Pearls

All life is measured by moments lived
One second at a time.
Pearls of memory glisten and shine for such a short time.
It's luster fades like dew in the morning sun.
Life~ a series of events, the good, bad, and mundane of it all....
Difficulties 'A test of our metal" my Grandad always said.
Each moment, one at a time,
Becomes our wisdom, our life's experience.
Moments shared strung together like pearls on a string.
Glistening like precious jewels in the dazzling light of day.
Life well lived, love shared generously, experiences strung together
Beaded, dazzling pearls lovingly added to the string of life one by one~

The Beat of the Drum

The beat of the drum opens the door to our memory.
Ancient stories passed on to generations and generations yet to come.
True~ as the sea rolls in and out,
As bright as the stars that shine in the black of night.
Old souls in a modern world , seeking balance, harmony.
Looking for a place where peace exists, presently struggling to co-exist.
Living in a throw away-instant world,
Where patience, kindness, and compassion struggles to be known
in this inhumane, human world.
Softly, gently, drumming, beckoning to us
the quiet drum beat, the heart beat of Mother Earth.
Calling to us, to heal us, bringing us together as one.
In harmony as we reconnect to the beat of the drum.

Ogie and the Girl or Analisse Meets Ogie

There once was a girl who just loved to swim and sail on a mysteriously legendary lake. One beautiful day during summertime play, the girl found herself stranded. She was smack dab in the middle of that lake. All alone and just a little afraid, the girl scratched her head and wondered how she had gotten there. The goosebumps rose from her head to her toes as she had the strangest of feelings. Prickles prickled on the back of her neck telling her someone was watching. Frantically the girl looked left and then she looked right...absolutely no one was in sight. A sudden stirring deep underneath down, down, down the cold murkey depths.... Bottomless fear held the girl in tight in it's grip. Searching she struggled frantically for someone to save her. The water beneath her bubbling, churning, swishing and frothing. Something was emerging from the deep dark. An eye, a massive eye looking back at the girl.... Filled with an ancient warning. A stern look stared back at the girl as if to say, " You should know better, little girl, it's not safe for you out here, I AM WATCHING!" With a swish and a flash and a blink of an eye, the girl was back on shore. The girl now dazed and amazed and understanding, the legends were actually true! The fables of old, a warning foretold for all to respect the bottomless depths of the home for the One who the locals fondly call Ogie.




By Leslie Flamand
A children's story

Remembrance Day- A Tribute to Irish Strife

Blasting ancient wind blown sound,

Celtic highland native be found.

Leading men and boys to war,

Fighting for lives, let be - nevermore!

Unknown boundaries of hate and spite,

No forgiveness know these and their plight.

Ages old strife retold and retold,

Plastic explosives hurled tenfold.

Religeon: Catholics and Protestants,

Show ne'er a Christian virtue.

Polotics, economy vs: futility,

A modern world vs: heredity.

Why can't they just let it be?

Hate and Intolerance is the true ENEMY!



LKF.

Connected

Heartbeat, sound of the drumbeat
Chanting to the Creator
Giving thanks for life.

Respect the environment
Respect eachother
Respect yourself

Love one another
Sister to brother

We are all in this life together
As one, yet seperate
Connected, yet affected

All Earth's Children
One and ALL

Connected by our heartbeat
Listening to the drumbeat
Chanting to the Creator
Giving thanks for life!

My Twin Brother, Michael ~

My Story of Womb Twin Survival

By Leslie Kristine Flamand

This book is dedicated to Phaelan, for you know why...as promised! To Bevan for all those pasta meals when I was too busy writing and for the computer tech issues that were beyond my understanding. To my parents for obvious reasons, without whom I would never been born . To my one and only, for now and forever, for eternity...My J~

Finally, to Michael my brother who was never talked about, but was always there, just out of reach. I look forward to spending eternity with you someday. Then we will

never be seperated again.

~

Foreward

In this world there are many people who are the product of a multiple pregnancy. Comfortably so, science has well documented the live twin phenomenon. The amazing and lets face it, sometimes unsettling bond that live twins share. This bond has been marveled at and held us in awe since the very first set of twins were born.

However, there is a side to this particular subject that doesn't always end happily. This socially taboo subject has been too painful and upsetting to talk about. No one ever wants to imagine that sometimes babies die. It is every expectant parents nightmare.

Althea Heyton (writer of the experience, lecturer, and a survivor herself) coins the phase 'womb twin survivors' to describe the sole survivor of the multiple birth phenomenon. This taboo subject has rarely seen the light of day. Something I hope remedy and to bring into light in a small attempt to bring healing to the survivor in these pages. I am a womb twin survivor and this is my story.

~

My Twin, My Michael

We were created together,

Shared the same space for seven months.

I'm sorry you only lasted for five!

In the womb,We were as close as two people can be.

Like two peas in the same pod, Each half of the other.

Then suddenly, you were gone!

I guess God needed you in heaven and you left me- Alone.

I have looked for you around each corner,

Searching for my lost Brother.

Missing you day after day, Year after long year.

My Michael, my twin

the whispered softly, family secret.

sternly hushed, never discussed in my presence.

Cloistered and hidden from the light and the truth.

My innocent twin, my Michael,

Transformed into a shadowed secret.

I have always known you my brother, my soulmate.

I have held you safe and close to my heart,

My personal silver lining around each stormy cloud.

I steal you away in my dreams and in my imaginings.

I remember you ALWAYS, for YOU are the missing part.

My dear brother, the brother of my heart,

I remember you and honour you in all I do,

In all I see and feel, you live on through me.

Michael, you are in the colours of every sunset,

In the quite of winter's first snow,

In autumn's brilliant glow.

In every rustle of the fallen leaves.

In every summer sun dappled stream,

In every bloom of springs tender growth.

You are in the smiling face of my giggling babies.

Michael, for better or worse, you live ON in ME!

~

Chapter 1

The human condition dictates we enter into this world alone. We leave the world in the very same way. What we do between the beginning and the end, is what defines our humanity. The memories made, the love shared, many life experiences along the way. The bangs and bruises, fear, pain, joy, laughter and fun, the good, bad, and ulgy that is life. Rights of passage, the many different seasons we move through in life's journey. All of it strung together like glistening pearls on the string of the uniqueness of each human experience. At our core we are an amazingly fragile, yet hardy, simply complicated, contradictory creatures.

Twins and multiples enter this world set apart from the rest. Multiples will have to speak for them selves. Twins on the other hand, are a different kettle of fish. First, you have the identical variety. Same egg that seperates to become not one, but two people. Visually impossible to tell apart (usually), carbon copies, two halves of the same whole. Then, you have the paternal twin, same womb, seperate room so to speak. Side by side, in the same cramped place, both struggling for space.( I fall under this particular umbrella.) Twins have a completely almost magical life experience. Born with a best friend for life built right in. Equipped with an uncanny symbiotic bond. Where communication is either not spoken at all, or in a language shared by only the two. Shared looks that speaks volumes to the twins but is a mystery to the everyone else. Those mysteries of the twin experience have been scientifically documented proving the twin bond is stronger and deeper than any other human relationship.

Looking on another side of the experience, what happens if the unspeakable happens. Every expectant parents worst nightmare. What if one of those babies dies? That's what happened to my Mom and Dad. According to my Mom, at five monthes ingestation, my brother, Michael died. As the story was told to me, Mom became very ill. With three more children at home, according to Dad, they were aged 6, 5, and 3. Mom was put on bed rest and was shuttled off to the hospital where she stayed on and off through the pregnancy. Dad being the sole provider and with no help, paid for people to take care of my sisters and brother when she was in hospital. Mom was toxic because of Michael and was suffering with extreme asthma which she recieved gold drip IV treatments. Like a trooper, Mom held on to us for as long as she could. Doing everything possible, so I could have a chance at life. It even got to the point where the doctors told my Mom, she was so sick, if I wasn't born by midnight, they would have do an emergency C-Section. As my history goes, I was born at 10:53 pm November 20th 1966, my dead brother was delivered shortly after. With a whole hour and 7 minutes to spare. My Dad says I was no bigger than a pound of butter. He said I could fit in the palm of his hand. I was small enough to sleep in a shoe box. He says I was a couple months too soon, I/we should have been born in January. Dad said I was in the hospital for a really long time.

~

Chapter 2

To negociate what comes next, it maybe helpful to to have the following, albeit one sided conversation. So, when does life begin? This age old question has been passionately debated for centuries by scholars and philosophers alike. When does life begin? Does life first begin when the sperm first penetrates the egg? Or is it when the cells begin their cellular division and multiplication? Is it when a child is born and takes its first breath? Some would even argue life is not life until the first year of the child's life out in the world. What I know on the subject is from my personal experience. I am not in a position to back it up with scientific documentation or argue it with facts clutched over head in my hot little hand. The goal of this book is putting a voice of personal experience, not a scientific study. Don't get me wrong, I'm all for science as long as the 'almighty buck' is not the prime directive but for the betterment of health and preservation of life.

My personal view on when life begins, is in the womb. During the miracle of cell division and the little polly wog of a human swims in those fetal waters. Do we have the technology able to monitor conciousness of the fetus? Or psychological effects different experiences have on a baby? The science behind the miracle of life is as much of a mystery now as it was back in the days of Adam and Eve. Yes, medical science has come a long way compared to the days where women gave birth in the fields, chewed off the umbilical chord, put the new babe in a sling across the back and just kept on working. It is a well known fact that a baby recognizes Mommy and Daddy's voice in and out of the womb. A baby also desponds to music while still in the womb, even showing preference to a specific type.

I will even go out on a limb to declare, losing my brother in the womb, has had a deep affect on my life. I have always had a wierd facination with death and an uncanny ability to help others faced with it. As a child I was always bringing 'broken' animals home to fix or give a proper burial. My personal experience, losing my twin brother in the womb has left a deep pshchological chasm in my psyche.

I knew my whole life, I was missing someone. It was not until I walked in on a family conversation as an 8yr old, that I even had a twin. Memory is a hinkey thing, I think I was 8, I could have even been 9. Michael was never talked about. He didn't even have a name until a few years ago. Where I had a conversation with my older brother about him. Locally there was a group of people who created a memorial at a local cemetery to honour siblings who had passed away. I was needing to know my twins' name ( My Dad at the time thought the past was better left in the past. Mom died in '93 so she was unreachable to ask...) to add to the plaque for the memorial. My brother said he thought my twin's name was Michael, so it stuck. Talking to my Dad about it, he said in those days only the living were given names.

Maybe that's why I got a boy or girls name . To cover the both of us. Then again I could only be letting my imagination run away with me again. What I do know for certian, is that my whole entire life I have been searching for my brother who I will never see this side of life. In my awake moments, and in my daydreams, when I am in the place just between conciousness and sleep, I am forever searching for my brother.

~

Chapter 3

YET TO COME...............