Seize the Cabernet

There is a bit of gratitude for my inability to remember some of the more traumatic events which have shaped my life.  Every now and then, though, those little flashes of remembrance sneak up and wreck you like an instant replay of an accident caught on film.  And you live it over and over again.


It has been both my pleasure and my curse in this life, to be a loving and generous person.  What a gift to learn that you have made a difference in the life of another.  Of course some of the things that I've given were probably not perceived as gifts, but emotional and spiritual maturity has shown me that it's all fine.  It's all for the good.  And for those things, I honor the pain that I inflicted with my remorse, my caring and my love.

I wish I could pinpoint the minute that my AHA! bell went off and I realized that loving too much is not loving at all.  This is a lesson that I had to learn not only once, but over and over, and it had to be in a degree that burned my soul and melted my heart.  And it finally did.  I couldn't tell you if it was one particular thing or the culmination of them all, but I learned that love must be freely received as it is given, to be good love.

Today is the birthday of a friend whom I love. At no time in our relationship was there ever a definition of what we were.  We were.  Plain and simple.  That did not stop me from wishing for something more though.  Maybe... with space and time... maybe.  But today is his birthday.  I bought him a sweet bottle of wine that I was going to give him when he fit me in to his busy life.  Laying in bed this morning I made  all kinds of reasons to be understanding for what he is going through.  After all, when it's good, it's so very good.  AND  I can give him the wine the next time I see him...you know... when he feels like it.

It was a sweet day in a lot of ways, some surprising, and some predictable.  Sitting here on my gorgeous patio, sipping some truly delicious wine; the pine trees' typical whispers are bellowing a beautiful song to me in a volume that drowns my trivial thoughts and beliefs.

This blessed sip of life is to drink.

There is but one truth that I have yet to live and it is scribed most accurately by my hero, Henry David Thoreau, "As if you could kill time without injuring eternity."  


So as I sip this delicious bottle of birthday wine I do so knowing that it is truly time to live- for me.  Carpe Diem.