Happy 2014

A New Year to:

Love more

Laugh more

Believe in me more

Risk more

Play more

Work more

Live in the Light!

It is not because things are difficult that we do not dare; It is because we do not dare that they are difficult.

-Seneca

Thanks

"Really great people make you feel that you, too, can become great."

Thanks to all the really Great People!!! 

Threads

Strands
crossing the globe
the universe
crossing differences and struggles
hatred and pain
loneliness and fear and ...

Always there
because you and me
we shared something
I miss you

in space - Somewhere -
all my friends
seeds in the wind
flying in random patterns
dropping into fertile soil
taking root in separate worlds

Till random memory, sparked
by that same wind that carried us away
brings us together for a second

Yet knowing this I wonder
do i trust the threads?
not to break
loose ends drifting

It is not the threads that need my trust
But myself

Cemetary Wall

The 1840's brick walled cemetary which is located in what is now almost the parking lot of IKEA is where my family remains rest. Or are buried and lie there still? Well, its where we are put when we die. At least where they put what is left of us after cremation. My dad jokes that there is standing room only left, at least in our plot. And it is where I go to talk to my mom sometimes. (Although I talk to her lots of other times too, this is just a more formal thing where I take in my coffee and some flowers or an angel or something and sit by her grave and think about her)











Well, I see that I didn't finish my last posting on cynism ... and that was back in May. Spring and summer passed without a word, my garden flowered and faded without a glance, the kids did their thing and I did mine with very little engagement of any sort, and the trees are still here and so am I, but the cemetary wall is falling down. A combination of natural forces and vandalism. Interesting why one is considered vandalism and the other is natural forces.

Cynicism; work in progress

Cynicism; a luxury I can no longer afford.

I was not thrilled when my brother emailed me last week asking if I would go to yet another meeting. I owe him big time though, in the way of meetings he has been to more and read more realms of technical and legal jargon than any non-lawyer human being should ever be subjected to. To honour this, once again, I resigned myself with as much grace as I could muster, to attending another Public Information meeting which I assumed would be another example of the ‘government’ spending money on ‘consultants’ to appease the ‘public’ by giving lip service to informing us before an outcome was predetermined and asking for input.

I’d had my own notice of this meeting and thrown it out a month ago, I saw the notice lying around at my dad’s house and scorned to even look at it. Cynical hah, I was being totally realistic! I received the notice because I’d attended the first go round of meeting on what was then referred to as the Mid Peninsula Highway. Egads, it was painful. Though technically at the preliminary stage of determining the Terms of Reference for an Environmental Assessment it was impossible not to feel the buzz that the Harris government was fast tracking the ‘Process’, that the highway was a done deal, and that the best we could hope for input on was a pathetic struggle about who’s back yard was going to be paved.

It turned out the meeting night was the only night this week both my teenage daughters were home from work and I left them at the dinner table (after only a couple sips of wine) complaining all the way. My first impression on entering the meeting room was the smell of coffee and I made a beeline. Caffeine and I do not have a good relationship but I’d done my own Needs Assessment and deemed short-term gain more important than long term sleep. The analogy here of instant gratification that justifies impacts and ignores less tantalizing options (like water or juice) seemed to correspond to my expectations of the meeting’s scheduled entertainment: A Public Stakeholder Orientation Session for the Niagara to GTA Corridor Planning and EA Study.

The purpose of the meeting was to provide an update on the study progress since the approval of the Terms of Reference, outline the planning, technical and public consultation approaches being proposed by the Study Team, and obtain feedback and advice from stakeholders. Yeah, right. Who are these stakeholders ‘they’ want advice from?? I didn’t quite roll my eyes but man, there is something odd about us paying for the services of consultants hired to make us believe a fair process has taken place with the end result that some government will get credit for a legacy of accomplishing something because dammit they know better than the masses and once they’re elected they can manipulate their mandate into any pet project they want.

Do I sound cynical? As I ...
To be continued - tomorrow if I can sleep tonight, and later tonight if the coffee does its thing.

Violins and Raindrops

I walk pass these trees every morning on my way to work. Yet I do not see these trees every morning.
Imagine missing trees dripping with pearls.










I cried when I read about a man playing violin in a subway station for change, and out of a thousand people who walked by only a handful heard the music.
This violin player was one of the best classical violinists in the world and the music brilliant. Each piece was an emotional powerful, each note a pearl.
Imagine not hearing a thing ...





How can that happen? How can we pass by beauty without seeing or hearing it. Has beauty become irrelevent?

"What is this life, if full of care
We have no time to stop and stare?"
From Leisure by W.H. Davies

The amazing article about the violinist (Joshua Bell) and the subway is called Pearls Before Breakfast and was on Washingtonpost.com. It came to me from www.charityfocus.org which sends a thought of the day and an article everyday.

Robert's Calendar

My friend Robert gave me a calendar for Christmas. More than a calendar really, it is "the Ultimate Family Organizer" with huge lined squares for each day and hundreds of stickers to use for birthdays etc. It was lovely of him of course, although I always wondered why he thought it was a good gift for me; I'm generally pretty organized, my kids look after their own schedules now (at 17 and 20 they don't let me sign them up for soccer or piano lessons anymore) and I've never missed a dinner or a party with this group of friends ... But it is quite possible Robert sees things in a different way. (Perhaps it was simply a thoughtful gift for a woman entering her fiftieth year offering her the convenience of one place where she wouldn't need to find her reading glasses.)

Whatever the motivation I find myself attached to this calendar. Well, I wasn't at first, at first I didn't know what to do with it. It was too big to put on the wall in the usual calendar spot, and took up a lot of room on the desk so I just shifted it from pile to shelf and forgot about it until a couple days into February. Dreary old February when the snow settled in for a long visit and the cold crept through the windows and doors. It was February when I decided enough was enough and it was time I took control of my habits. Inspired by an article I'd read about a woman who challenged herself for one year to give up one thing for each month (after each month she would be able to have that thing back and choose something else to give up the next). One month it was chocolate, another it was shopping, another it was elevators ... The point being to take a conscious look at some of her habits and assess their meaning in her life.

As I had quit smoking for the last time in January and was therefore riding a confident wave I decided to use the monthly plan to address some habits I'd rather not take with me into my 'mature' years. And to add some habits that I had wanted for a long time. According to another article it takes 21 days to break a habit, or make a habit and here I was going to make the opportunity to give it a try. The deal I made with myself was to give up one thing and add one thing per month, with the option of changing back the next month as long as I made it a conscious choice.

I got pretty excited about this, listing some of the habits took up two pages of my journal and the more I looked the more appeared. Deciding I needed to have a record and a visible progress marker I leaned back and gazed randomly around my office and what do you think? Robert's calendar almost leapt off the shelf at me. Then a pot full of coloured highlighters I hadn't touched for years except to dust around (very occasionally) slid into view and - Bob's your Uncle!

Its a pretty cool thing, the satisfaction of colouring in squares one day at a time. I decided to colour smoking for the whole year so I could have three colours (and in case I ever forgot #$%&@#). I made a X in pink highlighter in every square beginning January 14th. For February I decided to add yoga every day and eliminate playing those damn computer solitaire games. Yoga got a blue X and computer games got a green X. Halfway through February I was feeling great from the yoga and extremely virtuous about work because in the hour that I spent in the office each day I'd done the T4's, finished the year end reports for 2006, done a budget for 2007, sorted the filing drawers, and read the past years worth of farming magazines. And equally, or perhaps even more delicious than all this was the colour pattern appearing on Robert's calendar which I'd posted on the wall beside the computer.

Soon February was over; a work of art, and I felt I was on to a new and wonderful way to make meaningful my every action. March's blank squares challenged me to come up with green and blue habits (smoking kept the pink, a circle this month). I chose to add writing down one new project idea each day (there's been projects circling my mind for years I've never done anything about) without any need for making them realistic, or understandable to anybody but me, or adding details. I chose to eliminate keeping my email on all day and reading emails as they came in, rather I would check it only twice a day; when I turned the computer on in the morning and before dinner.

The idea writing turned out great. The first few days after I exhausted the projects in the top of my head were a struggle, then ideas began pouring out, naturally clarifying themselves and becoming doable projects. Although, or perhaps because, I knew I was not committing myself to actually doing anything details and plans began forming and I wrote everything down. It was fascinating and fun to do this. Not quite so fun was the email habit, in fact I failed miserably and gave up completely after three days.

It is now one week into April and those lovely pink smoke rings are continuing their march across the squares. The end of March I slipped into an old funk and lost some power, but it is back again now. That's another cool thing - I get to make up the rules as I go. April feels like a tough month, particularly Easter because it reminds me of my mom. My habit I am adding this month is a new written prayer each day. And I want to try again to break my addiction to email during the day. I think I'll be able to do it this month because the weather is likely to allow me more time outside.

And as a follow up to February's habits: I am doing yoga four times a week, this feels reasonable. Computer solitaire I play now and then. I think I 'should' give it up for good - like the smoking, and now I know I can, but what the heck, I got so much work done in February there's not enough office work to keep me busy an hour a day now. And some of March's ideas are sprouting leaves and taking shape, still without committment, yet some of the projects are entering the possibility range.

As gifts go Robert - this calendar was a pretty good one, thanks!!

Stuck

I've been listening to Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance while pruning in the orchards these last couple of weeks. And today it was the part about being stuck... man that book has stuff to say about 'stuck' that I never imagined. In fact I kind of thought stuck and procrastinating were different versions of the same word. Wrong! Stuck is so much more.
It is a place where perspective is lost, passion is lost, quality (lots of talk about quality) can't be found. As I'm listening I'm thinking okay - purpose, he's talking about purpose that is not aligned with values inside us. Yet don't we get stuck with the things we are passionate about ... hell yes, like this writing assignment I have - I love writing and voluntarily chose this assignment because I think it will be good for my writing and I believe it will take me another step. AND SO ... what is my stuck??

The author uses the example of a motorcycle that siezed because of an innocuous little screw that somehow got stuck. And the manuals didn't talk about how to get a screw unstuck, the trained monkey mechanics didn't know because it wasn't classical training, and in all the reasoning and rationalizing of what could be wrong a stuck screw was not mentioned. Then, if by some chance it was discovered and diagnosed as the root of the problem there were no instructions how to fix it ... essentially the machine was junk if the conventional instructions were all that was available.

Fortunately there are things like quality... and in this I infer he refers to 'quality' as a feeling that the product of whatever you are working on is of value. And from this 'quality' the manuals are but a starting point. There is a more intuitive learning and assessment. For certain deductive and reasoning are used; to start at least, then if the object has enough value to the person working on it a passion or a zone place of quality kicks in, the mind goes quiet and restrictions of knowledge are forgotten. This is where the 101 ways to remove this screw become available, or accessible; because they were always available. The knowledge was there, just in a different form for a different purpose and the connection not made because it was out of context and the motivation wasn't strong enough before there was 'quality' or 'value'.

And how does this relate to my writing? I haven't made the connection yet ... wonder if it has anything to do with value? Am I trying to do it in a trained monkey way?? Where is my little screw and where and in what context do I look for answers. Ahhhh, my old favourite quote, paraphrased from Albert Einstein "You cannot solve a problem with the same thinking that created it"

Or- maybe it is just plain old fear keeping me away from my computer; fear that it won't be good enough (for what i wonder), fear that it will lead me somewhere I'm afraid to go, fear that if I stop procrastinating on this then I'll have to move on to where it leads me ...

And there we have it ladies; Jan and Lou, at least if you can't understand what I've written you will see that I have written today. About time the old coach was herself accountable.

Spring

they told me it is spring today
and i believe them, only
for me the season is on hold
stuck in winter
waiting for a sign
ahh, not trusting
the longer days or
the birds

Faith takes work
perseverance, determination, and strength
dear source of light, energy and endless love
let me believe in the spring,
trust the signs
and allow it's miracles and mysteries
into my heart

Dead Iguana

I got stuck thinking about the dead Iguana we passed on the road.

That was two months ago, and still I wonder what I wanted to recognize about the Iguana so strongly I couldn't get beyond it. I'd already made a big deal about him lying there sprawled out on the road in the full hot sun like he was in a heat trance and maybe not really dead at all and I'd said a prayer for his soul, although I know people will say Iguanas don't have souls like ours, but they are made up of cells and molecules just like us and live and die just like us and all other creatures and live and have a purpose on this planet just like us and therefore we are all part of one really large family and when any death crosses our path some recognition and show of respect and appreciation of their life is important. This I know to be true, the same way I know that the icicles are dripping outside my window and spring is coming.

Here is my prayer;
Iguana, you beautiful miracle of a creature, unique and no more or less special that the rest of creation but perfect in who and what you are, what you came from and what you become, I recognize, respect and appreciate your presence and value the experience of our paths crossing in this life and all you have taught me. I bless you with all the love, peace and joy in my heart.

cows

When nothing is true anything is possible ...

My daughter is desperately unhappy ... how do I know? I don't - I am unhappy about what I see happening with her - that is true. Or is it? Perhaps I, who professes to not 'buy in' to the status quo for myself, am hypocritical enough to 'buy in' to it for my kids (hedge my bets with them) and that is what I am unhappy about - that she's not fitting the mold, that my friends kids are graduating and making 'responsible' choices about further education so they can get better jobs and become financially independant. Have I bought into that as her role? and therefore my role would be to keep her on that path. And in this I have 'failed', and that is what is making me unhappy?
I wonder why I hesitate to let her drop out of school? To let her choose her own path? Do I know better?
What do I know anyways? I know I just took her to lunch at Wendy's and she had chicken nuggets and fries and coke and I think those are unhealthy choices on many levels, but my taking her and paying for thhis lunch is giving her (and the universe) the opposite message. I also know I ate too - a taco salad, which I thought would be close to real food, but I've been listening to The Omnivore's Dilemna and realized with each bite that what I was eating was supporting the industrialized farming I believe is one of the most harmful 'buy ins' we've ever been a party to. Shit, if those who hate us only have a little patience we'll anihilate ourselves with the poisons we are consuming and demanding (literally and figuratively)
And I do feel sick now. That poor cow that was part of the chili is not digesting well with me. And I committed the sin of wasting, so his life wasn't even worth appreciating.

Yesterday

Here's the quote for today
"For all that has been, thanks. For all that will be, yes" by Dag Hammarskjold
So to 2006; the lives, the deaths, the loves, the fears, the joys and the pains I am grateful. Even to the petty worries and guilts, even to the senseless waste and selfish cruelty and the ignorance that harms through its arrogance, even to the nights when I couldn't see the stars and days when I couldn't see the sun, I am grateful.
It is all in me and I am humbled and overjoyed at my capacity to take it all and grow.
I am delighted to be just like everyone else, and to be unique and special.
MY faith has grown, my peace has grown, my eyes and ears are opening to the beauty in everything, the presence of my death is freeing me to live and create my being and listen to my heart.
And for 2007
It is my intention to be intimate with every breath and every second and not take anything for granted.
"Yes" and then "thanks" are all that I need to live.

Intention

It's five o'clock on a Monday
The sky is grayer than gray
As I sit the washer is washing
the dryer is drying,
the heater is heating
the oven is cooking
and i am breathing

There are piles and piles
mountains of stuff
my house is a landfill
of things
I thought I couldn't live without
For reasons I can't remember
and i keep breathing

The temperature is rising
We fight disease and make weapons
People are starving
Trees are crying
hope is fading
and i keep breathing

The hidden cost of money
Is beginning to steam like a volcano
Trickles of molten lava are snaking into sight
The signs are seen, but few are listening
Even fewer acting
and i keep breathing

It's like a cosmic nightmare
Where consumption is the fan
For the spark that burst into flame around the world
And has itself consumed almost everything
We are running in slow motion from a fire that was us

I'm tired of the bullshit
That says our world will collapse if our Economy fails
How do we know that?
And we do know it'll collapse if the Economy continues to rule our choices

We all experience birth and will all experience death
Is there something you've been given in between that makes you right and me wrong?
Or me right and you wrong?
Can't we just forget about all that
And breath ourselves into life?

My Intention
To Know Nothing
And Hear Everything
Without judging
And trust
that this moment
Is
And each breath is
The only one that matters

Clock time

The clock on the wall that stopped a few weeks ago says the right time right now. 2:20. It doesn't say that it is a.m., but the darkness outside my window and the tiredness behind my eyes won't let me forget. Maybe it will stay 2:20 a.m. forever. Then I wouldn't have to see what 2:30 a.m. will bring - or won't ...like; my daughter.

Dear God please keep her safe -
And Dear God please know what I'm asking because my words do not come close to being what all I'm asking. And what is safe? Do I know? How will I know? How can I let myself go to sleep not knowing? How can I stay awake and be able to make any decision or think rationally when she does return? What do I do? What is she asking of me now?

The only thing I do know is she needs something from me and I don't know what that is and I don't know how to look for it or how to trust it enough when I find it to do what she needs me to do.

Okay, the clocks are no longer in sync and all I can do right now is to love her and know that whatever else the sun will rise in the morning.

Persian Carpets?

Like yesterday and the day before I worked in the garden today. Had help which was cool, first Jill came for coffee and pulled some weeds, then Lisa and her dog Ilse showed up and we pulled some more. Place is looking great, even I can see beyond what isn't done to the beauty now. Lisa, bless her, took over wheelbarrowing mulch and my back is sooooo grateful ... better than a massage Lisa!

After we had a beer, maybe two, Lisa left and I lay down because yesterday's mulching caught up with me. And I was into this delicious drift, part sleep, part awareness of how wonderful it was to be lying down when there was a heavy rapping on the door. First I thought "oh shit" I'll just ignore it, then I thought it might be someone I really wanted to see, some long lost friend or maybe even someone bringing me flowers (well, stranger things have happened-someone brought me a gingerbread house with lights out of the blue at Christmas).

I opened the door and there was this man, in a suit, at almost 6:00 Saturday evening, standing there and a blue van in the driveway. I'm usually polite, and never thought to make this an expection, but inside I was not happy. Anyways, he smiles and says hello and then asks if I'm German??? I say no, and he says well the name at the top of the driveway is a German name, and he's German so he thought it might be German people that lived here ... huh??? He did not look German at all, more middle east or something, but I gave him the benefit of the doubt. Then he asks if I like carpets ... huh? (In my ideal world this is not how I want to be woken up) Turns out he's selling Persian Carpets - real ones mind you - for 2 or 3 dollars ... I did not go to the van, did not pass go, said goodbye and watched them drive up the lane.

There is something here that does not make any sense to me. Unfortunately I started thinking about robbers scoping out houses and stuff like that. Fortunately I remembered that I believe fear and mistrust are no way to live life and I put it down as another odd incident that probably has some meaning I'm too tired to think of. I mean, in a world that makes a movie about Snakes on a Plane there seems no limit to the bizarre and pointless (in my perspective) things that people get up to.

In case anyone is as lost as I am with this I'm adding a couple of garden pictures to get back to my version of sanity. (please notice the mulching)

Sidetracked

Last night I decided this morning was to be all about the garden and I was going to be very firm about it. Then when the morning I got sidetracked. I'm forgiving myself about the lack of willpower because it's been an amazing journey and not time wasted at all, but Erica and Mark's wedding is two weeks today and since I offered this place for the reception I do feel the need to get the gardens ready. First though I want to make some noise cause stuff is all going around in my head and I don't want to lose it without speaking it somewhere.

It all started with getting up to drive Morgan to work for 7 am. Got home and decided if I started working then I'd not last through the day so I made tea and went back to bed thinking I'd read a few pages then fall asleep for another hour. Opened the book I was saving for a morning read because it is too graphic for night time reading. Finished the book - Shopping Cart Soldiers by John Mulligan.

After the first few chapters of rough going there were glimmers, then streaks, then flash in the face recognition that the same battles within this Vietnam vet are being fought in me. It's all there, everything ... God, the devil, hate, fear, compassion, forgiveness, loneliness, self pity, hanging on to the past as an excuse for not living now, hiding, hiding, hiding ... fear, imagination, delusions of reality

This is not new; just a different frame of worlds and words of experience - which touched me and that always makes me cry. And crying is my guage of beauty - the beauty of my heart responding - means I'm not dead yet.

Here's a couple of quotes I couldn't pass by:
"Aye, that's right," Silverbright agrees. "Don't ever forget it. Anything goes in the Land of the Truly Alive! You'll find whatever you're lookin' for no matter where you're lookin' - as long as you've the eyes to see, Finn. That's the answer son, that's the answer!"

and
"Everything true and special is simple"

Now ain't that cool stuff to take to the garden?

Looking for love

Today I didn't have to look for love, it showed up. In fact it shows up everyday, but sometimes I can be too busy missing having the lover kind of love that I don't pay attention to the the love that I do have.
I am paying attention now ... and I am saying a huge Thank you and I am appreciating everyone who loves me with all my heart.
(which doesn't mean there isn't space for any other, there is always room for more love :) )

I like them scrambled with cheese and salsa

I've been thinking about being an adult - as in growing up and what that means. There are times, like when I'm driving to play hockey or taking the train to Toronto for a course, when I think "cool, I have a life that I've made all by myself, just like the big people". But choosing to be one of the big people full time seems a little scary ...

Based on age I've been an adult for a very long time, and I imagine to my kids and 'little' people I seem no different than the rest. So why do I still have this jelly stuff inside me? Why do I not always (or even often) know what to do? Or even how to do it when I think I know what? Most of everything I do is still guess work and gut work and blind fumbling to find my way.

A friend told me he was going to start being an adult (he's 49, same as me) and I asked what that meant. He said it was time to become financially reponsible. I said that sounded good (I'm a lot like Julia Roberts and the eggs in Runaway Bride about this adult thing). And I started thinking about making up a budget and figuring out my spending patterns and preparing an action plan from there to best utilize my resources in the present and plan for the future.

Later I was googling around and saw some pictures of people; injured and bloody people and crying women and men and dead of all ages in Lebannon and I thought that it might be more adult to spend my energy on figuring out what the resources I have could do to help these people and prevent this happening. Perhaps this is a time to be human and let my head listen to my heart.

This past Friday, a little north of here, two small planes collided and three people were killed. This happens of course ... we hear about people dying in accidents all the time right? Only this time it wasn't people, it was Dave. On Saturday morning I got the call and my little world shook. At one time a very close friend, one of my ex's best friends, he was in our wedding party, we all travelled and partied and spent every Christmas Eve and August long weekend together for years and years. Dave is (and I will keep that as 'is' because he still is in our memories) a warm, caring and lovely person who will be missed by a lot of people.

I feel like a 'big' person now. That financial stuff; it may be important but it ain't nothing compared to this.

Rock Wall

This past few days we have rebuilt the rock wall and added a pathway to my lower garden. Slugging rocks in the heat and the humidity have given me a new appreciation for my body and what it is capable of.

It's also been good for my mind. This quote I read a couple weeks ago has stuck with me: "If the horse is dead, get off it!" A lot of those rocks represent dead horses. Some of them resisted finding their place in the wall, some went in easy, and now they are in may they rest in peace.

I know I've already started collecting new rocks, and I know just the spot where I'll build my next rock wall.

Angel

My friend calls her new boyfriend 'Angel'. I met him this weekend. He's not a new boyfriend, but this is the first time I've seen them together. they left together on a 26' sailboat last September. The boat got beached somewhere on the New Jersey coast in a storm (they weren't in it), and they spent a month living in a borrowed cottage while they dug the boat off (no money for a tow) then the rest of the winter in a marina on the boat (with a woodstove and their dog) doing repairs. They met lots of people; some were kind and some were unsympathetic. Then they came home to make some money and get their teeth fixed. They live on 30$ a day (it cost me $60 to fill my car up with gas to go visit them) in a tiny trailer (which must seem luxurious space after the boat). They get water from the river and dress up oatmeal with spices for dinner. She's lost 50 lbs. And she calls him 'Angel'.

She had her 50th birthday in January so a friend took us all to an outdoor Sunday morning concert; Mozart and Muffins (I would have called it "Mozart in the Morning", it was delicious!) then out for lunch to celebrate. They showed us the trailer and we drank homemade wine and got sunburned sitting on the rocks with our feet in the river. She told us of sunsets on the water and showed off her paintings. (painting had been her dream for the last twenty years) The dog is happy. They plan to sail again this fall to the Carribean for the winter, and next year to Europe. And she calls him 'Angel'.

I wish she'd write her story and I wish I had an 'Angel'.



That's her in the middle and me on the right (need a haircut) and our other friend in the kayak. 'Angel' was on camera duty in between pouring drinks.

I've been thinking about extravagance... I was talking to a guy I met on the internet last week and I told him I wasn't extravagant (sorry for not putting this statement in context, but that's a whole 'nother story). And I really believed it. But if not being extravagant means I have to eat oatmeal for dinner (no matter how much cumin was added) I guess I am. (and I guess if I weren't extravagant I'd cut my own hair and let it be grey too)

And could I do that for an 'Angel'? Well, I wonder ... ? The thing is; perhaps if I were eating with an 'Angel' food might not taste the same. And maybe what seems a necessity now might not be so important if there were a sunset on the water everynight.