We talked about high school, graduation from high school and what if I am not there to watch her graduate? She’s asking all these questions, then, found her own answer, “Grandma, I will look up the clouds and watch you be proud of me from there. Then, we will meet again in your second life,” says #princess2015la.
She then showed me two bookmarks she made. “You can have one,” she offered.
“Grandma, thank you for everything. It is always yummy – Grandma’s cooking is always yummy, it is never ever not yummy.” How she emphasizes! To think it was just the simplest spam musubi, deconstructed with tomatoes, Manila mangoes and pears.
She then requested me to make fresh orange juice for her.
And, “Grandma, can you videotape me?” She started laughing after. She is quite a happy wholesome person.
When I inquired about the boys bullying her and her friend, she described how they want to crush the pile of dried leaves. Her friend, E and herself were cleaning up the yard. So, they stopped the boys. The boys replied, “What would you do, call the police on us?”
She said, “No this is not for the police to solve. This is between us and for you to stop.”
Next day, I asked, “How are the boys now?”
“Grandma, they are okay now. They are not bothering us.”
I just made my 12th batch. I am delivering 8 bags this week.
Each batch is a combination of inspiration, joyful anticipation from my customers’ feedback and a grateful, humble heart of being of service to others. I am even happier that the younger adults are loving it as part of their daily breakfast.
My customer shared this: “Have been enjoying this po for midnight snack for the past few days Greek Yoghurt, honey and iylagranola “
Just when you think you are done with public purposes, service and all; the Lord gives you another purpose, and enlists your hubby to chop the Manila mangoes and your #princess2015la to affix the labels to fill 16 bags’ order this week.
Yesterday, a thoughtful mom texted me to order 8 bags. She wants to take these bags for her son to DC.
Awhile back, another mom texted me that her daughter is flying to NY and ordered 8 bags too.
In a few days, a frontliner nurse supervisor is getting ready for a festival. He wants 4 bags.
Yesterday, another friend ordered 4 more bags as her stepdaughter really liked it.
But, the best customer of mine is my daughter. She walked in and asked:”Do you have anymore granola, Mom?”
I hand her a bag and said:”Here, waiting for you.”
#princess2015la whispered to me and said, “Sorry Grandma, I don’t like granola. But my mom does.” She’s so full of love and hope.
So, this morning as I ate #iylagranola, I feel connected in thoughts and in heartwarming spirits to these moms eating my CFO Class A home produced #iylagranola with a valid LA County health permit.
It has made me more conscious and caring about the health of my customers. I wait to be fully inspired before making it.
I read the blog below and my Spirit wanted to memorialize the lessons I learned in dealing with conflict:
1. Be persuaded and be persuasive.
2. Never let the ugly in others destroy the beautiful spirit you grew within you.
3. Pray their “wrongminded beliefs” be transformed to right mindedness. Acclimate and live within your zone.
4. Look at the relationship over a longview lens: has this person contributed mostly trauma and harm or has this person stood up for the common good, inclusive of you?
5. Honesty, though brutal, without compassion and trust that the person can change is cruelty and judgmental biased profiling of another. Jesus was nailed to the cross by brutal offensive bullying, cruelty and judgmental biased profiling.
6. Forgive 7 times 77 times = 539 times. In my lifetime of 7 decades, I have not reached that yet. It illustrates that folks are mostly good, if we allow them.
7. Live your life with gratitude, and an expectation that Holiness is in others, as in you. After all, your goal is to go to heaven.
8.While here, create more moments of heaven on earth.
9. Your life must be about service to others. Find the gaps you can help folks transcend their pain. That special observation skills, away from your own pain, allow you to keep making folks feel good and joyful around you. Life lived serving others is more meaningful than holding your pain.
10. When adults shun you – that’s the overflow from their hearts. It is not about you. You are God’s beloved, keep remembering that. They will soon recognize their intrinsic goodness.
Thank you for a very beautiful piece, Fr. Rodel G.Balagtas.
None of us wants conflict. On the contrary, we all want to live in peace and harmony. But the reality is that we will always live with conflict. There will always be conflict in the family and among relatives, at work, and in the community; conflict among members of a political party, congress, and city councils; and not to say the least, conflict in the Church, an age-old problem!
And there will always be conflict within ourselves in the critical decisions we have to make and the “demons” and sins we struggle with daily.
I would always tell my students when I was teaching in the seminary to have a “thick” skin when they become pastors to manage and resolve conflicts. “It’s all part of being a leader,” I would remind them.
The Scripture Readings this Sunday speak about conflicts in Jeremiah’s life and that of Jesus and his apostles. They faced deep conflicts with people of their times. Jeremiah ran into conflict with his people, so they threw him out in a cistern. Aware of some family members’ rejection of him and his teachings, Jesus told his disciples, “I have come to set the earth on fire, and how I wish it were already blazing.”
So how should we deal with any conflict?
First, we must face it courageously instead of running away. As Brene Brown says, we need to rumble with the emotions arising from any conflict. She states in her book, Dares to Lead: Brave Work. Tough Conversations. Whole Hearts:
“When we find ourselves zigzagging—hiding out, pretending, avoiding, procrastinating, rationalizing, blaming, lying—we need to remind ourselves that running is a huge energy suck and probably way outside our values. At some point, we need to turn toward vulnerability and make that call.”
Second, we need to learn how to enter into honest and challenging conversations with one another. As one priest said, “to be brutally honest with each other.”
Does this mean that we come up immediately with our defenses and best arguments? No. It means that we come together safely, first of all, to listen to each other’s feelings and concerns. As our Christian principles say, to seek first to understand, then to be understood.
Brene Brown describes brave conversations in this way:
“Here’s what I’m seeing; here’s what I’m making up about what I see. I have a lot of questions. Can you help me understand?” Then dig in, take notes, and ask questions, followed by “I need some time to think about this. Can we circle back tomorrow? I’ll come to you if more questions come up, and if you have questions, please come to me.”
Third, we must stand by our Christian principles, values, and unselfish intentions for the common good. Dialogue means not always catering to other people’s wishes and opinions. It is standing on God’s side because we can’t stand anywhere else.
The Second Reading from the Book of Hebrew speaks about the need to stand firm in the face of conflicts and opposition:
“Consider how he [Jesus] endured such opposition from sinners, so that you may not grow weary and lose heart. In your struggle against sin, you have not yet resisted to the point of shedding blood.”
Friends, let’s deal with conflicts in a most Christian way. That way, we can live in peace and harmony!
I had intimate moments exchanged with my husband’s brother, sister, nieces, and their partners. It was a lot to process. But the most beautiful image was the release of 20 homing white doves from Irvine back to their home in Hacienda Heights.
First, CJ, the spouse who cared for her during her illness, released the first dove. It flew. Then, the three children, M, G, and M all released the doves at the same time, and they flew in unison. While the four flew, they waited for five more to join them until all twenty were released from their wooden cage. One lingered behind and did not fly, instead, the dove trainer caught the dove while all nineteen flew together, back to their home, except for the one that dilly-dallied.
It was a perfect metaphor that we all strive to be home, our eternal resting place, believing in life, death, and everlasting life, as practicing Catholics.
During the burial, I sensed the presence of the Holy Spirit: strong winds that blew down all three wreaths. The winds gave us a brief respite in the 87F weather, and the rest was still air and heat.
It was a day after my 70th birthday when we attended the wake and viewing to say goodbye to Sarah Flores Delacruz.
You could sense how she was endeared highly by her family and her faith community. I was proud of my daughter, C who described holidays spent in Irvine with her cousins, now sisters to her.
All came dressed in white, a uniformity we appreciated, uniting in grief, as we approached the burial site, the next day, perched on a hilltop.
Wish I could write more, but in deference to the family, not to social media, these snippets are to memorialize the love I felt.
I spoke to her spouse and said, “You showed her sterling love, the finest example.” He then shared what were some of his inner thoughts, ideas, and feelings.
Thank you, Holy Spirit and family organizers, for these beautiful days of grieving, full of love, rosary, prayers, open mic, and mass. The reception had tastefully curated foods that Sarah liked, and the tables were tastefully decorated with wildflowers.
Thank you to my dear family, community friends, and virtual Facebook, Instagram, and friends who greeted me from several cities in the US and in the world.
Thank you for showering me with your greetings from the heart.
I choose this flower arrangement that is so beautiful at three angles, curated and arranged by Ed Rame; plus two more arrangements that illustrate how my heart feels, overflowing with gratitude and love for you all, one from Enrique de la Cruz and a year’s life of miniature, fragrant roses from Benel Se-Liban.
Hubby said I thanked him five times. I replied, “Just in case you didn’t hear me.” We smiled. It was a great dinner outdoors, not as hot as previous days and with boisterous background music and community gathering noise at Saffy’s.
On my 70th birthday, Aug. 11, I want to say a prayer for appreciating my two precious gifts from God. Thank you po Lord, for my C and C, as also, as my precocious enjoyable, wholesome #princess2015la
Of course, my adventurous husband who took us to more than half of the national parks and lots of state and county parks. Maraming Salamat po and thanks, google for surfacing these precious photos
And after more than 40 years of grassroots organizing, over 30 years of public service and over 14 years of being a community journalist/features writer, I have met hundreds of beautiful soulful folks.
———-
Snippets of virtual messages I got:
“Haluhalu Tita Prosy, happy happy birthday. Wishing you the happiest of birthdays today and every year, for the rest of your life. Please know that you’ve always been a blessing and inspiration to everyone around you.”
“Aloha and “Hau`oli Lā Hānau” to you. Hope that you are still holding up well after the past few years. Take care.”
“Your birthday is going to be so great. I’ll make sure of it by praying to the Lord through the intercession of St. Anthony of Padua, that may this new stage of your life will come full of successes and blessings, and may grace be poured out upon you.
Stay safe and well always, Tita Prosy
God bless you always
Best Wishes with love and virtual hugs,
Bro. Luke, rcj”
“I hope you enjoy your birthday celebration with your family and keep in mind that God’s love is always with you. Happy Birthday!“
“Aww happy birthday Ate Prosy Delacruz. You are such a shining star with the most thoughtful and generous spirit. You speak from gratitude all the time and it’s inspiring to be a part of. Happy blessed 70th! We all love you.”
Greek Yoghurt, honey and iylagranola 
“
