Happy Valentine's Day!

Happy Valentine's Day

To all my dear friends

Peace and love to you all.

xxxoooxxxx

Merely Me

Passion Poems

It is time to kindle the fire....

Too much busy-ness. Too much logic. Too much serious contemplation.

Bring in passion.

It will be valentine's day in but a couple of days....and I have not forgotten our little love fest. So get comfy, rest your weary head, and invite the sirens of passion to carry you to another realm.

Here are some passion poems for your pleasure.

This first poem was written in the 9th century by Ono no Komachi

"I long for him most
during those long moonless nights.
I lie awake, hot
the growing fires of passion
bursting, blazing in my heart."

I really love this one as well...

This was written by Izumi Shikibu during the same time period:

" My black hair tangled
as my own tangled thoughts
I lie here alone,
dreaming of one who has gone,
who stroked my hair till it shone."

This one is by Ikky Sojun

"At midnight, your face in a dream brings a sigh.
Ch'us love pavilion was long ago and far away.
But like a blossom on the flowering plum,
sweet narcissus blooms between your thighs."

Oh yes...i do so like that imagery...sweet narcissus.

Just one more for now...

This one is by Kabir

"Sometimes, everywhere I look,
O my love, I see your radiant face.
With you ever present,
how could I close my eyes to anything?"

I wonder if I love that one the best. So simple yet full of life. Love is like that isn't it?...an opening to the world. All at once the heart opens to sparkling clarity. Colors are more vibrant and true. The world is a ripe and succulent peach tinged with morning rain sweetness.

And for best romantic movies of all time...

the award goes to....

What do you feel are the best (five) romantic/love movies of all time?

I need to think more on my list but off the top of my head would be....The English Patient and Wuthering Heights.

More thoughts on the Lip Lock

In tune with our Love Fest I thought it would be fun to continue our discussion of the topic of kissing.

Remember when you were a teen-ager and you could kiss for hours?

Where's the chap stick?

In my memories I found...that the best part of kissing are those moments right before the kiss. You know it is coming but you don't know exactly when. There are the lingering soulful looks and the other person's pupils become enlarged and you want to fall right in. Everything slows down....you can feel your own breath...and you wonder...gee...hope my breath doesn't stink! LOL! Okay where was I? Right...feeling your own breath...feeling your own heartbeat...you gasp a little breath....as there is this movement closer.

Hold it...hold it right there. Freeze that moment. You stand poised and ready...everything tingling...electricity so great it could set things on fire....it is unbearable...the tension...but you are not quite touching yet.

There is crossing...a boundary....an invisible line...where you know if you cross it...there is no going back. You have held this kiss in fantasy...but this moment is the real thing. You know it is coming...and you also realize that once you experience it...you can't ever have it again because it is the first time. It is like falling into water...gravity pulls you towards....that impact.

At that exact moment the world falls away...there is only here and now and the feeling that you must move forward and cross that line. You slowly inch forward by fractions of an inch. It is quite tortorous but wonderful at the same time. And just when you can't stand it any longer...it happens...close the eyes and melt away....feeling the power of that first touch of lips against lips...warmth envelopes you and you savor it... holding on as long as you can until you have to breathe again.

A little gasp exits your lips as you slowly....break away.

Was it good for you too? :>)

Life is like a box of chocolates...

so which one do you like the best?



I don't know about you but I looooooooove chocolate. Can't ever have too much chocolate. People who know me well know that you just can't go wrong giving me a Whitman's Sampler box of chocolates.

Mmmm.....I am salivating already.

So when you open your box of chocolates what do you usually go for first?

1. The Chocolate covered cherry

2. The cream filled

3. Chocolate covered nuts

4. Chocolate covered caramels

















5. Or something out of the box as in hershey's kisses!

The First Kiss

Do you remember your first kiss? I do and I will tell you all about it. But first do go on tell us your story. It is time to put away depression...pack it away...stick it in the basement or attic and let's continue our celebration of LOVE.

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My first kiss

I was ten. And he had red hair.

I was living in the inner city in a row house. Down the street was a home for children. I am not sure if the children were orphans or wayward or what. But the red haired boy lived there in that big house with the huge porch. And he liked me.
I rode my bike a lot. My bike had one of those banana seats and a basket...white with a daisy on the front. I rode it everywhere within the parameters of my neighborhood. It was pure freedom...flying down the hills or even the concrete stairs of the nearby high school. I would stay out until the street lights came on. This was the sign to come home again. But until dusk I could go where I pleased.

And it pleased me to pass by the red haired boy's house.

He waved at me one day and the next day too. On the third day he got out his bike and trailed along with me. It was glorious...the wind and the red haired boy behind me. We traversed the hills and sidewalks of our neighborhood together. It was exhilarating.

We would sit on the curb across from Vern's, the corner store. I would make chains out of gum wrappers. We would sit and talk. And then it happened.

The kiss.

I wish I could recall the kiss with any clarity, but the memory is too clouded over by what happened next. I was so excited. That evening I rushed home to the buzz of the street lights coming on and exclaimed for all to hear, "I have a boyfriend! And he kissed me!" My older half- sister who was visiting my mother and me from college, wanted to know all the juicy details. I told her everything and being the older sister, she thought it was very cute.

But this first kiss wasn’t “cute” to me. Why it was love!

I remember feeling like floating. It was a feeling I had never experienced before. I could not wait to see him again.

The next day I went out on my bike, flushed and hopeful. It was then that I saw a glimpse of him sitting on the street corner. As I rounded the bend I saw something else. Someone else. A girl. Sitting with him. They were laughing. I rode slowly by as my heart sank. I waved but he didn't see me. His eyes were riveted on his new friend. They moved closer together and…I quickly looked away, almost driving my bike into a pole. I couldn’t bear to watch.

And just like that it was over. I had been so easily replaced.

I rode away...far away from that corner. I found a new curb to sit on. Alone. With my face cupped in my hands I wondered how the same boy could make me feel so special and so unspecial all within the span of less than a week.

Within a couple of days I had experienced both my first kiss as well as my first heartbreak. My first lesson: Love and loss sometimes go hand in hand. Oh and never kiss little red haired boys with wandering lips.

Loving Yo'self: Part One

In our quest for LOVE sometimes the person most overlooked is ourselves. I am going to be talking about self-love here in a multi-layered way. There is a lot to cover so let's begin.

The first element of self-love I wish to discuss is taking care of ourselves emotionally.

How can we show love for our emotional selves?

For those of us who have mood disorders, this is a big deal. For me there exists a bad feedback loop when I get caught up in depression. The depression itself causes you to not take care of yourself and to resign yourself to doing things which are not so mentally healthy. And these actions or sometimes lack of actions for doing mentally healthy things...causes the depression to linger even more.

So what sorts of things can one do to promote good mental health for themselves?

I can tell you the things I do or try to do and I would LOVE to see your lists as well.

Remember that your mental health is key to doing virtually anything else. All those goals and New Year's resolutions you have made won't mean diddly squat if you don't have any emotional energy to spare to begin working on them. And if you have health problems, being in a bad way emotionally is only going to hinder your feeling good physically or doing things to help your physical health.

So I believe the most important way to love yourself is to protect your mental health.

Here is my list for ways I wish to attempt to do just that.

1. There is only so much time and energy in the world. Spend your time with people who give you energy and don't drain you. And I realize this is sometimes not possible. Family members, bosses, co-workers, friends....can be totally demanding and impossible. But you gotta balance that out with being with folk who do sustain you.

I know from my life...I had spent so much time trying to please toxic people (those who drain you emotionally) as well as hours in costly therapy which I could have spent meeting new friends or being with people who I really want to be with!

Sometimes you gotta be with folk who are negative or potentially emotionally draining but we don't need to fork over our lives to them. Minimize these people in terms of what we give of our priceless energy.

2. Again...there is only so much time and energy...so pursue activities which give you joy and meaning. You are not superwoman or superman. A life well lived is not some super busy life filled with endless activities and chores to fill up time. What do you really want to devote time to doing? Start with five minutes and work upwards.

3. Be okay with empty space. It is always my tendency to fill up the void with stuff...actitivities...pursuits which...aren't always mentally healthy for me! We see empty space or time and our first instinct is to fill it up. It is okay to just chill. It is okay to have bare space in the closet. It is okay to not have constant feedback. It is okay to not have a plan for the day. Relax and enjoy the empty spaces.

4. Look at your life in a different way. Look for the meaning...the purpose as sometimes this is the only thing which will sustain you. I call it "the path" for me. I don't even know exactly what it means yet but I feel it. I feel that I am being led or called to give certain gifts. And it won't be easy. But this is what it is about really. You have this body...these gifts and talents...this mind....this spirit...this life full of experiences...so give it...share it. Even if you are not finding anything worthy in your life right now...someone else will. So put it out there and that act of sharing will help you see things in a different light.

5. Be simple. You don't need a bunch of stuff...money...attention....friends...achievements...to feel good. Let all the extra stuff go. Clean our your closets....physically and emotionally. Weed out the clutter of unhealthy relationships, stuff, activities, goals. Get rid of it. Be able to let go. Go bare bones. And then add things you really DO want.

I sound like a damn pop psychology book today. LOL I don't mean to. Just trying to process all this stuff for myself. It really does help for me to write these lists...put the thoughts to paper...commit to the idea of change...slow but sure.

This is just the tip of the iceberg...got lots more ideas to share.

Okay so what is on your list? What things, ideas, philosophies help you to be more mentally healthy?

Things we love...

Still going strong on the LOVE theme here and I think it is time for a little list. I am gonna make a list of ten things I love and you tell me if you love, like, hate, or are neutral about my items of choice.

Bonus points to those who share their list of things they love.

1. Bach and his music...love, hate, neutral?




















2. The color red...love, hate, neutral?




















3. Zingers! Love 'em...hate 'em....don't know what they are?


















4. Walt Disney World. Love, hate, neutral?




5. Penguins! Love? Hate? Like? Don't care?















6. Hillary Clinton...love her? Loathe her? Will tolerate her?














7. Karaoke...love? hate? indifferent?














8. The Reuben Sandwich...love, hate...never had one? Indifferent?











9. Godzilla! Love? Hate? Too young to know about Godzilla?








10. Cats! Love them? Dislike them? Allergic to them? Indifferent?

My First Love

Do you remember your first love? I do. We are talking about love here on my blog and I thought we could start with our stories about loving our four legged friends. And here is my contribution for you...my dear readers.

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Most people, if you ask them, will remember their first love. I remember mine very clearly. In order to show you these images which are now decades old, we will have to go back in time.

We are going in my time machine to the mid 1970’s to my childhood. My mother and I are living on "Success Street" in a row house among all the other row houses. We are poor like all the other poor folk who live on Success Street. I am ten years old and sitting by the stereo we had, an RCA stereo with record player and 8 track player. My mother is playing a record. She had quite a collection including Dean Martin, Patsy Kline, and The Carpenters. She also liked trumpet players because my deceased father had played the trumpet. My mother had records like Herb Allpert and the Tijuana Brass Band with the infamous Baby Elephant Walk. My mother liked to do a trumpet impression with just her hands and mouth. We spent a lot of time listening to music, dancing, singing, and making trumpets out of our hands. We did have a grand time of it. We couldn't afford to go to restaurants or movies so we take it upon ourselves to amuse and entertain ourselves the best way we knew how.

I was starting to develop my own tastes in music. I remember watching the show, Sonny and Cher, back then. I wanted to be just like Cher. I didn't want my blonde hair anymore. I wanted long shiny black hair like Cher. The very first record album I bought with my own money was by Sonny and Cher. My favorite song was the song they sang during the opening of their show, “I Got You Babe.” I would play that record over and over, sitting there in front of my stereo, shaping my hands like a microphone. I would try to swing my hair around like Cher did for stage presence. And whenever I would play my music and sing, my first love was there with me.

My first love was of the four footed furry species. My father had gotten Princie for me shortly before my fourth birthday, after which my father passed away.

Princie was a mutt, a blend of German Shepard and Collie. He looked every bit the part of a scrawny mongrel but I didn’t care. He was mine and I loved him.
Princie would lie there on the floor next to me and seemed to more than tolerate my Cher impersonations. I would pet his coarse sandy hair and he would heave out sighs that sounded like he was talking to me. He was always there for me and was an integral part of my childhood.

I adored Princie. He was my friend, sometimes my only friend back then.

Of course there comes a day when all things come to an end. And it always takes you by surprise, knocking the wind right out of you. One day Princie wasn't able to get off the floor. All he could do was lie there. I felt sick to my stomach knowing that something was hurting him. He would lift his head up to look at me imploringly. I asked my mother what was going on and she did look worried. When he wouldn't get up all day and wasn't eating or drinking then we decided to get him to the vet.

The only problem was that we didn't have much money and also no real way to get him to the vet. We had no car. We were living in the inner city so my mother called a cab. As we sat waiting for the cab, I knelt down with Princie and looked him in the eyes, held his head and sang him a lullaby as any good mother would do.
The only real one I knew was that Irish one:
"Too-ra-loo-ra-loo-ral, too-ra-loo-ra-li, too-ra-loo-ra-loo-ral, hush now don't you cry! too-ra-loo-ra-loo-ral, too-ra-loo-ra-li, too-ra-loo-ra-loo-ral, that's an Irish lullaby."
I just kept singing it over and over as I stroked Princie's head. I *knew* that something was very wrong as I held back tears.

When we finally got to the vet it was already pretty much too late for him. There were things that could have been done to stall death but it was inevitable that it was his time to die. I asked to sing the lullaby one more time to him. While alone with my dog, I cradled his head and sang. I told him I was sorry for leaving him. Lastly I told him I loved him and then I released my hold. I would walk away with his eyes forever imprinted in my memory. Princie was the one living link I had to my father. Now both were gone.

My mother and I took a bus back home. I remember it being very bright and sunny that day. I was so angry that it was a beautiful day. I wanted it to be grey. I wanted everyone to feel as I did. I didn't cry though, not on the bus, and not outside my house. Some of the neighborhood kids gathered around to ask about my dog. In kid fashion, some of them were unknowingly cruel. "Is your dog dead?" one of them asked.

We went into the house. I touched the spot where Princie had last laid down and I sang the lullaby to myself while petting the carpet.

It was not until then that I did cry.

I had lost my best friend and my first love.

The Perfect Bed

Since we are having our very special "bed-in" love-in...celebration...I was wondering about what sort of bed y'all like the best. Look these over and tell me which one you like the most and why. This should be very interesting indeed.

Bed Number One: The red circular bed.

Bed Number Two: The hammock bed.

Bed Number Three: The rustic bed

Bed Number Four: The Scarlet O'Hara Bed

Bed Number Five: Bed in a hut on some remote island

Bed Number Six: Cozy bed and breakfast Bed

Love makes for Strange Bedfellows

Remember when John Lennon and Yoko Ono had their "bed-in" for peace? Well actually I don't remember it so well. Not sure how old I was then. But I digress...

I would like to invite all of you for a virtual bed-in to celebrate love. No I don't mean wild monkey sex kinda love (okay if you insist we can talk about that too)but rather all the many varieties of love. I got the idea today from visiting Broede's Broodings where Jim has been talking about love pretty much non-stop. If you haven't read his blog yet...please do...you cannot read his story and walk away unchanged. Anyway...this is a man who has devoted his life and now his thoughts and writing to...love.

I propose that I will change the theme of my blog just for several weeks or so...up through Valentine's Day in order to give LOVE its dues. I am gonna acquire selective amnesia for this time...forget about Mulitple Sclerosis....my woes...my troubles...and focus on the topic of love's many variations and transforming powers. And I don't wish to limit LOVE in any way. I want to discuss love of ourselves, love for animals, love for country, love for our parents, love of friends, etc and so forth.

So okay! Let us begin by getting ourselves all cozy in bed. Get your favorite PJs or whatever else you um...wear and get into bed with me! Come on...don't be shy...this is all in the name of love.

This shall be our first offical blogger Bed-In for LOVE.

Whimsy! Come on...let's go...time's a wasting...climb in.

+PHc you too hurry hurry and bring your kitty and that fabulous cake you have.

foamy dear...why yes...you may bring your foam pets and your foam plants and your mismatched gloves.

Dirk dearest...yes do bring felicia and the baby...and no...we won't invite Obama....I promise. Dirk! What have you been eating? You could knock a buzzard off a shit wagon! Now keep that to yourself!

James! let us hurry dear...get in bed...and sure I suppose you can bring your pet moth...I hope it doesn't eat my sweater.

OOOH JIM! I know you would love to bring the Boston Red Sox and the New England Patriots here to bed with us but there simply is not enough room. You will just have to make do with watching them on tv. Here is your remote. Remember to share.

My dear friend Shirl...welcome! I don't think anyone would mind sharing the bed with Lola and your crafting supplies. You might have to fight Jim for the remote so you can watch QVC though...he likes his sports.

Lisa! We must hurry! Yes of course...I promise Big Pharma is NOT invited into bed with us no way no how!

Where's Bubbie? we need bubbie! She has all the cakes, pies, and cookies we will ever need! We love Martha and we love you bubbie.

Mark darling...there is always room for you. No...sorry...you can't bring Hilary's picture for darts practice. The kissing lesbians? We might have to take a vote on that...let's just get you settled here. There you go.

Jafabrit...all righty...i suppose there is room for all your art supplies...and paints...just ask before you start painting bare flesh....oh yes...the bug sculpture...as long as it is not a live bug but i am thinking this will be okay.

EVERYBODY ELSE....COME ON! Time is a wasting...there is only so much time for us on this planet and now is the time to celebrate love.

To all my friends, comrades, and fellow bloggers....I LOVE YOU!

And this...is a fine start doncha think? :>)