You own, WHAT?

You own nothing.  

Even those things which are in your possession now, do not belong to you.

Unless you created it yourself, even the most beloved object came to your life trough someone else and will pass out of your life no matter how tightly you attempt to cling.

Even the things you create will either be used up or given away, or pass from your grasp as your life changes.

 You came into this life with open hands, empty and welcoming to the joys and treasures which you will enjoy, use up and then let go so that it can carry your memory beyond you - like the memory of your great grandmother still clings to the apron she sweet or the platter she served Thanksgiving meals from.

 unfair though it may seem,



your nightgown may very well



have a longer life expectancy than your skin

 So shed the gown and let the skin revel in the warm breezes

 and the lover's caress

I am in love with April

I am rather in love with April this year.  The winter seemed colder and stormier and harsher.  I was awash in depressing greenness and almost feeling like I needed to punch and kick my way out of the weight of water laden clouds to get to some light.  Then the sun broke through and the flowers began to bloom, and even though most days are still rainy here

 I still find that the temperature has warmed enough that I am no longer having to huddle close to out wood stove with a jacket on.  Seriously there were weeks when the thermometer in my kitchen read 48 degrees and I wondered why I didn't unplug the fridge and just leave food on the counter.  This with cords of firewood going up the chimney constantly.

 Yesterday was warm enough that I got to get to the beach before work.  The tide was out and the tide pools were inviting and even with that grey sky, there was a warmth that caressed the face.

Each spring, a population of Aleutian geese returns.  They are smaller than Canadians, but very similar and had been endangered but have returned in strength.  I love to watch a flock of them rising in a swarm with the sun, to fly out to the grasslands to feed.  On the other hand, the dairy farmers hire young men on quads to patrol their fields and protect them from the ravenous geese.

Spring break has ended and we have 46 days left before my youngest graduates from high school.  Both my sons just got jobs at the local grocery store and life is taking on a more promising, hopeful feeling.

Hope you have a happy spring, if you are in the Northern hemisphere like me.  My friends down under tell me the days are getting colder.  I know the balance works that way, but it is strange to talk to someone who is in Fall mode as I surround myself with daffodils, rhododendrons and seeds.

Joy Comes With the Momentum of Habit

 When The New Year came, I told myself that I was going to focus on "Joy" as my word for 2012.  It hasn't been easy so far, because I am facing a lot of changes I don't want but have no choice over.  Kids growing up and moving out, parents growing old, debt piled up dealing with both.

But then I have made progress, and it is coming in baby steps.

I have been learning the truth of the fact that attitude is so important in shaping your life.  And every time I start bogging down in depression and a sense of being overwhelmed, I have turned the thoughts off by asking myself, "What is the happiest thing I know this moment?"

Often the answer to that is something simple and yet powerful to change the course of theta moment, and through on into the entire day.

Often the answer is the people in my life, my husband, my children, a friend whose offhanded compliment makes me grin for days.

and

often the answer is the places where I choose to see beauty.

I live in an incredibly beautiful area, but also one of poverty and problems

 So what I see, depends on what I choose to look for.

Beauty is always there, and seeing it refills the deep well of Joy that I am drawing into my life each choice I make.

It has created its own momentum.  I don't have to remind myself to look for the positive now.  When I wake up and my brain starts, "I hate . . ." even before it can add, "Mornings"

My momentum has turned it around in its tracks and started listing the abundant treasures that exist in my life.

It is also about habits and movement.  Last year, you might find me indulging in a hot bath in the middle of the day, then settling into my recliner with book and a plate of snacks  -  then feeling depressed because my house was cluttered and the jobs had not been done, and we had spent more than the income we brought in.

Deciding to be responsible for my own joy, meant I had to get up and get dressed, wash the dishes I was blessed to have dirtied with our abundant food. And look for ways to bring that peace and joy into my life.

Baby Steps, one pile decluttered, one step done in creating a resume, one day when I went out looking for beauty.  It adds up quickly into someone who is a better person, and happier, and joy slips in quietly and lifts my here in gratitude.

One Year after the Tsunami, we shared with Japan

 Most everyone knows that the Tsunami was major and that the impact of it upon Japan is inconceivable on so many levels.  Our Small, Northern California and Southern Oregon harbors had a bit more than sympathy pains for our Japanese brothers and sisters.

Starting between 7 and 8 AM, we began to experience our own Tsunami, and the waves cycled through the commercial boat harbor, destroying boats and docks and peoples incomes, but most devastatingly of all, Pulling two people into the sea, in Southern Oregon at Pistol River (They managed to get ashore) and destroying the life of one young man who was pulled out to sea in Northern California, but who's body was found long weeks later in Washington.

 His Father, Jon Weber, is hiking the route from where his son's body was found, to here where his son was pulled into the sea, that story in the Del Norte Triplicate at

http://www.triplicate.com/News/Local-News/Trek-makes-good-progress

There were several crabbing and fishing boats left shattered on the harbor floor, so this big crane was bright in to help raise the broken boats from the harbor.  

This is a picture I took of my TV screen when they were showing how the water from the harbor was being sucked out of the harbor and then came flooding back in in 10 minute cycles

My Aunt sent me this paper with our hometown on the front page news, from her home near Pittsburgh PA

Although surviving the Tsunami is not a free card other, this sailboat survived the big tsunami, only to lie broken on the rocks in the spring rains and flooding of January 2011

 This smaller crane was here just last month to help fix the channel markers which were broken and moved and have caused a headache for boats coming in and out ever sine

 This dredge loaded up barge after barge of the silt which had been deposited in the harbor and filled the boat basin during the tsunami

Crescent City won one of the $10, 000 prizes from Reader's Digest in the We Hear You America Contest to help with the rebuilding, but as the Curry Coastal Pilot said

"Visitors to Crescent City Harbor this week will find a port that is a shadow of its former self, the surviving boats in the fleet crowding around a handful of new docks. 

Emergency funds to repair and replace docks and other facilities have been hindered by state and federal bureaucracy. Crescent City’s port was one of three California ports to be damaged by the tsunami, while Brookings’ port was the only one in Oregon.

Still, the work completed so far is impressive: the removal of 61 pilings, the dredging of 83 barge-loads of silt deposited by the tsunami, and the repair of about 500 feet of protective rock slope, all at a cost of around $5.1 million. 

“It’s been kind of a remarkable year for what we have accomplished since the tsunami,” Young said. "

To see that whole story go to

http://www.currypilot.com/News/Breaking-News/Tsunami-one-year-later