Probably too deep for most of you, but....

[GreyWolf]

I consider myself lucky…..

I’m sitting here in Temecula, California. Just finished up a day of a wine trade show. Traded lively conversation with a number of people I already knew and a few that I didn’t. Connected with friends from years past and friends found present. The villa I have rented is part of a major resort in the area and my view out the French doors onto my own private patio is one of the southern exposure overlooking vertically trained grapevines now on their third leaf with grape clusters about to flower (what we call bud break in the wine biz). Red flowering geraniums and white/blue lobelia surround the patios edge. A solitary frost control fan spins lazily in the evening breeze with the spotty snow cap mountain range in the background while the setting sun lights up facing plants and creating the evening shadows that we all love as alpine glow sets in. My laptop spills out acoustic guitar music compliments of Pandoras website in the background. A gas fireplace cuts the evening chill in my luxurious one room villa while I enjoy sipping upon a Syrah wine after a long day of talking and entertaining various winemakers and vineyard owners. Ahh, yes. Luxury indeed. Fortune smiles upon me and life is good. Within minutes of opening the cotton drapes on my French patio doors to watch this dynamic natures display, I spy a cute furry cottontail rabbit who has come from seemingly nowhere to nibble upon the various flowering plants that line my patio. I watch fascinated that this small wildlife is so close and so seemingly oblivious to a human being scant feet from it’s small unprotected body. The rabbit rushes off after snipping off a floweret of a plant nearby. Within moments, another appears. This one much smaller, obviously a young one perhaps even a baby of the one I just saw. It hops across the patio in even a faster pace than the first one, seemingly more anxious and worried to be caught or touched. The poor young small rabbit about all of a ¼ pound in weight finally stops but three feet away from my window and it is then that I see the impediment that he/she has been cursed with. It has a half front left leg that never touches the ground. A mere appendage of the other fully healthy leg all but one inch away. As the furry small rabbit hops around the patio trying to see if I have left any crumbs for it to find and enjoy, I am torn inside. My emotions rise to the surface and my tortured inner being is released.
I have visited many places in my short lifetime now and there isn’t a moment that goes by that I don’t appreciate this life that I have been born into and blessed with, more as I grow older. Something that our parents and grandparents have always tried to tell us, but has fallen upon the deaf years of youth. I see kids with Down’s Syndrome or similar diseases, invalids in wheel chairs being pushed by either a family member or husband/wife. I see mongoloids, mentally unstable, and horribly disfigured children and adults of all walks in life in various locations that I have visited or been to. I have seen disfigured people with a wide variety of injuries how suffered I do not know but can only thank whomever, that I have, and continue to be, a whole body and mind in basically decent shape.
Every once in awhile I’ll call my mother and thank her. Thank her for not only borning me into this world, but also for borning me as a whole human in a human form that her and my fathers DNA created, without crossed matched faulty diseases or immune systems or shortened hands/feet or an incapable mind.
It would be an interesting research project for someone with more time than I have to look into just how much better society as a whole is now than what it was, oh I don’t know, some 50 years ago. I’ve already lived past the age that most folks passed away at a scant 70 years ago. We seemingly seem to be healthier, yet there are still those that are born less fortunate with impediments that they have to struggle with the rest of their lives. Not only do they have to struggle themselves, but what those that love them have to give up of their own lives in order to make those less fortunate more comfortable. Yeah, I know. Family. Blood is thicker than water. Commitment. Never say never. All those seemingly clichés. But the bottom line is as I watch the lowering sun and the evening shadows progress towards dusk and now early evening, I feel extremely thankful that I am who I am. I am a thinking, mobile, fortunate human being who hopefully contributes to society in a positive manner and continues the human race to the forward progress that comes from some unplanned plan. I am hopeful that that small bunny rabbit with the shortened fore leg has found a warm place to spend the night. I am hopeful that others throughout the world have found some semblance of comfort in what measely surroundings that they have found themselves. I am hopeful that my own family, wherever they are at this moment in time, are warm, cozy, fed, comfortable, and in good health. I say this at a time that our elders within both our families are dealing with the problems that old age bring upon these frail human bodies that we carry throughout our life from beginning to the consummate end. I have a step-father who is battling a shut down of his bone marrow producing healthy blood cells. I have a mother in law who is battling memory and hearing loss. I have many others within both sides of the clans that are approaching those elder years of declining health and bodies that are starting to decline, giving up limber movements, quick reflexes, control of bodily functions, and timely reflexes to normal reactions.
I sit here in my lovely villa on a 100 acre vineyard estate with the fireplace spewing warmth, soft acoustical music in the background and a glass of wonderful local chardonnay in hand and wonder. Wonder the infamous “What if?”. What if this had all been so much different? What if a ton of different options, thoughts, and ideas? What if I had been born into the inner city of some major metropolitan city? What if I had been born to some terrorist family with a future that was drastically shortened due to pre ordained religious laws?
This is the kind of shit that keeps me up at night or wakes me at 3 am in the morning. I am so fortunate that I feel unfortunate. Make sense? All this because of some three legged rabbit running across my patio in some distant city away from my comfort zone of my own humble abode some 300 miles north. A place that is becoming my base. My comfort zone. My center. My home. And my life.
I don’t know. My mind just thinks of this stuff once on awhile……..

[blurr]

Genes, my Great grandmother died in mid nineties when I was about 10, she was put in a rest home because the family was "worried about her splitting wood" at 91. Most people on both sides of the family live to be pretty old and healthy at that.

Personally I think in the 80s technology and appreciation for what we had was about right, now everything is just over the top, really not interesting to me at all.

[acalliste]

That was good reading. Deserves to be an article, not a thread. Moved...

[NeedinJustice]

Nice read, Mark. You're a soft-hearted soul.

[ghostrider_9]

I have to admit, I was a bit put off by the title. I assume that you think we are all shallow. Needless to say, I read on anyway and can appreciate what you have written. You might want to change the title so that us shallow folks don't get so easily offended . . .

[GreyWolf]

Hmm. Learn something new everyday. I didn't know there was an "article" place. Nice! Thanks for moving Tammy!