Category: 2015

Risk

Rachel Ann1 Comment

What is the biggest risk you have taken in your life?

The first thing that comes to my mind is the risk to stop giving into fear and instead, turning around, metaphorically speaking, and facing it.

For the longest time I was fearful of a great number of things. These included but were not limited to: Saying no, standing up for myself, tolerating bullshit from friends and relationships, worrying about things I could not change, fearing the worst when falling ill, and reading articles about all the, “what if’s,” that could happen in my life.

Then, in the course of one month, over three weeks, I learned a lesson: all things can go wrong, shit has hit the fan, and I am still standing. I am still here. 

I attempted to make lemonade out of the lemons I was dealt. Nothing motivates you more than facing that fear and realizing how ludicrous it is to give into it. Another motivating factor is realizing how imperative the nature of today, really is. The gift of this breath, and the moment you are being given when the person you love, whose hand you were holding, slipped away before your eyes. Life never simply prepares you to deal with the tragic, it merely provides you with experiences in which to learn that you are capable of handling it, because of the experiences that propelled you until you reached the edge of the mountain.

There were a few things that propelled me into 2016:

One: My sister’s death.

Two: Having two car accidents over the course of a month.

Three: Seeing a positive pregnancy result, seeing blood weeks later, and learning that it was not an actual viable pregnancy, but a molar one.

Four: Being told that the D&C was successful, only to find out that the betaHCG results had risen ten fold, I needed a chest X-ray to make sure cells had not traveled and multiplied in my body forming cancerous masses, receiving an internal ultrasound twice, and then taking chemotherapy shots in order to resolve the issue.

Five: Going weekly for six weeks to see an oncologist and receive chemo shots for an unviable pregnancy after walking similar pathways with my sister the year before for different reasons.

Life has a way of providing opportunities for rebirth.

That was my moment.

I hit my rock bottom on a cold, dreary day in January after leaving the hospital. I drove home in a wash of tears and bathed my sorrows away. Later, I found myself still grappling with many frustrations in the aftermath of grief for multiple reasons. I happened upon a video and blog that changed the course of my life. Gabrielle Bernstein’s work propelled me to make a dramatic shift. I cannot say how grateful I am for the book I read, May Cause Miracles, and the course work I practiced. I opened myself up to facing my ego, learning from my fears I had clung to, learning about my desire for control and deciding to grow as a human and not cower in the shadows of comfort.

Here’s the thing: it is never easy to take a risk. Be it in a small change, or a large shift in your life. However, in doing so, committing to the risk will invariably provide you with room for growth. Change does not happen over night. It happens in your daily thoughts, routines, and the patterns that you pave in life.

Risk is what you make of a situation, not what makes you falter.

Melancholy…

Rachel Ann7 Comments

“Tears are words that need to be written.” 
― Paulo Coelho

The feeling of sadness I will liken to going through the ebb and flow of the tide. It rises and falls steadily each day. Sometimes I can ride it through, other times it crashes right over me. It seems unexplainable and if allowed all consuming.

Key word being: if.

I continue to fight through the fear, the feelings of sadness, and I turn towards things that bring light into my heart. Sometimes they might seem mundane, but they bring me joy.

Warm laundry.

My cat’s swishing tail on my lap.

The sound of the alarm going off allowing me to rise for another day.

The thought occurred to me to seek comfort in other wise human’s words on this subject. I paused at these quotes and found them to be harkening back to what I was finding troubling alone, when in the midst of my own thoughts today…

“Don’t cry because it’s over, smile because it happened.”
― Dr. Seuss

“Every man has his secret sorrows which the world knows not; and often times we call a man cold when he is only sad.”
― Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

“You cannot protect yourself from sadness without protecting yourself from happiness.”
― Jonathan Safran Foer

“They say when you are missing someone that they are probably feeling the same, but I don’t think it’s possible for you to miss me as much as I’m missing you right now”
― Edna St. Vincent Millay

“Any fool can be happy. It takes a man with real heart to make beauty out of the stuff that makes us weep.”
― Clive Barker, Days of Magic, Nights of War

“Tears shed for another person are not a sign of weakness. They are a sign of a pure heart.”
― José N. Harris, MI VIDA: A Story of Faith, Hope and Love

“I don’t know what they are called, the spaces between seconds– but I think of you always in those intervals.”
― Salvador Plascencia, The People of Paper

Sometimes I find it difficult to put into words what I am feeling. When I talked to my little classroom students today I said this when they wanted to know what I was absent on our last Friday before winter break, “Someone I was very close to and loved greatly was very sick, and then passed away. It makes me very sad to talk about it, but I can if you want to know more. Please ask me privately, another time, and I’ll answer your questions as best I can. For right now, let’s focus on all the happy things we have the opportunity to do together. :)”

I think she would have liked my explanation.

They all looked at me with such seriousness and we moved forward with the day, as we should, and as she would have done.

I hope that with the words of Ms. Stacy from the tales in which Anne Shirley found challenging, I will look anew at the next day, “Tomorrow is always fresh with no mistakes in it.”

❤ Sparkle on friends. ❤

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Comunidad para mi hermana…

Rachel Ann1 Comment

Community: 

A unified body of individuals.

The people with common interests living in a particular area. 

I am always astounded at how many beautiful people there are in the vast communities that surround my tiny nuclear family. In the last twelve days this community has exploded into a vast array of artists, writers, teachers, friends, family members, doctors, nurses, musicians, and humanitarians.

If you look for the bad in (hu)mankind expecting to find it, you surely will. -Wise words from Mr. Lincoln.

I like to think of it this way: When you look for the good in people you will surely find it… -A Rachel take

In a time of grief and loss there are no words that can absolutely console or express the feelings that reside within. Although, all I have left are words in fact. These words helped guide me through the last handful of days. The first day I sat and read words, re-read emails, searched and searched for more of her words, looked at photographs, and cried. I read and wrote and cried some more. She would have understood and so appreciated my quiet little tribute on the couch with the cat.

I wish no family member or friend to go through the grief of watching someone so full of life slip away before your eyes. And yet, even in those moments of gray clouds there were bursts of energy, twinklings of starlight that illuminated our little room. These messages, these outpourings of concern, of love, of humor, of photographs, of inspiration, of hope, and caring kindness from a community that once I thought of with fondness and now feel akin to with love.

A friend from afar shared with me a bit of ideology I shall insert here:

“You want a physicist to speak at your funeral. You want the physicist to talk to your grieving family about the conservation of energy, so they will understand that your energy has not died. You want the physicist to remind your sobbing mother about the first law of thermodynamics; that no energy gets created in the universe, and none is destroyed. You want your mother to know that all your energy, every vibration, every Btu of heat, every wave of every particle that was her beloved child remains with her in this world. You want the physicist to tell your weeping father that amid energies of the cosmos, you gave as good as you got.
And at one point you’d hope that the physicist would step down from the pulpit and walk to your brokenhearted spouse there in the pew and tell him that all the photons that ever bounced off your face, all the particles whose paths were interrupted by your smile, by the touch of your hair, hundreds of trillions of particles, have raced off like children, their ways forever changed by you. And as your widow rocks in the arms of a loving family, may the physicist let her know that all the photons that bounced from you were gathered in the particle detectors that are her eyes, that those photons created within her constellations of electromagnetically charged neurons whose energy will go on forever.

And the physicist will remind the congregation of how much of all our energy is given off as heat. There may be a few fanning themselves with their programs as he says it. And he will tell them that the warmth that flowed through you in life is still here, still part of all that we are, even as we who mourn continue the heat of our own lives.

And you’ll want the physicist to explain to those who loved you that they need not have faith; indeed, they should not have faith. Let them know that they can measure, that scientists have measured precisely the conservation of energy and found it accurate, verifiable and consistent across space and time. You can hope your family will examine the evidence and satisfy themselves that the science is sound and that they’ll be comforted to know your energy’s still around. According to the law of the conservation of energy, not a bit of you is gone; you’re just less orderly. Amen.”

-Aaron Freeman.

This so eloquently embodies how I feel. I realized that what I miss most is the immediate sense of being able to share with Debbie. It felt so natural for me to email, write, text, call, Facebook message, FaceTime, Skype, JUST BUG her in general with these flutterings of ideas, jokes, blogs, story ideas, lesson plans, links, pictures, videos, DIY plans and suddenly I realized but wait….where do I send these now? Sometimes I catch myself thinking, “Oh I gotta tell Debbie that, she’d think that was so….” Dang it. Then the thought occurred to me…

I can still tell her. I can still write to her. That I shall do.

I feel a sense of energy when I fall asleep, and when I rise up each morning. I work through those moments in time when I feel like becoming moss on the silent log in the woods. I push myself as she did every day, I do not succumb to the voice in my head that says no, I turn around and scream back in response a resounding: YES.

Life is too short to not partake in the ample opportunities that surround you. Reach out to your community whomever that might be. Find those that inspire you and shed light on the joint ideologies that lift up one another.

I shall leave you with a quote from one of our favorite humans, Mr. Rogers:

“When I was a boy and I would see scary things in the news, my mother would say to me, “Look for the helpers. You will always find people who are helping.”

Look for the helpers my friends, be a helper, and shed love wherever you go.

❤ Sparkles for Debbie, always. ❤

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The sounds of silence…

Rachel Ann8 Comments

When you grow up in a musical home you look back upon your life through melodies…

My earliest memories are interwoven with the sounds of ’60-70’s folk music. One of my favorites for washing over the soul is, Simon & Garfunkel’s Bridge Over Troubled Water.

They trickle down from there into the sounds of klezmer. Occasional 90’s beats that move into more traditional Jewish music. I can see the years through bar and bat mitzvahs, weddings, and times of ruach shared with these melodies. One favorite is L’cha Dodi by Debbie Friedman who my sister introduced me to. Her voice feels like an anthem for my childhood days…

In times of crisis, joy, and heartache I have always drawn the melodies of familiarity toward my soul. They dance throughout our minds and hearts right now, leaving trails of healing beats on our souls.

The sounds of silence came to me earlier today, and I found solace in Simon and Garfunkel’s words.

I have no words for what is happening before my eyes. Only melodies that seem to flutter into my brain, I find them online, and share them with my family at this time of imminent need.  I’ve seen and experienced so much love for my sister and our family within the last four days, and it has been such a blessing. I’m left with only this, Mi Shebeirach by Debbie Friedman:

————————————————————-

I wrote the above as a blog that I now edited while I sat with my family surrounding my dear sister. I have no words for what has happened. Her passing feels surreal. Someone who I thought would always be with me, a rock steady in the stream of life has now taken flight and moved forward. I do not feel lost, I know what she would have wanted. I feel as though part of my soul is now in a region I do not know of.

She believed in love, life, laughter, literature, and above all else, education.

She was an AMAZING human who will now wink down upon us from the sky. A shimmering diamond in the sky taking on new endeavors and ventures that know no boundaries of us earthly forms.

I asked close friends and family to please read a book to their children or read on their own in her honor. Please hug your family tighter and read more often. If you feel so inclined, donate a book in her honor to a local library or children’s organization. (For Debbie Alvarez) Let your life take flight, explore, encourage, and enrich your life through adventure and literature.

I love you Debbie and I always will, to the moon and back.

Love,

Your little sister Rachel

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Here is more information on my beautiful sister if you’d like to read what our newspaper wrote: http://www.oregonlive.com/beaverton/index.ssf/2015/12/debbie_alvarez.html

Think: P-O-S-I-T-I-V-E

Rachel Ann6 Comments

“Positive,” this word’s meaning, per our friend Webster is defined as: consisting in or characterized by the presence or possession of features or qualities rather than their absence. (or) With no possibility of doubt; clear and definite.

When my sister’s struggle with cancer began three years ago she was given a diagnosis, a surgery, and a new decade of life, all in the same moments of time. Taking on the decade of 40 was a challenging task beyond belief. She had no idea what this would all entail.

When you watch a loved one experience pain, there is no worse feeling in the world I assure you. Worse yet is being powerless to stop it all when it takes place before your eyes. It’s like a form of Chinese torture. That slow grip on your soul that just never quite releases and squeezes you without warning when the worms of cancer release.

I remember my beloved Cosby show father character once telling his daughter, “There’s a battle going on inside of you. See you’ve got the white blood cell good guys fighting for you, and then you’ve got these other bad guys and they’re just waging a war inside your body.” Sometimes I think about that moment of hearing an explanation of disease. It makes sense and is simplistic and honest.

The unpredictability of disease has not stopped her from the positivity in the world of experiencing life, living, reading, loving, educating, reaching out, traveling, dancing, laughing, being sarcastic, fighting, and questioning and exploring. She always puts the conscientious thought of love first. That’s something that I have learned from her. “Don’t shut yourself off from being open to the possibility of what someone can bring in, connect, and appreciate Rachel.” We’re doing that together. She has wonderful care right now. Each day has been a blessing of opportunity to laugh, and experience things together.

I felt the desire to write, about what in particular I was not quite sure. What is currently on my heart and mind, my sister Debbie.

I have found writing and music to be extremely therapeutic over the last 72 hours and will continue to share that with Debbie. Currently I am playing d.j. while she dozes and we are all enjoying some Schumann. Thank you for the positive thoughts and love friends. Keep the energy going. ❤ Sparkle on.

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I’m feeling 32…

Rachel Ann5 Comments

birthday 32

My mother said that the night before I was born she had a conversation with me in the womb. She told me it was time for me to come into the world. She had stayed in bed for nearly 8 months in order to bring me forth into the world and that it was finally time. 

I generally follow directions, but I definitely march to my own drum beat still to this day thanks to my mom.

I followed the plan she laid out before me, but I arrived with a bang before my father even had time to arrive that early morning. My mother had her best friend Ann with her.   I like to think that she lives on within me, inside my heart, with my middle name and hers being the same. 

Friendships run deep in my life. Clearly from the first moment I breathed life, friends were surrounding me. 

I am a loyal human. I may kick, and I may scream my way through situations, but I will remain by your side. Much like my childhood likeness. I was the type of friend who would steadfastly watch their best friend branch out with other people and friends, but stay rock steady when they returned. I sought no comfort in constantly seeking other’s approval. I knew who I was even as a little one, and I loved my friend even from afar. I never looked at friendships as an, “end all be all per say,” but rather I cherished those whom I felt made a lasting hand print on my heart. 

The last 32 years have brought forth many recollections when I stop and consider the life that I have lead thus far. 

A few things hold true: life will always ebb and flow. It will continue to test you. No matter how prepared you might be, you can never prepare for the change that will set forth when you least expect it. 

I’ve found within the last year that spontaneity, pushing my limits, and testing my boundaries and also the human’s within my life makes my vision become clearer with this life.

We are given a gift to wake up and face each day for all that it will bring into our lives. 

I have watched those closest to me fight a battle of cancer.

I have seen love and loss.

I have experienced the unimaginable. 

I have discussed.

I have cried.

I have written. 

I have sang.

I have acted.

I have performed and put on a mask to make the smoke and mirrors reflect what they should from the stage. 

I have gotten up each day. Taken many deep breaths and washed away my sorrows through sweat and tears combined.

I have found solace in the arts.

Ultimately I have danced away carefree in those melodies and sparkling lights. 

I have worked towards relinquishing my desire to control. 

I continue to struggle with many things. 

I have found love, and shown kindness whenever possible. 

Life will always be challenging, and yet, I am anticipating what lies ahead.

The small, simple moments bring me boundless joy.

Cheers to you my blogging friends. Here, where readers and writers unite. 

I applaud all of you for sharing your quandaries and quests. May we all bring forth a flood of words to wash away our tears, and the anguish that our world is pulsing with. 

Peace, love, and sparkles is my wish on this, my 32nd birthday.

 

Sagittarius Birthday Eve…

Rachel Ann4 Comments

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My husband should blog. Poem courtesy of him.  Thank you to all the amazing fellow bloggers through wordpress. It’s been wonderful to connect, write, and inspire one another. I am so grateful for this community. Sparkle on friends.

I leave you with a few of my favorite things on this 32nd birthday eve:

Roxanne

Rachel Ann5 Comments

When I was a young girl there was an amazing human in my life. Her name was Roxanne.

She and my mother were in a mahjong group together. If I listen carefully to my mind’s eye I can still hear the tiles as they would gently slide across the table and click slowly into place.

Four players.

Four women.

All of them bound by a unique organization called Hadassah.

The word Hadassah itself translates from the Hebrew word meaning: compassion. Which further explains the namesake of the organization that is run in Israel known as Hadassah.

With compassion I write tonight.

I thought a great deal about Roxanne this past week.

I had the opportunity to spend time with my thirteen year old niece who is a wonderful young lady.  It’s crazy for me to stop and look back upon my memories with her. We met when she was six months old, a tiny sleeping baby in a crib visiting her Grandparent’s and Uncle Andy with her mother. Now she is a tall, beautiful, smart, sarcastic, and quick-witted teenager making her way in the world.

I thought of Roxanne when I drove to pick up my niece that morning.

Her small stature. Her quiet mischievous grin when I knew we were about to embark on an adventure together.

The little girl with the long brown hair and dimple that flashed with glee upon entry to her home.

She was the mother of two boys, always wishing for a girl to dote upon. She later became an amazing grandmother to a lucky little girl who I am sure felt the same way I did when spending time with this woman.

I was such a lucky girl circa at the age of six.

I so admired her immaculate persona, the air of Chanel on her person, Gucci hanging from her arms, and the red nails like slippers donned upon each finger tip.

What I loved most of all about her was how she made me feel.

They say that what people remember most about you is how you make them feel. It is ever so true friends.

She always made me feel like a talented princess. Roxanne had this special way of creating a make-believe world in her basement with me. I would dress up and march around waving my imaginary scepter, and she played along as a royal subject. Pink cheeks, singing Disney songs, and bouncing from couch to couch.

Little did she realize that along with my parents, especially my mom, they all helped set the stage for my belief in the magic of the theatre. I was a tiny star in her living room creating a world of imagination and ruling the castle one couch at a time.

I can fondly recall upon one play date when her husband came home and threw on his Groucho Marx mask and wig. I was scared out of my wits and jumped into this tiny woman’s lap. She laughed and laughed and yelled at her husband Gary to take off the mask while I squealed into her chest.

Another special event took place on a gray spring Anchorage day. Dad dropped me off and went about whatever errands he and my mom had to take care of that afternoon.  I spent the day with Roxanne watching a Disney film, playing on the kitchen table while she prepped a meal for lunch. Then suddenly she looked at me and said, “Do you hear that? It’s the ice cream man!” She rushed me outside with her, she darted past the rain puddles and into a stream of sunshine. The rainbow sherbet pop wasn’t the greatest treat that day. It was the memory that became nestled into my brain instead. Now, I think of her when I see raindrops and sunlight touch, meeting again for a moment back in that afternoon sky.

Sometimes I think I can see her in a crowd.  That shoulder length reddish-brown hair with the crisp blunt edges swaying just above a black turtle neck sweater and Chanel-esque cardigan.

She wrote to me at sleep away camp in 1997.  I was in the grim years of my life, the early teens, the awkward age of 13. This time was marked by training bras, awaiting the time when I would finally become a woman…oh we ladies know what I am talking about…

My mom called and asked her to write because even back then, I had quite a mighty sword with my pen.

I wrote to my parents telling them how homesick I was. How alone I felt. That I had no friends and no one to talk to. This was all true the first of the three weeks of camp. I slowly fell into a rhythm and made a couple of friends. But this is a story for another blog post.

The point was that Roxanne was there when it was needed.

She even wrote me as a pen pal the first year we moved to our new lower 48 state home. I should dig out those letters sometime. I have them all still, along with all my other correspondence over the years with friends and family.

Taking my niece out for a girls date of coffee treats, mall shopping, and laughing made me ache with a desire to call my sweet Roxanne and say thank you.

Thank you for making me feel beautiful when I was an ugly duckling waiting to blossom. 

Sometimes life deals you these cards that are just glaringly unfair.

I wish there was a magic eight ball of time that I could shake and go back to that place and find her and embrace her and say all that is on my mind.

However, that’s not the case. It’s not possible. As much as I wish it were.

So instead, I laughed with my niece that day, and I looked at her with love in my eyes.  I hug those moments in time when we can laugh like I did with Roxanne and enjoy the simple things about being a girl.  Discuss the in’s and outs of life as we pass by glittering dresses we hold up for one another and joke about trying the ridiculous attire on.

Roxanne, you made me feel beautiful. Your spirit comes forth whenever I see a rainstorm pass over and the sunshine through the clouds.

I can only hope that one day my niece might think back and say, “Aunt Rachel made me feel beautiful and loved.”

Sparkles for Roxanne.

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תודה Thank you

Rachel Ann2 Comments

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When I started my blog I got this idea and I went with it. I sat on the floor of this random house we stayed in with six other people in Whistler, Canada and I wrote. My husband was embarked on a journey to complete an Iron Man and I embarked on a journey to finally put my voice out there in the world.

I have always loved to write.

I discovered my voice through journaling and diaries at a very young age. It was not until my freshman year of college that I realized, “I really love this.” I took a creative writing course in which the objective for the term was to create entries in a giant journal that expressed ourselves as humans. We practiced amazing exercises in visualization, drawing, found objects, art that inspired us, prompts, you name it. I absolutely loved it. The reason why I even took the course was because my general studies teacher praised my metaphoric usage on some random paper. It goes to show, you never know what kind of impact you might have on another person.

Thank you to my new blogger friends:

Jessamayann: https://jessamayann.wordpress.com/2015/10/15/one-lovely-blog-award/comment-page-1/#comment-17

and Stephellaneous: https://stephellaneous.wordpress.com/2015/10/15/the-versatile-blogger-award-the-one-where-i-follow-through/

for being so kind and nominating me for the, “One Lovely Blog Award,” and “The Versatile Blogger Award.” These are my projects for the weekend friends!! Time to get crafty with words and of course, sparkles.

Muchas gracias.  Merci beaucoup.  Danke.  Grazie.

Glimpses

Rachel Ann11 Comments

Over the last few days I caught a few glimpses of all sides of the spectrum when it comes to humanity. The ups and the downs. Much like the ebb and flow of the tide.

Here are some of my glimpses…

While driving to work I saw this man walking his small Shih Tzu dog. I thought, “Oh that’s a sweet moment first thing in the morning, I miss our dog…,” and then as suddenly as the thought came it shifted.  I saw the man yank the leash towards him and yell at the dog, who startled began to run away. I almost slammed on my breaks and turned the car around. I had two thoughts.

One: That is not your pet Rachel and who knows the circumstance.

Two: You’re late to work and would it really be helpful or hinder yourself to question his decision?! I still do not feel splendid about the fact that I kept driving. That’s the truth of the matter though.

Today, a patient elderly couple were purchasing their medication at the drug store. I, standing in line with my sunglasses on peered at the husband as he sauntered over to a display rack of calendars. He smiled and pointed at one for himself. His wife walked over about one minute later and said, “Alright…” while folding her receipt neatly into her wallet. The husband said, “Wait,” and ever so gently pulled her shoulders towards the calendar in front of him. “Look,” he whispered, and then proceeded to read the title of the themed calendar aloud, “Senior Moments…” and then pointed to the photograph on the cover. He chuckled, she then laughed aloud and shook her head, which was followed with a rub on his arm. When I moved up in line I looked back at the calendar. Do you know what was on the cover? A photograph of the back of two elderly individuals, clothed, with one person’s hand on the buttocks of the other, pinching it.  Let the laughs ensue… you’re welcome. Needless to say the couple kept chuckling all the way towards the door.

My best friend has been out of town for a while.  I took care of her baby cat while she was away. Ok, he is not technically a baby, but you get the gist of my idea here. Every day, faithfully we would have an hour together around 5pm. Upon entry on my last visit, said kitty, promptly ran over to the door and declared fervently, “Meow, meow, meow, meow, meow, meow.”  Then he scurried over to his food bowl and I swear, he pointed.  He was probably trying to say, “You did not give me enough food!! Do you see this bowl? I moved it a foot away searching for any left overs! THAT’S how hungry I was!”  He paced around until I refilled the bowl, then settled into happy munch and nom nom time. Later while I graded papers on the couch he sat at the opposite end.  He stopped mid-thigh clean, looked at me square in the eyes and nodded. I promise you he did. He must be a genius.  If only cats had opposable thumbs, they would rule the world I tell you!

Lastly, while reading responses sent through google docs by my students with the prompt, “Write me a letter about yourself, tell me a joke, explain something about yourself to me through writing.”  I came upon a letter to the teacher, me, that the child had written that made me laugh aloud, during a meeting.  Said child wrote, “Dear Mrs. ___, I would just like to say that you are a wonderful teacher. Thank you for answering my questions, sometimes I have a lot of them, but can you blame me?  Sometimes I get frustrated and want to just burst, you have helped me with this. Thank you.” Why, you are welcome dear one.

I leave you with this dear world, smile more, laugh with others, and always believe that there are better moments coming your way.

Sparkle on.

pics of cartier and I