WHAT I WOULDN'T DO FOR PEACE

Driving yourself, depriving yourself, pushing yourself.  Just how do you take good care of yourself, when you know it is vital?  When the doctor tells you it is vital.  Melodie Beatty says, "The harder you push, the more you relentlessly demand perfection, the worse you feel."  She asks that we fall in love with ourselves and to be gentle, loving, kind and attentive to ourselves.  Okay good in theory right? But taking care of myself like I would take care of someone I love isn't all that easy.  People require things of you.  Things you know will deplete you, exhaust you and put you horizontal for a while. Sometimes a long time. But how do you say no? 

So if I read Beattie right, if I take better care of myself, the joy will return?  I don't know whether to put a question mark after that sentence or an exclamation point.  Ms. Beattie says that 'the better and more often you care for yourself, the more you'll align with the universe and God's love.'

Okay so I gave it a try.  I took a day off today. A day just for me.  A day to do things that would please me. Well the phone rang exactly 26 times.  The fax machine broke.  The dogs were in a frenzy over something all day long and not one thing did I do for me. Everyone who phoned wanted whatever they wanted yesterday and "if I wouldn't mind taking care of it asap...it would be appreciated."  Yeah right! Their lack of planning constitutes an emergency on my part!  Gotta love it.

Yesterday afternoon I had told everyone I was taking today for me (in other words leave me the hell alone), but besides the endless array of phone calls, etc., I ended up at Bass Pro being a cheerleader for a dog team graduating as a certified Train a Dog~Save a Warrior Service Dog team.  It really was great, but a price was paid.  Photos to celebrate with Santa, lunch I couldn't eat, a chair at the restaurant that sent me screaming for ice on my spine, and once home my dogs decided to reign havoc for at least an hour.  I admit I did the one thing I could think of to do.  I cried.  It didn't help in the slightest.  It only made me more exhausted. It clearly showed what state I am in. So a few sips of a Chateau St. Michel from Washington state eased the pain, at least for a while.

I more and more feel myself drawn to the mountains in Colorado and the beautiful solace of the mesas in New Mexico.  I find I want to escape...everything and everyone.  I want to stand on top of mesa at Sankawi Run in NM and look down and discover a centuries old pot shard made from the hands of a Pueblo Indian.  I want to feel the snow flakes hit my face and inhale the cleansing fragrance of a pine tree. And inhale, really inhale the scent of steaming hot chocolate with a warm fragrant croissant on the side.  I want to breathe again.  I want to feel alive again, instead of feeling exhaustion and constant pain. I want to walk the streets in Santa Fe and absorb the sights and sounds and the aroma of pinon in fire places and visit art galleries on Canyon Road and hear the bells from the oldest church in the United States.  I want to visit Ojo Caliente Hot Springs and soak in the waters on this ancient Native American site. 

Perhaps then I could breathe again. Inhale again.  Feel nourished and remember what peace feels like.  No phones, no faxes, no deadlines, no people who betray and lie to you, no stacks of work that keep replenshing themselves on my desk, no bank accounts that won't balance, no books left unread on my nightstand, no demands, no commands, no sultry looks, no tacky under the breath comments, no noise.  What I wouldn't do for peace.