To maintain balance day by day......

......minute by minute requires

loving attention to the value of everything and everyone.

When a balance is tipped,

I do not sleep well.

When I do not sleep well,

the balance tips towards an unwanted grand Mal seizure.

There are many ordinary stressors in this world ~

bills that keep finding their way into the mailbox,

insufficient money to pay bills ~ and support play,

inclement weather (yes, even here in Victoria!),

time crunches at work,

extracurricular fun and games with friends.......

Then there are the really big ones ~

sudden violent loss of loved ones,

not once, but twice, three and even four and five times

with all the destruction of swirling tornados 

whipping throughout the families.

My commitment:

     to remain as seizure free as possible ~

shaken on it's foundations with each crashing blow.

How does one restore balance ~ and then maintain it ~

in stagnating pools of grief that threaten to consume?

Honouring the lives gone before by 

living each day as a testament to those loved ones,

caring for myself each day,

remembering the wisdom and courage that each life held

finding the gold in the heaviness of grief.

“I measure every Grief I meet

With narrow, probing Eyes -

I wonder if it weighs like mine -

Or has an easier size.” 

- Emily Dickinson