Kristine E. Brickey

          Today I am feeling rather lost and mucked down. Literally, mucked down in my pasture earlier this morning when I went out to take care of my horse and donkeys. As I pushed my feet into muck boots I could feel the angst. I shouldn’t have to wear these in February. I shouldn’t need to fight my way through sucking mud one step and the next fight to retain my balance as my skating rink pasture tries to land me on my ass.      Ironically, the inside of my barn is oozing water from around the south wall, my donkey’s stall floor seeping water from beneath, and yet…my water source, the red handled pull up never failed me yet well yielded nothing. So, insult of all universal insults, I had to tromp back through the mucky, ice slicked pasture to fill buckets with water. Normally, water inside the barn isn’t needed because my equines prefer to stay outdoors; but today, because of the warm wet downpours Mother Nature shared yesterday, I needed ...

Fair warning, I need to be brutally forthcoming today. Please read or don’t read as necessary.  I’m not ashamed to admit that this post has been a victim of procrastination. Today is the two year anniversary of losing my brother to suicide. I am not ashamed of that either. Shame is, by definition, a painful feeling of humiliation or distress caused by the consciousness of wrong or foolish behavior. Shame is, in my opinion, why my brother got so wrapped up in and twisted by his thoughts that he lost sight of everything and everyone positive in his existence. Overcome by shame, he was unable to focus on all of the reasons he needed to stay. There is no logic in his death, though he must have logically felt he had no other options. Shame is tied to Guilt (the wasted emotion of a previous post). Shame is felt for things we do that we wish we could retrieve. When we shame ourselves or try to use it against others, it is a controlling device, an attempt to prevent future behaviors that c...