Do you have a healing place?  Do you need one?  Is there anybody who is so healthy and well balanced that they do not need to stop and just be to let their mind and body rest in healing peace?

I have the problem of my brain running miles a minute with chores to be done, or editing, or new stories to write.  When it gets to running in circles over and over in a panic that I’ll forget something, I know it is time to stop, because I become less functional. 

Yesterday, I ran a red light. I was horrified because I thought I was being attentive to the heavy traffic. When did that light turn red?  Where did it come from in the first place?  Who knows where my mind really was.  It was clearly time for me to allow my body to catch up with my brain by slowing down and sitting in quiet healing peace.

I’m fortunate that my healing place is my own living room. As the home to three dogs, it is not a tidy place but its windows look out on my gardens so I sit surrounded by my plants. The inside wall of my living room contains my dear piano, a gift from my grandfather given in love.  It is old and filled with the wisdom of music.

In the peace of this place I can let go of the thoughts and just exist. The world around me sits silent and my thoughts become silent.  I don’t have to do anything right now.  Really, it is seldom that in any given moment I have to do any specific thing.  Eventually, my chores must get done, but I find they get done faster with less angst if I’ve spent some time sitting in the healing peace that allows my poor body to catch up to my brain.

In working with at-risk youth, I discovered my own need to have a few moments of uninterrupted quiet.  My co-workers and I used to talk about how we could get our kids into their happy place—someplace they could go leaving behind their problems and just be happy for a while.  For some of the children this turned out to be their blanket fort. Others liked to go sit in the car all alone.  Some could be happy on their beds.  Others needed to be outside running or swinging. 

Over the years, my healing place has changed. As a child, I knew that sometimes I needed to get on my bike and just ride and let the movement and peace flow over me.  Other times, playing the piano has been my healing place. This morning I will take the time to sit and look out at my flowers and feel my body letting go of the tension I didn’t know it was holding.

Everybody needs a place where they can be in the moment whether it is inside or out, alone or surrounded by family or friends.  In this space, we don’t worry about time.  Time will take care of itself.  Now, the body needs to let go of the thoughts that destroy health and the mind needs to let go of the circles and circles of nonsense that keeps the thoughts churning.

Peace and health to all of you.

As part of our vacation we spent a few days in Washington DC.  We toured the White house and saw the Washington monument and the Lincoln Memorial.  While walking from the Washington Monument to the Lincoln Memorial we encountered the WWII memorial. 

We proceeded to the Lincoln Memorial and read Lincoln’s speeches engraved on the walls of the monument.  We left the Lincoln Memorial to find the Vietnam memorial and Loren’s cousin’s name on the wall.  We found his name, and I wished I had a flower to leave.  We thought the Vietnam memorial was very somber, but thought it appropriate to the time and situation. 

Part of what struck us was reading Lincoln’s words about consecrating part of a battlefield as a cemetery.  He emphasized the role of the soldiers when he said, “those brave men living and dead…”  Lincoln, like the Vietnam memorial, stressed the role of the individuals who were engaged in the actual fighting of the war.  Perhaps if we had not encountered the two memorials on the same walk we would not have noticed the similarities. 

I didn’t take time to look for the names of my friends and classmates on the wall of the Vietnam Memorial.  They are there.  Their names add to the message that in war real individuals lose their lives.  Now, others might see things differently, but the memorial that honors the individuals who died impressed both Loren and me.  Also, we found the Vietnam Memorial off to one side of the mall, nestled under the trees.  I’m thankful our cousin and my friends have a peaceful place for their monument.

I mentioned we encountered the WWII memorial.  It had a very different feel.  It is large and impressive with it’s fountain and flags.  It struck us as a monument not to those who died in the conflict but as a monument to the war itself—almost a celebration of the war.  It’s position of prominence between the Washington Monument and the Lincoln Memorial speaks of its importance as compared to Vietnam.

When I think of Lincoln’s words and the somber simplicity of the Vietnam Memorial I am inclined to call the WWII memorial vulgar.  What were people thinking to place this monument with its colorful flags and joyful fountain so prominently?  I certainly knew many people who fought in WWII.  At the time, at least half of the male members of my family served in that war.  My uncle was in Pearl Harbor when it was bombed.  I have to ask, “In what way does the WWII memorial honor the service of my family?”  I don’t get it.  In my opinion something simple off to the side of the mall that honored the common men and women who defended our country would be more fitting.  

Considering the global carnage of WWII, something that remembered the common people would have been much more pleasing to me.  Instead we celebrate a victory for us while forgetting our allies and the many victims of the conflict.  The monument fails to communicate the true horror of that war.

I have to conclude that the placement of the two war monuments speaks volumes about our attitude toward war and to the individuals who served in those wars.   

One of the great things about traveling is seeing things from a different perspective.  We recently took a trip to the east coast.  We visited Manhattan, an island the same size as the little bit of heaven I live on. 

New Yorkers are generally pretty proud of their city.  It is home to some of the finest live entertainment in the world.  It gave birth to some of the modern art movements.  It is the home to people from all over the globe.  NYC houses many fine collects of art and art museums.  The architecture is both beautiful and innovative.

Entertainment abounds in NYC.  We arrived in time for the Columbus Day parade.  Broadway was closed off for a big party with street musicians, magicians and street performers of every kind.

We found crowds everywhere.  The streets were crowded with busses and taxis.  The sidewalks were crowded with a press of people all wanting to be somewhere other than where they were.

Lights flashed everywhere creating a constant show of moving color, while the noise of traffic, people, emergency vehicles and construction combined with the street musicians to create a continual concert of urban music.  Or so one from New York might see their city, and it is as I have described.

I also saw that those lights screamed at the passerby to buy buy buy.  That was the message of the millions of lights and signs—buy.  I think the noise temporarily damaged my sensitive hearing.  By the time we left the city, I couldn’t hear anything anybody said to me.  While eating establishments graced every corner, I longed for some good, crisp, affordable vegetables.  Instead of a plate of veggies I might receive two asparagus spears and a leaf of lettuce.  This is not how we eat at home.

While upper Manhattan was quieter than mid and lower town, the sense of people crowded together pressed in on me.  The wealthy residents of uptown did not appear on the streets as did their poorer neighbors.  I had an image of them huddled in their elegant high rises still breathing but distaining the great outdoors, or perhaps they were too important and busy to be outside on a beautiful day. 

What a relief to return home to my own little acre of ground.  My noisiest neighbors are the birds in the trees.  There is nothing elegant or majestic here, unless one considers the hundred foot fir trees that tower into the sky, absorbing noise and giving off lovely oxygen that only I am near enough to breathe. 

Ah, it is good to be home!  I very much suspect that my brothers and sisters who enjoy the sights and sounds of their crowded city would not appreciate my birds and trees.  Perhaps they would not consider wealth as having a whole acre all to myself.  In the end, we are all inclined to see our own home as best and those things that make it unique as being valuable.  The wisdom I took away from my experience in New York is that even someone who lives a very different lifestyle is still my brother or sister.  They communicate by speaking. They look at their world through human eyes. They smile and laugh.  We are alike in these ways.