Georgia on My Mind

This song has been playing in my head so much the last few days.  Since I moved to San Francisco over 33 years ago, I have not spent so much time in my homeland, as I have in the last six months. I was there in September for two weeks and I was there for a month from the middle of October to shortly before Thanksgiving to try to get some things squared away for my ailing mother.  At that visit, I was able to get meals on wheels started for her and I got her to the doctor and she, at least, consented to restart her medication for hypertension.  She absolutely refused to go into assisted living which my brother and I wanted since she is legally blind from macular degeneration.  Her argument was that she knows every inch of the duplex in which she has lived for over fifteen years and she feels comfortable there. 

My brother and his wife, have, just recently, sold their Florida home and, thankfully, have moved back to the Atlanta area so they are, at least, only a three hour drive from my mother.  They would like her to go into assisted living in an area near them. They cannot have her live with them for various reasons.  That is what I am hoping to accomplish this trip but it will be a battle.  There is no question that my mother is becoming increasing confused.  She just celebrated her 86th birthday on the 30th of January.

I fly out of San Francisco at 7:30AM on February 17th and return on March 10th.  I will try to keep up with my blog and following yours and commenting as much as I possibly can, whenever I can.  Please bear with me as I know you will.  I'll miss you all, that's for sure and I could sure use prayers, on my behalf and on my mother's, to whatever deities you worship.

Why I Write

I Must Write

It doesn't take much effort,
My thoughts are always there,
For me, it helps to write them,
Whether poetry or prayer.

The words express my daily life,
The pain I sometimes feel,
Putting it in writing,
Is the way I start to heal.

I write to tell a story,
Of my travels far and wide,
Of sharing different cultures,
All differences put aside.

When I cannot find the words,
To speak to someone dear,
Sometimes I take a pen in hand,
Writing what they want to hear.

I write poems for everyone,
It's always been that way,
For occasions sad and happy,
Or just an ordinary day.

Writing helps my sanity,
As we live upon this earth,
I've been jotting chronicles,
Almost since my birth!

Carmen Henesy

Copyright (c) 2007 by Carmen Henesy
All rights reserved. 

Rest in Peace

Today is Veteran's Day in the United States.  I am an Army "brat."  My father was a second lieutenant at Ft. Benning, Georgia when he met my mother.  They divorced many years later and my mother remarried.  When my stepfather retired, he was a full colonel in the Infantry and had served three tours of duty in VietNam.  My son, Shawn, is an Air Force reservist for fifteen years now.  He repairs computer systems for the C5 and C15 aircraft.  

My prayer is for world peace.  I would hope that none of my three sons ever has to be involved in a war and that no mother ever loses a son or daughter to conflict anywhere in the world.  Why can't we learn to negotiate and settle our problems in a civilized manner?  Why don't we teach our children, from their earliest years, better ways of handling conflict?  As a nurse, I look at those sweet babies in the newborn nursery, lying there next to each other, without a shred of hatred or animosity in their minds and ask myself, why can't it always be that way?  

The following is not a happy poem.  It is an all too cold reality that takes place every day.  I am posting it on this Veteran's Day with my prayers for every single person who has lost their life in service to this country and for all the families who have suffered and continue to suffer without their loved ones.  

Rest in Peace

He was such a precious child,
Fair haired with eyes of blue,
Always into everything,
With laughter bubbling through.

Everybody loved him,
He just had that special way,
Of making it seem sunny,
On a cloudy, rainy day.

He'd always help another,
When things would go awry,
So all of us were saddened,
The day he said goodbye.

His unit reached Iraq,
And was only there a week,
When his mother got the news,
Of which she couldn't speak.

A roadside bomb exploded,
He lay in a pool of red,
His blood slowly oozing,
A paramedic pronounced him dead.

Carmen Henesy

Copyright © 2007 Carmen Henesy. All Rights Reserved