April 1, 2009 @ 8:43am

It's a wacky Wednesday, the ultimate hump day and why are our lives centered around the workweek or the weekend? I wonder if we miss out on life focusing on these trivial things but actually it April Fool's Day, I can relate to this day on a personal level because there is this saying, I can't recall where I heard it and how it originated but it's definitely something from black culture and my kids father use to spat it out from time to time "God looks out for babies, drunks and fools and thank God I'm a fool." In his case he was a drunk and thank God I wasn't as big of a fool as I thought I was. But I still refer to myself as a fool, not in a negative but in a surrendering kind of way. In a way where I just admit to God, I don't know all the answers and the older I get the less I seem to know but I'm all right with it because well God looks out for fools like myself. In some ways being a fool allows me more time to really enjoy life with too many expectations and I'm so hard on myself when I don't know everything although the perfectionist in me is alive and well. I suppose it's the momentary down time for my perfectionism.
Speaking of fools and drunks, for me today is Hash Bash day, the Ann Arbor tradition of smoking hash in the University of Michigan's Diag. This is an indication of my age because I'm sure most people don't know what hash bash day is and although I never attended or participated in the act of smoking hash, the nostalgic thoughts of people getting high downtown is a very romantic idea and the ultimate act of rebellion. I think I miss the spirit of rebellion in our culture. I miss living in a city full of fun loving hippies, revolutionaries and cultural warriors. We used to go out in the play ground, okay this was when 6th grade was still in elementary school and we'd imagine smelling the hash, there is no way we could but we pretended to have magical olfactory abilities and I guess we bought into the notion of second hand smoke in a more positive way back then before it became the evil thing it is now. We needed that second hand smoke otherwise we would have no connection to hash bash day but in our little minds.
I'm reading this book and it has so many references to the late seventies. It ignites my memory about what life what like when I was growing up and how much fun I had although I always thought my life was miserable but if I'm honest or when I'm more objective, I realize that my mother afforded us a really, really, really good life and for that I am eternally grateful. She worked her butt off and she made our lives comfortable considering she was a single parent, I felt rich yet we were working class and I never wanted for anything, never and in this moment I wish I could be a better daughter, be a better friend to her or at least thank her adequately. But this is a woman who loves unconditionally, who gives without regard for herself and a woman who never complains. Maybe it is she, it is her spirit that challenges me to be my best self, to live with purpose and to express life in the fullness of love. She has been my greatest spiritual teacher and I didn't know this until this very moment. This is good, this gives me hope because since I'm made from her, made of her stuff, maybe I can be a representation of her good, perhaps exhibit a fraction of the unconditional love that she has shared with me and everyone that comes in contact with her.
There's no fooling here, only that I have been a fool but that's what this day is for, for fool's to wake up and recoginize the endless possibilities for their lives.
I am perfect and I am whole and I am complete. I LOVE ME!