This blog covers an eclectic range of topics for information, fun, and all the ups and downs of life and always with the support of meditation. Dreams and ideas dance in our hearts and swirl on the wind. It’s just a pilgrim traveling across the universe on a planet orbiting a sun in the Milky Way Galaxy.
If I were to tell you, your essence is that which is held
inside the hollow bamboo.
If you lift that bamboo up and behold the sky,
where is the division between the vastness
and that which is you?
It is always One.
It is just that you begin
to perceive only the bamboo case.
You think that outer shell is you.
You need to move back to the hollowness,
to the emptiness, and in that moment,
You are the entire vast sky itself.
–Leslie Anneliese
Arrgggh, me matey, 'tis time to weigh anchor and sail into Vallejo, California.
We be joining a motley crew of pirates, swashbucklers and buccaneers. There be officers of the Royal Navy who claim to keep order 'round here and barmaids to keep us all happy with a bit of brew. We be going back in time to the high seas of piracy.
It's the Northern California Pirate Festival.
Arrgggh, me pirate matey, 'tis time fer a pirate gathering in the port of Vallejo.
Aye, ye be hearin' right. This gathering celebrates all things pirate and is an annual event in June.
This festival purports to be the largest pirate celebration in the country and 2015 marked their 9th year. Like any festival of this nature, there are food booths, shops and wares, music and entertainment and just plain relaxing. Here's my own little video.
Vallejo is an ideal venue for this event. Participants, excuse me, pirates benefit from the bay breeze that blows off the water. It cools many a pirate's brow as he lifts his tricorner hat.
If you're a fun-loving pirate who likes a good sword fight and to say argghhh, this is the place to be. You'll only feel out of place if you don't have anything of a pirate-nature hanging off of you.
Costume shops in town sell an inexpensive packaged pirate outfit like the one I bought some time back. I saw my outfit walking around on children and dads of all sizes. In this first picture you'll see me in the packaged costume. (The extras such as hat, belt, pistol and belaying pin are additional purchases.)
The downside of a mass-produced, lower-cost outfit is synthetic polyester material. Not particularly healthy to wear and it certainly doesn't breathe when you're baking under a Californian summer sun.
You arrived without a pirate outfit? Fear not. There are vendors on the premises happy to deck you out in period clothing, albeit for a pretty farthing.
Thanks to the plethora of vendors and booths, I updated my pirate outfit this year with a 100% cotton shirt and a gorgeous Hunter's vest. I also exchanged imitation gauntlets for leather ones.
While some complain that shopping makes the event too commercial, I find it convenient and helpful. I can't imagine it's easy to find high quality gauntlets at our local Target.
We're not talking only pirates here. The time period is the 1700s. Let's not forget those who chased after the pirates too. Members of the British Royal Navy delight us with their handsome uniforms; ladies of pleasure welcome one and all.
Speaking of ladies of pleasure: one thing you have to prepare yourself for is the sight of "heaving bosoms" as they are called in period writing. Some may think this is great, others not so much. Many costumes are historically accurate, including the bosom lifting corsets and laces.
How did I even get involved in pirate fun? Check out this post Talk Like A Pirate Day where I detail the beginning of my slide into the life of a pirate. It all started innocently enough when I worked at a hospital that celebrated this illustrious day.
You may be asking what does a Pirate Festival and a meditator have in common? It's all about taking the light with you wherever you go and whatever you do.
As I say in another post, "Aye, even a pirate can meditate."
It is all about harmless fun and dancing and learning about this period of history.
For those who share the love (or at least the idea) of the sea and swashbuckling, the Pirate Festival is like coming home, settling in where you belong amongst your mates.
Slip back in time and sharpen up yer sword skills.
Arrrgggh, me fine salty dog, will ye be joinin' me and me mateys as we stroll the fine decks of our mighty, glorious ships?
What say ye?
Permission to board is granted.
Set sails for adventure!
The Fourth of July is just around the corner. Holiday displays in the supermarkets are set up to tantalize shoppers with outdoor foods and drinks.
Isn't this a gorgeous American Flag Pie created by King Arthur Flour? I dream of creating it one day. It may remain a forever dream, but in the meantime, it's nice to see.
If you're willing to tackle this pie adventure, here is the recipe for the American Flag Pie, made with strawberries/rhubarb and blueberries.
Fourth of July in America.
Start your grills. Friends and family gather 'round for picnics and barbecues.
Grilled corn on-the-cob (with barbecue or herb butter), sizzling hamburgers and hot dogs are all de rigueur. Dedicated meat-eaters splurge on tri-tip beef. Vegetarians don't have to feel left out. Tofu burgers make a fine alternative.
Everything can go on the grill, not just meat. Vegetables and fruits also grill up pretty. A fun television show from The Food Network features recipes by Bobby Flay, the acclaimed grill master.
How about grilled peaches with cinnamon sugar butter? Sounds delicious, doesn't it? Click on the link for the recipe.
Summer picnic food on the menu:
Baked beans
Juicy watermelon
Chips and dip
Finger sandwiches
Fruit salads, and
Everyone's version of their famous potato salad
Family feuds have started over potato salad. Dill or sweet pickles? What brand of mayonnaise do you use?
People stand firmly entrenched in their mayonnaise camps:
1) Best Foods (west of the Rockies) or Hellmann's (east of the Rockies) – same company, same mayo, different name per regional distribution.
2) Duke's mayonnaise has Southern roots and is also found in some states further north.
3) Kraft mayonnaise has a nationwide distribution.
4) Dare I mention Miracle Whip? Some argue that it's not even mayonnaise, but Miracle Whip has a strong, if not beleaguered, following. Take a look at this Tumblr account that proclaims in a joking manner, Miracle Whip and Proud Of It. Miracle Whip was created in 1933 by Kraft as a less expensive alternative to mayonnaise.
Rest assured, never the twain shall meet. Each brand has a dedicated cult following.
Here's a fun tongue-in-cheek story for your amusement.
We are a Best Foods mayonnaise family. In our corner of Washington state, that's our mayo. For decades we remained true blue to Best Foods.
Recently, my sister returned home from an 18-month job assignment in Tennessee. She was living south of the Mason-Dixon Line and Duke's is the mayo of the South. She divulged that she had tried, and liked, Duke's mayonnaise.
To make matters worse, she had the audacity to bring jars of Duke's mayo home with her. Even her husband was perplexed when he saw the alien mayo jars in her bags.
Oh, the shock. This was akin to heresy. My own sister, cheating on Best Foods. She admitted feeling a little guilty about it.
After her heartfelt confession, we welcomed her back into the fold. She was home again in familiar territory and surrounded by Best Foods. Let bygones be bygones.
And then, our nephew ordered a big jar of Duke's mayonnaise from Amazon and sent it to my sister as a birthday present.
The saga continues...
The Fourth of July is dedicated to picnics and summer fun, such as swimming, boating, hiking, and, not to be forgotten, naps in a hammock. It's a holiday, so some healthy relaxation is included on the menu. Reading a book in a hammock rates high on my list.
Does all this food talk make you hungry?
I know I'm ready to treat myself to potato salad and other picnic delights.
Let's raise a fork and a patriotic spiral cookie in honor of the United States of America.
I'll see you at the picnic.
"You need a biopsy, Tara," the pulmonologist advised as he fiddled with his mouse to bring up the CT scan on his computer.
"Yes, a biopsy" he repeated, focusing on the flat screen. "The nodule in your lung has gotten bigger in the last three months." Clicking on the mouse, he enlarged one area of the black and white image. "See," he pointed to the offending nodule, "the ground glass aspect has a solid component in it now, measuring 5 by 7 millimeters."
An abdominal CT scan that itself was normal, turned up an incidental finding of pulmonary nodules. Incidental findings. Things you weren't looking for, but found nonetheless, and now required that you follow up.
They both stared at the follow-up scan that showed "significant interval growth" in just three short months. Localized to the right middle lobe of the lung.
A lung biopsy.
A long needle pushed through your chest wall to gather tissue from deep inside. Not a simple venous puncture.
The overshadowing and unspoken fear? Lung cancer.
The frustrating part? She was a lifetime non-smoker.
Risks of the procedure?
"Well, the usual," he intoned. "Infection, but that's unlikely." Right. Any time something punctures your skin and digs into your body, you have a risk of infection.
"And a collapsed lung," then he quickly added, "but that really is unlikely. You're strong and healthy, Tara. It's not like you have COPD."
Tara wasn't feeling terribly strong or healthy at the moment. Her gaze fell on the lump of her black purse sitting on the floor beside her. She really needed to replace that. She had promised herself she would buy one that wasn't black, now that she was free to have any color that tickled her fancy.
With retirement finally reached a month ago, she dreamed of a new purse that wasn't "regulation." She hadn't gotten around to that yet.
And in the unlikely chance it happened? A collapsed lung? What then? She pictured herself positioned on the CT scan machine, lying on her side in the midst of the biopsy, suddenly unable to breathe.
"Don't worry, we'll fix that," he stated as a matter of fact. "We'll insert a chest tube and admit you to the ICU to give your lung time to reinflate."
Tara had to smile to herself. Medicine is so linear and mechanical. If we break it, we'll fix it and if we break it again, we'll fix that too. Because that's what we do in medicine. We fix things.
For all the frustrations with reductionism in medicine, there are wonderful aspects. Broken bones that could handicap us for life are carefully mended with the use of ultrasounds. High blood pressures that could slam our hearts to a crashing halt are coaxed down to reasonable levels with pills.
Medicine puts us back together, extends our lives, makes us prettier.
Medicine also finds incidental things, especially with the myriad scans, x-rays and ultrasounds that we order.
Sometimes, that's a blessing. We find something, we take care of it right away.
Other times, it's nothing and off we run on a wild goose chase.
It was possible it was only inflammation. That's what her radiology report said, "inflammation versus malignancy."
She would need to hold space in her meditations for this one.
Tara was clear that her meditation didn't guarantee a rosy outcome. Still, the inner support comforted her. It was hard to explain. Unlike medicine, the richness of the support accessed was not linear or mechanical.
She supposed she could choose to do nothing and let nature take its course, whatever that may be. Cancer or not. Maybe this was the end of the ride. How do you know when it's time to say goodbye?
Taking a deep breath, she looked down and placed one hand in her heart for clarity with her choice. When she looked up, their eyes locked, and she nodded consent to the biopsy.
For some reason, not any particular one she could identify, today was not the day to do nothing.
"We'll find out what those cells are up to," he nodded back for emphasis.
"Alright," Tara whispered when she added a final pen stroke to her signature on the consent form, "Let's do this."
We're munching on almonds and beating them into milk and cheese. Almond growers couldn't be happier. Some people also feel happy that they're not using cow's milk. They consider almond milk to be vegan.
However, the definition of vegan is not eating any animal product or using any by-product. This includes wearing silk made by silkworms and honey made by honey bees.
“To me, saying I’m vegan is synonymous with saying,
I have decided to live a lifestyle that does not support animal exploitation.”
Without honey bees, we wouldn't have almond milk. The only way our vast almond groves exist and the millions of pollinated flowers become crunchy tidbits is because we enlist the massive workforce of our honey bees.
LOTS of honey bees.
You've probably seen the ads for California Almonds. All that advertising by California almond growers is paying off.
The majority of almonds are grown in California. They provide more than 80% of the world's almond harvest.
California almond groves cover more than 900,000 acres. Plans are being made to expand even further.
Almond trees are not self-pollinating; honey bees provide the missing link.
We don't have enough honey bees in California to pollinate all of these almond orchards. Every year, nearly 85% of ALL beehives in the United States are trucked to California to pollinate the state's almond crop.
More than one million beehives (not bees, beehives) travel to California every year from as far away as Maine. Honey bees provide pollination for the almond crop in February and early March.
Shipping honey bees around the country is not particularly beneficial to them. Traveling the entire length of the United States on trucks with hives wrapped in saran wrap is stressful. It can weaken their immune systems.
When honey bees gather together from around the country, they bring their local viruses and pathogens. Not all the little bees make it back to their own hives, and thus, germs and diseases are shared.
“The migration continually boomerangs honeybees between times of plenty and borderline starvation. Once a particular bloom is over, the bees have nothing to eat, because there is only that one pollen-depleted crop as far as the eye can see.
When on the road, bees cannot forage or defecate. And the sugar syrup and pollen patties beekeepers offer as compensation are not nearly as nutritious as pollen and nectar from wild plants.
Scientists have a good understanding of the macronutrients in pollen such as protein, fat and carbohydrate, but know very little about its many micronutrients such as vitamins, metals and minerals — so replicating pollen is difficult.”
The road trip itself is not necessarily a safe one. A semi-truck loaded with beehives crashed on I-5 in Washington State. Clean-up crews killed nearly all the bees.
Out of 448 beehives only 128 were rescued. This doesn't help our declining bee population. Perhaps if they had not been on the road in the first place. From this article: Almonds Require A Ton of Bees:
Large mono-crops provide an ideal habitat for pests like fungi and insects and thus, the almond growers have a strong incentive to use pesticides and chemicals. There was an uproar from beekeepers when a massive die-out of the honey bees took place in 2014 – beekeepers thought almond growers had used too many pesticides.
Some have asked why we don't just add more beehives into California.
“California is already home to 500,000 of the nation’s 2.7 million hives. The almond bloom is great for a few weeks, but not in terms of year-round foraging,
California is already at or near its carrying capacity for honey bees. The areas with the best-quality forage are already well stocked with bees.
So, satisfying the world’s ever-growing appetite for almonds will continue to require an annual armada of beehive-laden trucks.”
No one is saying that we do away with almonds. Who doesn't enjoy a toasted, salted almond? Who can resist the lure of a delicate macaron?
No one is suggesting that we do away with honey bees or honey.
We need to raise awareness that literally millions upon millions of honey bees give us all these almonds. We must find ways to support them.
There are ways that we can help the situation and our honey bees. We simply have to choose to do so.
At the personal level: buy local. Support small businesses of beekeepers and buy local, organic honey. Not only are you getting fresh, unadulterated honey, you also benefit from the local pollens.
Amongst the thousands of crop acres, we could restore portions of acreage with natural, bee-friendly habitat. This would favor native pollinators as well as honey bees.
The idea is to plant varied types of wildflowers in different areas for bees to have more places to forage and nest. With a robust population of native bees and pollinators, the amount of honey bees required could potentially be cut in half.
Although, bear in mind, beekeepers currently make more profit from pollination services than they do from honey sales. This idea could be met with resistance from the beekeepers themselves.
irrigation ditch, california. ap photo/jae c. hong
Given California's recurring drought situation, it is worth noting that almond crops are one of the highest water consumers. It takes about a gallon of water for one almond.
“There is little dispute that almonds are among the thirstiest crops in California. Almond trees require about 4 acre-feet of water a year for every acre planted.
Tomatoes and grapes take about half as much water...”
Furthermore, almond orchards are continual crops and must be watered throughout the year. Almond trees don't have the option to lie fallow during the off-season.
There is nothing we do that doesn't touch everything. We are all connected together. The idea of separation is a simple delusion. It's not our greater truth.
With each breath we take, we touch a vibration that connects us all, all the time, wherever we are, whether we are conscious of it or not.
This article Why California Almonds Need North Dakota Flowers (And A Few Billion Bees) describes the interconnection of our bees, orchards and wild flowers.
It’s important to support local beekeepers. We need to continue to bring awareness about the almond groves and the growers as well as making sure that policy-makers make decisions and policies that are responsible and caring.
We can have both almonds and honey, but let's do so with awareness and responsible caretaking.
We may, however, want to rethink the idea that almond milk is vegan.
“One in-breath alone is enough to set you free – from your regrets about the past, your worries about the future, and your projects in the present.
In that state of freedom, you will make better decisions.
Next time you have to make a decision, be sure to breathe in and out first.”
We breathe. All day, all night.
Gratefully, we don't have to think about it. If it required our conscious thought, we'd all be dead by now, having let it lapse at least somewhere during a day of activity, racing to work, getting a cup of coffee, avoiding a traffic jam. Never mind trying to consciously breathe while we sleep.
Our breath is simply there, or we can choose to shine our awareness on it. As quoted above, our breath is a key to our awakening, a deeper awareness.
Our breath is precious. It's the first thing that connects us to this earth at our birth. We can be born, but without the invisible cord of our breath that ties us to this earth, we won't be able to stay.
When I first started working in Labor and Delivery, I felt sad when the newborns cried. That is, until I realized how deeply healthy it was when their lungs filled with air and they proclaimed their entrance onto this planet with a loud cry. My heart dropped to the floor when a delivery remained in frightening silence as we scrambled to save a little one.
I learned to love the cry of a newborn infant. Hearing it, I knew, at least for that moment, all was right with the world.
As our lives march on, sometimes our breathing becomes shallow and tight. Sometimes we hold our breath.
While performing a medical procedure, we often tell our patients to breathe.
"Breathe, don't hold your breath."
Breathing with the discomfort carries us through the procedure.
Breathe in, breathe out – with awareness.
Follow your breath and let the breath set you free.
“Meditation cannot be a fragmented thing.
It should be a continuous effort. Every moment one has to be alert, aware and meditative. But the mind has played a trick. You meditate in the morning and then you put it aside. Or you pray in the temple and then forget it.
Then you come back to the world, completely unmeditative, unconscious, as if walking in a hypnotic sleep. This fragmented effort won’t do much.
Consciousness is a continuum. It is like a river, flowing constantly. If you are meditative the whole day, every moment of it – and only when you are meditative the whole day – the flowering will come to you.”
Does this happen to you? You meditate in the morning, then you jump up to get ready for work and off you run into your busy day.
The next time you connect to mindfulness or meditation is in the evening when you get home.
Oops. What happened during the rest of the day?
In the beginning of our journey, it's not uncommon that we "pop in and out" of a deeper awareness. It can be a challenge to bring the awareness from our meditations into our minute-to-minute lives that are stuffed full of outer activities.
Even if our goal is to have less busy-ness, sometimes we don't have a choice. Work demands gobble up our days and time-consuming obligations take us further away from our own center point.
Whenever you remember, bring yourself back to the awareness. Don't beat yourself up over forgetting. It's okay. It's part of the path in our personal growth.
Once you have studied The Radiance Technique® (TRT®), you are able to use TRT® hands-on throughout your day. TRT® enhances your dedicated meditations and also benefits and expands your awareness throughout your busy days.
You can integrate mindfulness into your daily life, such as when you get ready for work, while you are at work, watching tv at home, whatever you may be doing. It's effortless with the use of your TRT® hands-on, for example, with just one hand placed in a position in the midst of talking, walking or in a meeting.
Integrating TRT® into your daily life doesn't make more work for you. It doesn't require extra effort. It's easy to blend your TRT® hands-on into daily activities; TRT® makes it simple to bring increased awareness to all you do.
The more you practice, the less separation there is.
Allowing you to expand your knowingness of wholeness and to be in touch with the continuum of consciousness.
Radiant Nursing - Caring for Yourself, Caring for Others. Offering classes in The Radiance Technique® with Authorized Instructor, Leslie Anneliese.
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