Category: love

Gratuitous Noise Appreciation

Posted in loveTagged , , , , , , , , , 71 Comments

“The quieter you become, the more you can hear.” – Buddha

The other day I was driving to pick up four-year-old Mr. D from preschool with Cooper the puppy riding shotgun. Coop looked at me and then started making noise like he was a cat spitting up a furball. “Khak, khak,” and then came a terrifying pause after which he let out a huge belch, “Gluuuuuuck” followed by a little cough.

Whew! Of course I told Mr. D about it as soon as he got into the car and he made me imitate the sounds for the next five minutes. It made me laugh and think about Click and Clack, the Magliozzi brothers. Remember their show, Car Talk? And they laughed with such glee as they had people describe what noises their cars were making.

And then writing noises down – isn’t that even more fun?

Like my vacuum who frequently chokes on all the puppy hair and traces of mud. It starts wheezing, “runk, runk, runk” til I clean out the filter.

Or the sound of eight-year-old Miss O practicing her hoverboard. “Wheeeee, ooohh.” Then “Clunk” and “ooof” combined as she stops herself against the wall.

As much as I love (and sometimes am overwhelmed by) the sounds coming from my little family, I usually sit in complete silence after my kids have gone to bed. But the other night, there was a rhythmic, and a little creepy, bomp, bomp bomp coming from the dining room. Upon further investigation, it was a balloon from the day bouncing on an air vent.

Early in the morning when I take the dog for a walk, I’m used to the steady patter of January rain. But the other day, it sounded peculiar. It was a “splonk” and “squitz” so I left my hood off to figure it out. It wasn’t actually raining at the moment, so the noise was the houses, trees, bushes, and wires pooling and then shaking off the recent precipitation in fat bursts.

I immediately start smiling when I hear the epic sound tracks for movies like Indiana Jones, Star Wars, and Out of Africa. But I love the sound track of my life.

Khak, khak, gluuuuck

Runk, runk, runk

Wheee, ooohh, clunk & ooof

Bomp, bomp, bomp

Splonk, squitz

What does your life sound like these days?

Style and Grace

Posted in loveTagged , , , 61 Comments

“She wasn’t doing anything I could see, except standing there leaning on the balcony railing, holding the universe together.” – J.D. Salinger

When I was 17-years-old and a senior in high school, I lived for a year with my best friend, Katie’s family. My dad had taken a job at a church across the state and they gave me the option to stay and finish high school.

Which all hinged on a family being willing to let another teenager live with them. Fortunately, Katie’s parents, Jim and Connie were willing to take me in.

I was 17 and typically self-absorbed. I didn’t think much about it at the time, but it was my first glimpse into how other families operated. Looking back now, I giggle at all the misconceptions that my teenage brain put together.

For instance, Jim and Connie were originally from North Carolina. So, I assumed that was the source of Connie’s grace and style.

She never got flustered by the trials and tribulations of life. She was poised and prepared for just about anything.

She graciously had little gifts for Katie and me for every holiday. Like for Valentine’s Day, she gave me a wire basket filled with goodies and two pairs of socks, red and white.

The holiday she exceled at was April Fools Day. Connie was wickedly good at April Fools tricks. She’d rubber band the kitchen sink sprayer so you’d get soaked. She’d split apart Oreos and insert some plastic wrap. If you don’t think of April Fools as a holiday, it’s because you never lived with Connie.

Connie was such a good listener and was genuinely interested in what others had to say.

She never said a bad word about anyone, even the next door neighbors that could be somewhat challenging.

She taught me, to the degree I was teachable, about being a lady. Our dates had to come to the door to talk to the parents. We had to wait in our rooms for at least a minute before bursting out and running off.

She made the best chicken, cream potatoes and cole slaw.

Now that I’ve got a lot more life under the belt, I understand that none of the above, with the exception of the cooking, came from North Carolina. They came from pure love. A strong, selfless, caring, gracious woman who loved family and others, and exceled at living life.

All the way until she died this past weekend. But the legacy of her grace and love continues in the beautiful and incredible family she created with her presence. RIP, dear Connie. You knew how to do life well and will be missed.

(featured photo from Pexels)

(quote from Victoria Ponders – Holding the Universe Together)

5 Things I Wish For You Today

Posted in loveTagged , , , 51 Comments

“Peace is not something you wish for; It’s something you make, Something you do , Something you are, And something you give away.” – John Lennon

1. A moment where your heart touches the heart of another.

2. At least one belly laugh that, in the best case, makes it so you can’t breathe for a split second.

3. The calm feeling that you are okay right here and right now.

4. Something unexpected that creates a ripple of knowing that magic exists.

5. An experience where you notice the sun on your skin, the rain on your face, or the wind at your back.

I wrote this as a list of what I wished for my eight-year-old and four-year-old kids on Christmas day. Then I realized that it was what I wanted for myself on Christmas day. Finally, it dawned on me that this is a an everyone on every day kind of list.

(featured photo from Pexels)

One Less Thing To Worry About

Posted in loveTagged , , , , 54 Comments

“Learning without reflection is a waste. Reflection without learning is dangerous.” – Confucius

I don’t think of myself as a very controlling person. Every once in a while, my mind wakes me up in the middle of the night to laugh at that statement.

This weekend my kids spent the night at my brother and sister-in-law’s. I like to chalk the anxiety I experienced in advance of that to the fact that they live on a boat and four-year-old Mr. D doesn’t yet know how to swim.

But is it that really?

Then I came across this quote and felt it fit like a glove:

“Every person needs to take one day away.  A day in which one consciously separates the past from the future.  Jobs, family, employers, and friends can exist one day without any one of us, and if our egos permit us to confess, they could exist eternally in our absence.  Each person deserves a day away in which no problems are confronted, no solutions searched for.  Each of us needs to withdraw from the cares which will not withdraw from us.”

Maya Angelou

Raising my kids is the single most important thing I do. I want to live long enough to see them happily reach adulthood. Fortunately, there is no indication of anything health wise that will cut that short. If all goes well, I’ll be 68 years old when Mr. D graduates from high school and so far I’m managing the creaking joints and other travails that come with age.

But taking a day away from my kids reminded me that they can survive without me. I hope that isn’t ever the case.  But my mind can rest at ease because I’ve been reminded they are surrounded by others who love them and care for them as well.

Talk, Talk, Talk

Posted in loveTagged , , , , , 36 Comments

“We spend the first year of a child’s life teaching it to walk and talk and the rest of its life to shut up and sit down. There’s something wrong here.” – Neil deGrasse Tyson

My daughter, Miss O, learned the power of words early on. She started talking at 10 months and it’s been off to the races ever since. Now she’s eight-years-old, and I’ve learned to get worried when she isn’t talking.

One Sunday when it was just the two of us and Miss O was about three-years-old, I was feeling overwhelmed by the constant talking, singing, and narrating. We were sitting and drawing at the dining room table as the last rays of fall afternoon sunshine filtered into the room. I said to Miss O, “Do you think we could just be quiet for 10 minutes?”

Miss O paused for a moment and then said, “Why?”

About a year later, a friend was at our house trying to troubleshoot a problem with his van. Four-year-old Miss O asked him what was happening and he started, “When hot air meets a cold surface and water forms…” She interrupted him and asked, “You mean condensation?”

I confess, I don’t always listen to her every word. But I recently had the honor of editing a podcast that Miss O did with Vicki and me. As I tuned in with ears to make sure the conversation flowed, I was stunned with the perspective of this delightful young person talking with the incredibly interesting and supportive Vicki Atkinson.

Am I biased? No doubt! But most of all what I noticed is that Miss O has learned to use her words well. And she’s found her voice – to express herself, to give voice to her feelings, to convey her delightful enthusiasm, and at the end, to share her delightful glow with everyone around.

Ha – I just realized this post could have been reduced to one sentence. Miss O is on the Sharing the Heart of the Matter podcast with the always amazing Dr. Vicki Atkinson and me – please listen. Perhaps wordiness runs in the family….

Perfect Moment

Posted in loveTagged , , , 40 Comments

“We love what we attend.” – Mwalimu Imaru

The other day something touched me at a deep level. I’ve been trying to peel back why ever since.

I’d picked four-year-old Mr. D up from preschool and he’d scrambled in the car and closed the door. I’d stopped to talk to a man walking his dog, and so it was a minute or two before I got around to my side of the car and realized Mr. D was crying. He’d tried to do his own seat belt and had gotten frustrated when the thing wouldn’t click. Then he got more frustrated when the belt got tangled as he tried to fix it.

When I opened his door to help, he reached up and with the back of both hands, swiped away the hot, frustrated tears from his eyes.

Something about that gesture just hit me deep down where it counts. I’m not sure I can even put it into words why. To the best of my translation, it’s some combination of the following:

Witnessing the dignity of another person

Gratitude that my kids’ problems are small at this age and I can mostly fix them

Realization of Mr. D’s sudden self-consciousness about crying

Commiseration with how frustrating technology and systems can be

Relating to how fiercely we want to do things for ourselves

The deep gut punch of how much I love my kids.

Whatever it was, it started to change how I think of perfect moments. They may have nothing to do with when we’re smiling and posing for a picture or spending a gazillion dollars on an experience.

I think perfect moments might be when the inside of me meets the inside of another, and in the process learns something real about being human.

With Me Everywhere

Posted in loveTagged , , , , , 55 Comments

“There is no where you could go that I won’t be with you.” – Moana

In a tradition suggested by a Jewish friend, I burn a Yahrzeit candle every year on the anniversary of my dad’s death. The ritual, as I understand it, is supposed to celebrate our loved ones and bring them close as the candle burns for 24 hours.

I’ve had to modify the tradition slightly since I’ve had kids since Mr. D in particular is fond of blowing out candles. So I light the candle and then hide it around the house until the kids leave. [“Sorry if the candle brings you to the laundry room, Dad.”]

With or without the candle ritual, my dad seems to be especially close at this time of year. The anniversary of his death is November 7th. On November 6th of last year, I received an incredible email from my soon to be dear friend, the amazing, talented, and incredibly wise Vicki Atkinson, with notes from a wonderfully deep read of my book about my dad, Finding My Father’s Faith.

The conversation then went on to be the beginning of our close friendship, even though we’ve never met in person, as well as our partnership in creating the Sharing the Heart of the Matter blog and podcast. But it started with my dad. And Vicki’s incredibly open heart, of course.

And then on November 4th of this year, I got a delightful email from another wonderful blogging friend, Jane Fritz of the Robby Robin’s Journey blog with some great humor. In our email exchange, Jane said, “They made me think of your father, and I never even knew him!”

Two things that strike me about this. [I’d like to make it three because my dad loved having three points in his sermons but I’ll just leave it at two for now.]  

The power of writing is amazing. In these examples provided by Vicki and Jane, they have a sense of my dad because I write about him so often. Putting words around the people we love creates connection to know us and them. Writing about my dad has not only helped me to clarify and cement what I learned from him, but it has also allowed others to meet him, even after his death.

Which is my segue to the next point – death isn’t as final as it seems. Of course I don’t know what happens when our loved ones are beyond the veil, but I can feel times when they are tantalizingly close. I’ll forget it’s the anniversary of my beloved dog Biscuit’s death until I see the golden patch of sunlight on his favorite place to lie that oddly shows up on January 13th, even though sunshine that time of year is not a given.

Or the touch of my dad in these emails from others, bringing him close and making me comprehend that there is no where that I can go that he won’t be with me.

For a post about a way that I found to move through my grief, please see Gratitude versus Greed on the Sharing the Heart of the Matter blog.

All The Secrets

Posted in loveTagged , , , , 41 Comments

“Take chances, make mistakes. That’s how you grow. Pain nourishes your courage. You have to fail in order to practice being brave.” – Mary Tyler Moore

The other day my kids and I were out walking in the neighborhood and ran into two brothers, 11-years-old and 9-years-old, from the English family that has moved in up the street. The older brother did a card trick for Miss O. I wasn’t paying attention to all of it, but there was audience involvement, and even some spelling and counting going on.

When the older brother finished and revealed the chosen card – the right one – the younger brother exclaimed quite proudly in his delightful British accent, “It works nearly every time.”

Which made me laugh. The way he said it so charmingly uncovered that a lot of practice has gone into this particular trick.

And it reminded me that often family members know our secrets and weak points. Hopefully, especially when they are working well, within the context of great love and acceptance.

Speaking of family, I spoke with Vicki on this week’s Sharing the Heart of the Matter podcast about how I started my family as a single person. We talk about invitro fertilization, the fears I needed to overcome, the lessons I apply from my dad, and the seven quotes that have helped me change my script from fear to love. Please listen and subscribe on Amazon Music, Apple, Spotify or Pocketcasts to Sharing the Heart of the Matter podcast or find it here on WordPress: Episode 40: The Power of Choice with Wynne Leon

(quote comes from the MSW Blog: Being Brave)

Forced Flexibility

Posted in loveTagged , , , 43 Comments

“Blessed are the flexible, for they shall not be bent out of shape.” – unknown

I had to get rid of a settee from my bedroom. It was a holdover from my marriage, beautiful but useless. It sat in the corner holding books. But my kids have been arguing at night when we read together about who gets to sit where so I put the settee on the curb with a free sign. It was gone within hours and then I was free to build out a reading space on the floor.

That’s not the only change going on around here. I’ve been shuffling up my morning routine and have landed on feeding and walking the dog before I meditate. It isn’t really how I envisioned my feet hitting the floor. But it works well enough to create the calm I need for my sacred morning time.

I’ve been thinking about these as examples of how I’m being flexible for the beings in my home. But I suspect that I’m the biggest beneficiary of this practice. Left to my own devices, I would do the same routine every day in perpetuity.

But that sameness doesn’t loosen me up so I stiffen over time. It reminds me of the aphorism, “what doesn’t bend, breaks.” I’d like to think I’d bob and weave if I wasn’t being “flexible for the kids” but I’m not so sure.

It’s all part of their plan to keep me young. It’s like yoga for my soul – these exercises that keep my innards loose enough to go with the flow. I get a lot of practice being a tree that will sway with the wind instead of a stick dropped in the mud.

I write this to encourage myself to be flexible. Because I don’t like it much at all. I’m stubborn and dogged by nature and that has taken me far in pushing through to mountain summits and every other metaphorical summit. Yet I see the goodness practicing this acceptance and letting go of what is. It frees me up to create and be the next thing.

(featured photo from Pexels)

The Dog Ate My Homework

Posted in loveTagged , , , 66 Comments

“Your beliefs become your thoughts. Your thoughts become your words. Your words become your actions. Your actions become your habits. Your habits become your values. Your values become your destiny.” – Mahatma Gandhi

The other night our puppy ate Miss O’s homework. Such a cliché but truly, it happened. It was something she’d brought home finished, so it wasn’t like she had to turn it in. But when she saw the remnants of the paper in Cooper’s dog bed, this homework became the best thing she’d ever done.

Miss O was so angry. I’m not sure I’ve ever seen my generally happy kid this angry. She wanted to hit and kick the dog. Someone had to pay for ruining her beautiful work product.

Had it been the beginning of the day, I’m not sure she would have lost it to the degree that she did. But it was the end of the day, and tolerance was down across the family.

So, I stopped her from beating the dog and felt a huge surge of anger in myself as well. Something along the lines of, “How dare you want to hit the dog for ruining things without understanding how many things of mine YOU have destroyed! And do I hit you for that? NO!!!”

Three things strike me about this.

  1. How transferrable anger is
  2. That life is defined by these moments, not just the ones where we are all happy
  3. How much energy it takes to transmute anger into something expressed but not acted upon

Scenes like this make me think about psychologist and author, Jonathan Haidt’s, metaphor of the elephant and the rider. We think our minds are in control but as the rider atop the elephant of our feelings, it’s just an illusion. Or, in this case, it takes a lot of effort for the rider to turn the elephant away from rampaging down a path.

I’ve wondered why we are designed like this but as I see this play out close up with my family, I’m struck by the possibility that how we traverse the gulf between emotion and action is in part driven by our values. We start the groove the reactions and they become at least slightly easier.

That is to say, as we train the dog, we train ourselves.

When we’d all calmed down, I told Miss O that beating a dog doesn’t make it so that it won’t eat your homework, it just makes it a mean or fearful creature. And I suspect that it makes us a little meaner or more fearful when we do the same. So, we lost a piece of homework but learned a little bit of a lesson. Probably a fair trade.

There’s no doubt that I got my values from my parents. For more on my discovery about my dad’s source of the always present glint in his eye, I’ve written a book, Finding My Father’s Faith. For a bit about the courage I learned from my dad, please see my post on Heart of the Matter: The Courage to Not Be Divisive

(featured photo is a photo of Miss O and Cooper in a calmer moment)