appreciation

Life is a funny thing. I never get tired of analyzing or remembering.

Outside is cold and cloudy and for some reason i remembered Romania ..many  years ago..

When I was about 9 I used to take the bus to the town and do stuff, whatever my mom was sending me to do. That one time it was my math teacher. She used to take me to her place and i used to do things in change of extra classes. I needed because math was not my strong point.

That night I had to go to the pharmacy to get her something  and on the way back i passed this beautiful church.

I used to admire churches but always avoid them , i was afraid  because every time I passed one, it was a funeral going on and in Romania is a bunch of people crying and blocking the street completely .You get stuck and even if you don’t want to see or feel  that sadness, you are force to anyways.

That time was different. It was partially dark  and cloudy, people were rushing down the street making the sign of the cross  fast( they all do that in Romania when they pass by a church  and if you don’t,  people will look at you funny) (  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sign_of_the_Cross  )  and it was very quiet. I also remember that at that time it was very rare that you will see a car passing by .

At the church the lights outside were on and they were candles in the cemetery. Remembering all that I went and look in my diaries from that time and this is what I found.Its funny how I even remembered the color of the notebook where I wrote that.Was easy to find.

What I wrote when i got home(tried to translate)that night of december(25 years ago!!wow I am old)

“His little hands where frozen holding the cardboard that he was carrying with him everywhere. His bare feet, put together , were purple and frozen on the side walk from the corner of the church street. ..I was standing there watching this child sad and lonely. My heart was crying and  breaking in a thousand pieces thinking he was just a child…

No dreams , no chances of getting to far in life, no hopes of any happiness ahead of him, just a child alone in the cloudiness of snowed streets of the gray, dark  city. I watched him for a half of hour unable to blink even leaving aside moving  . He had this tiny face with fine lines, baby lines like, too young,to fragile..The streets with their dust and snow, the streets were the place they live,the place they are born, the place they grow. People were passing by, some without even looking  and some with rush and no compassion let to be seen, throwing   1 leu (Romanian money) into his box. It was getting darker. Looking at him I was wondering if he will be able to move, to stand on his feet. It was so cold outside , ice on the ground..he was with no shoes sitting in top of that ice. The wind was dry and was cutting into your skin.I didn’t move that  all time I was looking at him and i already couldn’t feel my feet. The kid did got up and slowly start walking towards the church . He was stepping careful , in a slow hop. Just couldn’t stop thinking about the pain he must’ve felt. He passed by me. He was crying..his look felt empty, he was empty inside ..so sad!I wanted to reach and stop him .The first question that came to my mind was: why are you crying? 😦 for which of the hundreds of reasons he might have, he is crying now?

But I didn’t reach, I couldn’t.

He went into the church yard.The candles were lightning  kind of in a nice,warm way the cemetery.I thought he went there to beg but then I saw him making the cross sing and then heading behind the church. I went after him, don’t even know why, but i did. Hiding carefully behind a tree i was watching this kid that seamed to have a ritual ,he  seamed to know what he was doing. slowly and quiet walking down the alee. He stooped at some point and set down  and start taking out stuff from a tiny  bag. He seamed to have chosen  that one spot because they were many candles at that grave,probably a little warmer..I don’t know.I was so shocked that I wasn’t  really thinking straight ,it was no logic involved..I could see in the candle lights that he took out some kind of carpet that he then arranged on the floor.From  the same bag he also pulled  a little blanket. The cardboard went under the carpet and the blanket covering him…yes..he  was going to sleep there. In that late December night, when winter is horrible,in that cold , he was just going to sleep there. He was about five years old..

What was the mistake that this kid was paying for with this miserable life? what did he do wrong? His mistake was maybe that he  has chosen to come into this world!

Was he wanted, was he a drunks night mistake,was he just the result of an unhappy day??Its almost absurd to thing he came from love. where is then his mom,that mom that waited for him, that bright him into this world,that cried when he finally came of happiness?/.Where was his father then? Where was the love send to him from above,where was God now?

In this world where love lost the meaning, a soul was waiting.

In this cold winter night,on the ground of an old cemetery this child was living a life.

So that was what I wrote when i was 9.

You see, back then there was not such a thing as child protection or anything .Kids on the street begging was normal.Is even normal now in Romania. Remembering all that I  now know why I dint hate my life even if it was how it was. I’ve learned appreciation early in life.

Sometimes is hard to appreciate what you have , because probably in top of what you have, you also have a lot of problems. Now, I wake up in the morning and the first thing I do,  is saying thank you. For all I have and all I am. Appreciation is important

.If you want to have more, to ask for more  and to enjoy what you have,  finding smiles every day around you and within you, then you need to be grateful for what you have and what you achieved in life, whatever that is

. There is no little or big in the happiness of a heart.Its just happiness .

There is no Important or Not important in the love that you send to others . Its just love.

If you are grateful and happy ,they will come back to you. If you give love, love will come back to you. Its simply beautiful.

So thank you God or Universe ,or whatever is out there, thank you for my life,for everything I have and I am!!