Life seemed so simple when I grew up, there was a code of conduct and rules that we lived by, they were just common sense. Here are the ones I remember that had a lasting impact on me.
Remember your P’s and Q’s (please and thank you)
We are NOT heating/cooling the outside world (reference to leaving doors open)
Stop crying or I will give you something to cry about
Idle time is a devil’s workshop
Clean your plate! There are starving people in the world.
What did YOU do? In reference to any time, you complained about other kids or what others did
Just because everyone else does, does that mean you have to do the same? If they jumped off a bridge, would you?
Because I said so!
If you can’t say anything nice, don’t say anything at all.
Doesn’t leave much to the imagination! (In reference to skimpy revealing clothes)
Golden Rule: Do unto others as you would have them do unto you
I grew up in a time and in a home where these were the lessons and the house rules. Most of these were from my parents and grandparents. They definitely formed me into the adult I am today.
Recently we met our friends Audrey and Art for breakfast on the day after Easter. We always enjoy getting together with them. During breakfast Audrey mentioned that her daughter calls her every day just to chat and catch up. When she can’t get her mother on the phone, she calls Art. Last summer when the four of us were out to dinner her daughter and boyfriend met up with us. Audrey wanted me to meet them. Our friends live in Maryland but frequent their beach house here in Delaware. Their home is perfect for when Audrey’s daughter comes to visit as they have their own private place in their home to stay. Although the daughter lives in Colorado and far from her mom, she makes the effort to stay close. All I could say and think when Audrey shared the frequent phones calls was “that is a good daughter!”
Then I started thinking about my friend Carole who passed away a few years ago and the loving mother-daughter relationship she had with her daughter Kathleen. You couldn’t be Carole’s friend without knowing and meeting Kathleen. They loved being together as they traveled together, shopped together, dined together and vacationed together. When Carole passed Kathleen said, “she was my mother, she was my best friend, and most of all we just had so much fun together!” how wonderful is that? One of the greatest gifts Carole left me is the ongoing friendship we have with her daughter and granddaughter. Kathleen is definitely the definition of “the good daughter.” And I know for a fact just how proud and how much love Carole had for Kathleen.
Then there is my neighbor Diane who recently had surgery that required a long recovery period. Her daughter came from out of state and stayed a few weeks to help her mother during her time of healing from the surgery. Diane wanted us to meet and when we did, I asked, “how long will you be staying?” Her response was “a month” and her mother was like maybe two weeks, not because she didn’t want her daughter’s company but rather that she didn’t want to disrupt her life for that long a period of time. We watched the care, concern, dog walking and more that Diane’s daughter was happy to provide to her mom. Again, another definition of what a “good daughter” looks like.
I don’t believe that moms ever expect to be on the receiving end when it comes to their daughters as most moms just want to give rather than receive. But how wonderful to witness up close and personal the loving good daughters many of my friends have and I am so thankful for the stories they share and bringing me in to witness so much love between mother and daughter.
So today we lift up all the good daughters out there as they truly are the greatest gift to their mom.
Writers whether they are poets, song writers, authors, bloggers, journalists and more have something to say. Typically, they are “observers of life” and take in, process and then write about it. You have to be motivated but most important is that desire to express yourself.
Over the holidays one of my favorite young people came to visit and she asked; “Have you been writing?” my immediate and rapid response was, “no, I have nothing new to say.” I have definitely been in an observation and reflective mode. I see things, the news, people acting this way or that and I shrug and often think how bad it must feel to live with such angst, most notably about politics.
The other part as you age is choosing your words or your ventures with discernment, do I want to step into that? Many times, I don’t, because I have cared so deeply for so long about so many people, places and things and at this stage of life (retirement) and in a healthy way, I don’t care. I preserve my happiness and my peace.
What I have given much thought to is how grateful and how blessed I am, how much life I have lived and how what is ahead I look forward to … I have ticked off just a few of my biggest accomplishments and here are a few 1) my loving and long-term marriage of 33 years 2) raising millions and millions of dollars for several non-profits, most notably underserved minority children 3) building a beach house after purchasing a lot of land 4) raising three children of which two were adopted 5) surviving abusive and toxic relationships and managing to maintain a loving and peaceful heart and 6) my books that were published and my many articles and blogs 7) connecting with my friends, family and my many readers and 8) most important and life-sustaining is my relationship to Jesus Christ My Savior.
I am blessed … my life began in a small town in Northeastern Pennsylvania as one of five girls. My childhood was filled with angst and upheaval that often left me nervous and anxious. My parents married each other twice and divorced each other twice, that is only one part of my story. We moved a lot. I was insecure and anxiety ridden as a child. I couldn’t wait to escape it. I married young at 19, got pregnant at 20, had my child just three days after 21 and my husband died when I was just 23. Lots of life for such a young woman. All of these life circumstances I have processed thoroughly and am so happy to be on the other side of it. I am richer for all my many life experiences.
When I was just 26 years old, I purchased my first home as a single mom after becoming a Realtor. Another accomplishment for me to be “successful” I was driven!
Last March we retired to our beach house, I have enjoyed so much reflective time. Some travels but mostly getting to know and love myself again. This time not for all my so called “accomplishments” but for coming out the other side, a place of love and of peace.
A few days ago, I read this, “What if your markers of success were how well you slept at night? How many books you read? How easily you laughed? How much time you spent storytelling, feeling warm in the arms and homes of people you adore?” It hit me! This is my life now, retired and living with my handsome hubby Brian, our two precious pooches, at our beach home! Life is good/great!
Right now, our two pups are at the groomers, and we are getting ready to enjoy lunch out at one of our favorite eateries? Simple pleasures living a simple and happy life – as my husband often says, “We earned it!’
Living Learning Loving Losing By Bernadette A. Moyer
Living, learning, loving and losing, what else is there and what else really matters?
It seems like these four words could sum up life … and/or at least be a pretty good road map for a good and rich life.
We live and do the best we can with what we know, we learn or we die, learning keeps us alive and is the breath of life. Loving, what else really makes life worth living but loving, having the ability and the capacity to both give love and to receive love? And losing where so often it is in losing that we learn our biggest lessons. The lessons that both mold us and stay with us.
Living, learning, loving and losing might also be periods of our life or seasons of life. The periods and seasons that can and may overlap too.
So I guess my questions to you my readers are what are you living for, what is defining your life right now?
And what are you learning? What is adding to your growth and development and bringing the necessary oxygen to your life?
Loving probably the greatest gift of them all, what are you loving? Who are you loving and what and who is loving you?
Losing is probably the one that we try and run from the most but the truth is losing is about living, learning and loving and making room for what is about to come next …
Each experience comes down to, what will we do with it? How will we perceive it? Will we see it for what it is or try and make more or less of it? In the end will we take and appreciate the gifts and leave the rest behind?
Happy living, learning, loving and losing, as each affords us new and different life experience, challenges and riches.
There are so many life lessons that are learned in the garden. Some are so simplistic and others much more complex. Like a flower that needs lots of water and sunlight and another variety that does better in shade and dry soil. Each flower, each planting has its own specific needs.
We learn how water and sun create some of the most beautiful green plants. We learn that a specific growth in a planting is a result or more and sometimes less amounts of acidic soil. The garden teaches us the importance of cutting back and weeding. Some of us talk to our plants, after all they are living things.
Each year I marvel at the plants that naturally return every season and the ones that I start new from seeds. Each plant and flower tell us their own story. Depending on the time of day and the time of year each plant has a different look.
I grew up on a small farm in Northeast Pennsylvania that was once an orchard. That farm taught me about fruited trees and growing food such as tomatoes, potatoes and more. To be a good gardener you have to be a good nurturer and in touch with different types of plants, their needs and requirements for their very survival and existence.
Roses can be tricky they require lots of water and sunlight and they are also magnets for disease and leaf eating insects. It can be a delicate balancing act and yet every year when they are cut back and survive a cold harsh winter, it can be amazing to witness them return to life in the spring.
There are so many life lessons that we learn in our gardens. Every plant is a living thing that requires different kinds of care, much like the people in our lives. People and relationships that thrive and survive under different care, nurturing and circumstance. Others like our flowers and plantings that just don’t survive and thrive at all.
Our gardens are a place where we learn many valuable life lessons just like we are afforded in all of our relationships. What works for one might not work for all. Some of my fruits and vegetables are attacked by animals and never make it to maturity. We see that happen in life too. Where a life is altered and changed by others that it encountered along the way.
I find peace, love and joy in my garden just like what I seek out in all my relationships. Like a garden that needs love, light and to be nurtured so do the relationships that we hold near and dear.
There comes a day when you learn that letting go is so much healthier than hanging on. That love can be and is the best gift and best medicine for most all that ails us.
That laughter releases the negatives and soothes the soul and that you listen and see and hear and yet never feel the desire to speak. And then comes the day when just like your garden, that changes daily, weekly and with each season, so too have you changed.
Then comes a day when you accept and embrace the flaws within yourself and in others and you come to that place of peace where there is nothing that you are willing to engage in, if it isn’t love or coming from a truth based place of love.
Then there comes a day when you find all the joy, love and peace within your own heart and soul. Rather than seeking out others to fill your own voids.
There comes a day when you are content with little and lots just looks like more to manage. There comes a day when you realize that enough, truly is enough.
There comes a day when you are in alignment with your own heart and centered enough to know who and what you are all about, that nothing other people do or say is about you. It never was or will be about you, but rather all about them.
There comes a day when you are free and understand what freedom means, what it really is and brings with it and places upon us.
There comes a day … when we finally trust enough to let go and let God lead us and we know that there was never a need for control or fear or anxiety.
No one wants to be that person, the one who gets left behind. Sooner or later we all have that experience and it never feels good. Whether we are left by choice, by divorce or by death, being left behind is hard and it is a scary feeling.
We build our lives with others, we have friends, we have families and we have our pets. When they leave and we are left behind we feel that void. That special place they once held now is an open space.
Our bichon Chipper is grieving his sister Happy who passed over just a few weeks ago. We have never heard such deep intense cries from him in all our seven years with him.
Every time when of our children grew up and left home, we almost immediately replaced them with a furry baby. Each dog has held our heart much like our young children once did, today we grieve Happy. It drives home again, that feeling of being left.
Yet with Happy is was a soft pain and loss because we have so many happy memories with her. She was just so easy to care for and to love. It was natural.
“Those we love never truly leave us, Harry. There are things that death cannot touch.” – Jack Thorne, Harry Potter and the Cursed Child
From day one my husband Brian and I acknowledged that one of us would be “widowed” again, one of us would know that feeling again … that feeling of being left behind. We do everything in our power to honor all the time that we share together by living our best life and living it as centered and honest as possible.
So many people live within us… we remember … we grieve… we rejoice …we are better for having known them and loved them …
Each of us finds that day when we move past the loss … past the grief … and truly celebrate what once was and what was once shared. We learn once again that life is for the living and that we must live it!
“If you focus on what you left behind, you will never see what lies ahead.” – Gusteau, Ratatouille
On June 14, 2018 we had no choice but to put our most precious Bichon Frise Happy down. She was in kidney failure and suffering. It was the day before she was scheduled for surgery. It would have been her third surgery for removing bladder stones. The bladder stones never really went away.
Happy was a heart stealer, anyone and everyone took to her. She was regal and intense and sweet. She had a mind of her own, she let you know what she needed and wanted. When you pay attention you really can connect and communicate with an animal.
From the day that we brought her home she was a family member, she was our child, she was our baby. We loved her, we took care of her and we protected her. Happy was smart, she was tuned in and she was sensitive. On a rare occasion if we corrected her, she immediately responded with affirmation of a lick or cuddling up. She always seemed to understand us and we felt that we understood her too.
Happy traveled with us, slept with us, ate dinner with us and was that family member that was always so easy to be with. We joke that we preferred her company over some people that we knew. She was pure delight.
Love is ongoing and a learning experience, we learn to love and we learn to give love and to receive love. Happy was one of our best teachers, as she was easy to love and she freely loved us all in return. The exchange of unconditional love is what we will miss the most. She never failed to greet us with kisses and expressions of happiness to see us.
Happy was a pure bred Bichon Frise and named after our first Bichon Happy, her full given name was Happy Again and that was exactly how she made us feel, we delighted in her, she brought us so much joy and so much genuine love. Real love where you give and you give and it is all given without any expectations.
Our hearts are broken, we are beyond tears, but we know that heaven has a new angel and we know that because of Happy we are better people, who learned to love better and to love deeper and to love without any conditions.
But we are also at peace, we are at peace because we know that we all shared in a good and meaningful and loving exchanges of life and living life. What more could we really have asked for?
We let her physical being go in love because we knew there really was no other choice, but Happy Again will live forever in our hearts, in our memories and in our prayers.
We love you Happy and we already feel the void of the gift of you, the gift of your presence in our lives … RIP sweet baby girl!
Bernadette A. Sahm 