I've already made two resolutions.  I haven't told anyone about them yet, but I think it is important that I do.

First, I'm going to tell my husband that I will stop bashing the Catholic Church.  He's a priest.  He is well aware of the failings. He has been the only one who really understands my disappointment, and even anger, toward the institution and its straight-laced, dysfunctional and demeaning treatment of human sexuality. Even so, I understand why it is the way it is, and there is much good present in it, just as there is much good present in anything.  But, I think he knows me and my feelings well enough already.  He doesn't need to have me grouse about it any more, especially when it really doesn't matter to me.  And I think it does pain him.  So, I'm going to tell him that I'll stop. (so that he notices) and I am going to try very hard to stop.

Second, I'm going to stop country-music bashing for Mary's sake.  It's more like eyeball-rolling and groaning.  But, Mary likes it, and I understand why.  And like with the church, I understand why it is the way it is, and there is much good present in it.  So, I am going to celebrate the good and stop putting it down, cause I think it does bother her a lot that the mom she adores dislikes something that is so special to her.  So, I'm going to tell her that I'll stop (so that she notices) and I am going to try hard to stop.

The preferences I've expressed, the outrage, the indignation and sometimes just plain condescension are all vanity on my part.  I suppose my attitudes have been part of an adolescent-like finding my voice, my ideas, what I believe.  But they are nonsense.  The Catholic Church isn't any worse than any of us other human beings and country music is a manifestation of a particular, earnest, earthy culture in the U.S. today.  So, I should get over myself, stop being so high-falutin' and judgmental and be more centered and gracious to those I love.

One of the most valuable lessons from the Course in Miracles (1992 Foundation for Inner Peace) is that "projection makes perception."

From Lesson 189:5:

"What would you see?  The choice is given you.  But learn and do not let your mind foget this law of seeing: You will look upon that which you feel within.  If hatred finds a place within your heart, you will perceive a fearful world... If you feel the Love of God within you, you will look out on a world of mercy and of love."

My choice is mercy and love. I choose to look within and see the God who sits there at my center.  When I do that, it allows me to see others as who they really are as children of that same God.

Do human beings have faults? Sometimes egregious ones? Yep.  Doest that make us any less children of God? Does that diminish the Source of our Life? Not at all. 

So, if we are all one, made of the exact same Stuff, why waste the time and effort of focusing on the veils and illusions of nonsense we create around ourselves?  Why not cut through to the heart of our Selves and create a space, a tunnel, if you will, to pull our highest Selves to the surface?

So, today my darling daughter told me, "I'm going to give you an Indian name.  I'm going to call you Yoda-Raffiki."  We quickly contracted it to "Yoffiki."  Ha!  That's delightful!

We created on..."Yoffiki, the Lithuanian Peasant. That's what I'm going to put on your headstone," she said.  I think that's fine with me.  I'd add, however, the other "name" she gave me when she was much younger:  "Wonderfulist" as in, "one who makes wonderful."

So, I am honored with my new name:

Yoffiki, the Lithuanian Peasant Wonderfulist.  It's all in there.

Yoda and Raffiki honor my wisdom and mysticism.  The Lithuanian Peasant honors my family's roots, my physical, "substantial" self and tastes as well as my devotion and love of the Earth.  The Wonderfulist is the part of me that does not and will not die, the optimist, the Light, the one who creates wonderful wherever I can.

Wow.  I'm honored.  Thanks, darling.

This is my first entry.  Why would I have a personal blog?  Because I am a writer.  Because I am a thinker. 

I have always labored under the idea, the feeling, that I am somehow "different."  Quirky.  Eccentric.  Living life on the margins.  Being able to hold seemingly opposite ideas comfortably in my head at once is not a problem. 

Lately, I have the distinct feeling that I am NOT alone in my quirkiness or my ability to tolerate the seeming intolerable tensions of our culture, of our age.  I feel like there are more and more people who feel precisely the way I do.  So, I'm going to write about it and see if that's true!