POEMS In a dark moment when I needed it most, two beautiful poems flooded like light into my world. One was from the Sufi mystic, Rumi. The other was... Bribing the Fireflies* I festooned the entrance of my life with ornaments of the warmest colors to lure you in. I slanted my front walk downward to pull you closer quicker. I paid off the crickets and fireflies to sing and dance in my courtyard.
The afternoon sun squeezed out the softest light on my face when we first met. The curvature of the earth warped for a moment to make me appear taller. The wind blew its sweetest spices of mint and musk your way when we spoke.
See, the universe just so happens to be my partner-in-crime. And I did a heavy favor for the gods in my last lifetime, which means I had a wish coming to me in this one.
No, I didn’t wish for you.
I asked the night’s sky for happiness.
And that’s about when you knocked on my front porch.
And that’s about when the moon fell from the sky and landed in both of our eyes.
I was reminded that I was Light and that I had the power to ask for happiness. So, I became more Light and I began to ask. *Ed Pilolla
Pain is a thing of the mind. The mind can be controlled. ~ Spock, "Operation --Annihilate" Stardate 3287.2
The first real memory of pain has me in the summer before the third grade. We (all of my siblings that existed at the time and all the cousins that live in town) are playing baseball in the mid-yard. My grandmother owned two houses. Actually, three. But there is a yard in the middle of two of the homes. They were modest abodes. I remember ours as the bright yellow one and I remember it matching my mother's car. The other house was white and black, I think. Anyway, I was playing barefoot. I think I was on second and one of my cousins hits a homer so I take off and, barely at third, feel this excruciating pain rip through my foot and into my leg. I start hopping around crazed and I hear someone scream, Kat's bleeding! I immediately start bawling because blood can only mean one thing. I'm going to die!
I hear my mom yell to my dad to go get me. We all know if she looks she's going to faint. She can't handle the sight of blood. As a child, she battled polio and there were plenty of hospitals, doctors and needles to last her a lifetime. In fact, after baring all her children, she has never sought medical attention again. She smokes (picking it back up after a 20 year hiatus), eats poorly and sleeps little but if you ask her how she is she will tell you, There's not a damn thing wrong with me! I believe her. Except for that blood phobia, which has my dad wrapping me up in his arms and her taking a towel, with eyes closed, and wrapping my right foot in it.
We have to drive quite a ways to the nearest hospital. My dad is flying. We're in a pick-up. We didn't own a pick-up and I've never once thought about that until now. Who's pick-up was that? K. That's gonna bug me. Anyway, my dad is flying though hills and valleys. It's a blast. The faster he goes the more like a rollercoaster it becomes. My stomach loves it. And by the time we make to the hospital, my mother has convinced me I was going to live.
Yeah. Right.
Enter Dr. Inebriated.
Actually, I'm not going to rehash that ER event. And it's much more enjoyable to hear my mother tell it. But let's just say that sewing was not his forte. Nor aiming for that matter. And in the days before melting stitches, a follow up is necessary to pull them out. That would happen a few weeks later.
Enter Dr. Shock.
He had no business using this kind of stitch on this wound!!! He calls it a 'mattress stitch' and he has to go in under my skin to remove it because the stitches were embedded so deeply. And boy does he. I keep thinking as he does, I'm going to die! It hurts so badly. So badly that we should probably thrown in an OMG here: OMG!!!
Turns out I stepped on a dog bone. A very sharp one. It cut deep into my foot leaving me with a lovely "J" scar or, if I turn my foot just so and stretch the skin a bit, a Nike swoosh. Oh, the irony. For the longest time it was the only scar on my body until I was given permission to shave my legs a few years later. Losing that battle, I ended up with the Star Trek insignia.