwhile in the end, the kids' bickering (see post below), and a migraine coming on... all before the appointed 6pm Writers' Circle meeting.

writing is definitely my bliss and my salvation. no matter what life brings me/has brought me, writing and literature has always kept me true to my heart and soul, and helped me find my way in the years when i felt very lost and bleak.

tonight was just a further affirmation of that.

it might have seemed like a chore reading and thinking through the manuscripts shared and critiqued, but ohhh, i was in ecstasy!

i had a story critiqued, too, and i got some precious insights and advice from it which i will promptly put to good use (mainly to master the verse forms, and to study fine poetry, to achieve more control of my craft).

we are tentatively naming our Circle, Santermo, the local dialect for St. Elmo's Fire, with even a tagline -- Kalayo sa Papel (literally, "Fire on Paper").

: ) : ) : )

i can't wait for my leave to start.

learning fine poetry and children's fiction, even as i grow in my meditations and manifesting studies.

one solitary, introspective year, all my own.

ohhhhh, blissssssssss!!!

Kids

Thea rants about Paolo here.

(eyes rolling, with a deep sigh!!!)

1 Corinthians 13:4-8

Love is very patient and kind,
never jealous nor envious,
never boastful nor proud,
never haughty nor selfish nor rude.

Love does not demand its own way.
It is not irritable nor touchy.
It does not hold grudges and will hardly even notice when others do it wrong.

It is never glad about injustice,
but rejoices whenever Truth wins out.

If you love someone, you will be loyal to him
no matter what the cost.

You will always believe in him,
always expect the best of him,
and always stand your ground in defending him.

All the special gifts and powers from God
will someday come to an end,
but Love goes on
forever.

Goddess Ways

the point of divinity is creating life, and the naturally generative, sexual, joyful, erotic, nourishing, beautiful, connecting, loving parts of women (and men, who wake up to their powerful feminine parts) and Nature is divinity manifested.

the Divine has never been just masculine... (click on this link to watch the video "Divine Feminine")

While I Was Away

while i was away, with the net connection down at home for almost two weeks--

i literally climbed and went down three mountains, forded a stream, clung to two mountain walls underneath a cliff, and gingerly stepped through a handmade bamboo foot bridge atop a rushing river below, as i made my way, in by inch, along with my students in our Dynamics of Popular Culture class, to the highway that would take us to the bus back home.

of course, before that, earlier in the morning, on balmy, intermittently rainy and very coooold January weather, on our way to visit and interact with the indigenous peoples' community we were going to, we trudged through seven kilometers of dirt, stones, thorny bushes, fields and mud, mud, mud, all on barefoot, as it was difficult and slower to walk with shoes on, and especially for me when the soles of my rubber shoes gave out early on in the journey. i actually went home sitting on the bus, without shoes on, for the first time in my life!

ooh but what a beautiful, amazing adventure! i was grinning all the way home, along with my students, who were all tired and spent, but happily so.

now i appreciate tufts of grass so much more. heehee. during the journey, especially those dangerous moments underneath the cliffs, the tufts of grass were all that we clung to to keep us close to the wall, without falling off the ledge!

***

ive been mainly handwriting on my journal, taking solitude, with my thoughts and feelings... and learning the Timeless ways of loving, and being loved by, M...

***

i gorged on a movie marathon binge the other night, watching 4 rented movies straight in one night till 3am-- Awakenings, Sylvia, Les Miserables and South Pacific! : )

also finished a novel, If The Shoe Fits by Rae Ellen Lee, about a reluctant boatfrau and her new marriage and her writing while living with her husband in a sailboat and learning the vagaries of sailing (life? married life?), even as i finish growing through The Passionate Life by Sam Keen

later today, i will be watching Seabiscuit and The Age of Innocence, even as i have Shakti Gawain's Living In the Light, and Jane Smiley's The Age of Grief, as bedtime reading for the coming week or so.

Food for the soul time.

i didn't realize i have been sooo starved!!!

***

two months to go and my year's leave starts. my excitement is still there, bubbling, gurgling, but tempered and sober now with the realization of certain "realities" impinging on the fantasy...

i've been finetuning my budgets, and realized that if we keep the ship tight, the children and i can live comfortably well enough during my leave, if we stay close to the basics, as i forego a year's worth of 20k/month net pay,... just to follow my fulltime creative writing Dream, at last, and see where it leads me.

of course, i can always postpone my leave to the schoolyear after next, and save up some more... but i feel called, drawn, to follow this path now, or never at all.

... i don't know how to describe the feeling exactly... but it feels like "fate" somehow, like i have an appointment with Destiny to keep... now or never.

we will see where this path leads me. i don't see the way clearly exactly. all i know is that this is my Joy, and i trust that whatever happens, the children and i will be alright, if not finer and better than ever before... like we always have, when we just followed our Joys!

God bless us all.

Mine to Make

ahhhhhhhhhhhhhh..... the weekend!!! two full days, mine to make and use as i see fit, no outside demands to fulfill!!!

1. take my early morning walk

2. meditate

3. update my handwritten journal and planner

4. sort and clean the last of the stuff from the Christmas and New Year's "overhauling" to finally make the space clear for all good and new things to come in!

5. check my students' papers and update my class record

6. make my exams, so i can have them risographed by monday, in time for midterm exams the following week

7. finish the last two of the films i rented so i can return them today

8. treat my self to a foot spa and manicure and pedicure

9. just enjoy my life : )

thank You, God, for all the blessings we have received, all the blessings we are receiving, and all the blessings coming our way!!!