The Homeless Healer

While on our Sunday bicycle ride Rick and I stopped at a public beach pavilion. Picnic tables sat in rows waiting for the weekend onslaught of beach goers.  As we headed toward our favorite spot we noticed a woman at a table with a dingy bed roll, a bag of clothing and a cup of coffee. It was 8 am and she was barely awake. Giving her some privacy, we seated ourselves to rest, refuel and regroup.

We were having a conversation about some discomfort I was experiencing during the ride when I heard a voice coming from her direction. 

“Sleep with a pillow between your legs.”  she said.

“Oh, right,” I replied, “I had forgotten about that! Thanks!”

With little encouragement she began to suggest several exercises to alleviate the pain. She had information to share that would help me heal. She wanted to contribute. As we mounted our bicycles to continue our ride I thanked her profusely for pointing me in a proactive direction of healing.

She advised me to sleep with a pillow between my legs. But she had no pillow and she had no bed. Her kindness touched me and I realized that on the surface she could be judged as lazy, mentally ill or an addict. For all I knew she might be all of those things. But she was something else as well. She was a healer, a fallen angel gone off track for whatever reason, but her knowledge was just as helpful as any doctor could offer.

This generous healer reminded me that I should not judge a person by her or his appearance. We are all more than we appear to be.

Holding you in love and light,

Nora

Gratitude

This is the time of year where we are especially inundated with unrealistic images of perfection. Families are depicted gathered around the Thanksgiving table with gleaming smiles, adolescents are without acne or attitudes and Grandpa, sharp as ever, carves the golden brown turkey. Life is portrayed as a Norman Rockwell magazine cover. No one is hungry, no one is tired, love and thankfulness abound.

As I approached writing this entry I thought about my readers and concluded that most were the thoughtful and introspective kind who do not need to be reminded to be thankful during the holiday season. They were in tune with thankfulness even as they braced themselves for the Madison Avenue version.  I ditched gratitude as a topic for my blog and focused my thoughts elsewhere.  But all that changed last Saturday when a woman driving an SUV ran a stop sign.

It happened in an instant. In an instant our car was totaled, airbags deployed and seat belts put to the test. All functioned as expected and we miraculously walked away with minor bruises and scrapes.

Suddenly writing about thankfulness and gratitude seemed exactly what I needed to do. I now find myself in a celebration of gratitude for my body, my mind, my spirit.  I am filled with thankfulness for my family and the love I feel for them, for my husband and the children he brought into my life. I am grateful for my legs, my arms, my brain and for the sky above and the eyes to see it. I am rejoicing in happiness for my business and my clients. I am eternally thankful that "What could have happened" did not. I am thankful that I walked away from the accident and that the people I love so dearly did as well. Thankful that all immediate logistical problems could be solved with a little creativity and a bit of cash.

This Thanksgiving take some time to be grateful for what you have and be in appreciation of how precious this fragile life really is. Skip the sap if you will but spend some time with the message. Carve out some time to celebrate some aspect of life daily, I am.

I am deeply thankful for all that I have in this world, all that I share and all that has been given me. I rejoice in the abundance of life.