See Cherry. See Cherry run. See Cherry thrive. See Cherry Win.

I do not beleive in coincidence. I do not believe in happenstance. I do, however believe in the providence of God. I do believe in Karma. So I guess this puts me in a predicament.

I have three half-brothers who are all younger than I am, we share the same mother and unfortuneately we all were molested by one of our mother's many husbands when we were young. The molestation started when I was nine and my brothers were seven, five, and three, respectively. My mother, I should say has been married, at last count nine times, with several "live-ins" in between. The man that molested, beat and emotionaly/verbaly abused us was number three. In the summer of seventy-eight, in the dark of night, we were packed into our volkswagon bus along with whatever possesions we could carry and were taken from our family and friends in Phoenix, Arizona to live in Missouri. For about a year nobody knew where we were.

Eventualy, my brothers were taken back to Phoenix to live with their father and I was left to be raised as an only child. My abuse lasted untill I was about fourteen and it was, to say the least, horrific. This man eventually left my mother and moved to another state with another woman and was never seen or heard from again.

From time to time in the last twenty years or so I have done searches to see if I could find him, none of my searches yeilded anything of note. Years ago I was filled with rage and violence toward him. Now, as I have had much counseling and began my addiction recovery I have felt less raw anger, like a soda-pop sitting with the lid off, my rage dissipated, somewhat.

The last several weeks have been horrid around our home. One of my closest and dearest friends was diagnosed with cancer. My husband's mother was taken to the hospital with a suspected stroke. My kids are all home for the summer, blah, blah, blah... So, with already raw nerves and an exhausted spirit, I sat down to check my email Friday night. My sister-in-law just happened to send me a forward, which as many of my friends know, I hardly ever look at and simply delete. This one I opened. It happened to be a website offering specific information on people in the United States. It was totaly out of the blue. I hadn't even thought about him in months, but, out of some knee-yerk reaction my fingers typed in his name almost before I was conscious of doing so.

I've found him.

After all these years, I know exactly where he lives and even his telephone number.

So, what to do. I sat for a moment staring blankly at my monitor, my mind in reality was blank. Some great void in the spiritual plane of the universe took all of my brain function at that moment and I simply stared. My dear sweet husband just happened to be standing, looking over my shoulder and realising what I was looking at he put his hands on both of my shoulders and gave me a squeeze. I was vaguely aware of his presence, just as a swimmer going out to sea is vaguely aware of the shoreline. Not seeing it, but knowing instinctivly the direction in which it lies. The first thing I remember is his calming voice, "Well" he says "what are you going to do?"
At this moment, a million options are running through my brain and all I can formulate in my head is, "I don't know." I imediatley caught one of my brothers on-line and IMed him the whole story. WE looked up the Missouri State Statute of Limitations. We are too late to file any civil claims. I have a number to call the Missouri A.G. this morning to get more of an understanding of the legal classification of molestation compared to forcible sodomy and forcible rape. Maybe we can get the State to take criminal action. Unfortuneately, my brother had made plans to go away for the weekend and was unable to talk. We are going to talk hopefully this week.
I've been trying to make sense of this in my head, to put all the pieces together, to unravel my emotions and figure out what it is exactly that I feel.

I feel Confrontational.
I do not feel unbriddled rage and anger.
I feel determined, precise.

I want to see him. I want to look into his eyes. I want to see the frailty of his age robbing him of the power of his youth, the power that he yeilded like a caveman's club to beat down anyone in his way. I want to see his legs weak and his hair falling out, I want to see him wrinkled and gnarled.
Truthfully, honestly, I want him to see ME. I want him to see me strong and beautiful. To see me surviving, no, thriving. To see me happy and well and sober. To see me a loving wife, a good mother, a breaker of the chains that bind us to familial cycles of abuse.

I want him to see ME.

I cannot say at this point what the next step will be. I do not know how this will proceed or how my feelings will evolve with time.

I do not believe in coincidence. I do not believe in happenstance. I do believe in the providence of God. I do believe in Karma.

I want him to see ME.

Life and Times

Standing there on that hot August afternoon Will felt alone and dirty. Wranglin' for a living was hard work here in the southwest and he was just plain sick of being hot. The monsoon was late in comming this year and that ment no rain for quite sometime now. He got to thinkin' about the future and the endless line of days ahead of him that seemed to stretch into a dull listless and boring life. Each day pretty much the same as before. Walking down Main street headed for the cafe to get a bite of supper he stopped outside the window of the general store. Boy howdy he was a sight covered from the top of his head to the tips of his spurs in dust, you could almost tell he was wearing chaps under all that dirt. Well, almost. Looking at his reflection in that window he took off his hat and started brushing off as much of the dirt as he could. Not making much in the way of progress he stopped, put his hat back on and headed down the street again. That's when he saw her. Lookin' like she had just stepped out of the JC Penny catalog, she was the prettiest young thing he had ever seen. He noticed her hair first thing, soft and silky. It was hanging loose down her back in beautiful auburn waves. It reminded him of a beautiful chestnut gelding he had when he was ten years old. Watching her, there, he was simply overwhelmed with that shadow of loneliness always on him, and it seemed there was a lifetime of longing built up in his arms just then. Longin' to wrap his hands around her waist and pull her close. Desiring to smell her hair and kiss her long and hard, stringing kisses together like a diamond necklace on her neck. Without thinking he tried to barge ahead but his legs were wobly and he couldn't walk straight. Catching up to her he finaly got up the nerve to tap her on the shoulder.
"Beg your pardon Ma'am."
Just then she turned and he was speechless. He noticed for the first time how clean she was and this close to her he could smell her perfume. Her eyes were the truest blue he'd ever seen framed by dark lashes and freckles dancin' all across her nose. Pale white skin and soft like velvet. Forgetting himself and feeling a little ashamed of being so dirty he hesitated. Her eyes looked him up and down, he watched her as the shadows of the silk parasol she carried cast shadows on her face, making her even more lovely. Gathering his courage he remembered his Pa, "there's no shame in hard work son." that's what he would say. Standing tall under her gaze and meeting her eyes he spoke, "My name is Will, ma'am. William Puckett. I'd be much obliged to make your aquaintance." Remembering he had forgotten to remove his hat he yerked it off quickly, a trail of dust scattered in the air as he stood waiting for her response...

Two Coins for the Boatman on the River Styx

" When the fifth veil falls, and with it the illusion of financial worth, individuals might recognise themselves again, might find themselves standing, as if naked among ancient values in a long-lost landscape.
Meanwhile, it can be stated with some validity that for all of the clamorings and phobias that it generates, money barely exists. An abstraction, a symbol, an act of faith, an IOU backed only by a bankers word, money is first and foremost a substitute. The funny part is that it is often a substitute for things that often do not exist.
Both money and art, powered as they are with the romance and poetry of the age, are magic. Rather, money is magic, art is magik. Money is stagecraft, sleight of hand, a bag of clever tricks. Art is a plexus of forces and influences that act upon the senses by means of practical yet permanently inexplicable secret links. Admittedly, the line between the two can be as thin as a dime. What's more, the magicians of capitalizm strengthen their hold on their audience through the manipulation of artistic images.
What is plain is that neither money nor the love of it is the root of all evil. Evil's roots run deeper than that. Anyway, money is not a root. Money is a leaf. Trillions of leaves actually; dense, bushy, dollar-green, obscuring the stars of reality with their false canopy.
Who says that money doesn't grow on trees?
So, as we lie there at the moment of our death, helpless, beyond distraction, electricity stealing out of our brains like a con man stealing out of a sucker's neighborhood, it will occur to many of us that everything we ever did, we did for money. And at that instant, right before the stars blink off, we will, according to what else we may have learned in life, burn with an unendurable regret-- or have us a good silent laugh at our own expense."





Tom Robbins, from "Skinny Legs and All"

Checkout time is at Eleven o'clock

Well, after about two weeks without internet access I'm back in the saddle again.

I'm very tired and I was thinking today about when you are checking in to a hotel, before you've even started to think about your perfect vaccation, the front desk reminds you imediately that you have to leave.

What's up with that?



Words that are causing me stress this week.

1. Mother-in-Law

2. modem

3. school

4. homework

5. college tuition

6. getting high

7. getting drunk

8. giving blow jobs

9. loosing sleep

and the number ten stress causing word for the week,

10. cancer


Check out time is at eleven...

Please Pass the Jelly

It isn't a desire for a new or different love, it's a desire for more love.

Fragile Felines and Feelings of Pink

My cat is about eighty-four years old. In cat years that is. She's a great cat, she lays around the house, she loves on everyone, eats and is generally to old to raise much of a fuss about anything. She has always been an inside cat, so sometimes when the weather is cool and the house is open to the spring breezes she'll find herself transfixed by the outside world. She sees the opportunity of an open door before her. She'll sit right at the threshold wagging her tail and you can see the wheels of her mind turning.
"Should I go? It looks fun. What's out there? Scary. I'm going to go, wait no, I'm not..."
She'll sit up, put a timid paw on the ground outside the door stand for a second and withdraw at the slightest sound or movement that is unatural to her. Sitting back on her haunches she looks, longingly, too frightened by her own shadow to venture forth into the wilds of the backyard. Then, it happened, the day came when she actually stepped outside. Her whole body made it outside for about five minutes. She sniffed and peered and skulked on the patio and I thought for sure she was a gonner. She would take off in her newly found freedom and we would never see her again. I mean all of her dreaming had brought her to this point, right? Her future waiting to be grasped.
Wrong.
As soon as she had walked around outside a while you could see the muscles on her back relax and her tail swish gently back and forth, she was completely uninspired by what she thought was the adventerous. Almost imediately she had a sort of bored expression on her face. Insolent, in a way. Looking at me with those sharp green eyes I could just about hear her in my head.
"Yeah. It's no big deal."
And with that she slowly, nonchalantly walked into the house, jumped up onto the couch and went to sleep. She has not yet ventured again outside.
This got me to thinking about my life and how I do the same things at times. I look and look for things outside of home and hearth for adventure and excitement, half frightened and half raptureous with expectation. Only to find as I venture forth that the world outside is not that amazing. In fact, it can be quite dull. All of the things that I require or desire or dream of can be found easily in my little bubble of a life. A life so full of quality that everything else seems to have lost its color. The grass isn't in fact greener on the other side, because my lawn, truthfully, is pretty damn good. There's a truthfullness and a reality to my life and the relationships I've had in the last several years, that I'm just not finding in the real word. In fact I'm finding a lot of people who lie, and cheat, and steal. People who use and abuse those around them for their own gain. There is selfishness that eats away at people like a cancer. It marrs the outward beauty they so desperately seek after. I'm glad that I can look at the world through rose colored glasses. I'm glad that I have surrounded myself with people of integrity and character. The bubble of my life can float here and there on the wind, but I will protect it and keep it from bursting. I will carry on those feelings of innocence that I have in my heart. The feelings I get when I wear pink. Wholesome and girly and sweet. I will choose to know the world as a good place, a wholesome place, a pink place. And I will cut away the diseased relationships of my life that darken my vision of peace. Because after all, outside, is really no big deal.

Eros

My body feels overwhelmed with wanting you. Almost as if I were generating too much electricity. I woke this morning to a calm silence and wanted to relish the feel of the sun on my bare skin. Laying under the clouds, listening to the harmony of the birds I didn't feel shy in my nudity. On the contrary I felt so much alive, tears filled my eyes and spilled onto my lips.
Every part of who I am is yearning for your touch, my breasts feel heavy and my thighs feel weak.
I can't get you out of my mind, a warm passionate tingle is filling my abdomen and spreading to the tips of my fingers. I close my eyes to concentrate on the image of your face. I imagine the weight of your body on mine and the feel of your hands on my bare skin. I can hear you wisper my name. I smell your scent and feel your breath on my neck and the tiny bitting of teeth on my ears. I am longing for you, craving the satisfaction of our intamacy.
I want to hold you in my arms, to gently stroke your hair back from your forehead. Nurturing you with the love that can come from the strength of a woman consumed.
I want to give to you everything you need. To touch you in every way.
Hear my words; Longing, yearning, craving...
All for you.
Just because,
it's one of those days.




"Love is an act of endless forgiveness, a tender look which becomes a habit."

Peter Ustinov

I'm so bored, you have no idea...

You Are a Dreaming Soul

Your vivid emotions and imagination takes you awy from this world So much so that you tend to live in your head most of the time You have great dreams and ambitions that could be the envy of all... But for you, following through with your dreams is a bit difficult You are charming, endearing, and people tend to love you. Forgiving and tolerant, you see the world through rose colored glasses. Underneath it all, you have a ton of passion that you hide from others. Always hopeful, you tend to expect positive outcomes in your life. Souls you are most compatible with: Newborn Soul, Prophet Soul, and Traveler Soul

What Kind of Soul Are You?

Mo Schmo

It's two O'clock in the morning and I can't sleep. I feel so uncomfortable, bloated heavy and crowded, it's the kind of crowded feeling that makes it hard to breathe. I'm going to the bathroom every five minutes it seems, and you know, as much as I love being pregnant, I'm ready to have this baby. So in keeping with the karmic forces of the universe, the first contraction right then, gets my attention. Contractions are a sensation that's hard to describe to someone who's never experienced it. It's like a tightness and a squeezing of all your abdominal muscles, tightening untill there's accute pain that radiates from just under the rib cage down to your knees. Adrenaline hits your body at this point and even though your in pain your really high on speed at the same time. I'm sure that's the only thing that keeps you coherent at first.
Well, Morgan is working graveyard shift downtown and the hospital is downtown, so we have the plan all worked out. I call my Dad and Morgan and we meet at St. Joe's. I guess I should also point out at this time that Mason, who is anouncing himself, (right on schedule) is my third child. I know this routine so, I'm calm and relatively relaxed, breathing and focusing. My Father on the other hand is a wreck. He is of course driving very fast and rattling on about something, I'm not really listening. The poor man. We meet Morgan at the entrance to the hospital, I'm plopped into a wheelchair and off we go.
Now, since Mason is my third, for those of you who aren't aware, your body naturally becomes more flexible and accustomed to labor with every delivery, consequently each labor should be shorter and easier on the mother. I should also point out that my first child was only about two hours to delivery from the first contraction to his kicking and screaming entrance onto the stage of life. Mason is here in a grand total of forty-five minutes.
My orderly is calmly walking us through the corridors of the hospital thinking he's probably got all the time in the world. My contractions at this point are comming very close together and the calmness and breathing techniques have been abandoned to a somewhat aggressive demand that I have I.V. drugs NOW. This action gets the imediate attention of the nurse in charge of my delivery. So, here I am out of control of my body, unbearable pressure, intense knife-like pain in my vagina, nausea, and the feeling like I'm going to wet myself. My head is dizzy and it's all I can do to concetrate on what my body is doing, and she says to me,
"Now honey, it's okay, let me just have a look at you." and at this point with all the stealth of a cat burglar her hand is up my gown and it feels as if her whole fist is in my vagina. Quite unpleasant, I assure you. The look on her face is comical.
"Oh my, you're dialated to ten." astonishment and shock have replaced the condascention that was there earlier.
Making eye contact I reply through gasps of air, "No shit Sherlock."
At this point I don't think I'm her favorite patient.
"Well," she says turning to the orderly "lets get her to delivery."
So, writhing in pain, with no drugs they lift me not so gently onto another bed and I'm being wheeled down the hall to the delivery room. It's so hot I have a sudden urge to take off all my clothes, fortunately my husband is there and he forces me to keep them on. (Thanks for that Honey) So, on to yet another table, only this time my butt is practically hanging off of the edge and my feet are being supported above my head in the dreaded stirrups from hell, which by the way, force my knees up by my ears. Yeah.
So, nursie looks at me and really sincerly says, "Are you comfortable?"
I won't tell you what I said to her. Then, right on time, my body is pushing. Now at first this is acompanied by a tremendous relief. The intense, focused, stabbing pain is breifly gone and know you're body is uncontrolably squeezing. That's when the fun part hits. The proverbial bowling ball out your ass feeling. Seriously, something THAT big comming out of something that small. It's surreal, a kind of freak show. Pushing is kind of like diharea cramps that take over your body, you know, when your just sitting there and man it's comming now matter what. Magnify that like a thousand times.
Now, unfortuneately, being in this position and dealing with the incredible pain you can imagine my usual shy, conservative demeanor is no where to be found.
I scream, "it's comming! I have to push!"
To which nursie replies, "Oh, Mrs. H____ you have to wait. The Doctor isn't here." Um, right.
My relply went something like this, (very loudly) "I am NOT waiting!"
I acompanied that with another heafty push, and thankfully my husband and the nurse decided to be on the recieving end of this transaction, otherwise poor little Mason would have been on the floor. Out pops his head, the nurse suctions out the gunk from his nose and he is awake, wide-eyed and looking at everything and so calm, he never even cries. Morgan at this point holds his head and grabs him as the last push releases him from my body, he's covered in goo and Morgan's crying and talking to him and I'm crying and cramping and cold and exhausted. Morgan cuts the cord and takes him to get weighed and tested. I get a quick clean up, my legs come down out of the rafters and I get to say hello to my son.
He's the smallest of my children at only five pounds six ounces and he's little, only eighteen inches long. He has a full head of red irish hair and the biggest roundest eyes that I've ever seen. I am most definately in love.
Mason is thirteen today. My last baby. His voice is changing and he's getting hair, a lot of hair. And when I think about it, I can't very well remember my life without him. I mean I can tell you all about my childhood and my early marriage, but when I relay those memories it's always with the fullness of three children in my heart. His presence in my life is a miracle. That boy, that person you see there was once inside MY body. I felt him, I felt him kick and get hiccups and roll over. I felt every bit of his delivery. I remember like it was yesterday. I never expected to love another person as completely and unconditionaly as I love my children. What an experience, what a ride...

What a Love.


Happy Birthday Baby.