Patience – Waiting for what we do not see.......

Yesterday, I got home at 3:30pm and climbed into bed, fighting my nausea and trying not to lose the small meal I’d eaten just an hour before.  Multiple infusion therapies since January has left me with all the expected side effects that at times pulls and pushes me into dark corners.  My hair and beard loss has transformed me into someone friends don’t recognize till they see my eyes, or hear my voice.  “Bill is that you?”  Many tell me I look younger without my beard, and I have slowly gotten used to seeing the beardless, white-haired man in the mirror each morning.  My fingernails and toenails have become brittle and sore; they have developed ridges and are an unhealthy brown color.  The nail brittleness combined with my neuropathy makes my toenails hard to keep trimmed because of the pain.  My biggest battle is with fatigue, and I’ve started carrying a walking stick which significantly decreases my energy expenditure and has increased my stability.

As I laid in bed yesterday, my meditation and conscious connected breathing exercises steadied my nausea and calmed my stomach.  Soon I had returned to our Vermont vacation and was sitting on the banks of Lake Champlain watching a glorious sunset paint the sky in shades of gold with streaks of orange and red.  In that moment of reflection, I realized it was my patience that blessed me with a golden sky to be framed in my soul forever.  If we had left the banks of Lake Champlain too quick, we would have missed the layering of colors, silhouetted clouds, fishing boats and gently rolling mountains.  Patience billy, this too shall pass, chemo is only a temporary phase that you are passing through.  It is not your life.  I am reminded of Paul’s words in Romans, “But if we hope for what we do not see, we wait for it with patience”.  Be patient with me. 

Monday MRI Flashback

Monday afternoon, my chemo started late, so by the time I was done I had only 45 minutes to eat and sign-in for my 7:15pm MRI.  The MRI was scheduled for the Radiology Outpatient Center (ROC) that use mobile MRI scanners that reside in huge trucks.  In my multiple MRIs the past nine years, I never had an MRI from the ROC.  The waiting room was beautiful, the staff was very professional and caring, and the best part was I had no wait.  After getting my scrubs on the technician walked me through an outdoor hallway and up six steps into the mobile unit.  Everything looked the same, except the room was just a little smaller, and then the technician told me the test would take 90 minutes, not my usual 45.  When I was comfortable on the MRI bed, he put earplugs in my ears and wrapped my head with a soft material.  The same weird spinning and knocking noises started, but as they got much louder, I was glad for the earplugs. 

Twenty or so minutes into the test, I had my first flashback.  We were riding low in a Huey copter and I could hear the enemy fire at 4 o’clock.  I raised up my M16 and started to yell, “Enemy fire 4 o’clock”, but my arm hit the inside of the MRI tube and the technician ask me if I was okay and I said yes.  Realizing where I was I laid back down and for the next 60+ minutes, I again rode in the Huey, or sometimes I was back in Europe in a huge Chinook helicopter with my feet resting on the biggest nuclear weapons in our arsenal.  Toward the end of the test, I was doing night jumps out of the thin-skinned C-141 where the engine noise was deafening with the jump door open as I watched for the green light and then fell through darkness wondering if I’d ever get time to pray. 

I rode my scooter home with tears streaming down my face; I had gone back to memory moments I had worked hard to push away.  We came back to a country that didn’t want us back.  The first time I wore one of my fatigue shirts, so proud of my Captain Bars and Ranger Tab, someone spit on me.  Forty plus years ago I wrote the poem that follows as I sat on my bed and listened to two friends make a decision that would cost them their lives.  Many of you may never understand the patriotic pride that drove boys like me or like my dad who fought in WWII and Korea to ensure we have the freedom so many take for granted today, but I hope this poem gets you to an edge of understanding. 

Second Tour – Got to Go Back

you what?
“it’s all I know”

you have an electrical engineering degree
“it’s all I can remember”

you worked every summer since you were 15
“it’s all I’m good at”

your crazy
“I can’t leave them alone”

we left too many to count
“I have to go back”

I can’t let you go back
“It’s all WE know”

It’s all we know
“yea, it’s all we know”

shi! – let’s go…….

Chemo Courage and Determination

Maybe it’s the memories of my mother resting her arm on mine as we walked through our backyard garden to enjoy the colors and smells from the camellia, and gardenia bushes fighting to live each day to its fullest as her cancer slowly spread.  Then again, maybe it was my dad’s determination to stay awake in the golf cart we had strapped him and his oxygen bottle into as his prostate cancer took his energy, but not his courage to be with family, giving all of us golf tips as we played on his home course. 

Two Friday’s ago, I was all prepped for chemo and just needed my oncologist approval.  As he entered the treatment room he said, “You look good”, and I felt a pride inside as I thought I was finally getting down the three-week chemo leash.  He looked, listened, and prodded those parts of my body that might be showing signs of chemo distress, and then we moved to my blood work.  I am always concerned about my kidney and liver functions, but those numbers looked good, and then we moved to blood cells and he stopped and shook his head and said, “Your blood is too weak, you can’t have chemo today!”  I was stunned, and asked him “What can I do?”  His answer was rest. 

MaryBeth and I took off the next day for Vermont and cooler weather where we stayed with our good friend Judd Allen, who pampered us with lots of TLC.  For seven days, I didn’t work, open any emails, or write.  Each morning I spent time meditating in a backyard that felt more like a forest, with flowers, and a short walking path to Lake Champlain.  In the afternoons, I napped and at the end of each day, we’d picked a different place around Burlington to watch the sunset.  On Top of Mt. Philo State Park one afternoon looking out at the slowly fading scenic Adirondack and Green Mountain Peaks, an old bare fir tree took center stage.  Feeling the bare trees courage and determination to stand strong as her life force was ending; I felt tears as I drifted back to memory moments with my mom and dad as they passed to me the gift of mindful whole person living and resilience.  What life gifts are you passing on?

Sorry Me Tears

In three hours, MD Anderson’s Interventional Radiology department will start the biopsy of my liver and intrahepatic bile duct.  Yesterday evening I drifted off to sleep with a bright internal smile created by the emails from my healing circle friends sending me lots of love.  Waking early, I thought about this past Saturday and the “sorry me” tears I had felt as I left Walmart with the chair I had bought for my shower.  Months ago, I started drying off, brushing my teeth and putting my suntan lotion on sitting down, for I didn’t have the morning strength to stand that long.  I am now in a place I know it would be safer for me to sit in the shower. 

Sunday, I sat on our lake house pier to watch the sunrise.  It was a perfect morning with the trees silhouetted on the glass-covered lake reflecting the pale blush of morning.  In a blink, it was over as the soft pink blush was swallowed up by the ocean blue sky, and the silhouetted trees slowly turned green.  For a few minutes, I once again fought back the “sorry me” tears thinking about how fast life had been.  As I watched the bold greens of the trees return, I realized how grateful I was to my mom who had taught me early in life to be present for those brief moments that never will be again.  A gift from my mom painted on my soul forever given to all of you today.  What will you do with my gift tomorrow?

Be Well bill – Retirement

Be Well bill – Retirement

It was Christmas eve when I realized I did not have a present for my mom.  She’d been sick, and my denial as a 10-year-old kid that I was so scared every time my dad tried to explain my mom’s cancer that I’d do my best to live in my own little make-believe world.  A world where I’d forgotten about Christmas.  My mother and I enjoyed doing flower arrangement with candles, so that night before my dad put me to bed I worked on decorating a candle for my mother’s Christmas present.  Sleep didn’t come easy, for even at ten-years-old I realized my make-believe world had kept me from giving and receiving my families love, and I so missed the specialness of my mom.  This experience slowly woke within me the need to fully feel life, and over the next eight years I practiced channeling and sharing my feelings with my mom and special people in my life through my poetry and writing.  A practice I continue today. 

Friday, I met with my oncologist to review bone and body scans completed last week.  Looking at the scans it was clear that much of my cancer has remained somewhat stable with tumors shrinking and others growing, but two new lesions appeared in my liver.   Living a metastatic cancer journey, I knew there was always the opportunity that someday my cancer would reach a major organ, but that little ten-year-old scared kid and his safe make-believe world is long gone.  Those of you, who know me well, know my life has always been about possibilities.  Possibilities that explode from the Airborne Ranger deep within me driven by life’s challenges, and the poet that fully feels fear, anger, frustration, happiness, and the love that accompanies life. 

Sunday, as MaryBeth drove us home from the lake house, I looked back and watched the sunset through the side mirror, and was in awe of life’s possibilities.  We decided this weekend I would retire from MD Anderson in January 2017 and begin a new life chapter of possibilities with all of you.        

Spirit Coach

When he walked in, I was sitting by Aurora’s desk talking to Ann.  We hadn’t seen each other for weeks, but I instantly felt the spirit of our comradery return, and I rose for a hug.  He was dressed impeccably, with a blue houndstooth dress shirt and bold tie.  After our hug I sat back down, he asked me “How are you doing?” and I said, “I’m doing okay.”  His reaction was immediate, he raised his finger and pointed it directly at my heart, “You are doing better than just okay, you are doing GREAT!” 

All of us in our life journeys have had spirit coaches who with a few words or a look transform us into who we are to become.  My dad and I didn’t really get close until the end of his life, but throughout our life together he’d give me strength in weak moments, by just placing his hands on my shoulders.  I worked my way through undergraduate school as the head manager of the LSU football team, working for Coach Charlie McClendon.  Coach Mac had a way of bringing the best out of all of us as individuals and as a team.  In the Army, I had a First Sergeant that held me steady through several violent deaths, engaging me to remain a courageous, confident commander

As Craig put his finger down, I stood and said, “Thanks, Craig I needed that!”  Every day each of us has multiple opportunities to be a spirit coach and transform someone by a few words or a look into who they are to become.  Become a spirit coach today. 

Learning to Hang Out

Last week on several days, I put in too many hours at MD Anderson, which meant on those days and the day after; I didn’t have the energy for a real life after work.  This week, I’ve paced myself better and my life after work has brought more shared time for MaryBeth, me and Auggie to just hang out.  Dealing with the fatigue of cancer is a slow learn and very frustrating.  I have strong memories of my mom’s long struggle with cancer and her return from multiple surgeries where she would tell my dad, “Boyd, I just want my life back”.  Toward the end of her life, she gave me some great years and memories I cherish.  Lately, in my dreams, I have watched little Billy Baun as he sits with his mom in the backyard, by the fireplace or space heater, and I begin to feel once again the power of love shared while just hanging out.  Those of you who know me well, know that just hanging out goes against who’ve I’ve been, but I’m learning how to enjoy who I am as I hang out.  How are your hanging out skills?  Maybe you also need some practice – smile.

Visit from an Angel

Tuesdays, I sat on the bench across the sky bridge from the Picken’s entrance waiting for participants to gather for my labyrinth walk.  Some Tuesdays, my labyrinth walk is a class I just teach; however, this past Tuesday, I really needed the labyrinth walk, for I was hurting inside. Last Friday, we had our first death in the Metastatic Healing Circle I attend.  Brooke was the youngest member of our circle and had so much love of life, and so much more of life to live, and her death brought back memories of the violent deaths of young friends I had experienced in the Army in a war few supported.  Then on Monday, I met with my oncologist and we looked at my cancer markers.  Since January, my cancer marker (PSA) has steady risen (10 – 164) suggesting chemotherapy resistance or some of my cancer cells have become resistant to the drugs and my cancer continues to grow, so I was hurting inside. 

As I sat on the bench, I could feel the pressure of the tears behind my eyes, soon I was wiping away beginning tears, and then I felt her presence.  Brooke was an old soul with a big heart; she had a way of connecting that always made you feel special.  She and I sat there for a few minutes, and then an elderly couple approached the bench.  He was pale and thin, you could feel his pain as he slowly sat down on the far side of the bench.  His wife stood by his side with her hand softly on his shoulder.  He slowly turned and looked at me and said, “Are you the greeter?” and I said yes, and then he said, “You two are on the same journey”.  A sky bridge cart stopped by the bench, and as I watched him move from bench to cart I slowly realized what he had said, he had felt her presence.  Today be open to visits from angels that fill our lives with hope.   

Being Our Best

My oncologist warned me that the cabazitaxel chemo would have a bit of a kick, so I was thinking that the first week would be tougher, but the kick lasted the whole three-week cycle.  My walking stamina significantly decreased and last week we had a chair lift added to the stairs that lead to our second floor.  As I taught this month, I found it was helpful for me to sit or lean on a chair or table for my standing strength is low. 

The past few months I’ve been teaching mindfulness in many departments and last Thursday evening I was a guest speaker at the MD Anderson Children’s Cancer Hospital Family Council.  The meeting started at 5:30pm with dinner and I didn’t start speaking till 7pm, so by the time I stood to address the group, I was pretty tired.  When I started speaking, I remember pulling up a chair to lean on, and after describing my metastatic cancer journey, I told them, “I’m pretty tired, and maybe at 65%, no I’m probably more like 55%, but I am going to give you my best 55%.”  As I finished my short talk one mom sitting at the front table, immediately stood, grabbed my hand and with tear-filled eyes said, “thank you, I so needed that”, another mom came up behind her and said, “you were talking to me – right?”, and I said yes.  As my cancer journey has gotten tougher, I’ve learned I can’t be 100% all the time, but I can give my best  no matter what percent my energy it at, and being my best fills my spirit and reenergizes my life blood.  Be you best today, no matter how low your live energy feels!  Be You!  

Heart Saved Experiences

How do you engage or energize your resilience, your internal strength to remain strong and true to yourself throughout each day?  Start in your head and immediately you start thinking priorities, to-do lists, and pretty soon you are ruminating about all the things that have gone wrong.  Start in your heart and you are driven by what’s important in life: life passion, purpose, joy, your beliefs and values, and life lessons from past experiences.  Life lessons are heart saved experiences that define who we will become. 

In graduate school, I worked the odd shifts in the emergency room at Flow Hospital, Denton, Texas.  I remember one of my first shifts as we waited for ambulances returning from a bad accident with serious injuries.  As the doors swung open, and the gurneys rushed in, for just an instant, I flashed back to my first Army medevac ride, with the screams, chaos, and blood.  After that medevac ride, I swore I’d never ride in a medevac again, but I did, again and again – and then I was back in Denton and I was ready, for the Army taught me I was good under fire, good when chaos ruled.  What have you learned through your heart saved experiences that are defining who you are becoming?

Father's Day 2016 Fun

There was way too much excitement at our house on Father’s Day for my grandkids to eat much of the pizza or even the cupcakes.  We not only celebrated Father’s Day, but also a belated birthday we had missed due to our current health challenges.  A favorite activity at our house was MaryBeth’s drums of all shapes and sizes that not only produced lots of noise, but also plenty of smiles as we watch new songs being created by a very young man exploring his courage around music self-expression.  Dog chase was the game of the day, that turned into dog chasing grandkid and lots of laughs, and shrills from dog and grandkids. 

At some point, MaryBeth tried to slow things down with calming kids music on the radio, but when the song changed and she heard the jungle beat she quickly moved her conga drums out of the corner and became part of the percussion celebration.  Kaleb and I celebrated our fatherhood by giving each other the best gift ever by being together and surrounded by those, we love.  I hope you were also blessed with Father’s Day memory moments.       

UT Benefits HR Conference 2016

He was a little older than I was, and was on his fifth treatment of the chemo that I was starting that morning.  We talked about our chemo experiences and the days that were the hardest, and he said that with this chemo it was day six.  Deep inside I immediately felt of wave of anxiety, day six was the day I had the honor to be the lunch keynote at our annual HR Benefit Conference in Austin to hundreds of employees from all 13 UT institutions.  The title of my talk was Engaged Resilience.   

My son drove me us to Austin that morning, and I slept most of the way.  It was a beautiful ballroom with round tables and four giant screens.  The stage had 3-steps, a podium, and table set for a four-person panel.  I’ve never been a podium speaker, I’m a storyteller, so I ask for a lavalier microphone.  After setting up the microphone volume, I approached the steps and Shelly gave me her hand to steady my walk up the steps.  As I looked over the slides and got comfortable with the stage, deep inside I kept wondering if I should ask for a stool or chair, but I didn’t. 

After two amazing introductions, I don’t remember walking up the steps, what I remember is the energy I felt from the audience mixed with my lifetime of passion for life.  Throughout the talk, I had sprinkled heart led stories that still bring too many tears to my eyes, but remind me how I have become who I am, a major theme of the talk.  Then I was on my last slide, and reminding them “that we all have challenging journeys, but they are our journeys and our futures to energize.”  Finally, asking them what, would they do different tomorrow to engage / energize their resilience?  Thursday, June 9 will remain special for many reasons, but the one I will always hold in my heart is it was the first time my son had heard me give a keynote, and on the way home when I was not sleeping we talked deeply about life.  

Swinging on a Swing and Flying High

Several Fridays ago, I received my fifth different chemo since I started my cancer journey.  My last two chemo’s have been infusion therapy, and easy as I relax for several hours as the drugs intravenously enter my body.  During the chemo, I listened to one of my Pandora stations on my IPhone and when I walked out, I still had my ear buds plugged in.  Walking back to my office I stopped on top of the bayou bridge and listened to Neil Diamond sing You Don’t Bring Me Flowers Anymore.  Three lines soaked into my heart, and I remember grabbing the bridge railing as a flood of tears poured down my face.  Three simple lines, “I’ve learned how to laugh / And I’ve learned how to cry….. / You’d think I could learn how’d to tell you goodbye.”

The tears wouldn’t stop.  There are times the reality of the journey is too much, I walked into my building and found an empty space on the second floor to cry.  Through my coaching, I know that all cancer survivors and caregiver feel it; sometimes more on some days, but the fear is there and real.  Slowly the tears stopped, I remember feeling lighter as my faith in life, love, and myself returned.  It was like swinging on a swing.  One moment you feel the weight of life and then as your toes touch the sky, everything drops away as you fly.  That night as I told MaryBeth about my experience, and realized how my low moments ensure I swing out really high, touch the sky with my toes, and fly.  Have you been swinging on a swing enough lately to touch the sky with your toes and fly?

Thank You!

Hope, Emily Dickinson wrote, “Is the thing with feathers that perches in the soul, and sings the tune without the words, and never stops.”

Positivity psychologist Barbara Fredrickson suggests that hope arises when circumstances are dire.  Tonight I remind myself that my hope is real, and with hope, I focus my energy on healing, which energizes my belief in life.  Driven by the possibilities that today has brought through inspirational notes from so many friends I find deep within me the core belief that what is today can change. 

In a few hours, I will head to a CT scan, but I won’t be alone, for I carry all of you with me in that intangible space we share called hope.  Tonight, if I show up in your dreams don’t be alarmed, it’s just me whispering, “Thank you for you being you and sharing a bit of your hope in life with me”.  

Bad News and Hope

        

The results of last week’s blood test came in late Friday, MaryBeth and I were tired so I waited until Saturday morning to tell her the good news that my cancer markers were down and it looked like the new chemo was working.  We were both thrilled since the last few months my markers had quadrupled.  Tuesday morning started with an early blood test and an appointment 2 hours later to meet with my cancer care team and oncologist. 

My cancer care nurse and I talked about my fatigue, pain, any new symptoms, and then she and I looked at the blood test results.  Everything looked better except my cancer marker (PSA) it had gone from a 31 to a 74 in just a few days.  I remember saying, “How could that be, last week they were down 10 points?” and she replied, “It makes no sense, maybe it’s a false positive, when your oncologist comes in, he’ll explain it to you.”  She left and I closed my eyes, could feel my heart beating in my throat, so I did a few deep breathes.  A few minutes later I heard my oncologist knock on the door, he entered with his smile, and the confident eyes and solid handshake I look forward to seeing and feeling at each visit.  He sat down and for a moment didn’t say anything, just stared at the graph showing my increased PSA, and then he looked at me and said, “It makes no sense, do we repeat your blood test, or do body and bone scans?”.  We talked about any new pain, and I told him I was having some upper chest pain that was new, so he immediately ordered a chest x-ray, maybe it had moved into my lungs.  He told me he wanted to wait for one more blood test result, and after the x-ray was read, he’d call me and we’d make a plan. 

We shook hands and I so needed to feel his eyes, and then I realized I had 20 minutes to get to a mindfulness class I was teaching in another building.  After exiting the elevator, I realized I had held my breath the whole ride down, so instead of heading to my scooter I took a few steps and stood in front of the massive Tree of Life sculpture with its whimsical shapes and colors.  A few minutes of mindful meditation and prayer got me out of my head and into my heart, reenergizing my hope.  Several hours later as I took a deep breath, I realized I had touched almost 100 employees with my stories and mindfulness techniques.  As MaryBeth and I lay in bed last night, I took her hand and placed it on my heart, and again I practiced a few minutes of mindful meditation and prayer that sent me to sleep with hope.  This morning, the first song I heard on my Pandora station was Allison Krauss’s When You Say Nothing at All.  The words, “It's amazing how you can speak right to my heart / Without saying a word you can light up the dark / Try as I may I could never explain / What I hear when you don't say a thing”, but it lights up my resilience spirit and hope.  What are your daily practices to manage your resilience spirit and hope?

Wellness Alchemist

Lately, my work at MD Anderson with patients, caregivers, and employees has focused on mindfulness and breathing.  This week as I worked with groups and individuals I realized many of them find the fast pace of life positively exhilarating, but also recognize they are losing pieces of themselves as they bend time just to keep up.  Many have given up or forgotten the transformational power of silent self-time where exploring their inner space leads to awareness, deep understanding, change, and growth.  Yesterday, as I addressed the staff of Internal Medicine, I felt like an alchemist creating new life view possibilities through the breathing techniques I was teaching. 

You are probably wondering if this work has any real impact.  Monday, a young woman standing in the elevator with me said, “Bill, I did what you suggested with my child and husband at our evening prayer time, and started out with the breathing exercises you taught our department, and it deepened our prayer experience together”.  Wednesday, as I waited for my breathing circle to start a faculty member who had been touched by my labyrinth work, sat down next to me.  She handed me a beautiful book on labyrinths as a gift and told me, “Bill you have put me back in touch with my spirituality, thank you”.  Be an alchemist today and reach out and touch someone and change their world!     

Heart Whispers

She was a little older and sat across from me in the waiting room.  When the triage nurse taking vitals called her husband’s name, she had gotten up, but he motioned her to sit down and wait.  He unsteadily rose, holding onto his walker and with the help of the nurse disappeared through one of the hallways.  She watched every step he took, and when he disappeared, I watched her lips move as her “mind whispers” grew louder.  Each time the door opened, she’d rise and then sit back down when it was not her husband.  You could feel her impatience, her fear; it was getting easier to read the mind whispers on her lips. 

My last chemo regimen (Sutent) was hard on me physically, emotionally, and spiritually.  The weaker my body grew the harder it was for me to hold it together. Some nights it felt like a riptide was dragging me across the bottom where I was losing large pieces of me.  One night as I began my riptide nightmare, I heard a faint whisper, a “heart whisper” that had an immediate calming effect and allowed me to step off the treadmill my mind had created.  Shifting your focus from mind whisper to heart whispers is a reboot that gets you back to believing in life!  Hear it, feel it, believe it!

Firefights of Life

A dark sky and the sound of heavy rain drew me to the window right outside my office door, and as I stood, and watched the storm swirl I was instantly back to the early 70s and Ranger School as we walked out of the Florida swamps with Hurricane Agnes pounding on our heels.  This memory moment was not about bad storms, but the firefights we live through and how life trauma becomes a piece of who we become.  We were soaked, dirty, tired, but walking proud, for we had just finished our last phase of Ranger training, but this memory moment was also not about pride, but the huge loss I felt as I watched Vietnam kill off friends.  Psychologists tell us that our past personal memories are guided by our current concerns, goals, and self-concept.  Don’t get me wrong when I say this, but I am learning how to live as I prepare to die.  Those of you who know me well, know that my life is about living as fully as I can “today”, and probably understand how my journey and resilience has been strengthened by the huge heart loss I felt as friends died in Vietnam.  What firefights or trauma have you lived through strengthening your journey, resilience and who you have become?

Being and Healing with Nature

Last Monday started my chemo clock.  Day of chemo all the steroids I received are very energizing, but they also robbed me of a good night’s sleep.  Day-2 I was feeling good, but toward the end of day-3, I was getting tired.  A half-day meeting kept me at work on day-4 (Thursday), but when I finally got home in the early afternoon I immediately had to go to bed.  I had decided to take a PTO day on Friday and MaryBeth and I had decided to drive up to the lake house early, but exhaustion kept me in bed until late morning.  Finally, in the early afternoon, I begrudgingly agreed to head to the lake house for we had friends coming up for the weekend. 

Saturday, after sunrise, I lay in our bed and watched the fog dance through the trees.  A little before 7 a.m., I dressed and walked out to our pier.  I could feel the fog as it encircled my legs, and with each breath, I was drawn deeper into just being in the beauty and natural surroundings.  Research shows the natural environment promotes positive emotions, reduces stress hormones, and boosts our immune system.  Selhub in her book, Your Brain on Nature, outlines emerging nature-based therapies and practical nature-based strategies to enhance life.  My nature-based weekend worked, and yesterday and today I feeling so much stronger.  How do you engage yourself in nature every day?  During my work days, I take a few minutes each day to walk the rose gardens at Clark Clinic, or maybe the labyrinth under the four live oaks at the School of Public Health, or the water garden between the Rotary House and Faculty Center.  Each day be responsible and spend just a few minutes of being and healing with nature as your medicine.  What will you do with nature as your healing partner tomorrow?

Mother's Day Tears from Heaven

My mother knew.  She had heard it in the short talks I practiced with her for civics and speech classes in high school.  She read it in my poorly constructed papers, and poorly written sentences in high school English.  She also read it in the poetry I wrote and sent her in the letters from summer church and Boy Scout camps I worked in Louisiana, Texas, and New Hampshire.  She highlighted the lines of poetry, wrote me encouraging words, bundled these letters, tied them with string and saved them for me as a gift after her passing.  My mom dreamed of me being a preacher.  I never doubted after her passing she watched me as I worked intently for years to put my lessons together for the adult Sunday school classes I taught. 

My dad was too tired when home so we had a hard time connecting for years.  Years after my mom passed, I had an opportunity to speak at a meeting in Baton Rouge about wellness and my dad attended the meeting, it was the first time he had heard me speak.  I remember walking out with him as he tightly gripped my hand, and before he got into his car, he held me tightly and wept.  He knew. 

Most days as I put the final sentences of my blog together I feel tears from heaven streaming down my face as I  realize I am trying to describe life lessons my mom and dad tried so hard to give me before they passed.  But now, I feel tears of joy knowing both, in their own way knew someday I’d not only learn these life lessons but pass them onto others.  When was the last time you experienced tears from heaven from mentors, friends, and family?  Life lessons you have learned and are ready to pass on to others.  Thanks, mom!