Life. Crazy, Chaotic, Ours!

Five Minute Friday : Release

Participating again in the Five Minute Friday exercise, which I love.  I encourage you to click on the link and write yourself.  Sign up for the e-mail reminders and share your stories.  It's just good for the soul.

This week's prompt/word is "release".  For five minutes, I wrote with that single word guiding my word flow and here's how it turned out...

 

Release … To free and to let go.  It’s a verb so to actually ‘release’ something or someone requires action.  Release is something that is easier suggested than done.

 How does one release control?  How does one release a love?  How does one release emotions or energy when we are so fixated on the notion that life has to be perfect and in order to achieve perfection, we should not let go of anything because by letting go or releasing, we relinquish control.

Ah, releasing doesn’t really require relinquishing.  Releasing is more an understanding, in my mind, that some things aren’t meant to be control.  Releasing is letting go and seeing what marvelous results unfold.

Envision this.  Close your eyes – okay, don’t, because then you can’t see to read the vision…

It’s a summer evening.  You are 7 or 8 years old.  It’s hot.  You’ve been running around with your friends during the day and enjoyed corn on the cob outside with your family for dinner.  Maybe you’ve even eaten a watermelon slice and had the juice trickle down your chin earlier so that the stickiness lingers.  Or, maybe you’ve just finished roasted marshmallows over a firepit or hibachi charcoal grill and that gooey goodness sticks to your fingertips.  The scent of charcoal permeates through the air and you are lying on your back on a grassy hill. The stars are just slightly visible through a dusky, summer sky.  You’re thinking about the grass stains on your knees and the adventures you will have tomorrow.  Out of the corner of your eye, you spy a slight flicker.  Then you see another.  And another ahead of you.  The air is still.  Very warm and completely still. The crickets are starting to chirp.  And then there’s another flash of light.  It’s firefly season. 

You jump up quickly, run inside and allow the screen door to bang.  You grab the first jar you can find from the kitchen and rush outside and down the grassy hill to begin the collection.  One, two, three…maybe one even escapes.  Before you know it, there are at least seven or eight or even thirteen fireflies in your jar.  But in your haste to catch the magic, you forgot to poke holes in the lid.  Or maybe you weren’t allowed to poke holes in the jar and you remember your Mom or Dad telling you that without the holes the fireflies won’t live for another day.  So, rather unwillingly, you twist open the lid and shoo the lightening bugs out the top and into the air, releasing them back to their home in nature.  You watch them as they fly up, up and away into the warm night air and you cross your fingers behind your back as you stare in amazement and hope, with all your 8 year old heart, that the magic of a hot summer night filled with fireflies comes back again.

Had you not released the magic, another person would never enjoy it and the magic would never have had the opportunity to return.  That is the beauty of release – you are oftentimes, letting go of something or someone to go on to something more magical, more beautiful, or bigger than where it began.  Release isn’t relinquishing or giving up, it’s letting go for more.

 

Watch the magic unfold as you release into a new day!

The magic in my world today revolves around a young man (no longer a boy) who turned 13 at 3:16 a.m. this morning, and his two siblings - one older and one younger - and the little pup.  We're soaking in the summer (because I am feeling well enough to enjoy it) and anxious for their Daddy to come home from work this evening.  We may, possibly, be lucky enough to enjoy the family movie night that has been postponed a couple of timest his week.  That means, popcorn and milkshakes and snuggles for sure!

 

Five Minute Friday : "Hands"

So this is the first time I am attempting this and I hope I do it 'right'!

I am a writer...I have been for as long as I can remember, writing stories and poems and in journals and school papers and scrapbooks and jingles, and, of course, blogging, but I'm joining in a linky part by the fabulous Lisa-Jo Baker, an author and all-around inspiring lady.  Her challenge is called Five Minute Friday and here's how it works, straight from Lisa-Jo:

"It started because I’d been thinking about writing and how often our perfectionism gets in the way of our words. And I figured, why not take 5 minutes and see what comes out: not a perfect post, not a profound post, just five minutes of focused writing.

So now on Fridays a group of people who love to throw caution to the wind and just write without worrying if it’s just right gather to share what five minutes buys them. Just five minutes."

So here's my first attempt and share at Five Minute Friday:

 

These Hands

These hands…once were young, grasping tightly to her Mama or Daddy as she walked out into the big world.  These hands…enjoyed playing jacks and checkers with friends as a young girl. 

These hands used cap guns to ward off cowboys and Indians that were sometimes disguised as her brothers. 

These hands learned to sew with her Mom Mom during summer break growing up. 

These hands learned to apply make-up and pass notes in grade school with the best girlfriends. 

These hands have been covered in paint and paste and chocolate – all for good reasons and never at the same time. 

These hands clapped and wrote as a teen, cheerleading, writing, leading and moving her way through high school. 

These hands gave her a career as a typist and administrator in an office.  These hands were joined with his hands as they said “I do” 20 years ago. 

These hands then bathed babies, felt for fevers, changed diapers and soothed fears frequently in the middle of the night for three children. 

These hands have cooked and baked for family and friends and sometimes strangers, kneading and stirring love into everything that has left our kitchen. 

These hands still hold tightly when the kids allow, but more regularly, these hands are on a steering wheel moving these kids from here to there as they go about their activities and own young lives. 

These hands know the swipe of a debit card to provide for our family and the grasp of groceries from a store shelf. 

These hands have fingers that are short and often lead to crazy texts that bring laughter to the friends who read them, which means these hands are definitely an extension of the heart of the owner of them. 

These hands love the feel of a warm mug of cocoa or coffee or tea and thoroughly welcome the feel of fabric, yarn or thread through their fingers.

These hands seldom have fingernails that are painted, unless one considers stamping ink or other art mediums as ‘painted’. 

These hands are frequently calloused from writing and, more recently, from medication.  These hands enjoy snapping photographs, creating, scrapbooking and writing to document the fast-paced, but so enjoyable life.  

These hands get to hold a puppy in the middle of the night as part of a healing process. 

These hands lost their fingernails but clung tightly to her faith and God as she fought the tough fight against leukemia in the past year plus. 

These hands have seen tough days and good days, folded together in making steeples and prayer to survive [and enjoy] it all. 

These hands have held friends tightly in an embrace and have patted many on the shoulders or back for encouragement. 

These hands miss the feel of soil and long for the day they can garden again. 

These hands are excited to pick strawberries this season and even more excited to preserve vegetables and fruits to share in the coming months. 

These hands have played and guided and enjoyed life through young people and old, far and wide.  

These hands have folded and opened through many experiences and objects, but always, these hands are always open to new experiences and love in any shape, form or time. 

These hands are more weathered than she had noticed, with lines here and there, but these hands are well loved and well lived.

***Note from author:  After completing this first Five Minute Friday exercise, I have to say thank goodness I have done typing for a living...and thank goodness, my fingers can keep up with my brain.  It was a challenge to get so many thoughts down in five minutes, but I totally loved just spilling it all out quickly!