Today was a federal holiday observed President Day.

Last night when I checked the weather report, it said we would have a cold winter morning this morning. They foretasted the lowest temperature as -1C.

I woke up with the bright sun shine through the windows. I noticed it was already 9:30 am.  

I was shocked at the late hour I woke up.

But at the same time, I thought it was okay. Today was a holiday anyway. My daughter didn’t miss the school.

Maybe the morning got very, very cold, so that my body needed some more extra sleep.

My daughter on the other hand, was awake while I was having an extra sleep. She said she was up since 6 am. Interestingly, whenever she doesn’t have school, she tends to wake up earlier than usual.

I recall my younger days. I was like her. My body intuitively recognized the differences between school/work days and off days.

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I watched the movie Smoke Signals (1998) on DVD. It was my second time to watch it.

My first time was back in 1999. I watched it at the theater in Japan. Since this movie was not a big title, I needed to go to the theater in the bigger city.

I went to the theater alone. Simply because I wanted to weep whenever I wanted, without feeling embarrassed to my company.

I shed tears at the scenery where the main character, Victor, run through 20 miles to get some help after he had a car accident. While he was running, he had flash backs of the memories with his late dad. When his physical body almost reached its limitation, he saw a hallucinated image of his late father, holding his son’s body with his both arms. In the reality, it was a road worker man who happened to be there.

I was touched at this scenery. I know spirits can send earth angels whenever they want to support their loved ones. I believe it was his late father who sent the earth angel to help his son.

At that time I experienced many miracles to save my life. Now I know it was my family spirits who sent me many earth angels, so that I could fully believe in them. With their support, I had come to be able to believe in me.

 

***

Fast-forwarding to current year, in 2019, while watching the same movie, I shed tears at the different scenery.

It was the scenery where the police officer accused Victor for the car accident. The police officer believed the other party of the car accident. The other party lied that Victor was drunk and driving. It was a stereotyped image toward Native Americans. Both of the police officer and other party were White.

It was just one scenery, but it touched my soul. I could not control my tears falling down. It was not physical me, but my soul, who was shedding tears.

My soul remembered these kinds of discrimination over and over again in my past lives. These uncomfortable experiences were imprinted in my soul.

In this lifetime, I am a foreigner in this country. I experience racial discrimination in the daily basis, which I never experienced while living in Japan.

Let’s face to the reality.

Even though we are living in the new era; we are not in 1800s nor 1900s anymore, racial discrimination is still going on in this country.

I believe there are things each one of us can do to fix it.

***

Each one of us should think about our desires.

Each one of us should pray for our desires.

Each one of us should discuss about our desires with others.

Each one of us should take a small action every day.

Because I want to change the bad habit.

Because I want peace between all the races.

Because I want to live in the world where everybody is nice and kind to each other.

As my baby step, I keep myself being trustworthy.

As my baby step, I keep myself being nice and kind to others.

As my baby step, I keep speaking up about my desires.

♬ Any feedback? (^^♪

My family and I browsed around some hardware stores such as Home Depot and Lowes along with Walmart.

All of them already had some herb plants available at their garden areas. They looked healthy. I wanted to buy some, but postponed to some more months later.

Because the weather report says we will have another snows coming up soon, the plants will not survive.

At the end of January, I participated in the microgreen project. The local library offered us some microgreen seeds of broccoli, sweet peas, and sun flower. I keep the planting trays by the window so that they get enough sun light. Our indoor plants are growing healthily.

Our outside plants on the other hand, they are still hibernating. It gets very cold in the morning and the night. They need to sleep some more months.

♬ Any feedback? (^^♪

Today I had an uncomfortable experience at school.

I walked to the school to pick up my daughter. When I was entering to the school parking lot, I heard kids’ voices saying “Hi”. I looked around. Within the 360 degree range, I was the only one. I looked toward the voices. There were four kids waiving at me and kept on saying “Hi” to me. They were inside of the playground, standing at the fence.

Considering from their height, they are probably 7th graders or 8th graders.

I could not see their faces clearly, but I don’t have any acquaintances in the grades, so they are strangers to me.

I waived back to them even though I didn’t know them personally.

On the next second, an unusual thing happened.

The four kids consisted of two girls and two boys. One girl pointing one boy who was standing right next to her, told me “Hi Mrs., he said he likes your butt. He said you have a nice butt.”

I really couldn’t believe what I just heard.

Back in my younger days I have heard similar statements from stranger boys in America. I was then in my 20s or 30s. I didn’t feel comfortable for their statements, but I could not do anything about it. I didn’t say anything to them and quickly left the spot away from them.

This time the situation is different from then.

It happened at the school property. The statement was made by the students in the school playground.

I am a mother. I should not be treated as a young single girl anymore. I should be treated with respects.

I really didn’t feel comfortable to the kids’ statement today.

***

I mentioned it to my daughter. She said the kids were rude. She was mad about the kids’ statement toward me. She said if that happened to her, she would yell back something to them, something like “Stop!!”

My daughter advised me not to tell my husband about today’s incident. We know he would get upset about it. He is protective about me. He can be a mother bear for me and my daughter.  

I honestly don’t know what to do about it.

At least I am happy that my daughter knows the proper reaction. I should have yelled back to them right away, something like “Stop!!“ in order to show my anger to them.

♬ Any feedback? (^^♪

My daughter came back from school with a big smile on her face. She had a great day at school.

They had a valentine dance party at the school cafeteria. The younger students from kindergarteners to the fourth graders attended. The PTO and some other volunteered mothers prepared for the party. They decorated the cafeteria with many floating balloons and cute heart stickers on its walls.

I asked my daughter if any boys asked her to dance with them, or if they had romantic love songs to dance with.

My daughter started laughing. She said “Mom, we are just kids.” They had only fun and exciting songs for younger kids to crazily dance around. They had fun fighting with floating balloons. It was far from a romantic dance party. I got so relieved to hear that from my daughter.  

Now that I recall her teacher told me at the parent conference. She said the school prohibits the younger students from making boyfriends and girlfriends.

My daughter is 9 years old. I know it is not far from today until the day when my daughter talks about her boyfriend. Kids grow very fast. I should cherish every minute and every second to watch over my daughter’s growing process.   

♬ Any feedback? (^^♪

My daughter’s school started offering an after-school tutoring for some students who needed the academic help. My daughter needs help in math, so she attended the math tutoring. Some other classmates in need of language art went to the English language tutoring.

This tutoring class started from last Wednesday, February 6th. Today was their second tutoring class.

My daughter is shy and cannot ask questions in front of many other classmates. In this tutoring class on the other hand, there were only two or three classmates including her, so that she could openly ask any questions she needed to ask the teacher.

I appreciate the teachers who volunteered to offer this tutoring help. I hope this will be great help for my daughter so that she can catch up with other classmates in math.

♬ Any feedback? (^^♪

I received a voice message from the local library. The librarian asked me to return one item I borrowed from the library as soon as possible. She mentioned it was past the due date. Her voice tone was intense. I felt like being scolded for not returning it on time.

I didn’t feel comfortable. It must be their misunderstanding, because we did return it before the due date.

I quickly called the library back. The director answered the phone.

Luckily I had the details with me. I told her the exact dates of when I got the item and when my husband returned it. My husband also remembered the librarian’s name, so I mentioned it to her too.

That was done like that.

Sadly though, nobody in the library apologized me for their misunderstanding. Nobody apologized me for blaming me wrongly. It was disappointing.

I have gone to the local library very often for the past ten years. They should know my personality very well by now. I am trustworthy. I am always good at keeping the due dates. I never forgot returning items borrowed from the library. I am always on time.

I apologize whenever I make a mistake or mistreat somebody. I want other people to do the same.

I deserve to deal with the people who are trustworthy. I deserve to be treated with respect and politeness, just as the same way as I treat others.

Whenever I dealt with people who don’t apologize for their wrong deeds, I end up with pondering. Why does it happen to me? What is this teaching me? Do I have to get used to them and let it go all the time?

I guess I will need to get used to people who have different action patterns from mine. I will need to accept the differences as long as it is not a big deal. I guess I will need to secure myself to stay at the high vibration no matter what.

♬ Any feedback? (^^♪

My daughter pointed out about my long sleeve shirt that I was wearing. It has lots of holes and frayed parts all over.

I know it does. The reason is simple. This shirt is very, very old.

I received this shirt from my brother. He stayed at Australia for one year using a working holiday visa. He was 23 years old and I was 22 years old at that time. He gave me this shirt as a souvenir. I liked the shirt very much. I often wear it since then. Yes, you are right. I keep wearing this shirt for 26 years.

I have several other clothes that are my favorite for decades.

One of them is a red cotton plaid shirt. As for this one, I keep wearing it for 32 years, since I bought it at the age of 16. I was then a high school student. I used to wear this shirt whenever I wanted to feel confident with myself. The only one thing changed about this shirt was how it fits me. This shirt was very buggy on me at the age of 16. Now it fits me slightly tight on me.

Please don’t get me wrong. I am not that poor that I cannot buy a new shirt. I just love some stuff so much, that I keep them forever.

As for my current car, I bought it in May 2013. This year is its 7th year. Nobody believes it is that old age. I believe it still looks quite new. It is because I take good care of my car. It stays inside the garage most of the time. I hope I will have this car for more than 10 years or even more.

I will do the same for the people whom I love so much. I will keep cherishing them until my last day of this lifetime.

♬ Any feedback? (^^♪

Several days ago while I was taking a walk with my family, my husband mentioned of his upcoming business trip to Hawaii. It was a great news because it was one of his wishes.

When I turned to him while he mentioned about that, I saw a beautiful rainbow in the background. As you know, rainbows are often seen in Hawaii and so, Hawaii is known as “The Rainbow State.” A rainbow is depicted in their vehicle license plates.

As for Hawaii, we visited Kauai as our family vacation in 2011. This time he is going to visit Honolulu, Oahu.

I am happy for him. I hope he will have a safe and fun stay there.

BTW: one of his wishes includes to visit Japan as his business trip. I hope it will happen to him soon.

♬ Any feedback? (^^♪