Wynford wasn’t just a voice teacher to me, he was my friend. When I was going through my own illness back in 2003 he always kept in touch and wanted to know about my health. He called me after every single one of my surgeries. I was standing at a precipice of giving up, and he saved me from what would have been a catastrophic mistake.

When I arrived back in England after my many surgeries and grueling hospital stays, I was relieved to see Wynford. I was at my lowest state, but he never gave up on me and never stopped encouraging me to keep on going.

I will never forget how he conducted me through the recording of my first CD, Five Songs in the summer of 2004. I wasn’t well at all physically and anyone could tell. Towards the end of the recording I was about to throw the towel in, but Wynford as his optimistic self told me, “You can do this, just look at me and I will get you through it.” And he did. But unfortunately over the next few years, even though I wanted to have the classical singing career we both worked so hard on me achieving, an endless amount of health problems occurred forcing me to put it aside and “get better”. By late 2007, I had become a recluse, but still Wynford would arrange lessons and suggest musical opportunities, again as his cheerful self. I can’t help but think now how I let him down. I wish I could have pulled myself together and just got on with it, but I never did.

Wynford and I had many great long chats since then, but about 6 months ago I stopped hearing from him. I assumed he went on a prolonged holiday in Spain and was happily playing golf, but I couldn’t have been more wrong. After many attempts at trying to get in touch, I found out that he was suffering from Pancreatic Cancer and had a few surgeries as well. So again, I was reminded how cruel life could be. Knowing what a vicious disease Cancer is, it was the last thing anyone would want a wonderful person such as Wynford to go through. I still haven’t got my head around it, and am devastated he had to spend his last 6 months suffering. Just the other day I wrote him saying, “Just keep listening to great music, that will get you through this.” At times like these that is all anyone can do– comfort yourself with music.

During these past two months the world has mourned the losses of many greats: Eunice Shriver, Ted Kennedy Sr, Patrick Swayze and now Wynford Evans.

If you would like to vote for Cooking With Dia for the Veggie Awards 09′, click the picture below. It will take you to a voting form for all sorts of wonderful veggie things, when you come to “best blog” and “best website” (about 5 pages in) click on “other” and fill the box in with “http://cookingwithdia.com”

I would greatly appreciate any votes, consider it a bday present! :) You don’t need to fill in the entire form in order to vote for best blog or website, unless you want to be entered to win their prizes.

If you have never visited Cooking With Dia, the food blog is about comfort food recipes for restricted diets including: veganism, vegetarianism, the gluten free diet and the macrobiotic diet. I’m a vegan and a macrobiotic, and have a lot of fun blogging about my foodie ventures. I create the recipes, cook the food, style the plate and snap the picture. Voting closes July 31st, 2009.

The owl whose night-bound eyes are blind unto the day cannot unveil the mystery of light.

If you would indeed behold the spirit of death, open your heart wide unto the body of life. For life and death are one, even as the river and the sea are one.

In the depth of your hopes and desires lies your silent knowledge of the beyond;
And like seeds dreaming beneath the snow your heart dreams of spring.
Trust the dreams, for in them is hidden the gate to eternity.
Your fear, of death is but the trembling of the shepherd when he stands before the king whose hand is to be laid upon him in honor.

Is the not joyful not Joyful beneath his trembling, that he shall wear the mark of the king?

Yet is he not more mindful of his trembling?

For what is it to die but to stand naked in the wind and to melt into the sun?

And what is it to cease breathing, but to free the breath from its restless tides, that it may rise and expand and seek God unencumbered?

Only the river of only when you drink from silence shall you indeed sing.
And when you have reached the mountaintop, then you shall begin to climb.
And when the earth shall claim your limbs, then shall you truly dance.

Kahlil Gibran

Rita’s Water Ice is branching out to Indianapolis. This is just the latest of 500 stores now open across 21 states. Rita’s is the most popular water ice distributor in the country, if not the world, but it’s crap! Why all the fuss?

I unfortunately had to settle for Rita’s water ice on those hot spring and summer days while attending Istinkalotta University–there was a store just across the street. I would watch students line up for the ‘more water than ice’ thing, day after day. Most of these people were from upstate Pennsylvania, so I would quietly giggle to myself thinking, “These idiots never had real water ice!”

One of the benefits of growing up in South Philadelphia was the multitude of water ice stands and stores available: Mom and Pops, Italiano’s, Fillipo’s Ice, That one place across the street from Dr. Steingard’s office and my personal favorite Pop’s. In my opinion and also many others, Pop’s Water Ice is the best it’s ever gonna get. The big difference between Rita’s and Pop’s is the 50 year age gap between them. Pop’s has been running since 1932 and Rita’s only from 1984, although the franchise didn’t pick up until the mid 1990s. Though Pop’s is technically a chain, their 3 stores don’t come anywhere near to the 900 Rita’s will have by the end of 2009.

I myself am guilty of going to big money corporations for grub once in a while, but at the same time I know the cappuccino in Starbucks can’t touch that served by coffee houses deep in the heart of Philadelphia’s Italian Market, for example, Anthony’s Italian Coffee. I know that the soggy shit given out by McDonald’s can’t compare to the Hamburger Royal served by Tony Luke’s. Which brings me to my point–Rita’s can open up in as many locations as they want, but they will always be missing one important factor, quality.

Charcoal 2 nights before going to Kitty Heaven

Rewind those 15 years… I was just starting high school, as the lonely, awkward teenager I was. Our cat Charity had just run away, and after searching the South Philly streets for her as a family, we had given up after a month. There was a brief moment there, when my mom convinced me that neighbors a few blocks away had stolen her and fattened her up. I later figured it was nearly impossible for a cat to gain 10 pounds over night.

Almost instantly my mom came home with a cat named “Cassandra”. My first inclination was to change the poor thing’s name, but before I had the chance, she was returned because of a faulty eye. Don’t quote me on that. A few days later our next door neighbor came to our door with two male kittens: Charcoal and Smokey (much better names for cats), and in our house they stayed for the rest of their lives. Sad, kind of, the way I worded it, but we lived in a city! Alright?

Charcoal and Smokey tore up the house bit by bit. When they weren’t satisfied with 9 Lives tinned food, they tilted the kitchen trash can, foraging for chicken bones. I did try to explain that we only ate processed food, but they just never understood. Charcoal was always eating two portions–his and then Smokey’s. Smokey dealt with his hunger pangs by getting high on cat nip. Charcoal would glance over disapprovingly.

In the early years, Charcoal slept in a shoe box I had put a blanket in for him in my room, but then one day the box collapsed, and it was onto my brothers’ lair…

I eventually moved onto university, but kept in touch with Charcoal via telephone: “Hi Charcoal, I am pulling another all-nighter just for the hell of it. This time I mixed coffee granules with jolt.”“Meowwww”. Seriously. Charcoal talked on the phone with me for years, my brother Josh had trained him to meow every time the phone was put up to his face.

Sad to say my junior year of university Smokey dropped dead by the front door. The finger was pointed at a poisonous olive from a certain martini glass, but ya know how those Philly cops work–they don’t!
The case was dropped needless to say, but poor Charcoal felt the full impact of his brother suddenly disappearing. No one thought he would live another week, but he ended up surviving eight more years.

The last time I saw Charcoal was back in August 2006. I had just dropped in on the way back from my friend’s wedding, and spent an hour or so catching up with the family cat. He talked about how strange it was to suddenly have a 6 ft cardboard cut out of Spike from Buffy the Vampire Slayer hanging out in the dining room, and I of course agreed, as I felt I had been hallucinating. I have pictures to prove it.
I patted Charcoal on the back one last time before hopping in a cab to go home. Looking back I think I took him for granted, never realizing he would one day be gone.

Charcoal the cat has lived a very exciting, tumultuous and adventurous 15 years. We all will miss him dearly.

My last blog talked a lot about my health issues, and where I built up somewhat of a following on that, I felt people thought my health problems were defining me, when they really don’t.

So, what will this blog be about? I can’t say at the moment. Whatever I feel like writing at the time I suppose.

Cheers,
Dia

Crocii

I took this a few weeks ago actually. Happy Easter!

http://www.arachnoidcystawareness.com

Arachnoid Cyst Awareness has teamed up with Arachnoid Activist and Arachnoid Cyst Friends to bring you a website that educates and supports all Arachnoid Cyst patients. We now have a very active forum which brings a blogging application free from spammers, a medical article and journal base, an Arachnoid Cyst Mall which is a compilation of 4 or more shops (and it will keep growing), a pamphlet, networking page and much more.

We at ACA want all Arachnoid Cyst patients and family members to be in the loop on the latest information. We want everyone to be connected. ACA was founded in 2003, and has been here to bring support to newly diagnosed patients and to the family and friends of Arachnoid Cyst patients. We would like to help educate those who have also suffered from their Arachnoid Cyst for years. In addition to this we would like to invite our neurologists, our neurosurgeons and our GPs who have doubted us in the past to take a look around and learn what it really means to have an Arachnoid Cyst.

The usual comment a doctor makes when diagnosing a patient with an Arachnoid Cyst is, “These are congenital and will not cause any symptoms.” This is a false comment. Will there be patients that do not present with symptoms? Sure, but that does not mean that every patient will never experience symptoms. This is the one point neurologists and neurosurgeons forget.

It is important to do your own research as an Arachnoid Cyst patient, and  on the Arachnoid Cyst Awareness Website, we have put together a nice collection of journals and articles to get you started.

Do not forget to stop by the forums to register, as this in itself is the perfect way to find out about Arachnoid Cysts.

If you would like to contact the website please email us.

Sincerely,

The ACA Team
http://www.arachnoidcystawareness.com
http://www.arachnoidactivist.com

Last night I had the most wonderful dream, which is quite odd, since I am constantly having nightmares. In this dream I was checking into an enormous Vatican style building with the most gorgeous gardens surrounding it. I kept asking my friend to come to the window and look how beautiful it was. Many people were walking around the grounds, but none were coming inside. Later on in my dream, while wandering the building, I lost my way. I was greeted by a young priest who led me to this sort of check in counter. There was another priest, one I actually knew in real life, although in my dream he was aged by 30 years or so. He knew I recognized him and I knew he recognized me, but neither of us said anything. I asked for him to point the way to my room, and he said, “Those rooms are scattered all around the building. I don’t know which one is yours.” The young priest and I decided to keep looking, but then suddenly I was back at the window of my room asking my friend to look out the window again. I just remember it being so beautiful. I didn’t realize it was a dream because it was so vivid. Then my dogs came through the back door and I woke up. Maybe heaven is wherever our mind goes to when we die. I don’t know, but I would love to go back to that building and finally be able to walk into the garden.