Seize Your Day...

Richard Bach, the author of "Jonathan Livingston Seagull," wrote in his wonderful book, "The Gift Of Wings," an experience he had speaking with a man sitting next to him on a long flight.  Mr. Bach asked the man about his life, and for a long time the man spoke enthusiastically about his experiences in WWII.  When Mr. Bach inquired what he had been doing since then, the man without any enthusiasm covered in less than a minute thirty years of his life.

I was never expected to live this long, yet with my indomitable spirit I am.  Since I was very young, despite my physical challenges I have been out there showing up and grabbing every moment with enthusiasm and gratitude I could.  Especially on horseback.  Through the years my dear doctors would have been happier if their patient wasn't off galloping bareback across the fields on her horses but recognized with as much hospital time I spent, my horses were the reason why I fought so hard TO keep rising above the daunting challenges being faced and why I kept holding onto life so hard.  They made me feel ALIVE.  And they allowed me to soar free.

Henry David Thoreau wrote in his book "Walden," how he went to the woods because, "I wished to live deliberately, to front only the essential facts of life, and see if I could not learn what it had to teach, and not, when I came to die, discover that I had not lived...I wanted to live deep and suck out all the marrow of life."

This is what I have been trying to do all my life:  "live deep and suck out all the marrow," so I know I have LIVED deeply, with all my courage, wonder, awareness, and appreciation.  To know I have fully lived.  And continue to embrace how loved I am.  For you see all that remains from all we ever are is the love we live.

Seize the day, my dear ones.  Show up.  Live fully.  Live courageously...break free...and...LIVE LOVE.

Please Grab That Brass Ring...

My dear ones, you just cannot wait until life is not challenging anymore before you can be happy, because life is challenging.  So with a gratitude attitude focus on the positives in your life (yes, if you can see, hear, walk, talk, breathe, have a roof over your head, you are blessed).  For yourself and your surviva-soaring friend Adelaide, grab your brass ring of happiness, live love, be courageous, embrace humor, walk TALL, hold your head high and soar!  Preferably while galloping upon the bareback of a horse for me, but if this just is not possible, a carousel horse or stick pony will do...

The Heaven Window...

When one spends such a great amount of time in hospitals including pediatric and adult cancer wards too, one sees a lot. 

 

My first experience witnessing a terrible death in a hospital was when I was during my first spine surgery and then learning to walk again.  For several days the hospital became so busy cancer patients had to be admitted to beds on the Neurosurgery Wing.

A lady named Mrs. Shields was in the room across the hall from me.  She was not very old but bless her heart, had been so terribly ravaged by cancer she appeared ancient.  And she was not expected to live much longer.

She was terrified and apparently whatever she was given for pain her last day was not enough.  For hours she screamed and cried, then kept thrashing in her bed.  Her family was VERY distraught as would be expected. 

All of this I couldn't help but hear and witness too that long horrible day as her door kept being left wide open.  And mine.  I couldn't get out of bed on my own yet to shut it as I still barely had any leg function.  It was awful.  I still have these terrible images I so wish I could erase from my mind. 

Sometimes these days I have what I call my "ten second moments," when I fear my own impending death though knowing exactly where my faith will be taking me.  Because I already live with such horrendous pain and sickness my ten second moments may hit me with the "how much worse can it get if it is THIS bad NOW" kind of fear.  

Yet only for a "ten second moment" though because I quickly jerk myself out of such fear.  I also focus on two other far different passings in the pediatric oncology ward which happened when I was there.

The first was Josh who was fourteen years old who had been fighting a rare form of cancer for much of his young life.  Finally nothing more could be done.  With his parents and a minister at his beside Josh was no longer conscious.  All at once Josh awoke exclaiming, "Mom!  Dad!  WOW, look at the angels!  They're so beautiful!"  And he slipped away.  His parents and the minister felt they had been given a tremendous gift.  And they had, for you see, they were given what touchingly was known as being the "Heaven Window." 

Marcy was six and dying after a long leukemia battle.  She had been unconscious for hours with her parents by her side.  Suddenly she sat bolt upright happily telling her parents Grandpa Hogan was there to take her to Heaven.  Then she slumped over and was gone.

Grandpa Hogan, Marcy's Great Grandfather had died years before Marcy was born.  She never even knew him other than seeing him in a few old photographs.  Her parents were both grieving and happy at the same time, realizing they too had been given the miracle comfort gift of the "Heaven Window."

So whenever I have one of my "ten second moments," I jerk my thoughts away to all the bright images I have in my mind of the "Heaven Window," knowing without a doubt, I too will also one day soar right through it.

And maybe, even upon a horse with wings.

If We Were ALL As One...

One day on a train was a twenty-four year old man traveling with his father.  As the young man looked out the window becoming more and more excited, he happily exclaimed to his father, "Dad!  Look!  Look how all the trees are like disappearing behind the train as we go!"

"I know son!  Isn't it amazing?!!"

A couple sitting across the aisle who appeared to be in their mid-thirties watched the young man's behavior as they whispered to each other with "THAT look" many of us know all too well.

"Dad!  Can you see the clouds?!!  The clouds are racing with us!"

At this the couple couldn’t stand it any longer so they spoke to the father about his son regardless of the fact he was sitting right there too.  [How many times this has happened to ME when friends or my Interns were rudely grilled about me while I was sitting or standing right smack next to them as if I were deaf, dumb, and this "object" without humanity?]  

"Hey look old man, why don't you just take your son to one of those places and have him admitted?"  

As "the old man" proudly smiled wrapping his sons' hand within his own he said, "I'll tell you exactly why that will never happen...a reason I hope you both have enough human decency left to take with you."  

"Now wait a..."  

"My beloved son and I are just returning home from the hospital.  He became blind as a child and due to the miracle of laser surgery the gift of his sight has been fully restored.  Today is his very first day outside being able to see the amazing wonders those with sight take for granted."  

"But..."  

"And you know what else?  Every person in this amazing world we live has a story.  Not the kind of story those with unseeing hearts choose to write FOR them before even trying to know them, but a story revealing the love, the beauty, the wonder, and inner strength within.  The profound ways their story becomes our treasure if only we would not assume they are less than us.  If only we would quit defining others by their appearance before you know them, otherwise it's your loss.  Not theirs."

The Theatre Scene Design curriculum involved far more than just classes painting on massive canvas flats or painting plywood to look exactly like marble, bricks, or wood paneling.  It also involved classes learning how to use table saws, circular saws, all other tools.  And the ability to design then construct from various types of wood an entire theatre set from stage up creating the magic of theatre. 

However I must confess theatre always has a wealth 

of wonderful, excited to learn Interns including some very dear Scene Design Interns I was privileged to teach and mentor along the way throughout my career.  They were a huge help to me over the years in handling the large sections of lumber needed, then the construction 

of the set.  Inaddition, I was always highly proud to help launch them each on their careers, besides being like a stage/life/fun/mentor/mother to each one.😊

Now and then my Interns would witness the ignorance 

I encountered, never hesitating to take a stand for me which unfortunately was often needed.  For you see,  invariably people who came looking for The Scene Designer would see me...hear me, yet proceed straight past me to my Interns as if I were not there at all.  This of course would highly infuriate my Interns to no end.  And though I was as "used" to being treated like this as one can be, it really infuriated the hell out of me too at times.

"Hello there sir, I would like to do an interview with you on how you create the amazing designs your sets are known for?"

"Uh sir, you know what?"  

"What?"

"I'm an Intern and I strongly suggest you interview my talented boss, the Scene Designer herself you just very rudely ignored who spoke to you.  She also just happens to have a fully loaded nail gun in her hand at the moment she is not afraid to use."😂

How many times throughout my journey in this amazing world have I had people talk to me as if:

A.  I must have a mental deficiency that goes with the height deficiency 

"Miss, here are the papers you need to sign and since you probably can't write you may put an X..."

"WHAT PART OF I AM A VERY INTELLIGENT COLLEGE GRADUATE ARE YOU NOT GETTING?"

B.  I must be deaf or incapable of understanding ANY hooman language on the planet Earth so they LOUDLY ENUNCIATE  their words...

"You mean THAT CAR  IZZZ YOURS and you CAN REEELLY DRRRIVE THAAAT CARRR?"

"DID YOUUUUU NOT JUST VERRRY RUDELY STARE THEN WHIP OWLT YOUR CELLPHONE TO RECORRRD  MEEE AFTERRR I GOT OWLT OF IT?!!"

"YEAH, SO WHAT MIDDDGITTT?!!"

"Why are you talking so loud to me?"

"Because you midgets are short."

"WHAT HAS THAT GOT TO DO WITH TALKING SO LOUD TO ME?!!"

"Words take longer to reach you."

[I am NOT kidding, conversations like THIS happen to me!]

C.  We are EXPECTED to reveal all secrets hidden deep in a cave somewhere near Mt. Everest pertaining to the mythical kingdom of Midgetdom with treasure we are all supposed to know about because Jerry Springer says we know this.

"Where is that kingdom you midgets all come from?"

"WHAT kingdom?!!"

"The one we heard Jerry Springer tell about and anything HE says is THE Truth only he doesn't know where midgetdom is located!"

"Oh THAT one!  It's in the Land Of Oz just off Route 66 in Nevada exactly 101 miles, four feet and three inches north of..." 

And FINALLY...

D.  At ALL times we are EXPECTED to make for great entertainment the moment cellphones invasively record our every movement for the express purpose of ridicule on a massive scale that pours money into the bank account of said cellphone owner who will stop at nothing to obtain images of us because we of course are objects and have no humanity when actually it is the other way around.

Four times where I currently reside strangers who somehow learned a midget lives here have VERY rudely and dangerously intruded which is exactly why I must ferociously guard where I dwell [unfortunately all one needs to do is ask the "right" non-human where "The Midget" lives and BAM].  So imagine what it is like to suddenly see a non-human with their cellphone trying to capture my image IN MY OWN HOME!  It is terrifying and thrusts me into a very dangerous position against 

a potentially very dangerous non-human!  If blinds are drawn they knock on my door.  I am a object to them and they will go to great lengths to obtain what THEY ASSUME is THEIR right.  Even assuming I must be on opiates THEY should be able to get from me!

But I am not only a fighter I am very creative and talented in these things.  Especially since my career was devoted to creating magic for theatre.

For you see I have made a very realistic looking security camera which I am replacing with a real one.  So when the non-humans show up at my windows with their cellphones and demands, I yell/asking if they are aware of the camera recording their image trespassing on MY property which is linked directly to our county police...

And WHOOSH!!!

Bye bye mean rude dangerous non-humans!

KA-CHING!

This is Surviva-soaring Adelaide!🐎😃🐎👍💫

What Makes Us Stronger...

That which doesn't break us makes us stronger.

I have often been asked what I think my life could have been like had I not been height challenged.  At times I have wondered this too.  As my parents were both unstable alcoholics long before I came along there is a chance without being born height challenged and the good things I came packaged with to surviva-soar through this life, I could have easily followed THEIR path, which is chilling.  

As it is, I came packaged with an indomitable spirit, a huge sense of humour, positivity, a gratitude attitude, talent in spades, and boldness...all the things needed for my very challenging life.  If nothing else but to bring laughter or inspire others by the ways I always keep surmounting the many daunting, sometimes tragic, sometimes shattering neverending challenges my whole way.  Well at least this is what I hope.

I have touched on briefly the horrors of my childhood, focusing more on the friends and bright aspects of my young journey instead.  Today I am opening that door wider.  Yet what this especially shows is not so much the sorrow of abuse, but the sheer determination I had to not let it define me, and the miracles of my four mentor friends being there when needed most, to love me on my way.  And did they ever.

As a child the way my mother handled my being gawked at, was to constantly "hiss" to me, "It's all your fault!  You're the reason they're staring at us!"  Then she would rush off in anger.

What is a child in my body supposed to do with that?

I had to hear it constantly, and have it pointed out to 

me how it was all my fault, for something I had no way of changing.  I cannot begin to put into words the helplessness and humiliation I felt.  Later when Joseph came up with The Dwarf Card, this is why I was able to free myself and rise above what was instilled so deeply in me.

As I touched on here previously, my father took me deep into a woods in winter when I was five with the intent to abandon me.  When he drove away, he realized what he was doing and returned.  Yet I never forgot that terror and feeling of abandonment because I KNEW he was abandoning me.

The violence through the years was never ending.  Drunken beatings for no reason, and I always felt the dwarfism was why.  Since I never knew the direction my father's rages would take, what may work one time to keep him from as much violence would not work the next, and I lived in constant fear.

When I was young and began crying, his rage became worse, so I made myself stifle my tears.  I was a young adult before my four mentor friends helped me learn how to cry and feel safe crying.  Eventually, I could finally get all the painful sorrow of the years out.

They also had to show me what it was like to be touched GENTLY too, for at first I would literally cringe when touched and pull back.  Yet at the same time, I was starved for hugs and loving words.  Nora, the devil she could be at times, really went out of her way to keep hugging me, determined to free me from cringing when touched, and believe me, she did.  Soon it was hard to believe I ever cringed when touched, because I began making up for lost time hugging them!

I was seventeen when my father went into his last drunken rage badly injuring me.  The more I tried to fight back the worse he became.  As soon as I could I called Ella, who immediately came to get me late at night, and I left.  Since Ella lived out of my school district and I had yet to finish high school, Jackie's elderly mother had a room available so I stayed there.

I believe in miracles, because my art is what threw open the door to the dearest friends I could possibly have who were there when I needed help the most.  Just very special people who cared.  And loved.  They would say I am the reason miracles unfolded in my journey, but I believe they are.

Gibran wrote, "The deeper sorrow carves into our soul the more joy we attain."

Though the often horrific sorrows of my childhood deeply carved into my soul, my courage and resolve with the miracles of four very special mentor friends 

are why I soared and attained joy.  

Oh, so much joy!

Just think, had I not been born height challenged with the kind of childhood I had so many wonderful, funny, amazing, inspiring things would not have happened you are reading about here!  

My unique set of circumstances are why my journey has been a gift of joyful attainment for myself and the many who have encountered me.  

And now for you.

Hey, Only Two Accidents...Ever...

Did you know that every three fourths of each stride a galloping horse makes is spent in the air?  Three fourths!  I have always cherished the quote, "When God created the horse He said, 'And thou shalt fly without wings.'"  This is why galloping across the fields for me was flying.

In all the decades I owned horses I only ever had two injury accidents, which were not their fault.  Or mine.

The first involved soaring across a field on my horse Bashum.  We apparently disturbed these huge grasshoppers and one suddenly flew into Bashum's eye.  He stumbled west and I flew east...with my tailbone connecting with the ground first.  We were a LONG way from the barn phone and my car.  

Thankfully we were near a fallen tree I managed to climb on.  We made it to the barn.  Bashum's eye was torn in the corner so I called the vet to come.  Then I had to leave driving myself to the ER.  I feared two things:  that I injured my spine, and/or my dear orthopaedic surgeon was going to kill me.

He fell over laughing.  

It turned out I only fractured my tailbone.  In two places.  

Bashum's eye had to be treated with medicine but all was fine there too.

The other injury involved my horse Selah.  It was summer.  I was barefoot.  In order for a Little Person like myself to put a bridle on a horse I had to lean into her to get the head strap over her ears.  Summer means flies.  At the exact moment I was leaning into Selah to do the head strap she raised her hoof to knock away a fly.

Only when she put her hoof back down it was ON MY FOOT.  She couldn't know it so I had to push her off but because of the position we were both in she TWISTED off my foot.  Then I did what any respectable owner would do...I rode her.  Thirty minutes later I looked down at my foot.  By then it was three times its' size and every color.  Oops.

I rode Selah to my car, fed her, then drove myself to the ER.  Again my very dear orthopaedic surgeon fell over laughing.

I was lucky.  Because I was barefoot everything was only severely bruised and kind of torn...not crushed.

To this day though I proudly have Selah's clear hoofprint on my right foot.

In five decades these were my only injury accidents.  And not their fault!😄

That I was so blessed to fly without wings for many years I had been given a gift worth the price of a very bent tailbone, and a hoof shaped scar on my right foot I am so darn proud I have.

Aiden, Adelaide, A Dream, And 911 Twenty Year Anniversary...

On that bright September morning, Aiden and I were already each at work.  Aiden, at the architectural firm he worked for, and I, at a small theatre working on a set for the new Theatre Season beginning in early October.  The Box Office Manager and I were the only ones there.

Simultaneously, Aiden called and Sara, our Box Office Manager came flying into the Scene Shop.  

Both said, "Adelaide, a plane has flown into the World Trade Center!"

Sara and I rushed into the staff lounge which had a small television she had already turned on.  I still had Aiden on the phone as he and his office were crowded around a television.  We were utterly horrified for what had to be a huge loss of life. 

Just as Aiden said, "I wonder how a pilot could have..." the second plane hit the other tower, and we, like the rest of the country realized we were under attack.  

In shock we continued watching.  Then the Pentagon was struck.

"Adelaide, we're closing the office and going home..."

"We're leaving too!"

As we both arrived home and turned the television on, the South Tower collapsed.  He knew people who worked in it.  Though not personally, I knew of actors and artists who worked and had studios in the Towers.

Aside from all the other humanity.

Before the North Tower came down, Flight 93 came down in Pennsylvania. 

Our hearts shattered for the terrible loss of life.

We each began making and receiving calls and getting and sending Emails from friends checking on us because suddenly that is what everyone did.  To just be close...to connect with those who mattered in the midst of a horrible, tragic nightmare no one knew where the end of the attack was yet.

Hours later we were grateful we had to go check on and feed our two horses.  Though calming of course, not even the peace and innocence of our horses could take away the horrors of that day, still unfolding.

Fast forward twenty years.

None of us, especially me, could imagine that less than two years after 911, Aiden would suddenly be gone and the profound sorrow of losing him.  I have continued surviva-soaring because that is what I do.  Yet there are moments which will come out of nowhere and I grieve for him so much.  I grieve for the journey we were on together, now gone, and for what we shared...for what we planned.

It hit, and it hit so hard on the Twenty Year Anniversary for September 11, 2001.  I just happened to check the BBC for news to see their Live Coverage in NYC...right when Bruce Springsteen sang, "I'll See You In My Dreams."  The words are about losing one we love, miss them, and how we see them in our dreams.  And I do.

This has been a very hard week since hearing the "Dream" song on September 11th.  The sorrow, the missing, and longing all came flooding back.  It is when my challenges are the hardest, like my current living situation, I miss Aiden so deeply.

My spinal cord disease is worsening.  In these recent months the medicine keeping my colon working has become less effective.  The bladder barely functions.

Pain and nausea have increased.  More frightening, the breathing difficulty began due to the spinal cord disease.   I wake up and can't breathe.  This stage was predicted long ago.  I am confined to my bed more and more.

My doctor began the paperwork to get me Home Health, where someone comes in each day to help.  We have known this was coming and I am ready.

Yet I am still a surviva-soarer. 

Through the years I have often seen Aiden in my dreams.  Recently I vividly dreamed Aiden was reaching

out his hand for me to take.  Behind him were Patches and Sierra, our horses also gone.  In the dream though, I couldn't reach his hand and was so sad, but he told me, "It isn't time yet.  You still have more to do, my love.  You can do it."

Then the dream ended.

I still have more to do before I grab hold of that hand.

And...I am still surviva-soaring.