THE SISTERHOOD

[Photos  L-to-R: Dorothy Hazel Tarr and younger sister Betty Lucille Tarr]

(20 DEC 2011 – Time cures all ills and heals all wounds – so say many quotations.  Forgiveness is a blessing one bestows on oneself.  Shame me once, Shame on me – Shame me more than once, Shame on you.  Enough is enough – I've had enough.  It's time to move on and let the past fall away with all the hatred.  The only way it seems to let it "go", is to let you "go" too.  Therefore, I release you from this day from any familial connection to me.  dht)

 I remember you, little Sister, as a little girl, but now I feel that we are strangers with little to nothing in common - but our DNA.  I know I won't hurt your feelings as I say this with complete honesty – you have forfeited your 'sisterhood' and 'familial ties' !!   Dredging up the past only brings painful memories back, and when I see your photos, hear your voice (so like my own), I'm reminded of how deep your betrayal in ALL THINGS!!

[Dorothy Hazel Tarr – 2011]

INVISIBLE HANDS

(9 NOV 2011 -  The tears in my eyes are NOT really from sadness, but rather from Nostalgia, as I look in the back view mirror again at all that has passed and will never come again. dht) 

As I walk in the twilight of my Life, it seems as though the past somehow reaches out to me – holding me captive in time – with Invisible Hands.

Memories flood my senses and mist clouds my vision – my surroundings are muted as heartfelt images of bygone days fill my eyes.

Remembering people, places, and events and wishing they had not changed, died, or passed so quickly – OH, Nostalgia's Bittersweet Sting.

[Dorothy Hazel Tarr – 2011]

[Photo Source: Photos of a Family and Lost Love]

MEMORIES – The Unbreakable Bonds

[Photos:   30 Nov 1963--Memories of my wedding, my spouse, my Heart. (GROOM-Dale Russell Jones Shoudy, GROOM Mom in Dark Blue and blond hair- June Grace Wolfe Jones Shoudy; BRIDE-Dorothy Hazel Tarr, BRIDE Mom in Light Blue and hat- Dorothy Helen Scott Tarr]

(The memories are fresh in my Heart, yet the images are as faded as these photos.  So many youthful hopes – unrealized and unfulfilled.  Love lost in the wake of passing years and tears.  However, for the Heart, there is no timeline.  dht-21 OCT 2011.)

As I behold all my treasured keepsakes and mementos,

my sense of déjà vu deepens. 
My Heart lives in the bosom of my past,
where memories of Family and Love reside.

If I close my eyes, I am transported once again

to a Time and Place all too familiar –
for I'm a frequent visitor
that is embraced in Welcome by my memories.

My visits are more frequent and

prolonged with each passing year. 
The simple pleasures of Hearth and Home –
strong lures.

 My memories – the unbreakable bonds of Homecoming.

After the Storm – Come the Tears

(I wrote this, 10 Aug 2011, thinking of the many losses in our life—Loss of youth, health, money, safety, privilege, prestige, respect, honors, LOVE, spouses, children, and family -- as a special tribute to those in my circle who feel their loss so keenly.)


*** AFTER THE STORM – COME THE TEARS ***

The poetical world is as a lyrical preface to Life's SCRIPT,
where light illuminates the STAGE,
with a jewel-like iridescence,
flickering over the richly embroidered PLAY.

A sadness imbues the atmosphere
with a sense of time and space,
whispering of generations past and lost
and PREVIEWS of generations to come.

The PLAY rages in a tempest at Life's Zenith,
as the Storms of Life forge a Path,
leaving behind loss of Love and Hearth in their wake.

As of a sudden, the Storm passes
and the Tears fall as gentle rain upon the SET.
After the Storm – come the tears.

[dht-2011]

[PHOTO SOURCE: GOOGLE online images]

Everyday Words - Everyday Thoughts

Your thoughts don't have words every day
They come a single time

Like signal esoteric sips
Of the communion Wine

Which while you taste so native seems
So easy so to be

You cannot comprehend its price
Nor its infrequency

[~ Emily Elizabeth Dickinson, Poem #1452]

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DEF: "esoteric" Adjective: Intended for or likely to be understood by only a small number of people with a specialized knowledge or interest.

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In this poem, my Maternal Cousin EMILY Elizabeth Dickinson (10 Dec 1830 - 15 May 1886), says to ME that there are NOT words enough to describe every feeling and emotion that float through my mind every day. Moreover, that the meaning of some thoughts is confusing to some who do not know my circumstance or me. In addition, some 'words' when said or written have a 'price' that is a toll paid by the author for their effect on the emotions and attitude of self and others.

EMILY did not follow the typical path of a woman of her time for she never married. She lived a solitary life in her parent's home taking care of the household and her parents during their lifetime and illness and after their deaths living alone in the homestead in Amherst, Massachusetts. She spent many hours in conjugating the mental processes and writing down some of her feelings and thoughts about her life, nature, faith, love, death, and other topics. In over 1700 poems and writings, that are known about, she recorded on paper by hand (no computers or MSWord) her thoughts in 'words'. Today she is considered a genius with the use of words, and there are college course, books, museums, and historical societies that are dedicated to reading her 'words' and analyzing each punctuation, phrase, topic, and nuance.

For myself, I believe EMILY'S 'words' and her poetry and writings can be best enjoyed when applied to my own life and experiences. In this way, I am internalizing her whispered words that murmur to my heart and that put a 'period' to my feelings and thoughts. Sometimes, I find that by reading something she has written, I am better able to gain clarity on a point in my life. Clarity helps remove the confusion and shadows that intrude and hinder the 'walk of life'. There are enough 'boulders' and 'rough seas' that make the journey difficult!

I am reminded of a time that a DEAR FRIEND helped me to reach clarity at a time, a couple of years ago, when I was baffled and confused. My friend listened to me describe my status and said that it sounded like I was experiencing DEEP GRIEF. This was a welcome realization and helped me put into perspective the many confusing feelings and thoughts that floated through my mind and heart and fell softly on to my wet cheeks. Grief is a personal process that no 'words' can explain, but 'words' in a Poem, a Prayer, or from a DEAR FRIEND can help the healing process through the solitary feelings from loss of loved ones.

[~ DOROTHY HAZEL TARR, dht-2011]


[PHOTO SOURCE; GOOGLE online images]

NATURE'S HOURGLASS

                         [PHOTO SOURCE: National Geographic online images]
                         (Weathered clothes pins on clothes line in an outdoor setting)

SOME OF MY WORDS

Our middle years are the best of times and proffer a chance to take 'stock' of where we have been and where we want to go. Down the road of tomorrow, the ravages of age will line the face and make us frail. However, these are but layers of time cocooning the child that lives in happy wonderment of making it to another birthday. [~dht-2011]


Each year is a special gift that you can hold and put into your Heart's Treasure Chest nestled with all the treasures and memories of yesterday. [~dht-2011]

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SOME WORDS OF OTHERS


"I'm as old as my tongue and a little older than my teeth." [~Jonathan Swift]

Old Time, that greatest and longest established spinner of all!.... his factory is a secret place, his work is noiseless, and his hands are mutes. [~Charles Dickens]

A person is always startled when he hears himself seriously called an old man for the first time. [~Oliver W. Holmes, Sr.]

You are only young once, but you can stay immature indefinitely. [~Ogden Nash]

They say that age is all in your mind. The trick is keeping it from creeping down into your body. [~Author Unknown]

The other day a man asked me what I thought was the best time of life. "Why," I answered without a thought, "now." [~David Grayson]

Do not regret growing older. It is a privilege denied to many. [~Author Unknown]

Father Time is not always a hard parent, and, though he tarries for none of his children, often lays his hand lightly upon those who have used him well; making them old men and women inexorably enough, but leaving their hearts and spirits young and in full vigour. With such people, the grey head is but the impression of the old fellow's hand in giving them his blessing, and every wrinkle but a notch in the quiet calendar of a well-spent life. [~Charles Dickens]

Wrinkles should merely indicate where smiles have been. [~Mark Twain]

It's important to have a twinkle in your wrinkle. [Author Unknown]

Years may wrinkle the skin, but to give up enthusiasm wrinkles the soul. [~Samuel Ullman]

There is always a lot to be thankful for, if you take the time to look. For example, I'm sitting here thinking how nice it is that wrinkles don't hurt. [~Author Unknown]

Middle age is when your age starts to show around your middle. [~Bob Hope]

The years teach much which the days never knew. [~Ralph Waldo Emerson]

In youth the days are short and the years are long; in old age the years are short and the days long. [~Nikita Ivanovich Panin]

A man's age is something impressive, it sums up his life: maturity reached slowly and against many obstacles, illnesses cured, griefs and despairs overcome, and unconscious risks taken; maturity formed through so many desires, hopes, regrets, forgotten things, loves. A man's age represents a fine cargo of experiences and memories. [~Antoine de Saint-Exupéry]

A man is not old until regrets take the place of dreams. [~John Barrymore]

Thirty-five is when you finally get your head together and your body starts falling apart. [~Caryn Leschen]

Forty is the old age of youth; fifty the youth of old age. [~Victor Hugo]

Years ago, we discovered the exact point, the dead center of middle age. It occurs when you are too young to take up golf and too old to rush to the net. [~Franklin Adams]

Everyone is the age of their heart. [~Guatemalan Proverb]

Youth is a disease from which we all recover. [~Dorothy Fulheim]

There was no respect for youth when I was young, and now that I am old, there is no respect for age - I missed it coming and going. [~J.B. Priestly]

I still have a full deck; I just shuffle slower now. [~Author Unknown]

To be seventy years young is sometimes far more cheerful and hopeful than to be forty years old. [~Oliver Wendell Holmes]

Age is a high price to pay for maturity. [~Tom Stoppard]

The key to successful aging is to pay as little attention to it as possible. [~Judith Regan]

The first half of life consists of the capacity to enjoy without the chance; the last half consists of the chance without the capacity. [~Mark Twain]

The great secret that all old people share is that you really haven't changed in seventy or eighty years. Your body changes, but you don't change at all. And that, of course, causes great confusion. [~Doris Lessing]

There is still no cure for the common birthday. [~John Glenn]

Some people, no matter how old they get, never lose their beauty - they merely move it from their faces into their hearts. [~Martin Buxbaum]

You can't hide your true colours as you approach the autumn of your life. [~Author Unknown]

I don't believe one grows older. I think that what happens early on in life is that at a certain age one stands still and stagnates. [~T.S. Eliot]

Whatever poet, orator, or sage may say of it, old age is still old age. [~Henry Wadsworth Longfellow]

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DAY'S VENUE

                      [PHOTO SOURCE: National Geographic online images]

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WHERE goes the day

Down yesternight's passage

How blind today's privilege

Lost fast in yesterday's grasp

Tomorrow's dream a pledge

Whence nature's precedence assures

Breast expanse upon deep breath

While shallow essence sums life's interval

What key holds true for grantor's trust

Whilst surety and worth stand anon
 

Time bespoke metered sameness

Whose vowel foretold spoiled fortune

Ribbons linger as fragments

Where once whole, a heart full

Shattered spectrum of hopes

Cast away on ocean's tears

Love's gamble played and lost

Age of regret the debt

Once concealed by life's chains

Now released by nature's bail

What hostage behind the threshold

Where compromise affords release

What sound the closing door

What venue the open window

What knock insures a beggars entrance

What token barters the price

[DOROTHY HAZEL TARR, dht-2011]

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In this offering:

What do you notice about the words? Their meaning? Punctuation? Sentence structure? Pairing of Sentences? First word, middle, or last words of Sentences? What words could be substituted? What connection words added for clarity? What meaning of your own would you assign to these words, phrases, sentences?

--------------- OR, Why didn't you just say so! ---------------

Today is just a memory that has passed into yesterday.

Thoughts of yesterday blind you to the beauty of today.

Tomorrow is a new beginning as sure as the sun will rise.

Now the lungs expands, as if you had been living with too little air for a long time, where before your breaths were shallow and the pain too great for deep breathing.

What is the secret to giving your trust to another, while other(s) do nothing to earn and secure your trust?

The rest of your life will be nothing but more of the same ... misfortune.

The ones you LOVED the most in this world, have all cut away a piece of your heart, until all is left are tattered ribbons of melancholy and despair.

A bright future so full of a kaleidoscope of hopes lays shattered, lost and washed away with oceans of tears.

It may be better for some to LOVE and LOSE, than never to LOVE at all; but what price must be paid and for what duration.

The years of aching emptiness and pain are camouflaged in life's daily routine, but soon there will be an end to the pain as nature ends its hold to death's surrender.

Where are the words of forgiveness and compromise that release pain's grip on a broken heart?

The silence of the closing door confuses the opening of a window; as the lack of plain speaking confuses the path to understanding.

What will it cost the one who knocks; and what more must the one who knocks surrender?

[DOROTHY HAZEL TARR, dht-2011]

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PHOTO CAPTION -- or just a few words to go with the PIX.

It is astonishing how a few short phrases pierce the gray of your world with a single beam of light. [DOROTHY HAZEL TARR, dht-2011]

 WINDOW DREAMs

How sharp the contrast between

the heart's abode now worn with time's despair

and

the gaping mawe of fate with

its distant vistas casting new shades of meaning

on another world (another life, another time, another place)

filled with vibrant colors, sweet breaths, soft gentle breezes,

and LOVE's warm embrace.

[DOROTHY HAZEL TARR, dht-2011] 

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BITTERSWEET ABSENCE

                                [Photo Source: Google online image]
 

Their absence in my Life is a Bittersweet ache still – that throbs in the back of my Heart, whenever I think of them which is often – but actually all the time!

After all, when I left in 1978 at age 32, they had been my Family – my Loves – for more than half my Life!  He was age 36 and our child age 14  - we were so young to be living in a Family without Love!

Now, at age 65, I still feel the pain of separation – the void where once Family existed and Never would be again in my Life!

However, there were no other options back then, and the pain of "Family" was killing my spirit and body with the sickness of neglect, betrayal, lies, and Lost Love!

The Loss – ever fresh – in my Heart and mind – has Never healed!

Some deep wounds Never do – such as in my case!

Sad and puzzling – really – for there was NO Loss for them – they went on with their Lives – without me – as if I NEVER was there at all, or ever had been!

No wonder then, why I was dying a slow death, day by day, when I resided under the same roof with Them!

The Pain was so BAD – I was seeing two doctors and taking medicine to dull the emotional pain and trauma!

They were killing me slowly!

Moreover, They still are – in their Bittersweet Absence from my Life!

(Submitted by: Dorothy Hazel Tarr)

THE PLEASURE - THE ROMANCE

A Family Tale—A living history

After we have "heard" a FAMILY TALE or STORY, it then becomes our responsibility to pass the story along to FAMILY and FRIENDS and our CHILDREN; for now we become the STORY TELLER, and have the sacred honor and privilege of passing it on to FRIENDS, FAMILY, and CHILDREN.

In this way, the STORY continues; for you see, a FAMILY TALE or STORY is only "alive" during the telling, listening, and sharing.

If it isn't being told, the STORY dies, FAMILY LORE is lost, and the richness of our lineage is diminished.

The death of a FAMILY STORY is something we must never let happen, for they are our sacred heritage entrusted to our care.

These STORIES are good, remember them, for they help to explain some of the mysteries that we find around us, some things that happen in NATURE, in the FAMILY, in FRIENDSHIPS, and in RELIGIOUS BELIEFS.

Family Short Story

In the early 1950s, when I was in Second Grade, I lived for a time with my Maternal Grandparents on the tenant farm they worked and managed in the Township of Pond, which is located near Delano and is in the Central part of California.  It was a flat farming area for miles around with one gasoline station, one store, one elementary school, and one "STOP" sign.  (Use GOOGLE to view this area from your computer and get an aerial perspective.) 

It was during this slice of my life that I learned some of the greatest lessons that would stand me throughout my journey on our heavenly earth!  I have SO MANY memories of just "ordinary" daily living.  Getting up early.  Making my bed.  Dressing for a day of play, school, or church.  Playing in the farmyard.  Watering the "truck garden" and outdoor plants.  Feeding the chickens, pigs, horses, cows, and pets.  Checking the mousetraps.  Sweeping the floor (we had NO vacuum cleaner).  Preparing a meal.  Doing dishes.  Clothing wash day.  "Ironing" clothes, table clothes, pillowcases, Grandpa's handkerchiefs and Gram's aprons.  Playing with my doll.  Cutting out paper dolls from McCall magazines.  Splashing in the farm pond.  Listening to radio soap operas and programs as The Long Ranger, Dick Tracy, Burns and Allen, Bob Hope, Milton Berle, and more.  Celebrating birthdays and other special days as Easter, Halloween, Thanksgiving, and Christmas.  These were the special days of my life that I remember today so fondly full of simple pleasures and the romance of discovery.

It seems sometimes the joy of life that comes with the simple pleasures and romance of daily living can be right in front of you, waiting to be noticed.  And, so much is missed in a hurried life, so that you can find yourself too busy to really enjoy the moment!

When my life gets too busy or my thoughts crowded, these simple pleasures are the first things I miss.  So an intimate awareness helps me slow down and "Stop and smell the roses".  Greeting the sunrise.  Celebrating a sunset.  Walking.  Gardening.  Painting.  Writing.  Listening to music.  Tuning into the rhythms of nature's symphony.  Connecting with dear ones.  This is living.  Slowing my pace allows me to savor the things that matter and feel fully present and real, just as I felt all those year ago living with my BELOVED Grandparents on the farm.

 There are moments in nature, when the simple pleasure of just listening to the frogs, ducks, and other nocturnal creatures rhapsodize of an evening, fill me to overflowing with enchantment.  Just this evening, I went out to enjoy the sunset after a beautiful day.  As the curtain of twilight lowered on the horizon, I began to hear the chorus of the Frog Colony that resides in the wild life reserve a short 200 yards from my front door, as they heralded the coming of the gathering darkness.  The romance of their chorus "lightened" the burdens of my day!

These are the simple pleasures of my life, the memories that stand out, the thoughts and actions that make my life feel very rich.

Sometimes the joy of life that comes with the simple pleasures and romance of daily living can be right in front of you, waiting to be noticed.  Some are so small that they could lie unnoticed right at your feet if your mind and body are racing and if you delay taking time to "Stop and Smell the Roses".

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Closing Thoughts

Here you have a Short Family Story of my BELOVED Maternal Grandparents.  This story began before they were born and continues after their passing, with their descendants and the many lives and hearts that they "touched". 

The testimony of FAITH, FAMILY, & FRIENDS that was the life of my WONDERFUL GRANDPARENTS is their legacy!! 

Grandpa and Gram, I LOVE and MISS you both every day of my life!

 

However, this is not the beginning for there are other family members that traveled this path before, and this is not the end for new generations are yet to come. 

This is just a short story for those family members that are interested in OUR FAMILY STORY and HISTORY.

I feel very honored to be a part of this FAMILY TREE. 

I love being a part of the history of this land. 

I love that my family were here before me ... and will be here after me.

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QUOTES

"At night I went out into the dark and saw a glimmering star and heard a frog, and NATURE seemed to say, Well, do not these suffice?"  [Ralph Waldo Emerson]

 "Stop and smell the roses" [Lyrics by Ringo Starr 1981]

"Stop and take the time to smell the roses,
Stop and take the time to fill your noses,
Stop as you stroll through life, ("pitter patter, pitter patter")
Stop and take the time to talk it over with your wife."

"Well, I was walking down the street the other day,
You know, and I said to myself, what's all this hurry,
What's all this hustle and bustle.
Why don't I just stop, look at the pretty roses,
Smell them for one moment, take the time to see,
Take the time to smell, have a good time in life.
Don't let ev''rything pass you by, you're only here once
And I've been here longer than most of you."

 

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