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I give to the world a half an hour of my unprotected heart…And this new prayer…

Posted in Uncategorized on April 29, 2012| Leave a Comment »

I’m gonna step out neath those dreary grey skies. Look up to the heavens even if rain gets in my eyes. I’ll let the rain mix with my heartfelt tears. I’m gonna ask for a way to comprehend, pray for a break, some serenity. I’m going to beg for this endless night to come to a peaceful end.

There’ve been hails of bullets, preceded by packs of lies. Even some of the folks that are supposed to be reporting “The News” are twisting the truth, when they aren’t fabricating out and out lies.

I’m not a baby or even naïve, I just can’t quite figure out what I should toss aside, or embrace and believe. I’m even confused should I pray to God, or be politically correct and instead put out “positive energies”?

The devil’s on the loose in some weak minded soul’s trigger fingers, stealing the traces of serenity and decent sleep that are left to me. We gotta look to each other for a place to lean, for warmth and support while our souls are left reeling and reaching. I’ll reach for you…and you for me.

I can’t help but think of the moments after 9-11 began to unfold, when I knew no strangers and welcomed anyone seeking a shoulder to cry into…any pleading hand to hold.

Friends, I am tired. I’m afraid and angry, and I too feel your pain. But my faith won’t fail…it might wobble and bend under the strain…I am not made of sugar and won’t melt in the rain…

I’m headed for a mountain top, so my voice is closer to the heavens and will be heard when I cry. I hope to see you there next to me in a show of unity and collective strength. This is no time to hide from the wind, to turn away from your fellow man…I have enough faith to sustain a few of you, but lend me some of yours whenever you can.

Remember, the minutes of sunlight are getting longer day by day, and if we let God see us coming together in the hours between dawn and dusk, perhaps he’ll protect us during the darkness and approaching light. Come together folks…Our collective hope, faith, and love will prevail…

Matthew Landsman 01/08/2011

 

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Growing old with Alzheimer’s

Posted in Uncategorized on April 29, 2012| Leave a Comment »

There are only memories, where a garden used to grow. Some days I think she’d like to plant a flower here, a snow pea there. Mostly she just rests and remembers…but her memory isn’t always clear.
The rows she sowed still remember her, the touch of her fingers, and the feel of her hands. But the recollections of springs of the past are fading fast.
You will do well to find the roses you hung to dry long ago. The connecting again with some memories will one day be all that’s left to know.
And though the fields have gone to weeds, long ago forgotten the touch of tilling, the water, and the seeds…There is the scent of green, of life of love. It lives on in you…you are the flowers now…grow proud and tall…
by Matthew Landsman

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Come Midnight…

Posted in Uncategorized on April 29, 2012| Leave a Comment »

Come midnight…the chill will descend from the North and the West, bringing frost to the pane and spent leaves beyond my porch.  Come midnight, there will be a breeze come visit to usher away the tired memories…to waltz off with the fickle lady who left me to weep with the tattered resolutions I tried to honor and romance starting at another midnight of a tired year ago. The lady called Eve, who visits but once a year, who urges me to raise a glass, to toss away the last three hundred sixty four, and sweep them aside out a seldom used door.

I will do so with a small reservation, a tug at my heart…and a quiet knowing smile…cause she was a sweet year, a collection of smiles and sighs…of both kinds. She gave me new reasons to laugh and to cry, friends to embrace…some to bid adieu for the time being, one to eulogize. I added to my collection of dried blossoms, of over-read notes, of songs to remind me of all of those things…and prayers to help me forget.

Come midnight I will have marked twenty four new year’s passing without champagne…perhaps a nod, a hug and a private tear. Come midnight there will have been fifty two, whether I marked them or not…and the knowing too that in two weeks passing, ten years since we said goodbye to Mom.

Come midnight, nothing will change, and at the same time; nothing will be quite the same. I am grateful; I am weary, wiser, and a little worldlier than this time a year ago.

Come midnight, I will remember I forgot to buy a new calendar when the leaves were turning, but none the less a new, but slightly older lady will accompany my plans and signatures. I don’t know whether I’ll make her any promises, but I plan to spend times with her clear eyed and sober, full of good intention and with respect for the times she’s given and will give to me…Come midnight…Please come, midnight…and accompany me.

Happy New Year friends. And hey, God…come midnight and come morning, my friends who fight the good fight as dawn approaches, still need you at their side. Come on midnight…I’m waiting here on you…

Matthew  12/312011

 

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a little life in the dead of winter…

Posted in inspirational, life lessons, seasons, Uncategorized on April 29, 2012| Leave a Comment »

frosty panes

And should this day extends its hand, I will take it into mine…and hope it leads me where I hadn’t planned…I will forget the winds and cold and headlines…and escape to a memory, a moment I’d misplaced…and the warmth of a friend…Cling to the reassuring sanctuary in the breeze of a familiar song…and forget how winter nights can be so long.
And should a stranger’s smile make my heart skip a beat, and remind me that happy hours are often made up of memorable seconds here and there…I will be grateful and glad to have collected enough of them to make for a happy day…Remember too that this spring’s roses are huddled in slumber neath the snow and spent leaves of fall…
I’m gonna run off with the offerings of this day, and hope you’ll do the same…Matthew

porch snow
Matthew Landsman 01/08/2011

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My thoughts on a tired cliché

Posted in life lessons, nostalgia, people, Uncategorized on April 29, 2012| Leave a Comment »

My response to the cliché …’you can’t live in the past…’
It is my past that taught me about tomorrow. It was my past that gave me failure to turn to future victory. My past that gave me every embrace and smile from my mother, to sustain me through all my tomorrows. My past that nourished me and gave me all my height and every ounce of sinew, that I carried to field of hay, field of play, all the strength to heft tool and toil for long days in both chilled air and heat.
It is my past that brought me all the smiles that I recall as I hope to find new smiles today. My past that urges me when I am shadowed with doubt, and look to the reserve of memory that tells me in fact; I can. Because I have. And I know I will again. It is my past that proves to me, that educated me with lessons hard and harsh, with tough love and subtle reminders.
It is every moment of my past that I am a cumulative result of. My failings taught me to live and learn. My winning moments taught me to be gracious and to always look back. And my losses taught me to be kind when I did win…for the victory isn’t in humiliating and demoralizing others…It isn’t done when I have won. It is done when I have helped the one who tried and fell short, to rise again and learn to enter the arena another day. My past of mixed results has made me a better man.
My past gave me a child, and ushered him away into the world. My past made me a father, and gave me the need to father, even if not my own. The past also took away some fathers from those kids for which I rise up to fill that void. The failings of others are the opportunity for me to rise to the occasion and help give a kid a future. I know this, because I live in the past. Their past…
My past nearly ended me, and drove me to my knees. It saw me torn and broken. The arrogance of youth is soon lost in a sea of humble…an ocean of humiliation. I hold those crevasses of foolishment close to my heart…so I never return to that stretch of road. Those moments are the ones that continue to remind me how fortunate I am to be among the living. I live in the past, so I can continue to live. I got sober in my past, and that moment is revisited often.
Something about my past shines with a recollection; that no matter the darkness of the hour, of glow of jubilant hours, I have always found my faith kept me afloat, reminded me to be grateful. I haven’t always embraced those moments when I probably should have, but the essence has followed me and waited there with open arms, an open mind and heart…healed me, forgiven me, schooled me and loved me without fail. I don’t live in the past, but my past lives on in me.
My past gave me teachings from my parents and the world around me. God followed and accompanied me, even when I lived some days with reckless abandon. No matter how my past has been taken for granted, I never found myself abandoned. I don’t dwell on my past; I let it teach me the moral of the story. And remind me of those things, people, and moments I like to revisit, but not to reside there anymore.
Welcome to my past, I’ll learn what it taught me; tomorrow. MLL

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Running through sprinklers…

Posted in life lessons, nostalgia, seasons, Uncategorized on April 25, 2012| 2 Comments »

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Nearly summer. We had the first dose of heat in the last couple of days. I see the entire community is in full blossom and pristine new leaves. I see bare feet and bicycles and open windows and doors. I feel the kids anticipating the end of school year and that old restless feeling of springtime and being cooped up inside.
I was reminded of things I miss, people I miss, places I thought I’d forgotten, and songs I couldn’t get enough of…
And suddenly it dawned on me; I want to run through sprinklers again.
I want to wake up a few minutes after dawn, and pull yesterday’s tee shirt over my head. Before anyone else is awake, I want to turn the TV on and have the volume way down low, I want to watch Aquaman, and the Monkees in black and white, all while eating cinnamon toast and a bowl of cereal with farm fresh milk. The kind we got in the glass gallon jar with a few inches of thick cream on the top.
I rarely wore shoes, and could run on cement. Once I learned how to ride a bicycle, I was all over our little town. Tragedy was a flat tire, darkness and still a ways to get home. I was scared of the dark…not like today because I KNOW what is out there, but simply because I didn’t. Dark was dark, and that was all.
I want to go barefoot all day again, over gravel and hot blacktop, and cool grass and through warm mud puddles. I even want to stub my toe the old fashioned way and walk home on my heel and bleed like a nine year old tough guy.

I want to eat my grandma’s apple pie, and have her ask me to go pick out a cucumber and a head of lettuce from the garden in her back yard. And I want her and my Momma to be having coffee together, and wondering if I’m ever going to grow? (I was a pretty small kiddo.)

sprinkler

Back when being 60 was real old, and the guy at the gas station actually came outside, and worked for a living and checked under the hood. And when the pump dial stopped turning, he “topped it off”. I want to marvel at muscle cars again…when they were brand new and only worth $3000…not $50,000.
I want to ride in the way back of our 1966 Chevy Belair station wagon and lay on a blanket…watching the stars out the back windows till I fell asleep before we got home…after a long day at the farm. I want a grandpa again. I want to explore his farm again…and smell the smells, and see dust floating in sunbeams. I want to ride on the back of his tractor and watch him roll a cigarette with one hand. I want to watch my uncles stack hay and feed cattle. I want all the adults to talk for an hour between the back porch and pulling away in the car.
I want to have a day with no plan, no goal, leave the house with sleep in my eyes, flyaway hair, seventeen whole cents and a Hot Wheels dragster in my pocket, a Band-Aid on my stubbed toe (for the first half hour), eat a chic-o-stick for lunch, hang out with my friends from dawn to way after dusk…and I want to run through sprinklers again. Oh how I want to run through sprinklers again.
Matthew Landsman, circa 1965 to 1971

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The cold pillow next to mine…

Posted in inspirational, Memorials, people, romance, Uncategorized on April 24, 2012| 1 Comment »

The cold pillow sets there next to me…the empty spot where she used to lay. The tired yard shoes, worn gloves, and ragged coat she wore to tend to garden and chore…she would leave them next to the washer, just inside that squeaky back door. Her keys hang there on a board with hooks and notes and paintings called tole.
She wasn’t a terrible driver, but she somehow seemed to get lost a lot…and on the way she’d go junkin’, especially Friday morn. I think she wandered and reminisced to songs of old, looking for yard sales and old friends to pass the time away…window shopping and chocolate dropping and being happy with things she had. She looked around and saw the half acre yards that others had to mow and knew she’d get tired of all that after a week or so. She was so much more than what others collect, polish and protect.
She was dry flowers and baby showers and dusty bottles of rainy day wine…clothes she wore when she could fit in them, and clothes she wore when she was happy just being who she was. God’s girl, whether she felt skinny or a little bit more.
She is still here…on the radio station that was hers. And those songs that would bring her cheek to mine on a worn spot there on our living room floor. She is here in the reflections in our coffee cups…I’ll keep hers next to the pot, on a napkin, upside down…just in case she happens around. Here…in the way the lid never quite got settled straight on the container of flour. I miss her baking…as will our children. She lives on in their smiles and mannerisms.
She had a way of sensing another’s tear about to form, and touching a cheek to capture that drop on its way down. She had a prayer in her fingertips, a reassuring song in the quiet look from those kind eyes. She could look out on a cloudy day and remind us all that sunshine through a mantle of green is only possible because of darker days and rains. She was all those things and much more.
But in quiet moments I will remember walking with her, and the sharing of dreams. Knowing which parts of her hurt a little more when the clouds were swelled with rain. How she would tear up a little when she heard a special song, or read something written in her grandma’s hand. I will recall her scent…that little bottle that reminds me of embraces and love that she sprayed just above her heart. Oh how it lingers still on the sweaters and coats she wore. I will keep them hanging there where they belong…and give them an occasional spray to refresh the hugs and love there.
But mostly, I will be grateful for the memory of her breathing there on the pillow next to mine, keeping her vows…making mornings worthwhile. I will recall midnight talks we had quietly after our kids were asleep. And I will feel her watching me sleep…on those nights she came to me late, after time spent pondering, folding clothes, and things she was always did to make ends meet. She was special like that.
And every day when I make the bed up, like she always did…I will fluff her pillow again…and hold it to my nose and breathe in her essence. And when I lay me down to sleep, I’ll look over there at the cold pillow setting next to mine…and I will give thanks and recall all those nights when her pillow was yet warm.
Matthew Landsman 03-2012

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Marking Glenda’s return to the garden

Posted in Gardening, inspirational, people, seasons, Uncategorized on April 22, 2012| 1 Comment »

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This is my time. The trees that blossom are in full plumage, and those with green or deep red leaves are unfurling like a sail being raised and filled with air, propelling, compelling, and telling of the season, of this moment in time.

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She called me weeks ago, did mother earth. I was drawn to that place where last fall I solemnly stowed away the gloves that know the curves of my hands, the curls of my fingers. I had wound up hoses, said adieu to tools that work the soil, with handles both short and long. It is as much of a ritual to admit the end of a growing season as it is to anticipate the approach of the new.

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There is a marriage between the beds where late fall and winter brought succulent greens to wither and fade into winter slumber. For the time where I lean on the bouquets I hung to dry and display in the harsh throes of winter…to sustain me and remind me of the coming of an end to longer nights and shorter days.

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And recently I renewed my vows and dedications to the place where shrub and bush, tall trees and evening scents beckon me, sooth and caress me in return for the touch of my hands, the straining of hoe and assertion of spade and gentle rains from both clouds above and rhythmic sprinklers urged to life thru an ancient pump.

glenda13

She gives to me more than I to her, but there is an understanding, an oath unspoken that I will return when the stranglehold of winter is broken. It is life in a state of slumber, brought back thru the stripping away of last year’s foliage that didn’t quite have time to decay and rejoin the earth that sustained it all those months ago.

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Each flat from the nursery, and packet of seed that are emptied, made to new homes and tamped to a perfect depth give to me a promise of returned pleasure and nurturing of my very soul, as the days grow longer then shorter after the solstice has come and gone.

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I love the efforts she matches me with the responding to my urges, the hours spent and her return of sight and scent and sounds from the winged friends that feed and nest in the mantle and bush there.

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There is no debate, no drama, only the well earned sleep and nature’s reward. I ask only for the same ancient ritual to recur, and am in turn rewarded for my faith, my bended knees and love instilled…and as always…she and I celebrate night and day with filled vases and scent filled breezes as I sleep under an open window when warmer nights return.

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The cycle and reassuring return of life to my winter ravaged and weary soul is all I ask…but she gives me so, so much more…

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Matthew Landsman 04-22-2012

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My faithful steed

Posted in Uncategorized on April 7, 2012| Leave a Comment »

My faithful steed

Lots of adventures on the old bike…

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A late spring…while Glenda waits at her porch…

Posted in Gardening, people, seasons, Uncategorized, tagged , , , on April 1, 2012| 1 Comment »

In the final throes of winter, especially this year when the infant spring is rather meek to emerge and take on the starkness of the naked branches, dormant fields and garden plots…The bulbs of fall and volunteer annuals are still evading the frost, and buds are hesitant and not about to swell as naive fools to fall victim to a killing frost.

But then and now I have had my own constant gardener, Glenda, to remind me that warmer dawns and greener views are but a Chinook breeze away. She’ll prepare to soften stiffened gloves and winter born visions of her patch of heaven on God’s green earth. And that dark earth waits with eager anticipation the attentions and loving intentions from her knowing hands.

There will be dirtied knees, hoses unfurled, spots of shade for those things that thrive in darkened corners, heartier varieties for the blossoms that can weather the midday sun. She knows these things, how to create a place of refuge and retreat there on that plot of earth bordering the canal that brings life to the desert.

No matter where I’ve roamed on this continent, I have passed nurseries and flower beds, trees for privacy and trees for shade. And for over two decades, the petals, freshly nurtured earth and shades of blue have always brought a glad feeling and reassurance that she remains. That spring will always closely follow the barren months. That hope is rarely lost even when the night is far longer than the day…

I seek shelter in the knowing that if I chance to pass her way there even just in my mind, there will be a potential for glimpses of April blossoms, hints of summer evening scents, and the essence of cool grass between toes, even in the dead of January when life has ebbed nearly into only memory. I’ll always find my gardener, and I hope when she is in need of love of a friend and words from her personal writer, that she’ll always find me…Matthew Landsman

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