The End of Days

With the anniversary of 9/11, my mind turns back to the state our world is in. Nothing has happened since that would make me change my mind. We lost our innocence on 9/11 and like the genie, can not be put back in the bottle.


The End Of Days

This was written in September 2002, in response to the predictions of total anarchy, the end of life on Earth and even the end of the Earth itself. People were stockpiling food, clothing, tools, weapons, anything they could imagine needing when they woke up tomorrow to utter destruction.
One of the first prophecies of the end times came from Nostradamus and had to do with the Jews going home, which they did a number of years ago. The Middle East has not settled down since. Another of his prophecies had to do with the mark of the beast on the forehead of a world leader, and was interpreted to mean the birthmark on Gorbachev’s head. Much was written about the bear and the eagle, possibly referring to Russia and the U. S., or perhaps China.
Even the book of Revelation in the Christian Bible referred to the end times in graphic detail. More of these prophecies are coming true with each passing day, the end of the world as we know it is more and more certain. Operation Desert Storm brought us closer to the end as did the American declaration of war on terrorism.
Iraq is heating up. India and Pakistan are at the ready and both have nuclear weapons, in part, thanks to Canada giving freely of our technology to make nuclear reactors to generate electric power. China is ominously silent. Both nuclear and chemical weapons exist in abundance. The ability to deliver such weapons anywhere in the world is an accepted fact.
The attack on the U.S. September 11th last year signalled the end of innocence and freedom as we know it. More and more freedoms are being taken away in the name of safety and the populace is accepting gladly these changes. The world economy is shaken to its very roots. The U.S. economy is heading for a very real, very drastic upheaval as the bills for the aftermath of 9/11 come due. The Japanese economy teeters on the brink. Even here at home, we lose services at a steady rate without making any real dent in the national debt. More of the world’s population slips below the poverty line every day. Starvation is no longer a Third World prerogative. It is happening right here at home.
Everywhere there are predictions of dire events, global warming, untreatable disease, floods, droughts, famine, earthquakes, destruction of our environment at an incredible rate, holes in the ozone layer, extinction of more and more species of both plant and animal life before they can even be catalogued.
I think it is obvious that if we do not succeed in wiping ourselves off the face of the earth, Gaea will have a flea bath and certainly reduce the number of Earth’s inhabitants drastically.
There is truly no way to prepare for what is to come. Because the course of history is cyclic, civilizations rising and falling, going all the way back to the decimation of the dinosaurs, Atlantis, Egypt, Athens, Pompeii, Rome, the Biblical Flood (a version of which exists in all religious histories), the European Dark Ages, the British Empire, the Russian Tsars, and now the USSR, Aztecs, Incas, and the list goes on, Life itself is in an eternal spiral of becoming, such that with every turn of the wheel, civilizations fall, but with something left over to begin again with, I believe our emphasis must be not on saving life, but on saving souls. Death, is the eventual outcome of all births, and as we know, death is simply a rebirth on another level. Panic is not called for; we are simply living in the end times of another civilization.
Because it has become truly a Global Village, we are much more aware of what is happening than in the past, which means that the general populace is privy to much more “News” than even twenty years ago. I am not sure I would want to survive, at my age, to greet a “Brave New World” where living simply is a must, with no medical services, no system of care for the elderly nor any of the modern conveniences that make life easier as we age. I believe that is the job of the young. There will certainly be survivors to repopulate the world and start the cycle once more. It would be hoped that these survivors would be much more spiritually aware than past generations.
Perhaps our responsibility lies in trying to make for a more enlightened populace. People are definitely searching for answers, for a better way, for connection with the Divine, the Creator, the Cosmic All. That is why so many Eastern Religions have taken hold in the West, among them Buddhism, Baha’i, Hare Krishna, Transcendentalism, Wicca, Native Medicine, Spiritualism, and any number of fakes allying themselves with the New Age movement. I see our role as one of bringing light to the dark recesses of the human condition, in all possible ways.

Hurricane Aftermath

Current hurricanes and events discussed recently in a news group sent my mind back over the past few years. As I looked back, tears filled my eyes and dread still fills my heart. This article has not lost it's meaning. In fact, the situation becomes more urgent every day. We all must do all we can to curb the current trends.

Hurricane Katrinas Aftermath

This was written after Hurricane Katrina, with all the attendant destruction and loss of life. In the case of Hurricane Katrina, the lack of early response and the attendant suffering and deaths make it very hard to come to grips with.

There is an old saying that power corrupts, and absolute power corrupts absolutely. There are no psychological profile tests given to the leaders we elect. We only learn the truth of their strengths and weaknesses after a catastrophe of such magnitude. Perhaps part of the blame for this is the Pollyanna attitude that “it will never happen to me”. Well, it can happen to anyone and is happening more and more everywhere. Last month, six commercial airplanes fell from the sky. There have been fires, floods, disease and all sorts of natural disasters piled on top of wars, political actions, rebellions and just plain anarchy.

I believe the world as we knew it ended on 9/11. Our innocence was lost, not to be regained. Until we stop ravaging our earth, the catastrophes will not stop. Until we use better judgment in our elected leaders, more and more people will be lost each time.

If we don’t soon start to deal with the roots of the problems, it surely will be the end of the world. Civilizations rise and civilizations fall, but never before with such devastation to our planet.

There is no sane way to view what is happening. Every thinking person on the planet is experiencing feelings of helplessness. We give until it hurts, then give a little more, but it is never enough! If we don’t find a way of thinking about these things, and doing what we can, we will collapse into madness trying. When I think about how different my world was as a child, the change is staggering, and happening so rapidly that I can not even catch my breath. Today’s children will live as adults in an even more changed world.

The only thing that saves my sanity and allows me to get up each morning and do whatever little thing I can, is the knowledge that there is a higher power, a higher purpose, that we cannot even begin to understand.

My role, my life can only be counted as a success if I bring positive change in the world that I touch. This is a very small world, but if we do nothing, it will rapidly become smaller. Individually, we cannot effect any great change for the better, but as an army of voices, perhaps we can at least lessen the damage by even a small amount.

Our children are our hope. We need to pay attention to them, try to raise them with an understanding and an appreciation for nature, life in general, and our fellow human inhabitants. Magic filled my world. We had no money, but we had so much love. The things I learned at my grandparent’s knee have lasted me all my life. The little, seemingly unimportant things, make the biggest impact. Who knows what ripples are caused by little acts of kindness.

An example of this is seen in my grandmother’s philosophy, that she lived by all her life. I lived with my grandparents for quite a while as a small child. They lived in a small clapboard house on a quarter acre of land cut from the public fairgrounds, built for my great, great, grandmother who was the first white woman in that small village.

They had been farmers, and my grandfather hunted, trapped for furs and did some blacksmith and carpentry work for a little money. In their golden years, when they could no longer farm, they moved into that little house with no electricity, or running water.

In fact, there was no water, it had to be dipped from the well across the street, and carried home by the bucket full. They grew a small garden, had chickens for eggs and Sunday dinner, a cow for milk, and a pig for winter meat. A neighbour half a mile away lived with an alcoholic husband and struggled to feed her children. Many times, my grandma would dress me as warmly as possible, wrap a cape around me and send me off with a basket of eggs or a quart of milk or a pound of butter for this lady and her children. As a result of my grandmother’s example, I have always tried to be open handed, giving away the last of what I had on more than one occasion. The Creator has always looked after me, not often providing what I wanted, but always providing what I needed, usually at the very last moment.

As I said, magic filled my world, but these days, magic has almost disappeared from the lives of children. Any time we can return some of that magic to them, we are helping them to grow up dreaming big, trusting in the Creator to provide, and having an open heart and an open hand in their dealings with the world. We cannot know what ripple effects it will have, only that it will be good.

And this is the last one for now

This is the tree and wild rose where the fairies live! At least it looks like they should.

And Summer

These were taken in late June and July

Summer Pictures

We took pictures of everything as it bloomed so we would have a record of this magical summer.

The Time Has Come

the walrus said
To speak of many things
Of aging and of moving
Of cabbages and kings.

It is a difficult thing that we must do. After 22 years here, it is time to move on. We believed we would end our days here, but life has other plans. We need to downsize and take our Time Warp to a spot easier to look after, single story, only a couple of acres, but still in this general community.

The house is too big to look after and the landscaping that I put 20 years into is looking forlorn. It needs younger blood to take up the torch and work along side Gaia to continue making it beautiful. As hard as it will be to leave, it would be harder to watch the degeneration of what we have worked for.

When we moved here from the city in 1986, I was able to bring a little of most of the plantings I had there. They mean so much to me because it is a friendship garden and many of the plants came from friends who are no longer here. When I look around I remember the giver as well as enjoying the tangled garden. My young neighbor across the street will keep and care for whatever small bits I can take from here, until I have a place to plant them.

I know how blessed I am. I know that this is just a transitional state, and that all will be well again. I believe we all pass through various emotions when we have big changes in our lives. I share mine so that others need not go through the same thing believing that they are alone. Time passes, things change, we cling then we let go.

Our refuge, The Time Warp will move with us. It belongs to us, not a specific place. A young friend named it The Time Warp long ago because she checked her worries at the end of the driveway and felt renewed by the time she picked them up again on her way out.

Everything that can bloom, has done so this summer. Mother Nature has thrown me a farewell party beyond compare. It has been a magical summer in so many ways, but as with everything we treasure, it costs. The head knows there is nothing to struggle with, but sometimes it takes a while for the heart to catch up. My heart hurts! but I will be OK.

I would like to share some of that farewell party here.