When Life Serves You Lemons...

Sometimes learning to give Life that certain "twist" isn't an exciting endeavor. Sometimes Life's "twists" are an awful tangle; a seemingly terrible dance in which one can't leave the room. More often than we may prefer Life serves a bag of lemons and forces us to be master lemonade makers; the subject of this week's blogtalkradio/ jnetsworld.

While some of us forge through Life in rooms full of rotting lemons, some of us will practice the alchemy of making gold out of Life's unexpected gems.

Darling, I know how to make a strawberry lemonade, an Arnold Palmer, a lemon twist, and a lemon drop martini and though I sometimes wish I can face someone off with a lemon pie, I've learned to sit out the heat and know the comfort of a good and honest glass of lemonade.

So what recipes have you learned in your own Lemonade University? Who were your professors? Your parents, your neighbors, your lovers, your enemies, your television programs???

And if you're still sucking on your seventh day, month, year or decade of lemons... Why has it become your preferred flavor? Luckily, most of us have figured out how to sugar up the sour times or see that a little bit of lemon has the power to excite an otherwise predictable and bland life.

Interestingly enough, as I reflect upon my earliest lemony moments, I would like to declare that it is all my mom's fault. Disagree away and be disagreeable she encouraged; it was our freedom of expression in the space of what appeared like chaos and discord. It took several years of matches did I understand the game and found that she wasn't being a total weird toad and we both enjoyed serving it up.

I've flown the nest and didn't earn my lemonade stand degree until after college. Life had a few make-up courses. I had to learn to make peace when I'd rather put on my running shoes. I found that I was pre-programmed in ways that didn't create the autonomy I wished for my personal goals. I had a few bags of lemons laying about.

What is a girl to do except learn to get cooking. I am not a lemon farmer.. I'm a freakin creative lemonade maker.

This Life has not been roses, lollipops and sunshine 24/7. I wasn't borne into that Life. Has anyone? No matter what one's station in Life is, no one is immune to disappointment, regret, heartbreak or pain. Everyone has tasted lemons.

Sometimes it seems that I get a new batch every week and the only thing I can do is be quick... slice it up and serve it fresh and enjoy sitting out the heat with a new recipe for Life.

I saw a picture of a few kids minding their own lemonade stand this past week. What were they raising funds for? A new toy? Candy money? No... they were raising money to help out victims of a terrible disaster.

A lemonade stand for peace? A lemonade stand to bring comfort and support to others and make for a better world?

Why not?

What are you doing with YOUR lemons?

JNET

Life Isn't Black and White... nor Red, White and Blue

The fireworks fanfare faded fast.

By dawn everything I thought was ... came to a screeching halt. My host and friend of many years had a moment of weakness in the twilight hours and made a passive assault. Alcohol was not the "cause", I gave no social cues to permit his behavior and I banked on years of friendship as well as a wealth of common friends to create what I thought was a trust.

No I did not kung fu beat his booty into a far horizon. How to speak volumes to a passive aggressor who makes attacks on sleeping beauties? I'm stunned. I'm creeped out. My enthusiasm has blown out like a candle and a part of me sits in silence....

I packed up my things and left, leaving a household of other friends...and chose not to expose my "host's" weakness. I am too shocked to pursue the conversation. If he wasn't a friend, calling the police would've been an option I wouldn't think twice to do. Years of loyalty thrown away to indulge a weak moment.

The offers for safer havens were numerous. I am a lucky girl. I don't think my host knew that I had several plan B's that would rise for the occassion. Perhaps I was an easy target in trusting the friendship... What type of person would bring such ruin?

Someone already in ruin. Shall I yell at him? Shall I bring the police? Shall I allow my friends a "few words" to set the man straight?

And I am sad. Sad to be betrayed by someone I thought was a dear friend. Disturbed that a friend would disrespect me and exercise a sense of power to diminish me and treat me like a soulless bag of flesh. Sad to be reduced to an object.

Despite all things, I poised myself for a strong return.... after spending a whole day listless and shocked. Detached... I don't know how I really feel.

I will not be a squashed flower... instead, I will rise gracefully and beautifully.

JNET

Lessons From Beethoven

How to overcome misery....

Mulling over the topic for my show, I landed upon Beethoven's Ninth Symphony, "Ode to Joy"

Who knows better about putting OUT misery than the maestro himself. He never heard a note of his final symphony. Beethoven was deaf. He had given up playing the piano years and years before he composed the "Ode to Joy." Frustration at hearing sound fade away must've been profound...

And in the complete deep silence where only he could hear his thoughts did he write his Ninth Symphony.

What is Joy? Beethoven postulates... Is it power and dignity he poses through his first movement... Is it playfulness and cheer? The second movement is a blizzard of laughing notes. Is it peace and tranquility? The third movement celebrates like a sunset saying good evening.

No, Beethoven says to all these suggestions.

The fourth movement mows down the roses, the poises, the blizzard of baby's breath and a theme swells from a tiny low voice; perhaps the voice that Beethoven hears in the silence. The familiar theme that we all know as his Ninth grows and develops and dances finally from the choir.

Beethoven in his despairing deafness DEFIES to be a silent miserable soul. Instead, he creates a masterpiece.

What is joy? What is it that Beethoven teaches?

Joy breathes in consciousness... in the ability to think beyond the circumstance.. Beethoven created beyond his deafness, beyond the cruelties from a violent parent, beyond the limits of the common minute... and created himself in a way that eternity can sing his soul's frustrations, his struggles, and his hope and joy.

That.... is living life as an artform.

Listen to my blogtalkradio segment on Beethoven's "Ode to Joy" with special co-host Miss Diva of Dysfunctional Diatribe.

JNET