women

ahhhh shakin' the grogginess off this morning
and gettin' down to business!
women!!!
it's international woman's day (see post below)

there's so many women who mean the world to me....
i honored lynn in mary's blog where we pick one
woman who's affected us, changed us.
in my eyes, lynn saved me.

so many women have affected me, shaped me,
grown me, made space for me......

i sat and thought of them all thru my life.
there have been many.

the ones who stand out at forks in the road are:

deanna who opened the gate for me to trust being
a mother who followed her heart. she was my role
model. she's the one i held in my mind when my heart
told me things the world argued. deanna gets the
credit for being my mothering mentor!!

sher who stood by me in my fear and reminded me
that it wasn't easy but it'd be worth it. who let
me know without a shadow of a doubt she was there
for me and would stand by me and would not leave
me when i was so afraid everyone would. many did...
but not sher. she only came closer. she grabbed
my hand and has held it tight ever since.

tam who validated me as an artist and made the
space for me to see that what i did mattered.

barbara who stepped up and said she'd be my mom
when i felt i had lost mine. she nurtured me and
poured unconditional love on me in my most raw
moments.

fre for teaching me about the different parts of
myself, for never ending support and for believing
in bone sighs more than i did at times. she opened
new worlds for me.

kar for listening and understanding and getting me.
for going thru my first real step into middle age
with me....for teaching me that good doesn't always
win...but that love keeps going anyway.

susan for allowing me to walk thru hell with her.
for trusting me so much that that very trust brought
me to edges where i had to face honesty inside myself
more than i ever had before.

and there's tons more. but these women i wanted to
mention today.
if you step back and think of who's touched your life,
it's pretty amazing.

funny, too, as i wrote this list more than one man came
to mind. it's woman's day, so i'm sticking with the women.
but i've been lucky enough to have some pretty impressive
men in my life also.

pretty cool.
it's just pretty darn cool.