I did not write the post MADNESS with out paragraphs or sentences but that is what this format did to me. This is why I no longer post. Isn't it a shame that things have to change to this degree. I am writing paragraphs with spaces between then just to see what will come up. So basically this is a test to see if I will write anymore blog stories. I just viewed this and again there are no seperation in my paragraphs so this time I am puttling 5 lines between each sentence to see what Google will do this this. I am even indenting 5 spaces. Isn't this crazy??????????????? Phyllis Heitkamp Writing under the pen name of Maggie Browne

Madness

How do we measure madness? I know it isn’t supposed to be called madness as only dogs get mad ( or so I have been told ) But I have just read a book assigned to me by our book club about Ted Bundy. It made me question madness and how people can appear one way and then act another way. At what point in our lives do we decide which side of the coin to play? Is it found in the cute little two year old that bites every one? Is it found in the decisions that we make every day? Do we chose with each decision to play the good guy or the bad guy? Are these decisions chosen because of our training or is this a genetic problem? Reading this book made me question my parenting skills. Did I give each of my children enough early childhood attention? Did I discipline too much or not enough? Did I help them to find the world around them to be a wonderful place and the people around them to be worthy of their love and attention? Did I encourage them to be the best person that they could be? Was the lack of a male role model a bad thing as even when their Dad lived with us, he didn’t like normal kids that can get messy? Did I over compensate for this? Did the flaws in me, over shadow my intentions with my children? How could I not have fostered some madness as I live with it. In our family we have a name for it. We call it a Harris Syndrome. This syndrome is real and has been handed down to many relatives. A lot of them suffer from depression for this reason. Some even have low self-esteem. ( I have to admit that I have been in these categories several times. ) Somewhere along the way, I remember a class that taught me to be real. If I feel sad, it was OK to cry. If I am angry, it is OK to be angry. It is not OK to be sad for no reason or to hide the anger one feels, but I have to admit that I am a rather good actress at times. I think I was fifteen or sixteen when I found the clipping of the death of my Grandfather who shot himself out in the woods, leaving a widow with six children. My mom was the oldest at home so she stepped into the role of farmer. She was plagued with bouts of depression as long as I can remember. My Dad used to take her places to get her out of these moods. He said that he would come home on a Wednesday and ask if she would like to go to Chicago or somewhere for the weekend as a family. So with three small children to get ready, she would plow into all of this and the depression was gone. Mom was lucky that my Dad was hyper and loved to travel. They did this all their lives. So at what point does one lose their bearings and latch onto an addiction that spins into madness? Could it be a point of loss so great that life holds no meaning? What kind of loss would that be? The death of a little white kitten? Seeing an accident where someone is mangled beyond recognition? Could it come from rejection so great that nothing matters? The book that I read wanted us to believe that his rejection by a woman created his addiction to killing them. The book also talked about the fact that this man had no working knowledge of love. The love of a good book or of a wonderful song or of a painting or a plant. He didn’t know how to love. At what point do we learn to love. I have seen it in the eyes of a 2 day old child. I have seen it in the eyes of a very old lady. I have seen love all around me and I know how to love but the syndrome is still there. It is at these times that I am required to find something to love. We are very complex beings and hopefully we are given ways to cope with the things that are thrown at us from time to time. Where do we learn how to do this? It isn’t in school, I can tell you that from experience. Rejection is a big part of public education. As one of the smallest in any of my classes; I was the last to be chosen by any team. How about being the last to get breasts and having to shower in front of all the “big” kids. This subject has me wondering how DOVE soap thinks it can instill self-esteem in any junior high school girl. (I can’t speak for the boys) Is madness trained out of us in religious training? Somehow I think not. I remember bible stories but they didn’t talk a lot about morals, or perhaps I wasn’t listening. THOU SHALL NOT KILL was a biggy but we kill to live. We kill the chicken. We kill the fish to survive. This planet isn’t about not killing, just not killing people we know or friends. Somewhere here I am losing the “Good guy” stuff. So let’s bomb Iraq? What did we learn from the “good guys”? We want people to follow the rules but there are so many that someone like Ted gets lost in them. If I don’t get caught, it is OK? Now that is starting to sound like our government again. How do most people keep their balance and still try to follow the rules? I guess the real question is: are we all mad to a degree and we all work very hard to keep it in check?

Meditation

What does that word mean? I am reading a book that has a whole chapter on it and they are suggesting different kinds of meditation and even different places to meditate.

In one chapter they talk about the different brain waves from Beta to Delta with Alpha and Theta in between.

Last week a lady asked me how to meditate. She was afraid that she might fall asleep or not do what the group was doing if she took a class.

Group meditations are usually called guided meditations. I have done this for groups and been part of groups that do this. It is a fun exercise but there is no place like just being me.

All of this sounds like a lot of work. Meditation shouldn’t be work, in fact it is pleasure. To drift off into another place in your mind is a comfort and should be thought of that way. It needn’t be a place to solve problems or to do anything but just BE. Our world is so busy we don’t know how to just BE.

Sudden thought: People think that the mind is confined to the head or the brain of the body but it isn’t. The mind is larger than….I am stuck here because I can’t find something that doesn’t include the mind.

I probably have an unusual situation because I have always found that I can split my attention and still be. An example of that would be while I was in school and I was out of focus relaxing in my seat; the teacher would call on me to answer the question and the answer was there. I do not look like I am paying attention so I remember getting called on often. My eyes are focused in front of something or in back of it but my mind was still recording what was happening all around me.

My son has this ability too. One of his teachers told me that he would be staring out of the window (Most present time schools don’t have windows, maybe for this very reason.) and she would call on him. He would have the right answer so she would ask him what he was thinking about. He would tell her that he was working on the angle of the curve that a wing would need for a certain amount of lift.

We are multi-faceted beings. So do we need a place to meditate? Do we need a set program to meditate? In my case, I find myself lost in other worlds all the time.

Let me tell you about something that I had to learn a long time ago. To function wholly in this world, one must be in present time. So for a person like me who finds herself drifting into other worlds easily, I had to work out a system to keep me here. What I found was a finger snap and the words “present time.”(This might be a reason that I don’t want to have a cell phone or that I can’t wear a watch?)

It is necessary to be in present time. How would you like to be riding in a car when the driver is functioning in a future or past tense or no tense at all? The safety of everyone around me is based on this. I need to be in present time when I am doing things, just for my own safety. Perhaps this is another reason that I find driving a car so much work. I need to continually make sure that I am here!

What do people expect in meditation? In the book that I am reading, they expect answers to present time problems. Meditation isn’t some hidden place with all the answers but a place where the soul can be without the harshness of the world around it.

Meditation is home. It is where we live and we just go to work in the world around us.

When I dip into meditation, it is like going on a vacation. I have no expectations. I am never disappointed. I don’t find anything or anyone. I don’t do anything. I just am the me that lives in this body.

If I am looking for answers to things, I might ask before I drift off into my “other world” or I might check in with other people or write down the problem and put it into the universe for them to solve. Most of the time my solutions are found in dreams and not in meditation sessions.

Where can I meditate? I can take this body for a walk in a woods and meditate while walking. I might come into present time enough to enjoy something that my eyes see but for the most part the sensations that I get are feelings of contentment that resonate through my whole being. Meditation allows my body to realign with itself and the world around me. I can sit on the library lawn and allow feelings to enter this body. I can sit in the back yard and enjoy the colors and feelings of the plants that I have there. I can even just sit in a chair in my living room, relaxing while holding my cat and drift into another world altogether.

This is something that I take for granted and I do wonder if at some point, I will refuse to return to the world around me. As I get older, I see this as a wonderful place to live and might take refuge there. It is my hope that I will be granted a pass to leave the body and return home instead of being a bother to those around me. Bodies are such a bother.

But as long as I have this body, I will continue to come and go at will and enjoy every minute of it.

Meditation is there for all of us to become who we really are. Lose yourself in a different time and place and see if it doesn’t help you to function better in the real world.

Learning

Have you ever watched new life trying to figure out what it is supposed to do? Sort like watching a baby bird decide to leave the nest or watching a flower open and having to decide which petal to send out first.

I had that experience the other day. I was sitting in a restaurant by a window when a lady with two children walked out of the building. The children were both about the same age. I was guessing about 18 months. The little girl was running all over the place. The mother wanted to get them into their car seats in the back of the car that was sitting at the curb.

The little girl was waiting for Mom to catch her so she just ran this way and that way until Mom finally got her; walked her to the car door that was opened and put her in.

The little boy was walking slowly from the building toward the car. He looked around and was aware of what was happening but he had a goal; get to the car.

I watched him walk with slow purpose toward the car and when he came to the curb and saw the step down, he stopped. At this point I could almost hear the wheels in his head turning. He checked it all out visually and then turned around with his back to the car and the step; then got down on his hands and knees and moved backwards until his feet were off the curb. Then he could touch the road.

At this point he straightened up and turned around just as Mom was finished buckling in his sister and he got lifted in and buckled.

People are amazing at any age but to watch this 18 month old problem solver do his work, just amazed me.

I wish that I could follow this guy through life and see where he goes. If he doesn’t bump into any labels that we attach to everyone and everything; and therefore doesn’t get put on drugs for one of these labels, he will go a long way. He is so methodical in his thinking. Maybe even tunnel visioned, which isn’t a bad thing unless you get an ADD label somewhere.

Where did these labels come from? Why do we have a name for everything that happens? Who creates these labels?

A friend of mine was a kindergarten teacher and she said that the system asks her to label these kids. She refuses to do that because these labels seem to get stuck in their folders for life.

Now that sister will be labeled OUTGOING. And he will be labeled what?

Vibrations

In the beginning was the Word. What does that mean? It means that before anything that we know existed, there was a vibration sent out that created all that we see.

Basically we are talking about atoms that vibrate on different levels. Each level creates a different molecule that in turns is part of different things. We know that the molecules in glass vibrate at a different rate than those in wood. Each and every thing has its very own rhythm/rate. Just as no two snowflakes are the same, so it is with everything in our world.
I guess that makes each of us very special.

A friend of mine came over to visit me a few weeks ago and showed me just how important these vibrations are. She showed me that each vibration creates a sound and each sound in turn creates a color.

While she was here we talked about the music and colors of the universe and how each tiny body in the ether has its very own sound. We talked about how the larger bodies perhaps have very low tones and tiny asteroids have very high tones. So if we could hear the range that is out there, we would be able to hear the music of the spheres. It is a shame that we are handicapped to the point where our hearing range doesn’t even keep up with the other animals on this planet.

After talking about the universe, my friend sat down at my piano and played a few of her own compositions. They were so wonderful that the music was creating color in the room. When I mentioned that I was seeing colors coming off her fingers (because I see auric colors on bodies but don’t understand the meaning of them); she said that if I want to see the colors, she would play some classical music as they are full of color. As she did, the colors danced off her fingers all over the piano. Some were shooting out 8to 10 inches with an array of different colors. I saw vibrant blues and vivid reds just flowing off her long fingers.

It is my belief that my piano giggled for at least a week after this encounter.

One cat of mine was observing this and wanted a part of it. When my friend stopped playing, Snowy went up to her and wanted to be touched. This cat is still remembering this to the point where she wants more. Snowy was not herself for a very long time after my musical friend left.

One day when she was crying pitifully, I told her that the animal whisper was coming over; that she should go and take a nap but come out when then Linda got here. I didn’t see Snowy until Linda arrived at the door and then she came out to get some help. The animal whisper then explained to her how she could pull in her own colors. After that she was able to settle down and not be so hyper.


I guess what I am trying to say is that vibrations are all around us in everything from our relationships to our projects.

Do we not feel the energy of the cars driving by or the pounding of a carpenter putting a new roof on a house many blocks away? Most men will relate when I mention that they are aware of all the sounds of their personal vehicle to the point of knowing when something isn’t just right.

All things give off a vibration but for the most part we don’t hear what is there nor understand the language that is being spoken.

Last week we had some men come to our property to trim some of our larger trees. And for those of you who know me, I told the trees ahead of time what was going to happen. But while the men were here, I asked one of them if he could talk to the trees or hear them. He told me that he couldn’t. Isn’t that sad? How can we work in an environment where we can’t understand the language? How will this man know if the tree wants more done or less done?
These beings were very knowledgeable as to what needed to be done and what didn’t.

My neighbors come out when I am trimming the two barberries in the front yard near the road. They comment on how I can trim these bushes with out gloves and not get full of scratches. It is very easy, I tell these ladies, (and they are ladies) that I will be making them so beautiful that everyone driving by will notice them and comment on them. They allow me to pull up things that need to be cut and put them into the clippings bin without any problem. We have communicated and we both agree on the plan.

Plants talk all the time. They even help each other with problems. They try to let us know what it is that they need or want. Right now I have a plant grouping that is telling me about a problem virus that may hit us this winter. I have acknowledged this and thanked them for this information. Now it is up to me to take action.

When we walk into a garden, don’t we feel the vibrations even before we see the colors?

If a plant is aware of a situation and can do something about it, why wouldn’t the vibration of the plant do the same thing? As an example: we are aware that the inner bark of the oak tree is loaded with usable calcium. (That means it has all the trace minerals to assist the body in its use.) So if someone needs more calcium, wouldn’t it stand to reason that by using that word, (The vibration of the word created the element) one could increase the amount of calcium where it is needed?

I tried an experiment once with a friend who is very open to my way of thinking. He called me from Madison and told me that he had blood in his urine and that his doctor told him that he probably had kidney stones. I don’t know where there is a health food store near him so I asked him to get a pen and paper. Next, I instructed him to write in big letters: Hydrangea. He did that, so the next thing was to fold the paper up and put it into his pants pockets. I told him that it might be helpful if he would add some vinegar to his drinking water today. (Foot note: Hydrangea dissolves kidney stones)

Three hours later he called back to tell me that there was no blood in his urine but he was still going to get some vinegar and add it to his drinking water. Then he asked how much vinegar he should add to a glass of water.

Vibrations! We create our worlds by what we put out or take in. What vibrations do we want? That angry word can not be taken back but it did sent out a vibration that could create something one might not want. What comes to mind here is, “Speak softly and carry a big stick.” We need to put out the vibrations that we want to live with.

Color your world with wonderful vibrations.

Rules

Rules are very important in our lives to keep order. Without them, people would be bumping into each other at street corners or fighting about ownership and much more.

Today I was watching a very old movie and could see how far we have come in being able to control others. In this movie, the attorney brought a new born baby, wrapped in a blanket across town to its rightful parents. Isn't that nice? The fact that he didn't have an expensive car seat or carrier for this new born and the fact that he was allowed to put this small child into his car without restraints that are required by present time new parents at the expense of their fragile budget was amazing and stood out in my mind.

I remember coming home in 1960, holding my new baby to my chest all the way home. She wasn't locked into an "ejection seat" and sitting backwards in the back seat but was being held in my arms, like she should be.

I read a lot about how we have become an indifferent people, but as I see it, we have created this with rules.

How about another rule? I am 73 years old and just over 5 feet tall. If I were growing up in today's world with today's laws, my booster seat would have been with me until I was a junior in High School. I was always the shortest person in my class and even today I am shorter than my siblings who are all younger than I am.

My Aunt Edna, who we all called Aunt Shorty was never even 5 feet tall. I towered over her until the day she died. I supposed that she would have been required to have a booster seat all of her life just to keep from being arrested.

My children would stand behind me and point out things that we saw as we road in the car. The "round and rounds" (windmills) or the "Daddy cars" (Volkswagen bugs). My husband told me that his children wore out the carpeting on the floor bump in the back between the driver's side and the passenger's side.

I am a rebel and don't wear seat belts unless I am in some else's car or see a policeman. I don't wear glasses either. I don't get bike licenses nor have my dogs tagged. I don't get pets from SPCA either. I called them once and asked if I could buy an animal without a microchip and they told me that it was required. So I just don't support them. Rules!

But we seem to need more rules?

In the center of Milwaukee, there is an area that is called the Core. It is populated by a very large black population. I don't have a reason to visit that area often but one time when I was there, my mind was thinking about how confining that area was. One can not drive more than a block before they have to stop for either a light or a stop sign. Very orderly and controlling. Have you ever held a young child on your lap against their wishes? What kind of action or reactions have you witnessed? That is how I felt while there and perhaps that is how the people who live there feel; controlled and confined? Perhaps that is why we witness the actions and reactions that we do?

Rules are great but how many do we really need?

There was a rule that seemed to be enough a long time ago but doesn't seem to work in present time. DO ONTO OTHERS, WHAT YOU WOULD HAVE THEM DO ONTO YOU.

Why doesn't that work anymore? Because we are used to having our control come from outside of ourselves. We are told to "take responsibility" but we are not allowed to do that. Everyone wants someone else to tell them what they should do. We basically have been trained to give up control of our lives from early childhood on.

We expect the people who "represent" us to make decisions that we can live with. Why are we surprised when they create rules that we don't like? These people start out wanting to be of service to us but as they feel the "power", they cave in and know that they and they alone will make the rules that they think are best.

Every time someone gets hurt, a new rule goes in. Is it against the rules somewhere to get hurt? Are we taught from childhood on that getting hurt is not possible or a bad thing? Is this where depression sets in because we got hurt?

There are many hurts in life, from emotional hurts to physical hurts. So as the government has rules out physical hurts, via all their rules; we then take on emotional hurts.

Hurting is a way to get attention. Perhaps we have gone full circle and the baby that is stuck or small child that is stuck in the back seat away from the parents somehow has to find a way to get close, to find the love that they need and want to become a healthy human. The rules won't allow closeness.

I told you that I disagree with a lot of present-time rules. It is my belief that in the near future, some of these rules will not apply. At the present time I am not allowed to say why but it will happen and how will people act who have always been controlled? Will they be able to think for themselves? I truly hope so as the future depends on this.

Teach your children how to think and not how to study.

Leaves

How do you feel about leaves?

It is fall and I have seen many different re-actions regarding leaves. My husband and most of our neighbors are piling them up to haul off to the dump and get them out of the area. To them, leaves seem to be a nuisance but what are leaves, really?

A leaf is the manufacturing area for all plants. It is what feeds this plant and keeps it healthy. They come in all shapes and sizes and for the most part, they have some differences yet look very much alike. Most people see them as all the same. They have the ability to combine the moisture and minerals found in the ground and hauled up to where; with the sunlight, they can create all the things that the plant needs to survive.

I remember taking a sensitivity class once and we were asked to hold a leaf in our hands. Then we were told to closed our eyes and travel inside the leaf that we were holding. Before doing this we had done it with a small block of silver and a few other things like a block of copper. While in the silver block, I remember when I said "Hello" it echoed all over the place but when I did this same thing in the leaf, there was no echo. In fact the sound was very muted. I found myself between the bottom of the leaf and its top. I could wander around in a catacomb of large cells that were very hollow. The light filtering through was a muted yellow-green. It was a very comfortable place to be. It reminded me of being in a forest with green all around and not being able to see anything else.

The leaves in my yard today come from a lot of different plants. These plants have all stored their food in their roots for the winter and dropping these leaves.

Today's problem stems from the fact that I think these leaves should be left on my gardens and most people think these leaves should be hauled off.

Today I took a rake and borrowed some leaves from my neighbors to cover the areas where the plants had already gone down.

The Hosta leaves died back and have been put into the pile of stuff headed for the dump but for some reason, I want some maple leaves covering the bare ground where these roots are sleeping. I want to tuck them in for the winter with Grandma Maple's quilt of different colored leaves for their winter's sleep.

I know that this will mean more work in the spring to uncover them but it is important to me. In the spring we all feel great about things coming alive again so it isn't a problem to take the "quilts" off the beds and watch the new plants coming up.

I borrowed leaves to cover the St. John's Wort that has a small rosette of green at the base of this year's growth, which has been cut down already. I borrowed leaves to cover the Ginseng plants and I will have more than enough time to clean that off next spring as Ginseng is a very lazy plant. She likes to sleep late and won't wake up until the trees have enough shade for her. I borrowed leaves to cover the two Goldenseal roots that I planted lately, that were sent to me by my cousin from a plant rescue group. I borrowed leaves to cover the Black Cohosh and the Blue Cohosh with her vibrant blue berries still on the dead stocks. There were other things that I covered because I wanted to give them a head start and maybe this is wrong but when I covered the peppermint, I could feel them snuggling down for the winter.

There were some plants that didn't need a "Quilt" but this year I had planted two Russian pink lilacs and as they are really small yet, I decided to tuck a "Quilt" around their base.

I admire the hardy plants but we all need some attention from time to time so if these plants ask me …. What a silly thing to say, as they usually don't ask when they want something, they scream at me. Sometimes I try to explain why this person got this and you didn't but for the most part, they are very understanding.

I have a few that I need to talk to yet; Garden Sage and the Roses need to be talked to. They struggle through the winter and do it very well. I will probably cover the roses with evergreen branches.

Leaves to me are the frosting on the cake. They are there for a reason and not just to be taken to the dump. One year using an edger, the kind with the plastic line that whips off plants that are not wanted in an area; along with a plastic garbage can; I pulverized and dumped them on my gardens. That was a lot of work. I also used to have a compost pile but haven't for a while as we don't have a space for it now.

Do you have some nice leaf memories too? Remember when we raked leaves into a pile and jumped in, laughing and giggling. My husband's nice memory is the smell of burning leaves. To him it was the smell of fall. I love to watch individual leaves blowing across the road as I am driving. I love when I am walking through leaves and hear the crunch mostly because I am shuffling instead of walking just to hear the sound.

Isn't it amazing that each plant, no matter how small it is, is loaded with leaves?

Above my fireplace is a collage of leaves that I found three years ago and pressed. Then pasted them to acid-free paper and framed it. The fall leaves have already lost their chlorophyll so they don't loose their color as quickly as green leaves do.

Leaves are so much more than what we think they are. They decorate our world with different colors at different times and some can even make you smile. That first yellow/green that peeks through in the spring, will lighten any heart. That yellow/red/orange that hangs on the branch in the fall will brighten any day.

As Martha Stewart would put it, "Leaves are a good thing."