Author: Katherine J Krein

Bridges have been on my mind these days.

Our country has fractured. There is one big divide.

Each side has further divisions.

Voices scramble to be heard, each hoping to demonize the other side.

Those struggling to be open and neutral are now being shamed into taking sides.

This is all happening across our media waves.

On the ground there are families struggling to raise children in this climate of hate.

Marriages  are hoping to bridge the divide, as gender differences have been magnified.

I don’t know the solution to this problem.

I keep hoping this pattern of hate can be transformed.

Love is needed, however, love is now viewed as a weakness.

How did this happen?

I want to run and hide and put my fingers in my ears.

The noise is so loud now; this no longer works.

The heat rises. Tempers flare. The cool comfort of reason is being erased.

I will vote, though in my divided household, no gain will be achieved.

These are the first and last letters of the Greek alphabet. This phrase can be generalized to mean the beginning and the end of anything.

There are 24 letters in the Greek alphabet. There are 26 letters in our English alphabet. Our English X is the 24th letter, and this seems fitting. To X out means to close or end.

Why did we add the Y and Z to our English alphabet is a question I now have. Could this be a tribute to our incessant human need to ask why(Y) and our human need to sleep (Z) at the end of our days.

It is interesting to note that when you add up all the letters of “Alpha and Omega” and all the letters of “The beginning and the end”, you will find that they are equal. I did this and arrived at 17. You could take this one step further and arrive at 8. However, I am inclined to stop adding up the numbers when I am left with a 1 in front (or to the left.)

My conclusion after all of this is that numbers are the universal language and all our letters have been ordered to follow suit.

I’m reminded of a dream I had in the beginning of my number obsession. I woke up from a nap saying aloud: “I am one, I am 1, I am 1.”

The word “one” adds up to 34, and this adds up to 7.

My dad was a no nonsense man. He lived by rules, lists, and time. He was never ever late for anything.

He struggled with color coordination. I think he must have been partially color blind. All oranges, reds, and maroons looked the same to him.

I would cringe every time I saw them clashing in his wardrobe choices. Over time I learned to enjoy this quirk of his. Now the memory makes me smile.

He did have a hidden creative side. He loved lights. He would place spotlights under our wicker furniture to create light designs on our walls. He made a white ceramic cut out ginger jar lamp long ago. I remember it lighting up our monkey pod wood bar.

This lamp is now mine. Every now and then I’ll turn out all the lights in our living room, and switch on this white ginger jar lamp. The cut out design has an Asian flower branch motif. I will sit and enjoy the beautiful light patterns that are created on the walls.

Thanks dad.

Father’s Day is June 17th this year. It has been five years since my father’s death.

He died on the 22nd day of the 6th month of the year. I was born on the 26th day of the 2nd month of the year.

This number connection haunts me a little bit. Every time I see the number 6 and two 2’s, I think of him.

He was exceptional at math, and I never was.

We were not very close. I loved him and he loved me, though I never felt like I lived up to his expectations. I felt like I was always a little too slow for him.

He died a slow death.

A couple of weeks before his death I finally got the courage to confront him with my feelings.

By this time, he could no longer reply.

When I bent down to kiss him that day he struggled with all his will to kiss my cheek in return. I couldn’t remember the last time he had done that.

I knew in that instant my words had sunk in, and he wanted me to know that he loved me.

Now, I’m left wondering whether he chose to die on a day that would keep us connected.

The letters have fallen off the page. The syntax and punctuation fled long ago.

They are now echoing loudly in the distance.

The pages are all unbounded and scattered in the wind. Everything had been numbered.

This might be useful and mean something to someone who knew the counting system.

Now all the imaginary characters in all the unbounded stories can write their own future, as they create their present.

The universe has no copyright laws. Individual fame gets washed away, and all the bits and fragments will recombine somewhere else in someone else’s mind at some other time.

A new thing will be created. It is intelligence transformed.

Memory of the old thing still exists  somewhere in the past. The trail is overgrown, most likely lost.

The new future is being written as I write. Time marches on.

To never grow up means to have non-stop flights of fancy.

“Peter Pan” boys revel in their freedom.

Girlfriends are disposable. The ocean is full of fish.

The boys cast their lines to see what wondrous creations they can catch.

It is all for play, no deep thought is reached or given.

Their true love is the state of boyhood. Their desires are all acts of a physical nature, from arousal to relief.

Feelings for others is not required.

Always on the move, always out for pleasure, always gone before they have to reckon with any consequences.

These boys range in age from young to old. The title “boys” applies to their mental state more than anything else.

P.S. — This post was inspired from reading tabloid magazines while my daughter got her nails done this afternoon.

Mother’s Day is not a happy day for all. Some have memories of being abandoned or  neglected by their mothers.

Some have problems from being over-mothered.

Some mothers are accidental and some are planned.

Some mothers had no choice, and some were forced.

Nature can give or take mothership away. Some grandmothers are given a mother extension.

The Holy Spirit seeks to comfort those left out of love. This comfort is often pushed away.

I’m a mother with a heavy load, and I’ll never be a grandmother.

The Holy Spirit hovers around me trying to help and humor me. I’m trying hard to have an open heart.

I’m lucky in that my mother was a good one.

I’m under the weather and having dark thoughts caused by all the media madness that surrounds us.

One story has children being killed, starved, and denied access to basic human needs.

The next story has a celebrity shaving his head. The juxtaposition is thoughtless to say the least.

I need to turn it off.  Our human obsession with rubber-necking is ruining us all.

I stop to eat some pears in syrup. I’m waiting for my head cold and sore throat to pass. My leg is slowly improving.

I’m anxious to get back to work to hopefully help some children.

The days of summer are ahead, and lengthening my media-free time is my goal.

My thoughts are turning lighter, though I’d almost welcome a sun eruption to wipe away all the vanity that passes on our screens, and this includes my own.

I have to focus on all the good that technology brings to us. I have to have faith that the good can conquer evil.

Channels of power control our human flow, our exchanges, and our lead positions.

The masses below trust and follow. All struggling to make a key connection.

Money is king, greed is the engine, and hopes of a better life fuel the upward flow of bodies.

Bodies that are willing and ready to be the moving parts.

Zooming ahead, racing forward, cutting corners, and leaving tons of waste behind.

Their tracks cut deep, mowing down obstacles in their way. All is done to reach the sky.

Have they forgotten that food comes from the land? Maybe, they have plans for lab grown food or pills, or maybe they don’t need food.

The oxygen thins at high elevations. Do they wear masks?

I’m immersed, entwined, entangled with the Earth.

Engulfed in its ethos, sunk in its mud, swayed by its winds.

Raindrops are on my head with the Sun holding court behind the clouds.

I’m a mere mortal hypnotized by all the raw power surging around me.

My body tremors. I will not relent. The blood in my veins was born fighting.

The history of who I am and where I came from is embedded in every fiber of my being.

I don’t want to let my predecessors down.

My body aches, my tears stream down. My morale has been savaged.

I stand alone, and yet, I stand.