I shall search my very soul for the lion inside of me…
And we sailed all around the world looking for a brand new start…
~ Van Morrison
♫ (Listen to the Lion) ♫
There is an eternal landscape, a geography of the soul; we search for its outline all our lives.
~ Josephine Hart
(Songs of the Dragonfly: Begging for Enlightenment)
It’s funny the twists and turns the course of our lives takes sometimes. Last month we were concerned with moving my failing 97-year-old aunt from elderly housing into my father’s house where my sister, her husband and a couple of home-care aides could make her last days as comfortable as possible. Auntie is hanging in there for now, even perking up occasionally now that she is settled in her new digs.
Sometimes we find ourselves bracing for one event when another unanticipated one appears on the scene. Toward the end of August my hard-working, stressed-out husband had an attack of angina late one night (or was it early one morning?) and landed himself in the hospital. Zounds! But the silver lining to that cloud was that son Nate flew up from Georgia and daughter Larisa came by train from New York and we found ourselves swathed in comforting layers of love and support.
This setback in Tim’s struggle with heart disease has left me frustrated and angry with his doctors. Predictably, I went on a search for a new book to give me some fresh ideas about how to proceed from here. After nearly a year on the vegan diet there has been no improvement in Tim’s health which has been a bitter pill for me to swallow. Truly, there are no simple answers.
The book I found, published just this year, is scientifically way over my head, but I’m learning. Learning by heart. About the endothelium layer of the arterial wall. About endothelial dysfunction, inflammation, oxidation, hypertension, and blood sugar. That there are more kinds of cholesterol than you can shake a stick at!
It seems the traditional 5 risk factors for heart disease (elevated cholesterol, hypertension, diabetes, obesity, smoking) are not the only ones doctors should be paying attention to. Of the 20 top risk factors there are, elevated cholesterol does not even make the list. Hypertension is #6, diabetes is #11, obesity is #19, and smoking is #20.
For now I am focusing on #1, endothelial dysfunction and what we can do about it. We can do nothing about #8, genetics, but it is interesting to know that there are myriads of genetic mutations causing different biochemical reactions that each play different roles in the development and progression of heart disease.
On a heart happy note, in the middle of all the other excitement, Larisa and her boyfriend Dima got engaged! It’s so nice to have a wedding to look forward to next year, and I’ve been told it will be very unique, non-traditional and unpretentious. Yes!!! ♥
Acknowledging our roots changes us. It makes us feel truer. Many people are interested in their family history, an interest that comes from the fear of not having roots, of standing on emptiness. But even more important than investigating our ancestry is rediscovering the connections with those who have crossed our path. … In that moment, I understood the importance of preserving the past. What a gaping lack of respect it is to carry on with our lives, ignoring what people who lived before us said and did, how they suffered, what they created, and even how they ate. And those who take the trouble to preserve the most creative and beautiful heritage that our predecessors left us are performing an act of kindness.
~ Piero Ferrucci
(The Power of Kindness: The Unexpected Benefits of Leading a Compassionate Life)
It seems to happen every year in the month of May – the ancestors begin calling again – do some more research, they beckon from the past, do some more research… It begins around Mothers Day, so I am convinced my late mother is egging them on.
In the late 1990s after years of hunting, I found a record of a second marriage for my Norwegian ancestor, Martin Thompson. He had married his housekeeper late in life and after his first wife died, a fact I don’t recall anyone ever mentioning before. Anyhow, my grandfather had told me that Thompson was Americanized from what sounded like (and turned out to be) Tønnesen. This marriage record said that Martin’s parents were John and Dorothy and that he was born 23 July 1818 in Brevig, Norway. John and Dorothy??? Didn’t sound at all Norwegian to me…
Meanwhile, my sister and brother-in-law were living in Sweden and my brother-in-law offered to hop over to Norway to do some research for me, something he excels at. He found that Brevig is now Brevik, a little seaside town in the county of Telemark, and sure enough, Ingebrigt Martinus Hansen, my 3rd-great-grandfather, who became Martin Thompson in America, was born there on 23 July 1818 to Hans Tønnesen & Dorthea Larsdatter. (John & Dorothy!) None of them were using surnames, they were all recorded with patronymics. Hans and his four brothers were sailors, and their father, my 5th-great-grandfather, Tønnes Ingebretsen, was a ship’s carpenter.
And that’s about where the trail ended for more than a few years…
But now through the magic of the internet and Ancestry.com, yesterday I traced back to my 6th-great-grandmother, Anna Dorthea Torbiornsdatter, who was born in 1735 in Arendal, a seaside town south of Brevik, in the county of Aust-Agder. I wonder what her life was like. She gave birth to six children, and the firstborn, Anne Lisbeth, died in infancy so her name was given again to the next baby. Then came Ole, Tønnes (my 5th-great-grandfather), Kirstine and Nicolai. Tønnes is the one who was born in Arendal and relocated to Brevik, where he died. There is so much more I want to know about Anna Dorthea – for some reason, she is the one calling me now!
Don’t give me the whole truth,
don’t bring me the ocean for my thirst,
don’t give me heaven when I ask for light,
but give me a glimpse, a drop, a speck,
as birds carry dew drops from leaves
and the wind a grain of salt.
~ Olav H. Hauge
(The Ways of Water)
Why not let people differ about their answers to the great mysteries of the Universe? Let each seek one’s own way to the highest, to one’s own sense of supreme loyalty in life, one’s ideal of life. Let each philosophy, each worldview bring forth its truth and beauty to a larger perspective, that people may grow in vision, stature and dedication.
~ Algernon David Black
(Universal Nexus: Secret Notes on the Sum of Life)
O star of wonder, star of night
Star with royal beauty bright
Westward leading, still proceeding
Guide us to thy perfect light
♫ (We Three Kings of Orient Are) ♫
Are you looking for answers, to questions under the stars?
If along the way you are growing weary,
You can rest with me until a brighter day
It’s okay
~ Dave Matthews
♫ (Where Are You Going) ♫
There’s the wind
And the rain
And the mercy of the fallen
Who say, “Hey, it’s not my place
To know what’s right”
There’s the weak
And the strong
And the many stars that guide us
We have some of them inside us
~ Dar Williams
♫ (Mercy of the Fallen) ♫
Because I am an early bird and a creature of habit, every morning I lay out in little trays our morning prescription meds (4 for Tim and 3 for me) and vitamins. A couple of days ago I suddenly realized that I had just taken most of Tim’s pills and vitamins. The shock paralyzed me for a few moments. Am I losing my mind??? For the rest of the day I worried about the effect his pills would have on me – one of them was definitely just for men – and worried about my brain’s increasing inability to pay attention. A few days later now and I’m still here and breathing so evidently no lasting harm done.
I’ve always been too easily startled and confused. And like most dreamers I do spend an inordinate amount of time living in my head. (One reason I was a sympathetic fan of the J.D. character on “Scrubs.”) But this latest episode was most unsettling. And I can’t even remember what thoughts were distracting me when it happened.
Mid-December is thus one of the most positively magical times of the year. Things are possible during December’s darkening days that are not even dreamt of at other spokes of the Wheel of the Year. We should use this magic as a vehicle for deepening our awareness of the world around us and preparing our souls for the ongoing pilgrimage of our lives. A seeker of Wisdom in the thrall of Winter’s Solstice should consider their celebrations as a spiritual pilgrimage or even a quest, during which, through the disciplined use of the spiritual imagination, he or she may encounter one’s own truest self along the way and in communion with Spirit.
~ Montague Whitsel
(The Fires of Yule)
Years ago in therapy I learned that if one feels weird on a particular day for no apparent reason it is sometimes helpful to see if it is an anniversary of some event that has left unresolved feelings lurking around in the subconscious mind. I didn’t have to dig too far to figure it out… But after figuring it out I had to deal with the feelings of regret and sadness and the fact that some situations don’t lend themselves to being neatly settled once and for all. Collateral damage from my spiritual quest… But deepening my awareness of the world around me, and inside my head, has helped.
No kids around this year to decorate the Tree so Tim cut a small one and I decorated it myself. Tim’s been working 17 days straight and I’ve been trying out vegan holiday recipes for our Solstice Party. Still haven’t completely settled on a menu. And we’ll be going up to see Dad and Auntie for Christmas. So it will be a subdued holiday season, but that’s OK, I’m content with the blessings we have.
Earth is generous with her provisions, and her sustenance is very kind; she offers, for your table, food that requires no bloodshed and no slaughter.
~ Ovid
Honestly, I could live indefinitely on soy milk and cereal, and beans and rice. But husband Tim is a lover of great variety and hearty meals. I’m starting to realize that if I am going to have a vegetarian kitchen I am going to have to add a lot more to my repertoire to keep this guy reasonably satisfied.
Borders is or was going out of business and we found ourselves there browsing around for good deals on books. Looking over the cookbook selections I thought 1,000 Vegetarian Recipes by Carol Gelles sounded promising and started thumbing through it. It has won two awards, the Julia Child Cookbook Award and the James Beard Foundation Award for Excellence. Following my intuition about this one – sorry Dr. Ornish, but Tim was not at all thrilled with the recipes in your cookbook – I bought it and am so happy I did. So far, Tim has liked every recipe I’ve made from it! 🙂 Who knew there were so many ways to prepare eggplant? Or that eggplants and plums went well together in the same concoction?
A few days ago my friend Robin, over at Life in the Bogs, mentioned that she was becoming more of a vegetarian. I told her I was heading in the same direction and she recommended a book to me, The China Study: The Most Comprehensive Study of Nutrition Ever Conducted & The Startling Implications for Diet, Weight Loss & Long-term Health by T. Colin Campbell & Thomas M. Campbell. Well, thanks again to Kindle it didn’t take me long to finish this amazing book, which delves quite deeply into why animal protein is so unhealthy for us, even if it is humanely and organically raised. Our Western diets are primarily animal protein and this is probably the cause of many of what the authors call diseases of affluence – cardiovascular disease, hypertension, diabetes, obesity, cancer, dementia, osteoporosis, multiple sclerosis – the list goes on and on as he cites the China Study and many other scientific studies.
As it turns out, the diet that is good for us is also good for our little blue planet.
We plow under the habitats of other animals to grow hybrid corn that fattens our genetically engineered animals for slaughter. We make free species extinct and domestic species into bio-machines. We build cruelty into our diet.
~ Peter Singer & Jim Mason
(The Way We Eat)
It seems disingenuous for the intellectual elite of the first world to dwell on the subject of too many babies being born in the second- and third-world nations while virtually ignoring the over-population of cattle and the realities of a food chain that robs the poor of sustenance to feed the rich a steady diet of grain-fed meat.
~ Jeremy Rifkin
(Beyond Beef: The Rise & Fall of the Cattle Culture)
It’s going to take a lot of effort to become a vegan household, but I feel like I’ve got enough information now to help me keep this new commitment.