The love inside, you take it with you.

My living room smells like banana boxes. Which, surprisingly, smell the same as apple boxes. Must be the fruit/cardboard combination, slightly earthy with just a hint of sweetness. It's a smell I associate with moving.

Years ago, I discovered that fruit boxes are the best and most economical way to move my schtuff from town to town. That came after ruling out liquor stores, which are generous with their boxes, but these tend to be odd shapes and sizes and never have tops. In Georgia, the grocery chain I found most generous with boxes, is Kroger. In California, it was Vons. They're always very gracious and will even save them from the recycler for you if you ask.

They rarely turn lose of banana boxes. I forget why. But, the Kroger in Dawsonville had stacks and stacks, so I brought home six, all that would fit in my cart and my car. Nothing like a crazy lady pushing a cart of boxes stacked higher than her head, maneuvering the randomly placed middle displays of fruit, bread and flowers. We needed a red light at one of those intersections, but a woman driving a motorized cart yielded to the crazy lady. It is a befuddlement to me why the powers that be arrange those sections so haphazardly.

When I got home I tossed the boxes on the front porch. Last I'd looked there was no rain in the forecast for days and days. And I was starving. It was close to 8:00 and I was coming off a sugar crash. Remember my no sugar, no bread? That lasted for almost two weeks before going by the wayside...along with my daily walk. Today, I'm starting again. I promise.

This morning I woke to raindrops falling a mere foot from my head. I lay there, smiling, enjoying the melody, then pulled back the blinds to peek and prayed that it would rain hard enough and long enough to wash the pollen of a quadrillion oaks, pines and cherry trees and a gajillion grasses away.

Rising, I put water on for my tea, opened the blinds to let in the lovely rainy day and saw Seven, our landlord's cat sitting on the porch in the rain, waiting for breakfast. When I opened the door to feed him, he ran in and Bugsy ran out. And I saw my glorious banana boxes, soaking up the rain. Operation rescue ensued, first the boxes (which are hardy and drying and smelling up my living room), then the shop vac that Randy keeps forgetting to take back to work.

Satisfied that my work, for the moment, was done, I sat in the ancient armchair with my tea, wrapped in the soft fleece jacket Carolyn gave me for Christmas, gazing out the window at God's handiwork. My world has turned green, even the white oak which seemed so hesitant at first, coaxed out of its bark by the warm spring sun. Soon, my vista will change. This weekend in fact. I wondered if my landlord would let me come by occasionally, to sit on the back steps, soak up the view and pet Seven. I just might ask.

As I type, the soft rain grows heavier, soothing my senses and sating my soul. The ocean does that. The susurration of the wind in the pines. My cat's purrs. The mockingbird's song. I love yous. Even thunder clapping and rolling. These all transform me, make me whole.

I am learning so much from my self-imposed exile, growing in leaps and bounds. About who I am. Who I'm not. What matters. What doesn't. I shared, long ago, about the light at the end of the tunnel, and having found it. I am now finding that there is more light, within that light, if one is willing to look. As a seeker, I must. I have no choice.

Freedom comes with knowing my self. Freedom to be who I am and who I'm not. Freedom to just be, without worrying about what you might think about that. I'm discovering it's not your judgments that haunt me, or harm me. It's my own

The stories I'm told, and the ones I make up, keep me running. It is these that keep knocking me to the ground. Always, eventually, I come back to the truth. I am not lost, I am found. I am safe, submerged in the stillness of Self, I've come home to the sanctity of my soul. Because nothing is real but love.

This brings to mind Sam's closing line in Ghost, "It's amazing Molly. The love inside, you take it with you." I had to go find it, and share.



Rest in Peace, Patrick Swayze. And Rest in Peace to my dear Aunt Aggie, who passed in to the light this past Saturday, April 17, 2010 at about 4:25 p.m. EDT. My cousins are laying her to rest today, on top of my Uncle Dick. Guess she got the last word. Or at least she came out on top.

I had the high privilege of telling her goodbye on Friday, before she entered a blessed morphine-induced peace. She was ready to go. And promised to give my Mama a hug for me. Aunt Aggie, I love you. Goodbye. For now...

Pictures from top to bottom: freshly fetched banana boxes, after drying out; Seven and Bugsy, caught yesterday, sleeping in the sun...born on different coasts, these two could be brothers; a close up shot of the rising sun shining through the trees outside our dining room window; a youtube clip from Ghost.