"You're Gonna Miss Them When They're Gone"...

I believe that Unconditional Love has to be understood in all its concepts in order to be able to invite it into our lives, otherwise it can be confused with different emotions. I think all human beings have the innate ability to feel love and  be loved but not unconditionally, we love things or people that bring into our lives some reward, whether it is their company, their exciting personality, their monetary support, the way they treat us or how they can understand and contain us, there is trust too, that's a whole other intense emotion, but hardly if ever to the point of it being unconditional.

Like the word says it is without conditions placed upon the love that we feel for someone. Most of the times the strongest feeling of emotional and mostly unconditional love would be the love of a parent to their children and viceversa, the strongest being that of a mother to her children, a lot of reasons for that being the case, but sometimes even that love is not without conditions, such as a child having strong mental problems that would turn them into criminals, some mothers continue to claim love for their children who deeply hurt others but some mothers have expressed feelings of hatred too.

I find that the best way possible to understand what unconditional love means and try to attract it into your life is going to the one or two human beings that have impacted your life the most, your parents. Nobody is perfect, everyone is going to do something that we are not going to like, but if you really want to learn unconditional love you can't judge your parents unless you are willing to place yourself in their shoes and that's impossible.

Perhaps something your parents did hurt you deeply, but are you sure it is their fault that happened? do you really believe that when they made the decision to take that action that brought you a painful emotion that their intention was to hurt you or perhaps it was their attempt at surviving or evolving themselves as better human beings so that you would have a better frame of reference in your own life of how it's done?

If you ever want to know what Unconditional Love means you must forgive your parents and give them all the Love that you can while you still have them around. Otherwise you will not know how to teach that to your children so you won't receive it back from them either and also because "You're Gonna Miss Them When They're Gone" no matter what. I promise you that...

Hugs xoxo
@nit@

I Should Have Danced one Last Dance...

I don't remember when was the last time I danced with my father. My relationship with my dad went through many different stages only to end up the way it started.

I remember very well the image I had of my dad when I was a little girl and the reason I remember it so well is because when that image changed it was never the same again. I loved my dad, he was my hero, he was smart and sharp, charming, charismatic, upbeat, he spoke several languages including difficult ones like Yiddish and French. He was very talented, artistic and most of all he didn't seem shy. He acted in Community Plays and many times had the lead role, he was friends with Abraham Zabludowsky  because they went to school together and knew other celebrities as well. I remember he was a Mason, I never knew what that was because he kept it all secret, so he knew how to keep secrets that was honorable to me.

His father, my dear dear Seide Eli was always sick, he had Burgers Disease, a disease of the blood that when he would get a cut the area could become gangrened and he lost several parts of his body to it, like the pinky on one hand and part of his leg from the knee down, my brother and I used to fight for who was going to sit on his half leg in the back seat of the car. To us it was fun, we didn't think anything of it because we grew up around that. But to my dad it changed the way he handled his life. He gave up going to Medical School after only a year because he had to take care of his parents. They had a small canning company that canned all types of chiles like serrano, jalapeño,  chipotle, vegetables like carrots, etc. The factory was right next to their beautiful house in the Lindavista neighborhood of Mexico City.

But it goes way back, my grandpa also had a huge potential, he was born in Alexandria, Egypt where his father was opening a new Synagogue. He was a religious man opening synagogues around the world. He took some of his children with him to Mexico to open one there. My Seide became a chemist, very profitable and comfortable path ahead of him but when you are sick nothing you plan works out the way you thought it would and in the end that's what happened, Seide Eli didn't make it the way he planned and neither did my dad. Their intentions were good but their circumstances were not.

I always thought my dad could have been very successful in the entertainment industry because he had the potential and the talent and most of all because he seemed to love it so much, he certainly had much more personality than some of the personalities that have succeeded and he had the desire and the drive, but he gave up on the dream.

I remember dancing with him all the time at parties, he was the Master of Ceremonies at most of the events of the Mexican Jewish Community and outside of it sometimes. I remember every weekend he would get all dressed up with a Tuxedo, he had a couple, he looked sharp and even his demeanor changed. He was happy to go to his parties to help liven them up and he helped himself as well bringing that extra money home. I'm sure there must have been MANY a times when he didn't want to go and spend all of his free time working to make others happy, but I never saw that in his face or his actions.

Outside of that he was a good salesman, he made a living certainly, we always had all we needed but he never got to where he wanted. Our lives were comfortable with the basics never luxuries.

Many things happened throughout the years with me and my dad. As the years went on so did the disenchantment from the man who once was my hero. He became more and more dependent on me and my mom,  it was always I who had to make the efforts to have closeness, to invite them, to make sure they were fine. We never really discussed his economy or his decisions and yet at the end it was I who handled his account till the day he died.

I was very lucky and grateful that my brother took over his well being in the last years of his life. He had to work that much harder to keep him in a place where he knew they would take care of him till the end with dignity. All the nurses and caretakers in that place loved Mr. Monty, he was still the same charmer and best dancer of the bunch. They all took turns dancing with him. I on the other hand, was unable to care for him or even see him again once I moved back to the United States to be near my children I had to work my way back and couldn't return before he died.

I'm happy that I was able to forgive, understand and stop judging his flaws, weaknesses, his inability to show love, that he stopped believing in himself and gave up on his dreams.

I was lucky to develop a stronger and more loving relationship with him towards the end of his life and thanked him for all he did for me while I was growing up. I have him to thank for my love of the arts.

At the end I learned to enjoy very much doing anything that I knew would bring him happiness. But I will always regret not being able to hug him one last time.

I Should Have Danced One Last Dance with my Dad...

RIP at last Dad, I Love You Very Much!!!

Hugs xoxo
@nit@

When Opportunity Comes Knocking at Your Door...

Its later today, 6:52 am, indicating the Angels are here with me. I wrote about that once, 52 is the number I encounter all the time without me looking for it, now after all these years of seeing it its become more expected I suppose but I notice it appears either when I'm uncertain about a decision and I'm asking for clarity or when I've done something that makes me feel proud and grow. Those are for the most part the two instances when I see it. Today is definitely a 52 kind of a day for me. I swear that if I didn't experience it myself I wouldn't believe it but it is so true that lessons do come to you many times over until you've managed to make the right decisions. I'll tell you a story that illustrates this, something I'm living in this very moment that also happened to me when I was 23 yrs. old, newlywed with a broken English a husband still in Medical School and moving to Chicago from Mexico City where all we had there was Poppo.

This was in 1979. To make a very long story with the end result (the punchline) being the total opposite of what my new husband and I expected to get. We went there to be with Poppo he was my husband's dad and an amazing guy to the end of his days RIP I miss him terribly. They had seen each other over the years but not lived together since he was six. We both loved him so much and were so hungry to be a part of a family that neither of us felt we had in our parents at home for different reasons.

So we took all we had and moved there with so much enthusiasm and enormous dreams, we climbed and climbed and climbed the ladder but we were never able to have that family that we dreamt of creating and you want to know why? because there was a Wicked Stepmother in the Picture. I forgave her because I didn't really want to waste any time thinking about her but then one day I was put in the very same position that we put her then.

If you think I ever thought that one day I would be divorced you're crazy not me, not my ex and I we were like two peas in a pod, we called each other half of a sphere; but when you come from a broken home I don't think you can truly learn how to love unconditionally. Poppo was great but he was weak, he lived in the past and was always devoted to a wife who never wanted to promote for him to have a real love unconditional relationship with his son. So our attempt to become a part of that family was never to be.

Now I'm the Stepmom, now I'm totally on the other side of the coin, I'm still wearing my other shoes, those of the victim of the Stepmom's decision. That decision she made then I believe affected the outcome of not only mine and my ex-husband's life, but the lives of my children and so on and so forth. But did I learn the lesson well enough so now that I'm on the reverse of the coin I can help my husband and his son who is about to move here with us. In the US for the first time in his life, hardly any English and he is 19. Am I strong enough to give up my routine, my lifestyle, or even where I find my dishes?

I did think about it I wanted to be clear and honest with myself and I believe that I did learn enough to be on the giving seat this time, maybe Poppo whom I adored and spoke to all the way to his deathbed not that long ago RIP I always thought of him as my dad and he thought of me as his daughter in law, yet the day he died my name never appeared on any obituary and his now old and ailing wife meant well, they just didn't have it in themselves to be any different, I understand it wasn't personal but it was hurtful to us then, she made it very clear to us she didn't want us around.

I'm very grateful for the opportunity I've been given to be on this side so that I can try to be instrumental in creating a loving family and watching it grow always surrounded by love and possibilities. You never know what life may bring, here is a new son, new beginnings, but what I do know is that I am grateful for the lesson Poppo and his wife gave me they showed me what decisions to make when "Opportunity Comes Knocking at My Door".

Hugs xoxo
@nit@

The Real Secret to a Perfect Relationship...

It's "Containment"!!! There I said it. So what do I mean you say? I compare it to a fine perfume inside a beautiful bottle, you don't want a bottle which cap opens wide because it lets out all the scent and if you leave it like that it loses a lot of it, not to mention that the scent is too strong, unlike when you just spritz it lightly on your body to enhance and please your senses.

Life presents challenges every single day, and the more we develop as a species the greater the challenges. Just on a regular day he/she comes home and is tired, either sat at an office surrounded by co-workers of all types and personalities, or his/her work is physical or mental, might be all day on the streets fighting traffic or helping people, encountering tons of challenges and all he/she wants to do is go home to his/her refuge and be with you. Maybe he/she wants to share his/her day maybe not. So he/she gets home and you've been dealing with your own day to day challenges, sometimes less sometimes more, but it's life and stuff happens all the time.

No matter what our lives are like or what we go through in a day, its just that, a day, and you can only deal with what you are equipped to deal with and sometimes we are either not well equipped or have too much on our plate so we open that cap wide and let out the 'Monster' that lives inside of us and we need someone who loves us unconditionally to help contain that 'Monster Within'. Not to judge, criticize, analyze, fix, or even label it, but simply to help us contain it until we recover our balance and our harmony once again.

I don't believe there is any "Free Will", yes we choose who we marry but can we choose what he/she will do on any certain day? we can decide to have kids, but can we choose what they make of themselves? we can choose our careers, jobs and our friends, but that's about where the "Free Will" begins and ends because outside of our choices there are all these circumstances that are totally out of our control that can make our choices either succeed or fail, so for me what works is having someone to LOVE unconditionally who wants to be loved and LOVES me in return the same way, so much so, that is willing to help me contain my 'Monster Within'.

Make sure the partner you chose to share this life adventure with is helping you contain that monster instead of being the one who opens the cap and lets it escape, look inside and see if you're not the one who awakens theirs, be more selfless and help them become a better version of themselves, be brave, caring and do something about it. It is worth every effort you make.

Are you containing each other with LOVE!?

Hugs xoxo
@nit@