Tag Archives: friendship

The Hana Chronicles: Month 8, Day 10

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Posted by on in children, collaborating, Community, Family, Historical, Inspiration, Personal Values, Social, Striving, Travel

August 31, 2026- Hana knows that her Papa is hurting a bit right now. My best friend in Prescott is dealing with a life-threatening disease. The person who did the work of ten people is now sidelined. It is a gut punch for me. I can only imagine what it must be like for her children and grandchildren.

My granddaughter has been trying to make me feel better, even as she has no knowledge of suffering, let alone the likelihood of death. I want to keep it that way, for as long as possible. So, we went on our stroller walk, this morning and I did a solo jaunt this evening, after dinner. Hana talked to me during our morning walk, looking happily at the trees and rocks around Russell Creek, and the solid bridge that pases over it.

That brings me to the other shockers- The flash floods that ravaged opposite parts of the world. Nepal and Tibet have been devastated by glacial breakage that led to multiple villages, on both sides of the border, being wiped off the face of the Earth. Thousands have been killed. There is likely more to come. At the bottom of the Grand Canyon, every bridge that crossed Bright Angel Creek was swept away by a torrent. 2 are dead and 15 people remain missing, Two tragedies, one almost unfathomable and one painfully symbolic.

HANA’S NOTE- I don’t know what dying means,but Papa looked sad when he talked with Daddy about his friend. I don’t want Papa to be sad.

YEAR IN REMEMBRANCE-2014 I wasn’t completely ready to travel overseas, but I went anyway. I promised my ailing father-in-law that I would travel to Normandy, for the 70th anniversary of D-Day and I did. He passed away, three weeks before that, and I did a boomerang journey to attend his funeral in New Jersey, return to Prescott for two weeks then go back to Newark, to catch a plane to Frankfurt-by way of Montreal and Ottawa. Four days in Paris preceded the D-Day events. I took in the Louvre, Versailles and Trocadero. I fended off some Roma “goldsmiths” and twice as many trinket vendors, most of them recent arrivals from French-speaking parts of Africa. A visit to Rouen brought me to the ruins of a church, where my ancestors had been baptized-right next to the spot where Joan of Arc had been burned at the stake. I spent some time in the dungeon where she had been held. Then came D-Day observances, of which I took in the daytime events and passed on a late night recreation of the landing.

Rennes, Mont St.Michel, Amiens, Lille, Bruges, Ghent, Brussels, Bastogne, Luxembourg and Frankfurt followed. Lastly, came Berga, where my father-in-law had been held as a prisoner-of-war, for the last six months of World War Ii. He was a Jew, and yet made it out alive, with American troops coming into the camp, right after the German troops had left. The area around the camp had a harrowing ambiance, still. Berga town, and nearby Jera, had the air of cities in recovery, having been part of the former East Germany, until 1989.

In October, I flew to Honolulu and met Aram and his ship, then took my place on what was billed a “Tiger Cruise”. Family members of crew joined the return to San Diego. I spent most of the time with Aram at his station and enjoyed the peacefulness of the open ocean. Whales and dolphins appeared alongside the ship, a few times.

I still had a way to go, in reaching stability, but I held my own on these long journeys. I also sold the house in Prescott, on behalf of my mother-in-law, sent her the proceeds, and moved into a one-bedroom apartment. The year ahead would be even more restorative.

Ruling Myself

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Posted by on in Assistance, collaborating, Community, distraction issues, Family, impediments, Inner Struggles, Matters of Faith, Personal Values, Service Activities, Spiritual, Striving

April 20,2021- Today was essentially a good day-for my own self-control, in accepting the reality of a friendship’s nature. It was a good day for widening the scope of justice in our struggling nation. It was a good day for the Baha’i community, as we observed the First Day of Ridvan, the twelve-day period that celebrates Baha’u’llah’s declaration of His mission.

It was also a challenging day, in which someone on the edges of my circle told me, very bluntly, that he regarded himself and his children as my personal responsibility. To some extent, I have my own efforts to help him contact aid agencies to blame. I also recognize that he is an orphan, and as such cannot help but latch onto anyone who shows him kindness-demanding more and more, until the cord ends up being cut. I am playing out my endgame here, with a GoFundMe campaign and a continuing effort to match him with financial entities that are far better equipped to help, than is any lone individual.

I have waited a long time to be the ‘captain of my soul”. My actions will remain rooted in service to humanity-but NOT to anyone who barges into my space and expects fealty. I am involved in a far more global long game. Perhaps this is just another case of my holding someone, who wants to get close to me, at arm’s length-as another such individual told me, just before I blocked and deleted her from my life, nearly three years ago. More likely, I am figuring out how to handle someone who MAY be a grifter (most people who hound others for money ARE grifters). More likely, I am standing up and saying that my primary duty is to the Lord God; that my secondary duty is to my (biological) family and not to any interloper, no matter how many years he/she has been seeking my help.

As I said, today was a mixed bag-and this month, or next, may well end with some very emotional volleys being made.

Are You Aboard?

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Posted by on in Community, Poetry, Striving

April 2, 2018, Prescott-

We are entering a Spring,

when our institutions

seem ready to let us down,

big time.

Are you aboard the train

of friendship?

Are you riding in the car

of community?

We, the people

stand a chance

of surviving anything

the powers that be

throw at us,

if we ride together,

if we stand together.

Are you aboard?

A Thing Called Love — Mental Stimulation

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Posted by on in Inner Struggles, Personal Values, Social, Striving

“Love is friendship that has caught fire. It is quiet understanding, mutual confidence, sharing and forgiving. It is loyalty through good and bad times. It settles for less than perfection and makes allowances for human weaknesses.”- Ann Landers Love is something that everyone experience at least once in their life. It is a feeling that […]

via A Thing Called Love — Mental Stimulation

ME:  This is a repost.  I see a lot of people tossing around the greeting “my  love”, and not meaning it in the least.  I take my friendships and feelings towards others, very seriously, very deeply.  Think about this, people.  Who are you helping, or hurting?

It Wasn’t the Women’s Fault

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Posted by on in Social

“There’s a killer on the road.  His brain is squirming like a toad.”- Ray Manzarek, “Riders On The Storm”

I love women; always have.  Even when they were girls, I thought they were beautiful.  My Mother was my first best friend, and I tried to be hers.  My relationships with girls and women ever since have been friendships first, and, in about five or six cases, they were more than that.  The friendship, then and now, is the, most important element.  It is what held my marriage together, even when I was making a mess of my life, in the late 1990’s and early 2000’s, and it was what gave Penny some semblance of quality of life, in her declining years, later in that merciless decade and in the first fourteen months of this one.

I’ve had friends of both genders, and of all ages, before and since.  Beautiful women are among my best friends now.  There is no romance, to cloud the vision, and when a few of my women friends have started seriously dating, I am among the first to cheer them on. It’s a happiness thing, a means of some fulfillment.  More important to me are their dreams, their goals.  Don’t get me wrong.  If someone special comes into my life again, it’ll be just fine.  This is not a priority right now; that’s all.

It was therefore with profound shock that I read and viewed news reports of the carnage in the Isla Vista area of Santa Barbara, on Saturday.  The deranged assailant/killer blamed rejection by women- in a pseudonarcissistic rant, which fooled no one. Santa Barbara was, and is, one of my favourite places in California.  I was last there in 1997, but keep abreast of  more seemly events there, through an online friend who has ties to the area.  It is, like many places in our modern society, a fast-paced and sometimes anonymous community.  When making connections, one must be patient with those around you.

I am somewhat of an outlier, myself.  I do not blame anyone else for that.  I live comfortably, I make friends more easily than I used to.  In my youth, I did not have women throwing themselves at me.  I was considered “an individual” by those of the elite who were thoughtful.  I was seen as a bit weird, by the rest.  That was never something for which I cast blame on others.  We all rail at our plights, now and then, and I did, just before meeting Penny.  Figuring that it was the way I was going about meeting people that was the problem, helped me right my social sailboat.

So, buying expensive clothing and driving a BMW didn’t work for Elliot Rodger.  Is anyone surprised by this?  If anything, it confirms what one of my beautiful friends from the early 1970’s had to say- “No personality, no date.”- Lisa was gorgeous, but never shallow.  Apparently, neither were the three young victims in Isla Vista.  My condolences to the families of the dead.  My entreaties to the Elliots who are still out there:  It is not the woman’s fault if she doesn’t find you attractive.  Each of us has a personality, and the tools for determining whether chemistry exists between us and others.  No personality match, no relationship.