Author Archives: lifelessons

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About lifelessons

My blog, which started out to be about overcoming grief, quickly grew into a blog about celebrating life. I post daily: poems, photographs, essays or stories. I've lived in countries all around the globe but have finally come to rest in Mexico, where I've lived since 2001. My books may be found on Amazon in Kindle and print format, my art in local Ajijic galleries. Hope to see you at my blog.

That Woman in the Mirror

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I have a few moments before dinner so will publish this piece written to the prompt, “That Woman in the Mirror” at the writing retreat where I will be for the next three days.

That Woman in the Mirror

The woman in the mirror has a better sense of humor than I do. This is because she does not need to depart to go into the world. She controls what is behind her and in front of her. Her wounds are my wounds. Her wrinkles are the selfsame wrinkles that fail to respond to the expensive face cream my sister sent me for my birthday. A gentle hint that my apparent age reveals her age, 4 years older.

The woman in the mirror does not necessarily reflect my feelings. She sometimes freezes in surprise at my tears. Chides me to get a hold on myself. She steams over at times and refuses to confront me. She does not flinch at sprays of toothpaste or a misting over of hairspray. She grows younger as the layers thicken. The woman in the mirror chides me to refresh my lipstick, define my eyebrows, pluck hair chins. Slowly, slowly, she ages—turning into first my mother and then my Grandmother, whom I had thought I had left so far behind. That self-pitying look? Shame on her, I chide. Those ever-lowering breasts, that additional girth? I will never get like that, I think, and then I remember.

There is a mirror in my house where my Grandmother cannot find me—a full-length miracle mirror where the one looking back at me is a woman in her 40’s, just barely overweight. She is my grandmother, stretched out—lengthened and diminished in width. It is the sort of mirror that was once seen in fancy dress shops that encouraged women to buy and buy. Like The Hollywood shop from fifty years ago, now long abandoned, shuttered and replaced by a Radio Shack…but whose charms can still lull me into a luxurious feeling that all is well. I am as I should be.

I flip off the bathroom light and move to the bedroom to catch a last glimpse of me in that magical full-length mirror, then climb into bed to dream and dream those slender dreams that, if we are lucky, are the ones that remain in our memory long after the mirrors have cracked and crumbled, like other more recent memories that fade quickly to give way to the past.

Hibiscus: FOTD Nov 11, 2019

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For Cee’s Flower of the Day Prompt.

Empty Windows

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Empty Windows

When it comes to neoteric, it is something that she’s not.
Way back in the fifties she’s permanently caught.
Travel to new countries? Definitely no.
She won’t have other countries profiting from her dough!

She has no curiosity about the human race.
Her interest in humanity ends in her own face.
She sits before her mirror like a window to the world.
Is her lipstick even—her hair correctly curled?

Bravery to her is answering the door.
She walks out to her mailbox, but further? No. No more.
She boils all her bed linen, lest creatures linger there
to creep onto her body and nest within her hair.

All the wounds her life will bear long ago were healed.
She’s a preserved specimen of life, hermetically sealed.
She’ll face no other heartache, no risks of being hurt.
She will not chance a world of germs, bacteria and dirt.

Cats are unhygienic and dogs an equal threat.
A goldfish in a bowl is her single lonely pet.
No companion goldfish to fill its tiny bowl.
Its full attention trained on her seems to be her goal.

All those empty windows with their draperies pulled tight.
All those single bedside bulbs burning through the night.
Behind each building’s blinded eyes, how many just like her—
sealed inside a bell jar, safe from the world’s rude whirr?

 

Prompt words today are bravery, window, travel, neoteric and boiled.

I’m leaving in 15 minutes for my writers’ retreat with eight friends at a resort across the lake so probably won’t be blogging until next Friday. Although I forgot to ask him ahead of time, perhaps Forgottenman will once again be my guest blogger. If not, see you Friday, and if you miss me, go back to some of my earlier blogs from 5 or 6 years ago or any year prior to your following my blog. I’ll miss you all. See you Friday with some new tales. Now, I’m off!!!

Hibiscus: Empty Nest, FOTD Nov 10, 2019

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Even after the petals have fallen, a flower remains.

For Cee’s FOTD

4 A.M.

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4 A.M.

The old cat yowls a caustic moan—a banshee’s rough lament.
It rips my slumber wide apart. My gentle dream is rent.
A night comprised of eight-hours sleep would now seem heaven-sent.
My friends urge euthanasia, but I’m of another bent.

I toast the bread and spread the jam. I let my coffee vent,
then take a sip and watch the cat sip oil but not dent
the surface of the tiny can of shrimp and cod I’ve bent
to plop into my grandma’s dish that was never meant
to house a meal for animals—that family heirloom leant
power by its years of use—everywhere it went.

No human family member can know the full extent
of what this antiquated vessel means in its descent.
It is a loving blessing. A secret grand event—
a little ceremony to honor her ascent
to wherever old cats go when it’s time to absent
themselves from an easy life that’s turned into torment.

Why can I not cut loose the cord? I am a dissident
regarding being left once more. Those other loves that went
more silent into that good night, finally content,
somehow have not prepared me for this coming event.
I cannot be the agent hastening her demise.
The cat and I return to bed to close our stubborn eyes.

 

Prompt words for today are comprise, tout, lament, antiquated and bread.

 

FOTD Nov 9, 2019

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IMG_7071For Cee’s FOTD

Relaxed

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Relaxed

The punch of youth deserted me a few birthdays ago.
My pace is not so rapid, my activity rate slow.
Though I’m really rather crafty at covering up my laziness,
the truth is the sharp edge of life has dissolved into haziness.

My fashion style has graduated from shabby chic and Goth—
loose batiks and rebozos that provide forgiving swath
to obscure a body settling into a comfort zone
that leaves room for a donut, popcorn or a scone.

I do the things I used to do, though in different proportions.
I exercise within my pool with minimized contortions.
My parties have grown smaller with the menus simplified,
and when I am out shopping, I am easier satisfied.

No longer do I seek out that perfect styling mist.
“This will do,” I soon decide, and cross it off my list.
I put off a few years ago my three nights on the town.
The nights I used to dance away, I love to lay me down.

Sorting through a milling crowd has become a bore.
My friends have dwindled to a few, but I enjoy them more.
Swinging in the hammock has become a meditation.
Looking at garden denizens a form of education.

Life filtered down is full of grace. I love its sway and hush.
Who knew that it would be such fun away from life’s mad rush?

Prompt words today are punch, youth, craft, birthday

Repurposed: FOTD Nov 8, 2019

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IMG_7054.jpegFor Cee’s FOTD

When the cats tipped over this 3.5 ft high figure of a man, it was repurposed into a planter.

Conspiring with the Enemy

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Photo thanks to Nik on Unsplash. Used with permission.

Conspiring with the Enemy

Accoutered best for sabotage, they peer over the ridge,
intent now on the enemy crossing o’er the bridge.
All of their stealth and camouflage is not, at last, in vain.
Each inch they push their foes back is another inch they gain.
They’ve learned that cynicism of war as friend becomes their foe.
Each success they win will be another’s loss and woe.
His battleground littered with the corpses, G.I. Joe
now wanders off the killing field, choosing where next to go.
War is not Hell for those who are just playing at the game.
As war games end, the dead arise, as do the halt and lame.
Off to a game of baseball, the conquered and the winners
play together all day long until called to their dinners.
Children could teach their fathers that enemy can be friend.
Oh that their fathers felt the same and war was at an end.

The prompt words today are sabotage, cynic, vain, accouter and friend.

The Passenger

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The Passenger

I see her back her car outside.
She never offers me a ride.
I go the same way she is going,
but she passes, still unknowing.

After ten long years, I stand
making no sign with head or hand.
My legs are tired. My back is bent.
My footsteps follow where she went.

It takes two minutes to go by car.
I take an hour to go that far.
If she knew, perhaps she’d say,
“Would you like a ride today?”

She would have rolled her window down
to offer me a ride to town.
I’d dust my clothes and step inside,
grateful, at long last, for the ride.

And at the bottom of the hill,
as though, perhaps, she’d had her fill,
She’d say, “I’m turning left from here.”
And I’d assemble all my gear,

and give my thank-you, even though
I need to go where she will go.
Charity goes just so far,
I think, as I exit the car.

I live about two-thirds of the way up a very tall mountain in Mexico, and often as I drive down to the main road, I give a ride to whomever I encounter walking down the cobblestones—especially the women, most of whom work as housekeepers in the houses in my fraccionamiento. But now and then when I am in a hurry or when I see a man suspicious-looking or dusted by his labors, I drive on by. Then I wonder what he is thinking as I guiltily observe him in the rear vision mirror.

 

For dVerse Poets Change of Perspective.