Southern Goddess

2011-04-06T22:54:00.000-04:00

2011-04-06T21:26:00.003-04:00

2011-04-06T21:26:00.001-04:00

2011-04-05T06:09:00.001-04:00

Laying in bed, I just woke up.....
Listening to the wind and the rain rattle both the trees and my neighbor's wind chimes.
The storms must have woken Emma up at some point, as she's cuddled up against me, snoring her kitten snore. So sweet, she still smells of last night's bubble bath, toothpaste and the coconut conditioner she loves. She turns 7 on Friday, and I think she has some lingering anxiety over 'growing up'. She has such a wild, precocious spirit, that the thought of the conformity of her 'growing up', is giving me a fair amount of angst as well. My wanna-be rockstar, with sensitive earlobes and a penchant for candles and vanilla sandlewood incense...how I wish i could cradle you in your youthful, brilliant innocence forever.

You with your Filipino grandmother's nose, and your American grandmother's delicate and slender hands. You with your well-timed comedic interjections that make even your overly cynical teen siblings guffaw with laugher. You with your soft little hands and pedicured, flowery toes, insisting it's the shoes, not your feet that smell so bad. You, my fae little pixie are most precious to me...

The house is quiet, for these brief few moments...as a home with 5 children is hardly ever quiet. In this quiet, I offer bountiful thanks for the Universe and Mother/Father God bestowing the mighty boon of you...to me.

I am forever blessed.

Mercedes

Sent from my iPhone. Please excuse any typos.

2011-04-04T15:45:00.001-04:00

gratitude

2011-04-03T17:33:00.000-04:00

I woke up today finding myself in a place of gratitude… and owing so many people, including myself, much love and appreciation.

Upon waking this morning, the first thing I was thankful for was more than nine hours of uninterrupted sleep. The last few weeks have been phenomenally busy at work, making for long days and short nights. The rollercoaster my personal life has been mimicking has not really helped either. So a full night of sleep was a blessing of grace. The next thankful thought that entered my mind was being thankful that my children let me sleep, even though they had been up for hours.

Grace shows itself in so many ways.

Thankful for my high thread count sheets, as I always feel enveloped in their soft, coolness, even upon waking.

Gratitude for the ache in my joints that I felt when I woke….That ache meant I had a full day of officiating yesterday. Wrestling was my first love, and being able to officiate yesterday meant more to me than I can find words to give voice too. That ache equates to happiness.

I’m thankful for friends… friends who greet me daily via email or text or phone call, just as they did this morning.

I have gratitude for understanding, both that I receive and that I give. For those that love without judgment… I have much to learn from you.

I woke with a sense of gratitude knowing, and actually feeling that I am enough. That I work hard and I play hard, and I’m learning to rest hard. That particular attribute is much harder than the others. We are conditioned to work hard (or at least I was) from a very young age. Society, and sororities, conditions us to play hard. No one ever teaches you to rest hard. Maybe I’ve reached the age where rest is important, or maybe I’ve just started listening to my body, my mind and my soul and allowing rest when and where it need to happen. It’s still tough to not go 90 miles an hour all day long… but I’m happy to let my state of rest be a work in progress… as I am.

I woke with a sense of peace. A sense of peace that I can’t remember having since I was a child.

For the first time in a very long time, I woke with gratitude for being truly happy.

shade and sweetwater to you…

namaste.

2011-04-02T17:20:00.001-04:00

2011-03-27T17:33:00.002-04:00

2011-03-27T17:33:00.001-04:00

2011-03-27T17:32:00.002-04:00

2011-03-27T17:32:00.001-04:00

2011-03-27T17:31:00.001-04:00

ache

2011-03-23T16:51:00.001-04:00

i'm a strong woman. i know i'm a strong woman. i have a career. i have 5 children. i have nearly 3 ex husbands. i have friends. i have love. i have all these things in my life that make me feel complete as who i am. i'm still growing and changing and evolving along whatever path my higher power designates for me. i can be a pta mom,a sex goddess, a lover, a companion,a chauffeur, a financier, a hotelier, a cook, a budgeting genius, a shoulder to cry on, a daughter, a writer, an artist, a bohemian hippie corporate flunky and all the things that i am on a day to day basis without issue (and then some)

however.

there are some days that carrying all of that is just too much. like, knowing my Solo has FIV and we won't know if he has months or years until we just know is just a bit much for me to bear. it's like the straw that has broken this camel's back. i've sat in this meeting all day, working away and it's killing me. i've been holding back a bucket of tears all day because i have to be present here, when i want to be present there. and right now, i don't even know if i can leave work in time to pick him up today. how much does that suck?

and on days like this, and i'm not saying this to be mean or degrading, but i don't have anyone to turn to when i need help. and when i really think about it, i've never had anyone to turn to. I've nearly always had to carry whatever burden has been placed upon me simply because no one else could or would. not saying that my friends don't step up when i need them, because they do, but dammit, they all have lives and families and jobs and soccer schedules, too. it's not always easy for someone to drop everything to help a friend, even when you want to.

some days i'm just tired.
right now, i'm bone weary.

2011-03-20T08:41:00.005-04:00

2011-03-20T08:41:00.003-04:00

2011-03-20T08:41:00.001-04:00

2011-03-20T08:40:00.005-04:00

2011-03-20T08:40:00.003-04:00

2011-03-20T08:40:00.001-04:00

just hold my hand...

2011-03-15T21:53:00.001-04:00

whenever, however, forever...

three words to describe another three words. both sets carrying equal weight and forcefulness.
both sets, indicative of my heart, soul and mind.

another three words.

does everything come in three?

always so near, so near i can feel you when i close my eyes...

always intellectual, playful,

beguiling and argumentative....

always pushing,

encouraging,

embracing the fullness of the idiosyncrasies

that make up the firmament of me.

and i will look upon your hand in mine,

my dear friend and think upon these words, my favorite words

that my favorite poet says, oh so sweetly,

'here is the deepest secret nobody knows
(here is the root of the root and the bud of the bud
and the sky of the sky of a tree called life;which grows
higher than the soul can hope or mind can hide)
and this is the wonder that's keeping the stars apart

i carry your heart(i carry it in my heart)'

whenever, however, forever

the muse was off her meds today...

2011-03-10T22:29:00.000-05:00

I want my soul to feel like I imagine amber would taste. When you smell the essential oil, any essential oil that has amber…that deep smokiness, the nearly bawdy flavor tone that still somehow implies elegance.

That is what I want my soul to feel like.

Regression isn’t change. Regression is an ostrich, head down with life passing by overhead. Forward motion is sexy, fluid and to me, amber colored.

I found God at my feet…at my weakest, lowest point. When i felt i couldn't take another step, the weight of the world was so heavy and Sisyphean. She said just take the next step, and the next, and the next…
And everything will begin to fall into place. Don’t be distracted by the noise at your side while you stride, just continue putting one foot in front of the other, and the things that are supposed to be in your path, will be there. The other things, the things that pass away, will pass away.

whilst cooking dinner, i was listening to songs and bits and pieces caught my attention, and provoked memories, some good some bad... some, inexplicable...and the bits and pieces of those songs just jumbled together into thoughts, some may only make sense to me, but i have a feeling, some will resonate with you...

'I’m so provocative and you’re so conservative'... 'And there’s you and me, with nothing to prove and I just can’t keep my eyes off you.''

'When I’m with you, the clock is always alive'… 'and I’m always reminded that I never told you what I should have said.'

and then on the heels of that, this collection of thoughts on need...

After everything been through, how does the need rob the heart of its memory? How is the hurt negated? Or is it? Does it just become a known issue, and thereby become mitigated? why do we knowingly... KNOWINGLY walk into what is inevitably going to be a painful situation. why is it with some people we long for that?

'Not giving you another hour or a second or a minute longer.'

I will not be a well behaved woman today… or any other day for that matter. (i saw this on twitter recently, i forget by whom, so i can't give accurate credit, but it's been a bit of a mantra lately, especially when i'm feeling particularly powerless).

and then i came to the realization, seemingly simple, but utterly revelatory in this incarnation for me that...

Your issues are strictly that, your issues. I cannot and will not take any ownership of how you feel. I can however, attempt to not tread on you, as much as I do not want to be trod upon. However… HOWEVER, my feelings are valid, too.

I am chocolate-flavored, amber-scented glitter…and that does not make me soft.

It will never make me soft. Unless, I choose to be soft.

The firmament of me is something i've been questioning for a while. as in what constitutes my firmament. and then it hit me...

My firmament is fluid.

There’s this bag that I carry, my hobo bag. It’s made of woven, raw-silk and I think it’s gorgeous (and it smells of amber). Actually there are a lot of bags that I carry. I consider myself a well-heeled bag woman. Somehow I feel unprepared and naked without my journal(s), a book or four; some current crochet project and one I may want to start in the new future. Not to mention a snack, or my water bottle, my iPhone, earbuds, maybe my laptop, various pens, lip glosses, keys, hair ties, sunglasses, lotion… you get the idea. You just never know when you might need some of this stuff, right, so you might as well be prepared. At least I try to be.

I’d be a boy scout if they let me. No, I really wouldn’t. I made the off-handed comment to my 14 year old son last night, as we did something rather efficiently, that ‘your mom is so super duper efficient’. He didn’t say anything and just went back to politely eating his candy bar. He knows me well enough to know that I’m anything but efficient. Efficacy is NOT on my resume (which is odd, given my career choice). But I thought it funny that he thought it was funny. He's an improv comedian, and his silence, goofily eating the candy bar, was a quiet joke between us that i'll cherish for eternity.

And I’m okay with that. Part of that whole, knowing who you are thing. And I know who I am. I think. At least for today, I’m reasonably sure I know who I am.

uncontained

2011-03-01T20:56:00.000-05:00

i will not be that woman, constrained.

i will not be that woman, contained.

a caged bird, i am not.

i am a pulse pounding

quickening at the thought of

life.

i am that woman laughing

so loudly it causes your head to turn

playful and deep,

guttural and sensual.

the alacrity of each step

is cause for rejoicing.

i am not that woman, restrained.

i am that woman

unconstrained

uncontained

unrestrained.

the cage door is open

thoughts that sustain

2011-03-01T11:36:00.001-05:00

early to bed, early to rise.

lots of sweat.

zero bullshit.

tend to the body that is my temple, treat it well. rest it. water it. feed it good, wholesome food.

love it. love it loud, love it hard. let it laugh. let it forget regret.

let it sleep, long and deep and sound. let the rest sustain it.

let the sheer miraculous nature of everyday life infect it with joy and grace.

let the smallest shift in the breeze brush across it's face and let it smell the jasmine down the road, the sun cooking the earth underneath it's feet, or the rain that's coming just over the horizon.

teach the soul within to forgive, even those who deserve it least.

even to forgive itself, which may be the hardest path to forgiveness.

show the heart ensconced in the temple love. allow it feel and show empathy. to fully experience grace.

to take the wisdom the mind has learned, and meld with it.

a heart with wisdom and compassion is a heart healed.

a heart with both of these can forgive.

let the self tolerate no bullshit. because what whole self really has time for bullshit anymore.

not i.

let not the mind wander, nor the heart despair.

for there is joy.

there are tears.

there is sweat.

sweat to sustain.

sweat to cleanse and sweat to replenish.

the ache in the soul and in the heart that only sweat and tears can erase.

let the body, the soul, the heart, feel that ache dissipate.

let the mind know peace.

let the mind find silent stillness.

and let the mind be comfortable in that silence.

2010-10-31T13:07:00.001-04:00

2010-10-31T13:06:00.001-04:00

growth

2010-10-29T11:30:00.001-04:00

“I beg you…to have patience with everything unresolved in your heart and try to love the questions themselves as if they were locked rooms or books written in a very foreign language. Don’t search for the answers, which could not be given you now, because you would not be able to live them. And the point is, to live everything. Live the questions now. Perhaps then, someday far in the future, you will gradually, without ever noticing it, live your way into the answer…” - Rainer Maria Rilke

Life is a never-ending journey. It’s cyclical, joyful, and painful. The lessons we don’t learn one year, grow in intensity as our years go on. The sweetest lessons, I’m finding, are those you learn and grow from, and you get the benefit of reaping the results of being a good student.

The Universe likes to bestow its boon. (I want to thank you, for every sacrifice).

"Freedom from obsession is not about something you do; it's about knowing who you are. It's about recognizing what sustains you and what exhausts you." ~ Geneen Roth

Learning who I am, who I really am, and being comfortable with what I found, has been one of the hardest lessons, and longest journeys I’ve ever been on. The most difficult aspect of this journey, is also acknowledging that it will ever remain in flux, as I continue to grow and learn and become the person I am meant to be in the future. (blessed are we as the twilight descends and the magick of dusk is upon us).

As I’m continually entering new phases of my life, I’m reminded to leave my tears where they fall, and not carry them with me (at the dawning of this new day). Their weight, sorrow, joy, pain… the heft of what those tears mean can no longer serve me as I move forward into this new space of .. me.

(woman am I, spirit am I, I am the infinite within my soul)

My journey through this life is mine own. Those who chose to walk with me… those whom I choose to walk with… all are those to whom I’m responsible to and for. I make no claim to what others say, or do, or feel… just as I expect them to make no claims to my words, actions or feelings. I may have an opinion on other’s actions, but there is a fine line between opinion and judgment. I know not where they are – mentally, emotionally, and spiritually- so the distinction of whether they do right or wrong lies not in my realm, but in the realm where they and their Gods live. (what matters to them, doesn’t change anything)

Show the love.

That’s all we can do that will ever, ever make a damned bit of difference. And I don’t mean just showing the love to yourself, but to those who love you, who like you, even those who spit on the ground as you walk by.

Show the love.

Shake off all the lower vibration bullshit and keep your groove moving in the direction in which you know it should be moving. (dance with me into the colors of the dusk… when you have awoken from the dreams broken, come and dance with me…)

What other think of you simply doesn’t matter. What do YOU think of you? What is the quality of your love for yourself and for others? Do you resonate peace?

Tied within this, is also my struggle with what I call my inner warrior. I don’t presume to think that everyone has it, but I know that most of the women in my circle of women have this inner fierceness that I certainly am glad is on my side. My inner warrior is of the scorched earth ilk, which often puts me at direct odds with myself. How can I be a warrior (when the time calls for it) and still be in touch with peace, love, harmony and nurturing?

The polar oppositeness of that duality has plagued me for years. How do you make peace with a blood fury? (and a member of the human race, I want to free my mentality and use my ability to get where I want to be..i want to be free).

I don’t have the answer to that yet, but I continue to meditate on the path of the peaceful warrior. Thankful I have people in my life that understand and are supportive… and thankful to those in my past who introduced me to that particular path.

first post of 215800

2010-06-08T18:28:00.000-04:00

for anyone who may be reading this throughout the course of this project, i must apologize now. i'm using the 215800 project as a stream of consciousness writing exercise. instead of writing in my journal, i'm going to put my through stream into the blog. who knows what may come of it?

they say that 800 words a day for 21 days (long enough to start a habit incidentally), will average out to about 67 pages. there could be poetry, a short story and countless essays that evolve from this experience. i'm also hopeful this will be a great jumpstart to get my lazy behind back into a yoga practice.

The new job is progressing well and I’m really starting to feel settled in. got over my first real hurdle and am progressing onto the other things I’ve been tasked with. There is still some uncertainty as it is a long-term contract position, but there is every indication and promise that it will convert to a permanent position at the end of the contract. So, instead of worrying, and causing myself more anxiety, I’m just going to let it go and deal with the positivity of knowing that I’m damned good at what I do.

Had a great conversation with my Director today and know that I’m bringing value to my team, and in a different manner from how they’ve had value added in the past. Some of the things she is asking of me are very exciting and I’m looking forward to meeting the challenge.

Having real issues with trust today. Recent events, and several long term ones are making it difficult for me to really let go and trust others. Especially when their behaviors continually show me that I’m correct in not trusting their words… and often their deeds, too. It’s continually frustrating to know that adults (who should know better) continually and routinely talk out of both sides of their mouth just to look good. If you don’t mean it, why do you say it? And if you continually fail at an intention that you set, wouldn’t you just change the intention or do you keep making the same mistake, over and over and over?

To me, that’s just insanity. Doing the same thing, over and over and over, expecting different results. Sometimes, we even get pissed when there aren’t different results. But we continually repeat the incorrect/routinely failing behavior ….and then expect something to change?

It’s like continually allowing that person in your life, or that person to have true traction in your life if they keep screwing you over. How smart is that? If you know what their tendencies are, and they prove it over and over and over (and over) again, who’s fault is it really when they inevitably screw you over again?

I’m not saying that there isn’t a place for compassion, because there most certainly is a place for it. However, being compassionate most certainly does not mean that you have to be a pushover. In fact, I think being compassionate to those that screw you over may be a form a tough love. You’re being compassionate to their long term lives by letting them know that they aren’t going to fuck you over any more. Or that you aren’t going to allow them that traction in ‘x’ area because you can see that they aren’t changing and you aren’t willing to play the victim in their particular drama.

As a friend told me recently… some people just perpetuate their own drama and they like it. What? Seriously? Who likes drama? The thought of dealing with that kind of crap, intentionally, or stirring it up to put yourself in the middle of attention… that’s just twisted.

Why would anyone in their right mind do that?!?! I guess that’s it though. They more than likely are not in their right mind, due to self-esteem or insecurity issues. And while most of us have those issues, I just don’t see the thinking behind pushing those issues off on other people who have had nothing to do with causing those issues.

It seems like, more often than not, (or, in my case) it’s the unsuspecting that wind up getting hurt more than the ones who caused the damage.

I know that I try, very diligently, to apply the lessons of my past relationships, whether they are friendships, family or romantic, to my current life. I don’t want to cause anyone, not the least concerned being myself, any amount of pain or anguish. Not intentionally. So when someone who says they care about me, or they are ‘here for’ me, and then they trample on me…it shows a level of callousness that makes me not want to have those people in my life at all. If you care so little as to cause hurt after hurt after hurt, never considering the consequences… really, you don’t deserve that kind of traction in my life.

(827 words - 28 min)

laughing today, instead of tears

2010-06-01T19:41:00.001-04:00

i choose laughter today, instead of tears...

to purposefully fill my life with joy, instead of honoring the void

that was.

that is

i choose to delight in the sun, and honor the embrace of the moon,

to sing with the petals of the flowers and to dance with the boughs of the trees.

i resonate with the whipporwhill as she sings

melancholy

and joyful

duality is

the chord

i strike as i skip

stones across the

water

the resulting wake

reveals

Karmic Debt

2010-05-08T09:58:00.000-04:00

As the blazing fire reduces wood to ashes, similarly, the fire of Self-knowledge reduces all Karma to ashes. ~Bhagavad-Gita

No boundaries.

Isn’t that how we most want to live? The way we want to approach the world without any real limitations on ourselves? I don’t mean lawlessness or unchecked anarchy. I mean living a real life without limitations on your person, being able to be who you truly are?

Liberating thought, isn’t it?

We live in a world that both celebrates and stifles creativity and personal freedom. All too often we find that we’ve ‘sold out’ our truer selves in order to meet the cause of going concern, or that the nagging doubts of conscience over actions taken, or not taken, affect the bedrock of who we thought we were.

At point does the ‘who-we-thought-we-were’ merge and come into alignment with who we really are? And, at the point, how do you handle the Karmic debt you’ve acquired by being the person you didn’t think you were?

By most standards, Karma isn’t easy to define. The best way for me to describe my interpretation of it is this… Karma isn’t about punishment. It is the process of cause and effect. Karma is about your experience and the subsequent fulfillment of that purpose. If you do A, B will happen. It is important to note, though, that most scholars feel Karma works both in the immediate and the long term (and by long term, I mean the course of your reincarnation cycle, sometimes hundreds of lifetimes). There are occasions where your actions yield an immediate and noticeable Karmic return, and other times where decades may pass before you reap the Karmic bounty for a past action, whether you consider it positive or negative.

My actions are my only true belongings. I cannot escape the consequences of my actions. My actions are the ground upon which I stand. ~Thich Nhat Hanh

Universe/Spirit/Goddess/God doesn’t see it as a positive or negative occurrence. It is merely viewed, and delivered, as the result of your previous action.

The results delivered to you as the end Karmic product of your actions should make you think. Are the results your receiving more of what you would consider to be positive or negative? If you feel you are receiving negative Karmic returns from Universe/Spirit/Goddess/God, how do you address that? In the turning of those negatives into positives and making the boundaries you’ve created for yourself into stepping stones that we find true growth and manifestational potential. Even if you may, momentarily, see something as a negative return, how do you turn that into a positive?

In order to help me get a grasp on my own Karmic debt, I had to section it off into Karma sub-categories. Taking from the old adage that it’s easier to eat an elephant a bite at a time, rather than the whole thing at one time, I decided that I needed to address significant sections of my life, and the associated Karma, and slowly start working towards the karmic theme of this particular incarnation.

One of the first sub-categories I had to address was relationships. I mean all relationships: children, friends, family, and lovers. By not being the best person I could be to all these people, they in turn, were not giving me the best of themselves. Why should they? If I was short-tempered, callous, dismissive or inattentive to them, why the hell would they bother to give me the time of day?

If you want to have better relationships with those in your life, it pays to take a true accounting of your part in the relationship dynamic and/or dysfunction.
Give more of what you want to get back. If you’ve caused a hurt, rectify it.

Another sub-category I created was work. Yes, I felt I had negative work Karma. I was working so far below my potential, and at the same time allowing others to treat me in a demeaning manner. I found that the more I ‘bought’ into that ridiculousness, the more power I gave it and the longer that mindset was going to hang around. I did ‘A’, and I got ‘B’.

If you practice sub-par, you get sub-par. If you give others permission to give you less than what you deserve, they certainly will.

When you manage to stay connected to your Energy stream, you always win. And you know what; somebody else doesn't have to lose for you to win. There is always enough. ~ Abraham

Financial was the last Karmic sub-category I used to assist my Karmic debt sorting. Most of us have had the pleasure of making sometimes rash, and oftentimes negative financial decisions. Have you ever stopped to think about the long term ramifications of those decisions, past the overdraft fee or late charge or increased interest rate? Looking back over my financial life, I can (now) clearly pinpoint major mistakes that either hurt me or other people and how those mistakes are kicking me in the butt today.

What I learned about myself after my self-inventory was not what I wanted to see. I was not the person I thought I was. I was embarrassed at some of my actions (whether others knew of them or not) and hurt by the pain I had knowingly caused myself and others.

Through a lot of study, self-study and meditation, I’ve found my key for honoring (and subsequently negating) my karmic debt. The formula was the same for each of my sub-categories, and was deceptively simple. Actual patterns of approach and execution may differ, but the formula is the same.

FACE UP TO IT.

Sounds simple, doesn’t it? For me, it really wasn’t.

It took years of agonizing fights with myself to even begin the process, much less the horrifying idea of facing up to all my faults. Even before I really had a firm intellectual grasp of what Karma was, I knew that something was off kilter in my life. I knew, in my most primal instincts, that I wasn’t living to ‘my’ highest best potential. Not anyone else’s idea of my potential, but my own.

When you start making changes to live towards your highest best self, it isn’t easy, or at least it wasn’t for me. To successfully do so, I had to embrace the wrongs I’d done myself and others, the hard lessons I had learned, and my ownership in all those scenarios. At the same time, I had to fully accept the future I wanted to create for myself, the ideal of the person I most wanted to be.
In looking at the past, and my place and actions in the past, I had to really study not only the negatives, but the underlying meaning and motivations behind the negatives. I needed to understand the ‘why’s’ behind the things I did, or didn’t do.

Facing up to these things, finding out the my ‘why’s’ helped me to change the underlying manifestational intentions so as to not make the same mistakes again, was valuable pain. If you don’t change the intentions… if the actions continue in a manner you’re subconsciously unhappy with, the results will remain the same. Until you learn the lessons, Karma will continue to deliver the expected ‘B’ results of your ‘A’ actions.

As she has planted, so does she harvest; such is the field of karma. ~Sri Guru Granth Sahib

Sometimes the growth (read: pain) comes whether you are consciously ready for it or not. I think the pain feeds the growth. I believe that Universe/Spirit/Goddess/God works under the premise that the path of least resistance is the best way to deliver what you need to you. This manifestational gift works (relatively) painlessly if you are flowing with the Karmic intent for this incarnation. If you aren’t already flowing in conjunction with your Karmic theme for this life, the Universal path of least resistance can get pretty bumpy.

Clearing your Karmic debt isn’t easy… but once you start down that path, it makes your living your life easier. Clearing your Karmic debt can also help the longer term of you reincarnation cycle by clearing something out for your next life. There is likelihood that a recurring problem you address now may positively affect your Karma in the next life. The boundaries you may have encountered before simply do not exist any longer. Things somehow ‘fall into place’ just when you need them to do so.

People pay for what they do, and still more, for what they have allowed themselves to become. And they pay for it simply: by the lives they lead. ~Edith Wharton

I think she likes it!

2010-04-11T09:24:00.001-04:00

2010-04-08T21:17:00.000-04:00

Life... Recently...

2010-04-05T18:39:00.001-04:00

Savage Daughter

2010-02-02T11:37:00.001-05:00

i think the song says enough.

from the simple woman's daybook

2010-01-31T13:11:00.000-05:00

FOR TODAY
January 31, 2010
Outside my window...my husband, changing the oil in his truck
I am thinking...that i need to plan a road trip to meet baby Sophie
I am thankful for...the fact that i can pick up and keep going, no matter what is in my way.

From the kitchen...pot roast in the crock pot
I am wearing...sweats and cashmere socks
I am creating...possibilities
I am going...to the grocery store (we need cat food)
I am reading...crochet patterns
I am hoping...for a good week at work
I am hearing...the sounds of the wii in the living room.
Around the house...naps and coloring and life
One of my favorite things...laughter
A few plans for the rest of the week: more crochet, practicing positivity at work, maybe a movie.
Here is picture for thought I am sharing...

happy, happy, joy, joy

2010-01-29T07:17:00.000-05:00

we've been focusing a good deal on prosperity in our household this week. while we are a paycheck to paycheck kinda family, we usually have all that we need and some of what we want. however, in looking towards planning our future a little better and paying off debt, we are striving to open ourselves to new avenues of prosperity. Himself is looking at going back to school and i'm in process of opening my Etsy store, so that i can use my textile therapy as a means of generating additional income for our rather large family.

soo, my happy this week is that we took a big step in welcoming the Spirit of prosperity into our home by setting up a prosperity altar. (yay).

it's really very simple. a small taper candle holder and a place for charcoal and powder incense is all we have now. i'm going to be adding a picture of Ganesha later today, and later, a focal point for removing bad spending habits. i'm sure it will evolve the further into our prosperity journey we go, but for now, the less ornate the better. we did have some discussions about placing it somewhere in the house where it would be set apart, however we decided at the end to put it in the kitchen, on the counter next to the toaster. the decision to incorporate prosperity as part of our day to day, instead of something to be set aside and revered just felt right. living in a prosperity and abundance that we create felt more real than having a show of prosperity and abundance.

Himself and I have also decided to work on our spirituality more. We are an eclectic pagan household, and as such, our spiritual structure is what we decide it to be. imbolc, or the returning of the light, is next week, and we are planning a little larger celebration.

the last few months of work and stress have pushed me farther away from my healing practices and getting back in touch with all these things makes my heart sing and my spirit soar.

my happy this week has been reclaiming a little that the outside world has pushed away, and seeking to grow our prosperity and abundance, not just our monetary wealth.

many blessings....

What a weekend!

2010-01-24T15:29:00.001-05:00

my happy this week!

2010-01-22T17:38:00.002-05:00

i had an absolutely awful, terribly horrible week at work.

BUT! i had an incredibly productive week at work that ended on a high note!

AND! i finished my Irish Lace Scarf, and i love it! (see blog post of earlier this week).
it took a week of steady work to finish, was very intricate and it makes me completely
happy in the face to have it done. i've worn it the last two days to work and i'm thrilled with
how it wears and how it makes me feel.

funky and eclectic are the order of the day for me of late.

my happy for the day is just that.. that i'm me.

*muah*

Irish Lace scarf

2010-01-21T07:08:00.002-05:00

catching up

2010-01-18T09:10:00.001-05:00

so, i woke up this morning to find myself squarely in the middle of January. and i sat back and truly wondered...'how the hell did this happen?'

it's not like i've been in a coma for an extended period of time, nor am i dealing with an overwhelming depression or family tragedy that would make me lose track of time. but, holy hell, it's the middle of January. (and it's been a while since i've written anything of depth.)

lately, every time something significant happens, i think, 'i should write about that', and then come home and get lost in the miasma of my life (mostly all happy) and never get around to writing about any of those things that i previously thought were noteworthy.

so, a quick (and somewhat rambling recap)... work remains that which it is... work. over the last year, my job responsibilities have quadrupled and i'm roughly being paid the same as i was when i started nearly 4 years ago. that is a continual frustration and a trigger point for bad feelings, so i'm just going to leave it at that. however, the positive is that the actual work that i'm doing is exhilarating and challenging and i leave the office everyday mentally fatigued. we are efforting real change in what we are doing and we can see it...every day. that alone makes the money issue a little less painful.

the oldest of the brood is still living with her dad. it pains me in places where words can't reach, but i realize this makes her even more like me, and that i should understand. she is following her own path, and even though i don't understand or even like it, i can relate. i threw off the yoke of my old life so boldly, and painfully for many, really not giving a damn what anyone else thought, and began doing my own 'thing' so that i could be happy. i guess she's doing the same. i just miss her. a lot.

we spent thanksgiving with our chosen family. not all of them, because we have a large extended chosen family. but with my soul sisters, pennie and d, and their families. it was a lot of love, a lot of laughter and Goddess help me, a lot of food!

i know it's a lot of pictures (sorry), but sometimes i think images can convey a thought or a feeling much better than words.

during this time, i was also suffering from a severely infected spider bite and had to have minor surgery to have it drained and packed and all that. since i consider the spider one of my totem animals, i really had to take a few days to ponder the metaphysical meaning behind the bite. i could only come to the conclusion that i needed to better follow my own spiritual path and do the things i wasn't doing, but that i knew i needed to do. (wow, that was a mouthful.). to that end, i moved my altar out of the living room where it's been residing for a few years, and into my bedroom. i placed it so that i can, quite literally, roll out of bed and sit immediately at the foot of my altar and be able to meditate. the warming tones of incense are a lovely way to wake up. and while i'm a little disheartened that it took me so long to do this, i'm meditating nearly every day, sometimes twice and am feeling much more calm and peaceful.

an old friend, sistahgoddess camara, is going to be making a medicine doll for me. we spoke (emailed) about it yesterday, and after telling her i'd gotten a nudge that it was time for a doll, she let me know that she knew who the doll was, and would keep me informed of the process. i can't wait to meet her and give her a place on my altar and learn all that i can from her.

d came over a few days after that and started the process of locking my hair. it's something i'd been toying with for ages, but unsure of the repercussions (work, family, etc.) i had just held back from giving myself the green light. i'd finally had enough though, of limiting myself because of how other people may or may not like what i was doing and started the process. and oh boy, is it a process! today, my whole head is kinda fuzzy looking, as i need to spend some time with a crochet hook and pull in all the fly away hair. not something i'm looking forward to, but i'll feel better when it's done. over the summer, after my car accident, i cut my moderately long hair very short, almost in a pixie cut. it was yet another of those 'i'm-letting-go-of-this-stupid-fear' things. because my face is very round, i've been afraid of getting my hair cut short. well, i did it, and it was really cute. but the decision of whether or not to dread now or to wait until it was longer was plaguing me. i went ahead and decided to do it now, mainly because i didn't want to wait. (patience is NOT one of my virtues).

this is me before dreads (horrible pic, please excuse it).

(Photography by Emma. =)....)

(lovely, blackberry level photography by me! )

you can see it's a little fuzzy, but hopefully you can get the gist.

having dreads makes me feel a little...freer. my spirit feels unburdened a little bit more.

and no, i don't want to convey the impression that my hair makes me who i am, nor do i identify

by my hair, but it helps me realize that i can be the person i want to be, even if no one else understands.

we spent a very quiet holiday season in our mixed spirituality household. being an eclectic pagan, leaning more dianic than anything else, but with some of my children being catholic, one being agnostic, the stepson being a church of christ christian, and Himself sort of figuring out where he fits in the pagan mindset, well, we had to make some decisions about how to celebrate the holidays. and the answer to all of our questions was quiet. we quietly spent quality time. we laughed and played. we spent all day the theatre being lost in Pandora and in the pandemonium of Holmes' mind. we cooked glorious feasts and made sinful cookies and cakes. we opened gifts, wrapped carefully in kraft paper and organza ribbon. we colored and cut and glued and pasted. we had nerf dart gun wars and found that the velcro-ish darts will stick to my dreads. we played wii until the batteries in the wiimotes ran dead.

in short, we nested. we cuddled. we hid away from the world for a few weeks. i received a text near the end of my vacation from pennie, saying i had been in her thoughts and she was checking in, as i'd been so quiet. i told her that i was hibernating my soul. taking in, and basking in all that has gone on for the year. (and we've had a busy year).

(solo and alice, sitting on the windowsill)

truth be told, even though we've gone back to work and school and have been forced to somewhat come out of that hibernation, we're still being quiet. we're still mindful and restful and taking some of that quiet positivity away from the holiday season and carrying it into the new year.

the bright, big, shiny new year, once again full of possibilities and questions and answers.

LOVE

2010-01-16T17:07:00.002-05:00

I love you without knowing how, or when, or from where. I love you straightforwardly, without complexities or pride; so I love you because I know no other way. ~pablo neruda

Emma's Bird

2010-01-14T16:10:00.000-05:00

Granny square baby blanket

2010-01-14T13:09:00.001-05:00

The beginnings of an irish lace scarf

2010-01-14T13:08:00.001-05:00

Fingerless gloves view 2

2010-01-14T12:51:00.001-05:00

Fingerless gloves view 1

2010-01-14T12:47:00.003-05:00

Wall hanging

2010-01-14T12:41:00.002-05:00

what i did on my winter vacation

2010-01-03T17:14:00.001-05:00

i have a bit of a crochet problem... i'm a big girl, i can admit it.

i find that every available moment for the last year or so, i've been crocheting. i've made blankets and scarves and hats and gloves and mittens and dishtowels and ... well, you get the picture.
i've made opera sleeves and rugs that double as wall art.
it's now january 3rd, and i'm back to it again.
on new year's day, i made a bookmark case for my son who collects bookmarks. on the second day of the new year, i started a set of fingerless gloves for my eldest son.
my mother has requested a bedspread and i have a baby blanket for a friend, and i'm determined to make a fancy, intricate scarf for myself.

i've procrastinated today and not done much with the gloves, simply because i'm pooped. Courtney and I just finished a Julia Child's roast chicken dish and put it in the oven. 2 hours of prep + 2 hours of cooking time should equal a great dinner, only now i don't want to do anything but sit, veg and watch the kids play the Wii.

during my vacation (which was exquisite, btw), i had great plans for things i wanted to get done for my creative side. work of late, has worn me out to the point of wanting to do absolutely nothing when i get home but cook dinner, take care of household necessities, crochet and go to bed. it's been a little depressing in that aspect.

i did accomplish a lot of cleaning, cleaning out and organizing. my house feels so much better and pulled together. (when i get too busy with work, or just feeling lazy, housework is the first thing to be sacrificed. not that my home is ever dirty in a pig pen sort of way, mind you. but i do succumb to the librarian type stacks of books and organized chaos stacks of paper and such). i cleaned out closets and bedrooms and bathrooms. i decluttered my craft supplies, and organized my yarn stash. the only thing, organizational speaking i didn't do was a clean up on my crochet patterns. ha! i even worked on two computers that were in need of repair and got them both up and running.

the kids and i spent a lot of time playing Wii and coloring. the girls and i made stained glass windows and colored mandalas. we cooked good food, stayed up late and slept in. there was luscious coffee in the morning, savory food and laughter in the evening. we debated mythbusters and had ethan itching to show us things that would and would not work. we went to the movies several times and had the checkout lady at the market trying to wrangle an invitation to our house for new year's eve.

the major thing i didn't do, that i wanted to do, was devote some much needed time to my creative side. i began writing again, something i'd not done in a while, and i spent a half day working on my inspiration journal. affixing all of those loose odds and ends that i've stuck in it over the last few months.

there is a very real feeling of gearing up now, of getting ready for the year ahead which holds so much possibility. i have two major decisions facing me, in my craft work. i don't have time to do both major projects, so i have to do some intense risk analysis on which would be the better bet (yes, this is my day job sneaking it's way into my real life).

i have a book that is niggling in the background of my thought that i owe some time too. my Muse, when ignored, is a bitch. if i don't start paying some real attention to her, the next big thing i write is gonna hurt.

for now, life is a good. i feel renewed and refreshed from my vacation. as i sit here watching my cat sleep on my printer, i'm dreading ever so much the return to the rat race. but for now that return is inevitable.

as the soft light of the winter day dances its way across my kitchen floor, i smell the roast chicken that Courtney and Julia and I made, i hear the laughter of the children and my husband from the living room.

i welcome the burgeoning gifts of the new year with open arms.

shouldn't you?

this song, time after time, by Margaret Whiting, completely captures my mood now...

sketch book inspiration

2010-01-01T16:57:00.000-05:00

i have a problem with journals... meaning, i like to buy them, and buy a lot of them.
i don't however, write in them.
don't ask me why, 'cause i really can't explain it.
i think it's the possibility of the unexplored potential housed in an empty journal.

that, and i think they are pretty.

at some point last year, i forget when exactly, i bought a $5 sketchbook, with 60 lb. premium recycled paper.
it's not really a journal, like the one i use to write-write in. it's turned into my inspiration catcher.

when i see a tweet with a pithy quote, or when i read a phrase in a book that moves me,
it gets jotted down. when i read a blog post that resonates, it get's printed out and glued/taped to the pages
of the journal.

it's nearly always with me, and i don't always write in it. but in the even that i need it, it's there.
there's a section there for 'book's i must read', and another page or two set aside for blog ideas.

i'm finding that the older i get, the more i'm turning into that lady that is always scribbling in notebooks.
or crocheting. well, i'm doing one or the other.. always.

what is really cool about it is when i'm having a particularly trying day, i can just pull it out, flip through the pages and find something that sings to me. (i'm a sucker for a good serenade.)

what sings to you?

crocheting and the active mind

2009-09-27T09:16:00.001-04:00

for my 33rd birthday, i bought myself a gift. the first birthday gift i've ever purchased for myself (and lemme tell you, i was so proud of myself).

i purchased a starter set of crochet hooks, knitting needles,various accoutrement (row counters, markers, huge safety pin looking things that hold your spot like a bookmark, etc.), a bag in which to carry said accoutrement, and lots of yarn.

i have to blame my friend Kimberly for this a little. she's is such an artist extraordinaire, both in textile arts as well as paint and brush, drawing, sculpting, jewelry making... i'm telling you, there is nothing she can't do. we work together and i would see her constantly with yarn and hook in hand, beautiful creations jumping from her hands while we chatted at lunch everyday. i wanted to learn how (hence the birthday present to myself when i was scarcely affording anything. i self-rationalized and justified a self-improvement and expansion of skills purchase, especially since it was my birthday.)

This is my box of patterns.

nearly 2 years later, i am crocheting nearly every day and loving every minute. it is my active mind meditation. i can sit, especially if i'm comfortable with a pattern, and just bliss out/zone out and let my fingers fly. crocheting takes my mind off of my daily worries and stresses and allows me to relax. i can't completely explain it, but it falls in the same vein of people cleaning house, or cooking, or gardening when they need a little relaxation therapy without taking a nap. i'm also learning that i have a hard time relaxing completely. i can't just sit on the couch and veg, i have to be reading, or writing, or sketching, or crocheting. i'm learning that i'm maybe a little more ADD than i thought i was when i was growing up.

ok, maybe a lot more.

i don't consider this a bad thing, just a further inward realization of my outward self.

last night i finished the latest in a series of dishcloths. may not seem like a big deal, but we are going through a big de-cluttering around our house and part of that, is streamlining. how do streamlining and dishcloths go together you ask?

well, i'll tell you. in cutting the extraneous out of our day to day, one of the very small things we've cut out are sponges. I'm using eco-friendly recycled yarn to makes dishclothes, so that we can stop buying sponges. dishcloths are healthier, in that they don't hold bacteria like sponges, can be washed at the end of everyday. by not participating in the cycle anymore, we aren't contributing to the need to constantly reproduce this item. yes, i'm aware that one family can only purchase so many sponges in a year. but, it makes, me feel good to contribute less in this particular aspect. hopefully, i'm also teaching the kids that we don't have the luxury of living a disposable life.

i guess that's partially what my journey of the last few years have been about. not being disposable. not living a lifestyle that favors material wealth or running out to buy the latest greatest... whatever. being happy in who i am, who we are.

living a homemade life. a life of substance and meaning. by crocheting with recycled materials, and using those to make usable items for my family, friends and loved ones, i feel like i'm contributing to being substantial.

yeah...i like that.

lessons from cyndi lauper...

2009-09-26T12:30:00.000-04:00

when i was 9 years old, i was mad for cyndi lauper. i wanted to be more like her when i grew up than like madonna (whom everyone else wanted to be like).

this is the cyndi lauper i grew up with.

fast forward to this morning and i'm treated to this on blisschick's site.

how chock full of awesomeness is this?? to see and watch the change (and yes, i've spent half the morning on youtube watching and listening to the progression of cyndi lauper's musical life) from a young woman and talented musician, to a mature woman, displaying an accumulation of life's talents and experiences...

more cyndi...

methinks there's a lesson to be learned here....

Mabon and what the harvest of the year has yielded

2009-09-25T17:10:00.005-04:00

Sigh.

It's been a long couple of weeks since my last post, and things have changed completely at home again. I won't go into too much detail, as most of it is just painful. My eldest has moved in with dad full-time. I told her that I'd be a raving hypocrite if I didn't allow and hell, even encourage, her to chase her happiness with as much vehemence as I have.

It hurts like hell to take the high road. I guess the harvest of this is she is taking my lessons learned and applying it to her own life.

On the converse, on the night of our first legacy Reiki circle, my eldest son decided to move in with us full-time. He and dad are like oil and water. And before you ask, this is a little different than eldest daughter moving out. My ex and I always knew, I think that the eldest boy would leave him someday. I feel like this is a shot from left field in regards to my eldest daughter.

It's such a joy to have him here all the time, my warrior.

The harvest of this, I suppose, is that all your chickens will eventually come home to roost.

I know this is rambling, all over the place. I guess that's indicative of how things feel lately.. rambling. Work is incredibly busy and bringing me to a place that I don't think I've ever been, career wise. It's not overtly stressful, it's internally stressful. I'm good at what I do, but it's not soul-nourishing, and that's a good portion of where my conflict comes from.

Some days I feel torn down the middle between the need for soul-nourishment and the desire to excel at my career. If I could be an artist full-time, I would. I just don't know how to get there without leaving my family in the lurch financially. Right now, it seems I must travel in two directions at once. Trying to climb the corporate ladder, and at the same time, completely covet Boho girl's dreads...

This is a very interesting place.

Mabon, and the harvest, have brought me to a place of further growth. Which I guess means I've sown the seeds for this growth over the last year, and these challenges, these opportunities, are things that are coming my way.

My continual harvest of change.

On a cool note.. I found this video on one of my fav sitesSummer Pierre:

I agree... I am not a robot.

And this was found on Bliss Chick

And this amazing piece of art from Goddess Leonie!

Wow!

Enjoy the links and nourish your soul!

simplicity

2009-09-13T09:13:00.001-04:00

Manifest plainness,
Embrace simplicity,
Reduce selfishness,
Have few desires.
~Lao Tzu

Mothers and daughters and perception

2009-08-18T21:58:00.007-04:00

I finished reading Yasmin Crowther’s, The Saffron Kitchen, about an hour ago. The imagery and comparison of pre-Revolution Iran to modern day Iran, with bits and pieces of modern day London, made me feel like I could walk the dirt roads in Mazareh myself, or navigate the Underground. From the moment I closed the back cover of the small, hardcover novel, I felt the tears building, but they wouldn’t quite come. A little over an hour later, the tears fell in large drops, onto the kitchen floor, my shoulders heaving in long, silent sobs. My poor husband just stood there, not quite sure what to do, other than hold me and let me cry.

The story of a mother and daughter, and two worlds, so different and misunderstood, striving to occupy the same space.

Dancing through the pages, I saw myself, my mother, and my daughters, of which I have three. Being misunderstood and striving for acceptance are emotions which are very close to the surface lately. I don’t think I was ever a mama’s girl, but if I was, it was long enough ago that I don’t remember. Even on our best days, there is always tension brewing just underneath the surface, an argument waiting to happen. I wish I was closer to her, but we have this problem of not really understanding one another. I feel like I disappoint her somehow, and sometimes, I’m disappointed in her. Even within that seemingly mutual disappointment, life goes on.

To me, she’s an anachronism. Small and almost frail, not in the greatest of health, she’s quick to judge, and doesn’t tolerate weakness in anyone, especially her grandsons. She wants free reign to speak her mind, and usually does, but can’t/doesn’t/won’t understand how doing so can hurt people. It’s as though the gentile filter is slipping the older she gets, and she has quite often, been angry with me when something she has said doesn’t sit well with me.

Frequently, she tells me as though she feels like she can’t say anything to me without my getting upset. And she may be right. With her, I’m a little thin-skinned and quick to temper. I know it, but I seem at a loss to stop it from happening. At the root of it, I know I don’t understand her or where her emotions come from. I don’t know what’s going on in her heart, her soul, and her thoughts.

A woman’s heart is a deep ocean of secrets. I don’t know my mother’s secrets or how they color her reaction and response to life.

Just within the last 6 months, my eldest daughter and I have been at stiff odds. She’s nearly 15 and therefore, a veritable genius. I, of course, am a functional moron in her eyes, but she tolerates me because I’m her mother, doddering old fool, such as I am. Within the last two weeks, though, things have really come to a head with her, and myself, and actually, my mother.
My eldest had to carry the burden of the children when their dad and I divorced and it took a heavy toll on her. Honestly, we never really talked about the divorce, heavily, until two weeks ago. My mother was here visiting, and in 15 year old stroke of genius, she was rude to her grandmother. Not overtly, but there was a definite, and purposeful slight. Needless to say, Grandma did not handle it well. But, it did lead to opening up a conversation between my eldest and I that was 3 years in the making.

We were up until 2 am, both of us talking and crying, trying to understand one another. There was a point several months ago, wherein she told me she was more comfortable at her father’s house. Until that night of soul sharing with her, I couldn’t understand why. I had been replaying countless nights of staying up late with her, watching sappy movies and having popcorn fights, laughing and talking and wondering how she could possibly be more comfortable with him.

“You’re different than you used to be.” She said.

For a while I didn’t say anything. She was right. To her, I was different. To me, I was the old me, the me of my youth. The me that her father fell in love with. I had reclaimed that part of me that for so long had been lost in soccer games and PTA and crock pot suppers. I had never looked at the last several years from that particular perspective for the kids. I never realized how different I seemed to them, post-separation and divorce. I never realized how NOT being the soccer mom, PTA, crock pot cooking mom that I was before could possibly be hard for them to deal with, because I had been in such abject misery trying to fill that role. I just assumed, I suppose a subconscious supposition, that if I was happy, that they would be happy. Dad was comfortable because, to her, he had not changed.

Don’t get me wrong, by and large they are, but her revelation stopped me in my tracks and made me realize she looks at me the way I look at my mother. I don’t think my daughter and I are as harsh with each other as my mother and I are, far from it. But I do think that if it’s not carefully managed, it could reach that point.

Just as I don’t know the secrets of my mother’s heart, my daughters don’t know mine. All growing up in the city, they don’t completely understand the comfort the country gives to me. My husband is a soft spoken, old-fashioned country boy, in sharp contrast to their father, and that is tough for my daughter to understand as well. I’m much more laid back than I used to be, and good deal more spontaneous, and again for her, that is a lot to which she must adjust.

The mother and daughter in this book face the same struggles in not understanding one another. In making the attempt to learn more about one another, a small bridge to understanding is built. Concessions can be made here and there. However, the more important lesson is that each person’s life is sacrosanct, inviolable, belonging wholly unto that individual.

My life did not become forfeit the day my daughter was born, just like my mother’s life didn’t, and her mother’s and on and on and on. As women, as mothers, we often sacrifice so much of ourselves to be wives and mothers forgetting who we really are, negating years of self development in our own childhood. Knowing how hard I’ve had to fight to get back to my own center, the years and tears and pain that it’s taken, I know that I do not want my own girls to go through that, if I can at all help it, even if that means learning the lessons and sharing my experiences, my secrets with them. Opening that bridge to understanding that my life, my mother’s life, like theirs, is my own, is her own, is their own.

Things with my eldest are better. She is nearly 15, so Goddess only knows how many more tempestuous days we have ahead of us, but in opening up my trove of secrets, maybe she can understand me, and I her, a little better. My younger daughters are 8 and 5, and while they somewhat remember the ‘old’ me, they are growing up more with the ‘older’ me and won’t have such a shock to which they must adjust. I can only try, however, to make my mother see that even though she is most definitely entitled to her opinion and her right to speak her mind, that doesn’t negate the fact that others may very well not like it and not respond in a positive fashion to what she’s said or done. I don’t want to have a negative relationship with her, or even a tense one.

I just have to remember that I don’t know the secrets of her heart anymore than she knows mine. And maybe, just maybe, that’s ok.

“Far away, the stone woman sighed out across the land, a flute, a drum, a song, a whisper, and Maryam walked alone into the foothills beyond Mazareh. She looked up at the sky where clouds tore apart in a slipstream of wind. Soon the seasons would change and coarse grass would grow again through the melting snow. Then there would be new knots for her to tie in the desert straw strands, and fresh wishes to be made, along with other stories to be told of the dead and gone, and of lives just begun.”
~The Saffron Kitchen

small and quiet, by the sea

2009-08-17T18:34:00.002-04:00

"Self-respect cannot be hunted. It cannot be purchased. It is never for sale. It cannot be fabricated out of public relations. It comes to us when we are alone, in quiet moments, in quiet places, when we suddenly realize that, knowing the good, we have done it; knowing the beautiful, we have served it; knowing the truth, we have spoken it."

Whitney Griswold

Blowing Shit Up... Sarah style...

2009-08-07T10:20:00.002-04:00

It's Friday and I have my first physical therapy appointment today... YAY! In the interim, my dear, dear friend Sarah has submitted a guest blog written in her usual stream of consciousness, make-you-laugh-so-hard-you-cry-and-then-maybe-find-a-point-so-touching-you-really-cry, way. Her bio, in her own words: I'm talkative and sassy, with a day-job that most would find utterly boring, but I find fascinating, (I do risk analysis for about $2 billion worth of investment securities, which means that I spend my days staring at Excel spreadsheets). I've been married for a little over three years to a swell guy that's at least as crazy as I am. I am starting to get really snarky when defending myself against the "So-when-are-you-going-to-start-a-family?" question, which seems to be asked more every day. I love to cook, but love to eat even more, and have been trying to lose the same 15 pounds for the past two years. My pasttimes include sleeping, breathing, thinking up new insults to shout at crappy drivers during my daily commute, and watching my ever-changing hairstyle. I read because I can and write because I must.

When I was bothering to enter my food choices in the Weight Watchers "Points Tracker" on Friday, I realized it was July 31st. (Note: I like how the "Points Tracker" doesn't judge me for having hot chocolate, a piece of string cheese, and a mini Mint 3 Musketeers candy bar for lunch.) You'd have thought that I would have realized this before now, being that yesterday was July 30th and the day before that was July 29th, and so on. But, I honestly haven't paid attention to the days recently, which is very unlike me.

For example, my dad's 52nd birthday was July 16th and I totally forgot it. Not like "Oh dad, I bought you a card, I just haven't mailed it yet." More like I was finishing up my mid-year performance review and signing my name at the bottom of the review and saw the date next to my manager's signature and said, (out loud), "Holy crap, it's my dad's birthday". About 20 minutes after I got back to my desk, I got a text from my sister, who was on her lunch break, that said "I completely didn't realize that it was dad's birthday until I had to sign my timecard today. Did you get him a card?" I texted back, "Nope."

I finally got my butt in gear this past weekend, more than a week post-birthday, and got him a card at B&N, patron saint of all things Sarah. Then, two days ago, I was working like mad, minding my own business, when my phone buzzed. It was a text from my sister. "What did you get Mom and Dad for their anniversary?" Shit. "Shit. Nothing. I haven't even mailed Dad's birthday card yet." Text back from sister: "Good, me neither. But, I should." (And this wasn't just any anniversary, it was the big 3-0. Yikes.)

Clearly we are neither of us winning "Daughter of the Year" awards so far this year. But, I digress. That whole spiel was to give you some indication of how oblivious I've been, holed up in Sarahland with my dented iPod nano and a stash of snacks. The year is two-thirds over and I don't think I've done nearly as much as I've wanted to this year. Now, don't ask me what I had hoped to do this year, because I can't tell you definitively. (Incidentally, a lack of goal-setting and not knowing what I want more than likely contributed to not having done what I wanted to, but that's another story.)

Mostly, I'm starting to worry that I'm running out of time.

I'm starting to worry that I'm running out of time with my husband. It's probably not completely unfounded or totally irrational, and I've been told that it's normal, but all of that doesn't make me feel better about it. He's deploying to Afghanistan in October. I know, it's not earth-shattering news, and it's not even surprising. I'm a military wife, I should expect it right? Right. But, I don't think that that's supposed to make the process any easier, especially for a first deployment.

He was supposed to leave last year, about one month into my treatment. We filled out about a forest's worth of paperwork so that we could convince a Department of Defense medical review board that yes, I really did have cancer and yes, my husband really was my only caregiver. That paperwork kept him here for a year. Not that I want to prevent him from deploying- I understand that it's his job, and I knew that he would probably be deployed many times throughout his career when I married him. It will be a great opportunity for him, and he will learn so much.

But, I'm still just a little bit anxious that he won't come back.

When we were first dating and into the first part of our marriage, I sort of worried about him all the time. My husband is brilliant and calculating and analytical, so naturally, when he joined the military, he wanted to be an EOD tech. Well, let me rephrase that- he wanted to be an EOD tech which is why he joined the military. EOD is "Explosive Ordnance Disposal", government jargon for "bomb squad". It's an incredibly hard program that has an attrition rate over 90 percent and is second only to Navy SEAL training in physical, mental, and emotional difficulty. (If you're really intrigued about EOD as a profession, and you should be, because it's horribly fascinating, check out the movie "Hurt Locker" that was released in theaters this May.)

It really took me quite a while to wrap my head around the fact that my husband, (in his own words), "blows shit up", for a living. In the summer of 2006, after I had moved down to Florida with him but before the shindig that was our October wedding, I noticed that the box some of our wedding supplies had come in had a light switch on the side. Hubs had to teach a class on those improvised explosive devices you hear about on the news all the time, and so he partially constructed a fake one for the class with just a little light bulb inside as a prop. Do you know how strange it is to find out that your husband made a fake IED out of the box that some of your wedding stationery came in? Very.

So, you can understand why deployment is a big deal for him. It's not like he's in the military as a mail sorter or an executive assistant or something (not that those jobs are not important); it's just that his career field is directly tied to conflict, so his work suddenly becomes more relevant in a deployment situation.

I'm starting to miss him already, to miss him for the things he's going to miss- holidays, birthdays, and those random sleepy weekend mornings when we don't do anything except hold each other in the hopes that we can make time go slower. (That actually hasn't happened yet, as far as we can tell.) I think he's starting to miss me, too. When he's leaving for work in the mornings, he kisses me just a bit longer than he did just a few months ago. When we're going to sleep at night and he's all cuddled up behind me, (don't tell him that I told you that he's a cuddler), he holds me quite tightly. It's not uncomfortable, but it is a noticeably tighter than usual; normally, he only holds me that tightly when I'm sick or something, (ie: most of last year).

I've always had some trouble falling asleep, and often lie awake for a while every night. These days, I'm lying awake for an hour-and-a-half to two hours because I don't want to miss any time with him. That probably sounds hokey and stupid, and much clichéd like that Aerosmith song from "Armageddon", but it's what I've found myself involuntarily doing, night after night, for the past few months. I even made an appointment with my gyno because I thought my birth control meds were screwing up my sleep cycle. I did get new pills, (which make me less bitchy, so that's a plus), but the insomnia stayed, along with the sporadic weepiness.

It comes along at random times, angry and hot and vicious. It's the nastier older brother of the depression I was treated for when I was in college. That was a crazy time in my life- my maternal grandfather had been diagnosed with leukemia at the age of 83, my parents sold the house that I had grown up in and moved in (next door) with my grandparents, and I was taking an academic overload that semester so that I could graduate in four years with a triple major and three minors. You could say that I pitched a pseudo-grown-up temper tantrum that lasted most of my junior year. The insomnia and sporadic weepiness was driving me nuts. I thought it was the birth control meds, (which I've been on since I was in high school for various and sundry reasons). My gyno gave me an antidepressant instead, and I felt like me again, after a few weeks.

I'm going back to the gyno this coming Friday to discuss how I've been doing on the new pills and to talk about whether I'll need another antidepressant. I stopped taking the other one four years ago when I got better, (turns out my first depressive time was probably situational), and I think I might need one again, not because I'm a slave to pharmaceuticals, but because I hate the way that my brain makes me hate myself sometimes. I didn't tell Hubby this right away, because, well, I'm not sure why I didn't tell him. Probably because I didn't know what to tell him. Plus, I wasn't sure if it was my body adjusting to the new birth control meds that might be causing the funky mood stuff, as they are sometimes wont to do.

But, about a month into the new pills, when I was sure my body had adjusted to them as well as it was going to, I didn't feel that much different. My mood swings were better, but I was still having these little bouts of anger within myself, these little episodes, that were totally irrational. And even when I was thinking these irrational thoughts in one part of my brain, the other part was thinking, "This isn't right, and you know it." And I would stop thinking irrationally and the thoughts would dissipate until the next episode. And when I say irrational, I mean, crazy irrational- thoughts like, "I didn't make a new batch of sweet tea so my husband will get mad at me and leave me".

(If you're backing away from your computer now and wishing that Merci were back so that you wouldn't have to hear crazy talk, I don't blame you.)

My husband is the sweetest guy and so laid back, pretty much the polar opposite of the person my psyche assumed him to be in that particular episode. When I finally got around to telling him about the whole, "Hey-I-might-need-to-go-back-on-antidepressants" thing, and was describing to him why I thought I was going nuts, he didn't understand until I gave him that example. He said "oh", very quietly and hugged me hard, which only made me cry harder, and for someone who cries a lot, (by "a lot", I mean at least once per week), I HATE crying. It makes my already stuffy-from-allergies nose that much stuffier. That was a month or so ago, and the really crazy part of it is that I haven't had any of those thoughts since, and no crying episodes. Ok, so that's a lie- I cried when we watched "Bolt" last weeekend, even though I've seen it before; I always cry towards the end because I'm a total sap.

I told him that I didn't like the way that I felt, that I wanted to feel normal again. "What's normal?" he asked. "Well", I said, "I don't know exactly, but I'm pretty sure that this isn't it. This isn't how I'm used to feeling." So, there might be some antidepressants in my future. We'll see.

As dark and depressing as this blog may have been, I didn't mean for it to be that way. I really didn't. It's just that this is the first really grown-up thing that I'm going to have to do. I'd lived my entire life in a town of 5,000 people until I moved to Florida with my husband, and the change nearly broke me. The traffic was scary-terrible and there were so many people and they weren't friendly like the people back home. (When imagining my home town, think "Mayberry", and you'll get a good approximation.) And I really couldn't have managed it, at first, if it wasn't for my husband, even though that probably makes me sound woefully codependent. I'm just such a homebody that I never would have moved to a place where I knew no one and had never been before if I didn't have him.

But, now, for the next 7-9 months, starting in September (or late August, we don’t know for sure), it will be just little old me, holding down the fort. And we have a house now, as compared to a less-involved apartment, so there's more to do. I have to learn how to cut the grass. The only time that I've ever used a lawnmower, it was my paw-paw's riding mower and I just drove it around the yard without actually mowing anything. This is a much smaller yard, but it's not a riding mower, and I’m paranoid that I'll run over my own foot. I've been assured that this is nearly impossible with the safety features that the mower has, but I am so incredibly spastic that I'm sure if it could happen to anyone, it would be me. I actually cut myself with a teaspoon once. (The thought of using the weed-eater is also starting to become intimidating.)

For minor electrical, automotive, and plumbing-related issues, I'm going to be the first line of defense, before calling up the specialists that will charge so much I'd have to sell my left ovary to pay the bill. I always jokingly referred to Hubs as a "useful mammal", (a line John Malkovich's character says to Nicolas Cage in "Con-Air"), but I'm only now, three years into living with him, realizing how useful he truly is. He does all the maintenance on our cars- oil changes, minor body work, replacing the brakes, etc. He does all the home-repair stuff, and not in an "oh-my-god-the-wiring-is-so-awful-that-the-ceiling-fan-comes-on-when-I-turn-on-the-left-front-stove-burner" kind of way. In a "geez-you-really-are-MacGyver/Tim-the-Toolman-Taylor" kind of way.

It's a lot to live up to. And even though I'll miss him like mad, I'm secretly looking forward to the challenge, like it's the next big step that I'll have to conquer before I'm worthy of calling myself a grown-up. (Though I will take the car to Jiffy Lube for oil changes- my spasticity is such that I wouldn't trust myself to jack the car up and have it stay perched on the jack stands while I'm crawling around underneath it.) I'm not sure what that worthiness would entail, but I think I'll feel quite accomplished when Hubs returns to the States and I can show him that not only is the house still standing and in one piece, but it's clean and habitable and in working order.

It will be a lot easier to keep clean without him in it. Being a boy-type-person, he attracts dirt the way that atoms have electron affinity. And by dirt, I don't mean that he doesn't bathe- he does daily. I mean that he can go outside to the mailbox and return immediately to the house, a journey of maybe 60 feet roundtrip, and have bits of nature attached to him. It's quite strange. So, I'm looking forward to having the house be neater than it usually is.

I'm also looking forward to living on my own schedule only. So, if I want to spend my entire Friday evening at the gym, I could. (I got that gym membership because I need to work out, obviously, but also so that I'd have something to do rather than spending all my evenings at home alone.) I can eat Rice Krispies for dinner and be perfectly content with it, or I can whip up and entire meal out of Bon Appètit and eat it all myself. The past few years, I've been a bit envious of the girls I went to college with who moved off to bigger cities and had amazing social lives and lived for themselves. I think this will be a teeny bit of that- not the scary dating scene bit, (which does not appeal to me), but the glorious solitude that comes with spending time with yourself.

I discovered last year, when nearly all my days were spent alone, that I'm not as extroverted as I once thought. Or maybe not as extroverted as I once was. I still enjoy conversation, even inane conversation, but I really like my quiet time. I once wrote, in the blog that I kept in college as a diary meant for no one else, that I enjoyed being the only one awake- whether it was because I was the last one to go to sleep or the first one to wake up. I think I was starting to realize the value if flying solo then, even if I didn't realize it.

I have scheduled some things for me this fall/winter, to give me something to look forward to every month so that I don’t live only for my job. My dad's flying down to Tampa in October and going to the U2 concert with me as an early Christmas present. I bought a plane ticket for November, so I'll be home for Thanksgiving for the first time since I left home three years ago. I'm going home for Christmas, and possibly going to see my best friend at some point in the early spring. My mother-in-law wants to fly down here and take me seashelling on Sanibel Island some time. I think my schedule of events will help pass the time.

I'm also planning to visit DSW once a month or so for a new pair of shoes. By reviewing my grocery bills, I realize that more than half the money spent on food was for Hubby's food, so I figure I'll use what I would have spent on food for him on shoes for me instead. I plan on having quite a collection when he returns, probably none of them practical. (Well, only just practical enough- in the sense that they will all provide my feet protection from the elements, sort of).

So, if you happen to be in Barnes & Noble or DSW or Sephora or Baskin Robbins any time between now and next spring, there's a good chance that you might run into me, and if you were to ask how I was doing, I'm sure I'd say, "just fine", and actually mean it.

Dodging Buses - Guest Blogger, Melissa

2009-08-06T07:08:00.004-04:00

Yep, still mending. So today, my wonderful friend Melissa, from Recognizing Me, is filling in for me with a blog a lot of us can relate to, I'm sure.

My job sucks. The corporate culture is one of stepping all over each other in the endless quest to get to the top. There is regular finger-pointing, name calling and attempts to throw each other under whatever bus is passing by on the downtown connector. The drama is off the charts.

I checked out a long time ago. I’ve been dragging myself out of bed each day and slloowwwly making my way into the office - partly because of sheer dread and partly because of the miserable Atlanta traffic. My only goal with my current company is to collect a paycheck until I can find something better.

The culture has only gotten worse given the current economy. People are afraid to lose their jobs, so they are trying to shine the corporate spotlight on themselves at whatever cost. Look at me! I’m doing my job! I punched my time card on time! I stayed until midnight in my frantic attempt to impress you! See, I don’t deserve to be laid off or fired!

People tell me I should be happy that I have a job, especially with the high unemployment numbers thrown in our faces each night on the evening news. I suppose. I do make good money. I have collected awards to add to my resume. I do get to work from home once in awhile. What more could I want?

Hmm... let’s see. I want to be treated with respect. I want the male dominated industry that I work in to not be threatened by a successful female. I want my company to practice what it preaches in its marketing slicks. I want to feel confident that my team will deliver for me without a million excuses or the regular “that isn’t my job” attitude. I want the actors in the crowd to take a bus to Hollywood so the rest of us can move on from the daily drama.

I desperately want to tell off the people who regularly try to throw me under all of those buses - fortunately without success. I want to dash through the halls of my building doing a running rendition of the Truffle Shuffle from Goonies, while flailing my arms and making weird mouth noises. I want my co-workers to see the insanity that they are causing.

Sigh... but, I do nothing. I keep my professional hat firmly planted on my head so as not to risk my job or my reputation. I smile and act like I care about the latest product-of-the-month or the most recent corporate rah-rah chant they’re forcing down our throats. I put in my time each and every long-ass day.

Secretly though, I’m plotting my escape. I plan to drive off into the sunset on one of the buses I’ve been dodging for years. That way, they can start looking over their shoulders for me.

Maybe I’ll see if Chunk wants to join me on the ride. I’m sure he could give me some pointers on improving my Truffle Shuffle.

The Crone wants to stay home - guest blogger Rhi Bowman

2009-08-05T10:03:00.005-04:00

Day, uhm, day, hell, I forget what day into my recuperation this is, but it's been a while it seems. I took an Ambien last night so I could sleep (first time ever taking a sleeping pill). I'll just say this, next time I take one, I'm alotting 12 hours for sleep and time to wake up. Today's Guest Blogger is the fantabulous Rhi Bowman. Rhi Bowman is a freelance writer in Charlotte, N.C., where she lives with her wonderful husband and spoiled rotten cats.

My mother-in-law has never been an angel. In fact, she’s spent most of her adult life being a non-contributing burden on society.

I’m not being mean, I’m being real. But, take my words as you will.

You see, my mother-in-law is mentally ill. She’s also from a generation that didn’t know as much about the mind as we do now.

In the 50s, when she’d hit manic mode, they’d shock her out of it. She spent most of the 60s and 70s in a doped-up haze. Today her health is managed with a handful of pills and frequent doctor visits. My husband describes her as “loopy.”

Besides being cracked in the head, she’s healthy. Or, at least, we thought she was.

Last Monday we got word that she passed out in her drive way, right behind her car. Fortunately, a neighbor saw her and called for an ambulance. After almost a week in the hospital, she was sent to a nursing home for patients with mental issues. She’s actually having a good time. All these years of junk food addiction have caught up to her. Turns out she’s diabetic.

We are 13 hours away and relieved. We’re relieved she’s got watchful neighbors and good insurance. But, we’re still worried about the immediate future.

Not a day goes by that we don’t discuss what we should do, could do, will do when she finally passes. We can’t move there, my husband’s job isn’t available in his home town. She can’t move here, her insurance won’t follow. Besides, she doesn’t want to.

And, it’s not her passing that we worry about; we know what to do when that day comes. We worry about every day in between now and then.

I keep asking, “What if she passed out behind the wheel of her car?”

My husband, an only child, is still mourning the death of his father this past winter. He is trying his best to both look out for his mother’s best interests and keep her happy.

So, here we sit, in a situation no one wants, feeling bad for all we can’t do and guilty for this truth: We wish she’d died first.

It’s awful to admit, but it’s true. Dan’s father was a hero to many. His life touched and improved the lives of everyone around him.

His wife, on the other hand, is a taker. She’s an endless drain. She’s not thankful. She’s not loving. She’s never done anything to make our world a better place. But, she is still alive and we’re charged with her care.

We’ll do our best. We’ll smile and push through.

The Crone says she wants to go home, she wants to die in her bed. So, we’ll have people at her house daily. They’ll help her bathe, they’ll run her errands, they’ll clean her house. But, we’re taking the car keys away. And, we know: No matter how much money or time we spend, no one will ever be able to fill that woman’s dark heart with love.

She’s a Crone from a different dimension.

Because we love her, we’ll honor her final wishes and continue to feel guilty for wishing her winter would hurry up and dawn.

Blessed Be.

Rx: Kahlua and milk and Robert Frost - Guest Blogger, Abby Byrd

2009-08-04T07:17:00.002-04:00

Today's guest blogger is Abby Byrd. Abby Byrd learned the necessity of having a pen name the hard way. She has been published in Verbsap, blogs for Skirt! magazine, and is working on a collection called "Smart Girl: Essays from the Fringe". More work at VerbSap Blog at Skirt. Her latest publication can be found at Vagabondage Press. Many thanks, Abby, for helping out while I'm forced to type left-handed in 20 minute increments!!

Boxes. Everywhere. Besides arousing my irrational fear of cockroaches, the presence of boxes suggests transience. I’ve moved eight times in the last ten years, so I’m intimately familiar with the process. I’ve become comfortable with constructing and deconstructing boxes, labeling them in thick black Sharpie, stacking them, ripping them apart at the last minute for something I was sure I wouldn’t need. But I never get used to leaving, to the ending inherent in each new beginning.

This time, it’s my roommate Natalie who’s moving, her dishes stacked in separate piles and her bubble wrap still neatly rolled as she sleeps. She’s excited to go back to upstate New York to a new job and to her family. As any friend would, I want her to do whatever makes her happy. As long as, of course, it doesn’t involve leaving me.

Stanley Plumly, the venerable white-bearded poet, once said in a creative writing class that all poetry is about loss or longing. I extend his theory to everything that we, as human beings, create. As a species, we’re obsessed with getting what we want—and keeping it. Try this: make a list of your worst fears. I’m willing to bet that most of them involve loss. My nightmares are never about monsters, at least of the conventional sort; they’re about losing the people I love, my job, my health, my mind (the latter, I fear, may have already happened).

As Buddhist thought teaches, our craving and our clinging—our attachment—is the cause of our suffering. But attachment comes naturally to us. Waking up next to my partner, I lean over to nuzzle him and breathe in his scent, and something clicks in my mammalian brain. This is my mate. I am safe; I am satisfied. We are imaginative, symbolic thinkers confined by animal bodies. We can conceive of forever, but we cannot attain it.

This is perhaps our greatest single challenge as a species—to accept that nature marches on and takes us along with it, willing or not. I’ll never be able to stop myself from attaching, knowing full well what loss feels like. I’m only human. But I can temper the loss by reminding myself that change is inevitable. Being constantly aware of the possibility of loss imbues everything with a bittersweetness—which is not, I’ve found, such a bad lens through which to look at life.

So I will reluctantly help pack boxes, and when the apartment is half-empty, I’ll get up from the bare living room floor and fix myself a Kahlua and milk, which is what Natalie would want. If I feel heartsick and averse to eating, I’ll make myself force down a yogurt. Which is what she would tell me to do. I’ll remember all the things we learned together: recycle cans, not men, for instance. And when I move out two months later to begin with love of my life, I’ll remember, even in my giddiness, just how fabulous it was having her as a roommate.

I can’t promise I’ll do any of these things gracefully, without weeping or small tantrums. Ah, as Frost’s lonely wanderer muses, when to the heart of man/Was it ever less than a treason/To go with the drift of things,/To yield with a grace to reason,/And bow and accept the end/Of a love or a season?

One Love - Guest Blogger, Jay Schryer

2009-08-03T06:16:00.004-04:00

While I didn't do much this weekend, what little i did do has worn me out! So, you have a whole week of fantastic guest blogging lined up. Today's guest blogger is my dear friend, Jay Schryer. Jay first encountered the Goddess during a near death experience at the age of 19. Since that time, he has spent a great deal of time studying various religions including generic Paganism, Wicca, Asatru, Buddhism, Shinto, and Cherokee spirituality. He is very interested in searching for universal answers and trying to find common threads among the different religions and spiritual systems of the world. Within the past year, he has turned his search more inward, listening to his own intuition instead of the voices of "experts".

Mostly, Jay is just trying to find himself, and his place in the world. You can read more about him on his blog Porsidan, where he explores spirituality, life, and the meaning behind it all.

One love
One blood
One life
You got to do what you should.

One life
With each other: Sisters, Brothers.
One life, but we're not the same -
We get to carry each other.

Carry each other

~U2, One

I love the music of U2, and I really love this collaboration between Mary J. Blige and U2 on their hit song, One. I love the melody, and her voice is just incredible. The first time I heard this version, I was left speechless.

Songs lend themselves to different interpretations to different people. Many people only hear a beautiful, slightly-haunting love song. Bono himself has stated publicly that the song is about inner turmoil within the band, and how they almost split up after a concert one night. For me, this is an intensely spiritual song, a gentle reminder from the Goddess telling us what life is all about, or rather what it should be all about.

We live our lives on the surface. Office politics, PTA meetings, the endless shuffling of ourselves and our children from place to place, event to event, activity to activity. Fast food and TV dinners have taken the place of dinner at home. Rolodexes and daily planners filled to the point of bursting, we hurry up and wait through our days and collapse into silent heaps of desperation at night. Rinse and repeat, over and over again.

We give of our time, but only half-heartedly. Emails and text messages, tweets and status updates, a quick call to let someone know we're running late, traffic is horrible. Yeah, yeah, I'll be with you in a sec. Just let me check my email real quick. I can't stay long, got places to go and people to see, ya know.

And the whole time, we're starving. We're aching for human touch, for a genuine connection. We long for someone to sit with us, to be with us, to listen to us, and to really hear what we have to say. To bond. To sympathize. To be able to look into the eyes of another human being and say: "Yes, I see you. I see the real you. I see the you who is hiding underneath everything you pretend to be, everything you have to be out there. I see your hopes, your dreams, and your fears. I see your wounds, and your scars - the battles you have fought along your path to this moment, this time. I see your pain, your shame, and your suffering. And I see your strength, your determination, and your courage that it took to move beyond the pain, and to heal yourself. I see the love that is you, reflected in the love that comes from you. In short, I see myself in you, and I want you to see yourself in me."

That's all anyone ever wants, really. To know that we're not alone, and to know that we are understood, loved, and accepted just as we are. We're starving for genuine human connections, just as we're starving for our connection to the Divine. The good news is that it's right there...always with us. If we can just learn to slow down and give it to each other, we can heal ourselves, and heal the world around us.

Because we're one, but we're not the same. We get to carry each other. Carry each other.

Lammas celebration

2009-08-02T18:16:00.009-04:00

So, last night, the circle of women I belong to, got together to celebrate the first of the harvest celebrations, Lammas. Being that we all live in the metro-Atlanta area, and everyone is so busy, not all of us can make it to every shindig. And that's cool. It's sorta how we operate, no pressure, no demerits if you can't make it. We are all women and we all understand that life happens.

So last night there were 3 of us, not counting the myriad of children. My Herd wasn't there as they are with dad until Monday night, so the myriad was smaller than norm.

So myself, Pandora and Dionnah came together and we made about 14 loaves of bread. We drank tea, we laughed and we cried. We shared as women, as friends, and as sisters.

We baked our intentions for our own 'harvests' into some of the loaves. Later, sitting on the front porch and surrounded by the encroaching darkness and burgeoning crickets, we shared a short prayer and a loaf of bread.

More guest bloggers, starting tomorrow, but for now, some pictures from last night!

Blessed Lammas

2009-08-01T10:47:00.003-04:00

Today, August 1st, is the celebration of Lammas... What is Lammas?
My moon-sister, Pandora, sent this to me. (I'm sure these are not her words, probably garnered from some book or other, so I can't cite the source directly, but as soon as I find out where she got it, I'll let you know.)

The Beginning of the Harvest: Grain has held a place of importance in civilization back nearly to the beginning of time. Grain became associated with the cycle of death and rebirth.
At Lammas, also called Lughnasadh, the hot days of August are upon us, much of the earth is dry and parched, but we still know that the bright reds and yellows of the harvest season are just around the corner. Apples are beginning to ripen in the trees, our summer vegetables have been picked, corn is tall and green, waiting for us to come gather the bounty of the crop fields. Now is the time to begin reaping what we have sown, and gathering up the first harvests of grain, wheat, oats, and more.

A Feast of Bread:
In early Ireland, it was a bad idea to harvest your grain any time before Lammas -- it meant that the previous year's harvest had run out early, and that was a serious failing in agricultural communities. However, on August 1, the first sheafs of grain were cut by the farmer, and by nightfall his wife had made the first loaves of bread of the season.
The word Lammas derives from the Old English phrase hlaf-maesse, which translates to loaf mass. In early Christian times, the first loaves of the season were blessed by the Church

Honoring the Past
In our modern world, it's often easy to forget the trials and tribulations our ancestors had to endure. For us, if we need a loaf of bread, we simply drive over to the local grocery store and buy a few bags of prepackaged bread. If we run out, it's no big deal, we just go and get more. When our ancestors lived, hundreds and thousands of years ago, the harvesting and processing of grain was crucial. If crops were left in the fields too long, or the bread not baked in time, families could starve. Taking care of one's crops meant the difference between life and death.
By celebrating Lammas as a harvest festival we honor our ancestors and the hard work they must have had to do in order to survive. This is a good time to give thanks for the abundance we have in our lives, and to be grateful for the food on our tables. Lammas is a time of transformation, of rebirth and new beginnings.

In that vein, we are meeting, my sisters and I, this afternoon, to make bread and share in the sisterhood of the first of the harvest festivals.

Many Blessings to you this day!

Ecstatic Dance as Moving Meditation by Guest Blogger - Deanne Quarrie

2009-07-30T21:30:00.003-04:00

Yep, you got it, I'm still on the mend. Again, another author and spiritualist that I admire has blessed me with a previously written essay to share with you on my blog. Deanne Quarrie, known by many as Bendis, is a well-known author, facilitator, teacher, coach, mentor, and feminist within the Dianic Wiccan community. I am honored, and blessed, to have her permission to share this with you. I could write an essay just on her accomplishments and list of involvements, but you can find out more about her, and her ways, here.

Ecstatic Dance as Moving Meditation

Come fly with me
come on, come on, come
dance with me
come on, come on, come fly
come on and dance with me

Dance is a dynamic tool for awakening and stirring up the subtle forces and energies of life. It is an outer expression of an inner spirit. Dance and movement are natural to the universe. Plants will move gracefully to face the sun and wave in the breeze. Birds and animals display magnificent arrays of plumage and posture for everything from courtship to aggression. Dance is natural and vital to us as well.

We are all musical. We all have rhythm. Anyone can dance. We live in a time when we are too self-conscious and caught up with how we might look when we dance.

Ecstatic dance is a moving meditation. It is not a dance to do with someone else unless that is what you want. It is not a dance designed to “look” good. It is free flowing. It is aware. It is between your spirit and the music.

How do you do it? Anyway you want. Anyway you feel the music. The idea is to let the music in, feel it, and release it through yourself in movement. Whatever movement “feels” natural to you.

The choice of music is also up to you. There are many selections available that are designed to be used for movement, but you need to select what appeals to you.

Find a time that you can be undisturbed. Wear clothes that you like and feel good in, and that allow you to move comfortably. Whatever appeals to you that will not restrict your movement. Clear an area. It does not have to be a large area because the dance is really happening within. It is a good idea to be barefoot. I very seldom move my feet at all. It’s about moving the body. Put on your music. Begin your movements slowly, warming up to the music. Breath naturally and easily, focusing on the music. Allow your body to seek a place in tune with what you feel. Get loose.

Begin to warm up by focusing on a body part. Say, first, your neck. Move it in time with the music. Get loose. Now, move your shoulders, your spine, your hips, and your knees. Continue focusing on different areas of your body until you have loosened up all over.

You should really be into your dance at this point. No one is looking. Free yourself. Become the music!

Ideally, your ecstatic dance session should last at least twenty minutes. Most of mine last close to an hour.
When I first started doing this, it was with a group women and we all wanted to experiment. We wore blindfolds. By using a blindfold we were freed from the idea of someone looking at us. Amazing! You can’t see anyone else, nor can they see you! This is not about how it looks. This is about how it feels. Try it! Listen to the music. Act out how it makes you feel. Your imagination is a wonderful tool. Let it make pictures in your mind. Become the music. The first time we tried it, we danced for an hour; one hour of being completely unaware of anything but the music, your mind, and your movement.

Ecstatic dancing comes more easily to some than others. It is particularly difficult for those of us who have allowed ourselves to become slaves to time, machines and consensus reality. Many of us have become victims of our left-brain logic and have stress-related disorders. If this describes you, as it did me, at least try ecstatic dancing. It is a great adventure and an opportunity to meet a part of yourself, which has been dormant for a long time.

The ways and means for achieving altered states are many. Every culture around the world has developed many effective methods. Examples briefly are Tai Chi, Qi Gong, and shamanic journeying. Explore what works for you.

I cannot stress strongly enough, that a meditation practice is essential to your spiritual development. Your journey will unfold in a better way. You will come to know self in ways not thought of and you will tap into your own Goddess Wisdom fully as you walk through this life.

Excerpt from Dancing with Goddess by Deanne Quarrie available at http://www.lulu.com/applebranch

Guest Blogger - Kim Sisto Robinson, the Phenomenal Woman

2009-07-30T08:44:00.005-04:00

Still on the mend, more of my writer friends have shared their work with this space to give you something entertaining to read. Today, Kim Sisto Robinson has shared her feelings on one of her, and my, my deeply loved poems. From Kim's bio at Skirt magazine, (where she is not only a frequent contributor, but also blogger of the year for 2008: ~~I am a struggling writer waiting to be discovered. My dream is to have a directer read one of my blogs and exclaim... "Hey, can you write a screen play about this?!" Remember Juno? Anything is possible, my dears. I am also at an elementary school working as a discipline teacher, a recent college graduate, the wife of a beautiful Brit, and a mother of two wild and crazy teens. I was a cat in my last life; a Siamese, I believe. I looooooove reading other women's work. I read all of the blogs on Skirt, and seriously, these women have transformed me into a better writer and person! I am addicted to writing, finding the right words, and much more interested and excited about the process than the outcome.....

"If what Proust says is true, that happiness is the absence of fever, then I shall never know happiness. For I am possessed by a fever for knowledge, experience, and creation." ~Anais Nin~ (Yes, that's how I feel, too)!~~ This has also been published at skirt.com

~This poem, by the remarkable Maya Angelou, is one of my all time favorites. The first time I read it, I exclaimed loudly, “THIS IS ME!” Thus-- the poet’s job is to cause the reader to find herself someplace within the words. I have continually met myself inside Angelou’s delicious verse and prose.

~For those of you who have not experienced “Phenomenal Women” I envy you reading it for the first time. Quite sincerely, she is writing about every woman, everywhere, or at least, how we’d like to see ourselves!

Suggestion: This poem is meant to be read aloud for one to fully appreciate the rhyme and rhythm. The words are syrup surging into the atmosphere.

Phenomenal Woman
~ By Maya Angelou

Pretty women wonder where my secret lies.
I'm not cute or built to suit a fashion model's size
but when I start to tell them,
They think I'm telling lies.
I say,
It's in the reach of my arms
The span of my hips,
The stride of my step,
The curl of my lips.
I'm a woman
phenomenally.
Phenomenal woman,
that’s me.

I walk into a room
just as cool as you please,
and to a man,
the fellows stand or
Fall down on their knees.
Then they swarm around me,
a hive of honey bees.
I say,
it’s the fire in my eyes,
and the flash of my teeth,
the swing in my waist,
and the joy in my feet.
I'm a woman
phenomenally.
Phenomenal woman,
that’s me.

Men themselves have wondered
what they see in me.
They try so much
but they can't touch
my inner mystery.
When I try to show them
they say they still can't see.
I say,
It's in the arch of my back,
The sun of my smile,
The ride of my breasts,
The grace of my style.
I'm a woman

phenomenally.
Phenomenal woman,
that’s me.

Now you understand
just why my head's not bowed.
I don't shout or jump about
or have to talk real loud.
When you see me passing
it ought to make you proud.
I say,
It's in the click of my heels,
The bend of my hair,
the palm of my hand,
The need of my care,
'Cause I'm a woman
Phenomenally.

Phenomenal woman,
that’s me.

Shalom, Kim

Guest Blogger - Elizabeth Cassidy Interviews Intuitive Coach Tara Roth

2009-07-28T23:21:00.003-04:00

While I am on the mend, i've asked several of my friends to help out and guest post to my blog. Today's guest blog is from Elizabeth Cassidy, a certified life and career coach. She is a national blogger for Skirt!(site w/ a very cool attitude), NY Life Coach expert for Examiner.com. and one-half of the Blogging Team - Coaches on the Edge: Skirt. You can also find her at Branching Out Life Coaching. This article can also be found at skirt.com

Intuition is a tool that so many people fail to use when making decisions in their lives. I recently interviewed Tara Crawford Roth, an intuitive coach, and she is sharing her thoughts on intuition and ways for people to tap into their intuitive side. So sit back and get real clear about what you want in your life and then ask your intuition what is the best path to take. You just might be surprised to find out that the answers do lie inside you!

ec: Before we delve into the subject of Intuition and how it has impacted your life, in all areas of your life, can you give us your definition of Intuition? I think there are still some who feel that getting in touch with your inner voice only happens in a smoked filled backroom with a woman named Mistress Sylvia and a crystal ball.

TR: Well that has been known to work but there is a better way. My definition of intuition is that still inner voice within that we all have but have learned to discount. Einstein called intuition the highest form of knowing. The word intuition means "in to you" in Latin. It is the voice of inspiration or sudden insight that comes from out of the blue. It's been called the sixth sense, an inner knowing or divine guidance. My experience is that it is an incredibly valuable resource that helps us live our lives more fully once we learn to recognize how it communicates with us.

ec: When did you realize that you were receiving intuitive hits and were not just someone with a vivid imagination? Was your reaction one of embracing this gift or were you fearful that something was off? I would imagine it had to be a little unsettling at first.

TR: When I was really young, I could communicate with animals but it wasn’t til later I realized this was unusual. I was the kid who liked to dress up as gypsy and read your fortune with the Magic 8 Ball for a nickel. I thought it was mysterious and fun. Sometimes, when I would get an intuitive hit, it was confusing, especially if I got one that was incorrect. Over time, I learned to pay more attention and notice when it was really my intuition and when it was “just” my imagination.

ec: Being intuitive from an early age, when did you reveal this side of you to your family and what was their reaction? Somehow I don’t think this would have fallen into the same category as discovering that you have a strong backhand for tennis or that your singing ability rivaled Aretha Franklin’s?

TR: Well it certainly wasn’t something you bragged about to the neighbors. I was deemed “sensitive” by my family at an early age; at first that was code for too emotional. Later it had to do with sensing things others missed. I kept this all to myself until I was a teenager and was noticed I was having prophetic dreams. The one that stands out the most is when I dreamt I met Paul McCartney and he asked me for a date. I met him the very next day in Central Park but he was with his new wife Linda, so I guess he couldn’t ask me out in front of her! I shared this story with my family only to find out my grandfather occasionally had “visions”. He was afraid of them so it was a family secret.

ec: So intuition is something we are born with? Like getting your father’s blue eyes or your grandmother’s wide forehead – we are all intuitive souls?

TR: It is something we are all born with and some families who understand it encourage the gift. Most people have no frame of reference for it and discourage it or call it imagination. Ever listen to some of the things kids will tell you? I had a cousin who at the tender age of 5 started telling my aunt stories about her own mom who had died long before she was born. She “knew” about her life growing up in the UK, pet names she called her and other events that occurred. My aunt was amazed and had to acknowledge the accuracy of the information.

ec: Tara, how do we develop our intuition? Are there actual exercises that people can do to sharpen their intuitive skills?

TR: The first thing you need to do is commit to pay attention to the nudges, quiet voice or feelings you receive and acting on them. Intuition is like a muscle that needs exercising and committing to listen for it is the best way to begin. There are many exercise and techniques you can use (many are in the audios on my website) but a daily centering and practicing stillness ritual is critical. You need to “”tame” the monkey mind so to speak to be still so you can hear the guidance of your intuition. Once you have done that you want to start asking your intuition questions every day and then expecting to get an answer. When you expect an answer, you are “tuned in” at some level all the time and open to the guidance.

ec: People who have intuitive hits will say that they had a feeling, they heard a word or a phrase, saw some type of picture pop up in their mind or they just knew. These intuitive hits do have “official” names besides butterflies fighting in the abdomen, hearing the lyrics from a Steely Dan song, a photo of a mountain on fire or being Miss Know It All. Can you please share what they are and it is true that some people pick up their guidance through smell?

TR: There are 4 main ways people receive their intuition and most people have at least two of them operating in their life. They are called the “clairs” meaning clear. There is clairvoyance, clear seeing, clairaudience, clear hearing clairsentience, clear feeling and claircognizance, clear knowing. To give you a little more information clairvoyance is seeing vision, pictures or images both literal and symbolic in your mind and includes prophetic dreams. It is not just seeing full blown 3D visions or dead people! Clairaudience is hearing voices inside or just outside your head and not that kind that require medication! This clair is prevalent in people with musical ears and can include hearing song lyrics that convey a message or a random comment that answers a question you had.

Clairsentience, clear feeling is a very physical form of intuition and includes a gut feeling, goose bumps or butterflies in the tummy. Many people with this clair are empathic which means they are very sensitive to the feelings and energy of those around them. Claircognizance, clear knowing is the most common form of intuition and the easiest to overlook because you “just know” something. Ideas pop in your mind full blown or you get an inspiration or insight out of the blue. Einstein said this was the way his intuition worked.

Two more obscure ones are clairaugustus, clear tasting and clairfragrance, clear smelling. I have never experience the first of these but when my dad, who is deceased comes around I smell smoke. It is his calling card.

ec: Okay, so now we are feeling our intuitive side coming to life, but how do you separate what our heart is telling us vs. what our egos demand?

TR: You know this is the classic struggle we all face. What part of ourselves are we giving power to- our mind or our heart? Your intuition is always positive and leaves you feel expanded with a sense of possibilities. It is supporting, loving and persistent and will address you in the 3rd person. Even when your intuition is warning you of danger it will do so with positive information and action such as: turn left, go faster, or look behind you.

When your ego is giving you “guidance” it is characterized by many things including negativity and fear. It can have a demanding tone and be judgmental. You may feel discouraged or pressure in your chest. It will tell you how you can’t do this or that or remind you of all the times things have not worked out. It is a little tyrant!

ec: What are some ways that people can “set their intentions” when it comes to asking their intuition for answers?

TR: Setting intentions is as simple as focusing on what you want. Remember, we see the things we focus on and not the rest of what is around us. If you don’t believe me try NOT to think about pink elephants for the next 10 seconds. You can’t do it!

I tell students to set their intention to be intuitive all day, ask questions of it and then expect the answers to arrive. Keeping your focus on your intuition allows you to experience it more easily.

ec: What do you think has happened in our society that people are now taking a look at intuition with new eyes? It is amazing to hear people now say that they are tuning into what their intuition has to say. I am hearing that all the time now. Of course, I am asking people and am thrilled to see that intuition is now becoming one of the tools of choice to use when making personal and professional decisions.

TR: It is time I think we have truly entered the Age of Aquarius where people are recognizing that everything is energy. Through movies and the net, people are exposed to these ideas and science has finally caught up. Quantum physics proves that everything has an energetic makeup, our bodies are composed of energy and so are our thoughts and emotions. Once you can work with that concept, intuition is easier to understand. It is about feeling the vibrations and the energy. I am expecting this shift to increase in the next few years and expect to see intuition become as accepted as any other sense. Won’t that be fun?

ec: As an intuitive business coach, do you see things or get feelings about what is going on with your clients? Do you share these intuitive hits with them?

TR: I do get intuitive hits when I am coaching clients, sometimes even in between sessions! I keep track and share them with clients, if it is appropriate to what we are working on, but the key is I have no attachment to being right. If I share an intuitive hit and it does not resonate with the clients, we move on. Coaching, as you know, is about serving the client and what they need in the moment.

ec: Why do you think tapping into our intuition is so important? Couldn’t we do just fine without listening to it? Or are you seeing an acceptance from people who happen to be CEOs, budding entrepreneurs, artists and even other life coaches?

TR: You know many CEOs I know tell me, in confidence, that they are intuitive. It is like having an extra edge on the competition and they have learned to trust their hunches. I believe science is helping intuition become more accepted among the left brained, logical population. Artists and coaches tend to be more creative to begin with and use the right side of the brain where intuition resides.

ec: Alright, so people are ready to start using their intuition as another skill – do you suggest they start off with the small stuff and then work up to the big issues?

TR: You want to start small. You wouldn’t begin an exercise program by going to the gym and lifting 100 pounds! Start by asking questions that are not emotionally charged like who is at the door, how many pieces of mail do I have, what road has less traffic or what task shall I tackle next? If you ask when will I meet my soul mate, chances are you will not get a clear answer this early in the process because you are too attached to the outcome. You can work your way up to more challenging questions after you are clear on how your intuition “speaks” to you.

ec: Tara thanks so much for explaining how intuition can bring more joy, satisfaction and personal and professional growth in our lives. I bet a lot of people may still have more questions. How can people contact you to learn more about becoming friends with their intuitive gifts?

TR: They can visit my website at TaraRoth.com There they can sign up for my bimonthly ezine Intuitive Insights and listen to archives of my radio show Intuitive Living. Or they can email me here. I would love to hear from them.

My 5 year old 'Rockstar' rawking out....

2009-07-28T17:04:00.000-04:00

a wink from the Goddess (and a friend)

2009-07-28T15:33:00.000-04:00

These were received in the mail today, sent by my old friend Porsidan.
The card has a little gnomish looking fellow on the front and reads, 'because I'm a huge fan of acts of defiance.'

molti ringraziamenti, caro amico.

Why are we unhappy? (guest blogger Christine)

2009-07-28T10:00:00.002-04:00

While I am on the mend, i've asked several of my friends to help out and guest post to my blog. Today's guest blog is from Christine, who can be found at her personal blog, Conversations with Christine , but also as a frequent blog contributor at Skirt Magazine.

I heard something very interesting on the radio this morning as I was driving to work. The morning show host had read a study recently that found women today are overall more unhappy than women of past generations. The host was surprised, because (more or less) "with the whole feminist movement and more options we have, how can we be unhappier? It must be divorce."

I am not surprised at the study, actually. And no, I don't agree with divorce being the cause. True, the divorce rate is higher now than in past generations, but how many women then were hopelessly stuck in unhappy marriages? There isn't a stigma attached to being a divorced woman any more. So no, I don't think that is the reason.

I love that the feminist movement has given women so many options for what to do with our lives! We can have successful careers, go to any college we want, raise a family (or not, it's our choice), and do basically whatever we choose! Heck, a woman could even be president and a few generations ago we weren't even allowed to vote.

But - I think this is the root of our unhappiness. Instead of feeling like we have a choice, too many women feel pressured to "do it all" and do it all perfectly. We must go to college, get regular promotions at work, marry, have children, raise those children to be perfect, maintain a spotless home, cook nutritious, organic meals, and look good doing it. We feel this pressure from television, magazines, our families, and ourselves. Out of these, I don't think our families are malicious with the pressure, but want "what is best" for us. But who knows what is best for us more than ourselves? Unfortunately, if other women are like me, we are our biggest critics. The outside influences, on the other hand, don't care about us as individuals and press their own agenda: Buy our product! You MUST breastfeed or you are a bad mother! You MUST NEVER make mistakes in raising your children or you are a bad mother! You MUST be skinny and have your hair done in salons! Do it OUR way! Your way isn't good enough!

We need to stop listening to all the critics! Including our own inner critics. We are human, not superhuman. One woman cannot possibly do it all and do it all perfectly. Something has to give! If we keep trying, it is our health and our own happiness that gets lost in the shuffle. So stop, take a step back, and relax. And breathe.

My new mantra? I am good enough, just the way I am.

beautiful and amazing ladybug swarm,

2009-07-26T18:56:00.000-04:00

5D and EX1 Lady Bug Swarm from Michael Ramsey on Vimeo.

bring on the rain....

2009-07-25T17:48:00.002-04:00

again, since my typing skills are limited to my left hand... one of my favorite musical artists for you to watch..

Since I can't type worth a damn this week...

2009-07-24T16:59:00.004-04:00

i'm not really able to write much, but wanted to share this article, as it's very powerful and poignant.

Losing my religion for equality

* Jimmy Carter
* July 15, 2009

Illustration: Dyson

Illustration: Dyson

Women and girls have been discriminated against for too long in a twisted interpretation of the word of God.

I HAVE been a practising Christian all my life and a deacon and Bible teacher for many years. My faith is a source of strength and comfort to me, as religious beliefs are to hundreds of millions of people around the world. So my decision to sever my ties with the Southern Baptist Convention, after six decades, was painful and difficult. It was, however, an unavoidable decision when the convention's leaders, quoting a few carefully selected Bible verses and claiming that Eve was created second to Adam and was responsible for original sin, ordained that women must be "subservient" to their husbands and prohibited from serving as deacons, pastors or chaplains in the military service.

This view that women are somehow inferior to men is not restricted to one religion or belief. Women are prevented from playing a full and equal role in many faiths. Nor, tragically, does its influence stop at the walls of the church, mosque, synagogue or temple. This discrimination, unjustifiably attributed to a Higher Authority, has provided a reason or excuse for the deprivation of women's equal rights across the world for centuries.

At its most repugnant, the belief that women must be subjugated to the wishes of men excuses slavery, violence, forced prostitution, genital mutilation and national laws that omit rape as a crime. But it also costs many millions of girls and women control over their own bodies and lives, and continues to deny them fair access to education, health, employment and influence within their own communities.

The impact of these religious beliefs touches every aspect of our lives. They help explain why in many countries boys are educated before girls; why girls are told when and whom they must marry; and why many face enormous and unacceptable risks in pregnancy and childbirth because their basic health needs are not met.

In some Islamic nations, women are restricted in their movements, punished for permitting the exposure of an arm or ankle, deprived of education, prohibited from driving a car or competing with men for a job. If a woman is raped, she is often most severely punished as the guilty party in the crime.

The same discriminatory thinking lies behind the continuing gender gap in pay and why there are still so few women in office in the West. The root of this prejudice lies deep in our histories, but its impact is felt every day. It is not women and girls alone who suffer. It damages all of us. The evidence shows that investing in women and girls delivers major benefits for society. An educated woman has healthier children. She is more likely to send them to school. She earns more and invests what she earns in her family.

It is simply self-defeating for any community to discriminate against half its population. We need to challenge these self-serving and outdated attitudes and practices - as we are seeing in Iran where women are at the forefront of the battle for democracy and freedom.

I understand, however, why many political leaders can be reluctant about stepping into this minefield. Religion, and tradition, are powerful and sensitive areas to challenge. But my fellow Elders and I, who come from many faiths and backgrounds, no longer need to worry about winning votes or avoiding controversy - and we are deeply committed to challenging injustice wherever we see it.

The Elders are an independent group of eminent global leaders, brought together by former South African president Nelson Mandela, who offer their influence and experience to support peace building, help address major causes of human suffering and promote the shared interests of humanity. We have decided to draw particular attention to the responsibility of religious and traditional leaders in ensuring equality and human rights and have recently published a statement that declares: "The justification of discrimination against women and girls on grounds of religion or tradition, as if it were prescribed by a Higher Authority, is unacceptable."

We are calling on all leaders to challenge and change the harmful teachings and practices, no matter how ingrained, which justify discrimination against women. We ask, in particular, that leaders of all religions have the courage to acknowledge and emphasise the positive messages of dignity and equality that all the world's major faiths share.

The carefully selected verses found in the Holy Scriptures to justify the superiority of men owe more to time and place - and the determination of male leaders to hold onto their influence - than eternal truths. Similar biblical excerpts could be found to support the approval of slavery and the timid acquiescence to oppressive rulers.

I am also familiar with vivid descriptions in the same Scriptures in which women are revered as pre-eminent leaders. During the years of the early Christian church women served as deacons, priests, bishops, apostles, teachers and prophets. It wasn't until the fourth century that dominant Christian leaders, all men, twisted and distorted Holy Scriptures to perpetuate their ascendant positions within the religious hierarchy.

The truth is that male religious leaders have had - and still have - an option to interpret holy teachings either to exalt or subjugate women. They have, for their own selfish ends, overwhelmingly chosen the latter. Their continuing choice provides the foundation or justification for much of the pervasive persecution and abuse of women throughout the world. This is in clear violation not just of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights but also the teachings of Jesus Christ, the Apostle Paul, Moses and the prophets, Muhammad, and founders of other great religions - all of whom have called for proper and equitable treatment of all the children of God. It is time we had the courage to challenge these views.

OBSERVER

Jimmy Carter was president of the United States from 1977 to 1981.

this fills my heart today...

2009-07-24T09:45:00.001-04:00

lyrics:
Pray to God you can cope
I stand outside
This woman's work
This woman's world
Oooh, it's hard on the man
Now his part is over
Now starts the craft of the father

I know you have a little life in you yet
I know you have a lot of strength left
I know you have a little life in you yet
I know you have a lot of strength left

I should be crying but I just can't let it show
I should be hoping but I can't stop thinking
All the things I should've said that I never said
All the things we should of done that we never did
All the things I should've given but I didn't

Oh darling make it go
Make it go away
Give me them back to me
Give that little kiss
Give me your hand

I know you have a little life in you yet
I know you have a little strength left
I know you have a little life in you yet
I know you have a little strength left

I should be crying but I just can't let it show
I should be hoping but I can't stop thinking
Of all the things we should've said that were never said
All the things we should've done that we never did
All the things that you needed from me
All the things that that you wanted from me
All the things I should of given but I didn't
Oh darling make it go away
Just make it go away now

living life left-handed

2009-07-21T14:07:00.009-04:00

i was in a car accident last week. no, it wasn't my fault, and this very nice woman rear-ended me when i was at a dead standstill.

this is my first injury-sustaining, attorney consulting, my car will be in the shop for longer than two days accident. i'm feeling a bit traumatized.
the first thing i'm traumatized about is my loss of bumper stickers. no, seriously. when the collision and repair guy told me that due to the damage to my rear lift gate (i drive a 2003 Honda Pilot), that they would have to replace the lift gate, and 'i'm sorry, but you're going to lose your bumper stickers.' as if i wasn't crying enough already, well that just pushed me over the edge.

my bumper stickers were placed on my car, post divorce, and were there as an act of independence and defiance for me. my spiritual beliefs are not mainstream, as i am what my friend Rhi calls a 'moon sister'. i don't want to be so shallow as to say that my bumper stickers define who i am, but they are definitely a mark of 'hey, coming through.' one of the first things i'm doing when i get my car out of the shop is replacing my bumper stickers. heck, i may even add a few more.

the second thing i'm traumatized about is that i'm actually injured, and typing this with my left hand. after 3 trips to the emergency room last week, it was determined that i have a bulging disc in my neck, in between C3 and C4.
this is causing a particularly interesting condition called cervical radiculopathy. all of these catchy phrases and terms mean that basically i have a really, really bad pain in my neck, and from that, my right shoulder, arm, elbow, wrist and hand are alternatively numb, tingling, tired, weak and painful. Yay, me!

i'm really trying to be a good sport about all of this and take it in stride, but it's really difficult. never having had anywhere close to a chronic pain filled condition, this hurting all the time thing is very, very frustrating. i've striving to remain hopeful and positive. i'm also getting new lessons everyday in how to do things left-handed, as my right hand is basically ineffectual. i'm typing this post left-handed, actually, and even though it's taken me nearly an hour to do it, i'm very happy that i am able to write it.

i am missing certain things though, like being able to pick up my children (i was told no lifting over 10 lbs). like crocheting, which for me is a sort of active mind meditation (and, i have one sock complete. the pair is ready to be finished.) i also can't paint, or write with a pencil and paper (i've always loved the tactile sensation of writing with a pencil and paper.) i'm having some difficulty staying at work and sitting at my desk, as the discomfort it causes, is, well, uncomfortable. the doctor's are making small noises about short-term disability, but for the time being, i'm not listening and just making an attempt to adapt.

on a very happy note, i found these lovely notes of affirmation at Kind Over Matter.

i have lots and lots of lovely ideas of what to do with them, but i may have to employ my dear hubby to cut them all out for me, as i know that is something i'm not even going to attempt to do left handed. what wonderful and amazing thoughts to create and share with the world! to the very talented ladies at Kind Over Matter, kudos!

Altar candles

2009-07-19T17:19:00.001-04:00

Forgiveness Friday

2009-07-17T06:44:00.005-04:00

i believe very strongly in grace, gratitude, and forgiveness. i think that carrying around darkness or very strong ill feelings in your heart towards others is just not good for you... that, and it strong messes with your ki, your chi, and whatever form of energy flow you happen to believe in.

so, i think that Friday is a good day, for me anyway, to forgive a few big things, or even the few little things that have led me away from my bliss this week.

1. to the check-in girl at the orthopedic office who was stoic in making every attempt to NOT help me yesterday.... you're young, pregnant, and just following the company line...i forgive you.

2. to my mother, who, no matter how much we can be at each others throats on any given day, is immediately there and available at the first sense she may be needed... i forgive you for always being so negative about things in my life of which you don't approve.

3. to my friend, who, during my most recent crisis, has been notably absent. i forgive you.

4. to myself... i'm way too hard on you, never really giving you an opportunity to either rest or, well do anything. i know nothing you ever do is good enough. i forgive you.

gift from Neruda

2009-07-16T07:05:00.004-04:00

I do not love you as if you were salt-rose or topaz,
or the arrow of carnations the fire shoots off.
I love you as certain things are to be loved,
in secret, between the shadow and the soul.

I love you as the plant that never blooms,
but carries in itself the light of hidden flowers.
Thanks to your love a certain fragrance,
risen darkly from the earth, lives darkly in my body.

I love you without knowing how, or when, or from where,
I love you straightforwardly, without complexities or pride,
so I love you because I know no other way than this:
where "I" does not exist, nor "you,"
So close that your hand on my chest is my hand,
So close that your eyes close and I fall asleep.

-Pablo Neruda

Isabel Allende

2009-07-15T15:16:00.001-04:00

stuck at home... again

2009-07-15T13:00:00.002-04:00

i've been running in such an overwrought fashion lately, with work, with family, with just myself, it seems that the Universe has found a way to make me slow down and just be.

send me the gift of a car accident (not my fault), and injure my right hand, so that i can't do anything but sit, and maybe read a little.

i am right-handed, so given the amount of pain and discomfort i have when i use my right hand, i, quite literally, can do not a damn thing while i'm recuperating. i'm even having trouble preparing food while my husband isn't here.

normally, when i have down time, i will paint, or fiddle in the garden, or crochet, and right now, it's uncomfortable to even hold a book, much less do anything else.

so, here i sit, doing nothing. i'm even typing this with my left hand, and it's taking me a fairly long time to hunt and peck with my inferior hand.

quite honestly, i feel like i'm about to just jump right out of my skin. i'm always doing something, finding some way to do something. even when i'm relaxing, my hands are busy.

it seems that the Goddess will handle those things for you that you can't seem to find a way to handle yourself.

a lot of different things that have been going on lately have put me in a spiritual funk, if you will. not necessarily a crisis of faith, but a frustrating cycle of what does all this crap mean? what is going on? did i do something wrong? what is this the karmic retribution for? all of that has been swirling around in my head for weeks now. and then yesterday, i had to take my car into a collision and repair center...

while i was there, i met two very different and very interesting people. the first was a hindu gentleman who studies hindi mysticysm. given that my patroness is Kali-Ma, i enjoyed every minute of the conversation with Mahesh. he offered insight into things i knew of, but told me more and encouraged me to study a little deeper with a little more diligence. the next gentlemen was a hermetic qaballist, and while i don't completely understand all of their beliefs and practices, it was an interesting conversation.

nonetheless, i distinctly felt like it was the universe's way of telling me to not give up, and to not let my current strife wear down my spirituality.

lysol

2009-07-12T16:30:00.000-04:00

Recently, my buddy and I were discussing the benefits of Lysol and its germ killing capabilities during our mundane work day. I don’t use chemical cleaners anymore, and while I’m not positive, I don’t think they do at his house either. But, a mutual friend of ours has had a really long run of incredibly sick kids and now buys Lysol by the vat. My buddy posited (jokingly) that perhaps their children are allergic to Lysol.

Whilst we were chatting (via IM) about this, he googled, well, I’m not sure exactly what phrase he googled, but he came up with this:

Apparently, Lysol was once heralded as a douche.

I’m gonna let that sink in for a moment.

Lysol, the disinfectant spray and cleaner, was once heralded as a feminine hygiene product.

Getthefarkouttahere…. WHAT?

As I sat absolutely slack-jawed at my desk, thinking he’s pulling my leg, he sends yet another interesting piece of anecdotal information.

From wikipedia: In the US, from around 1930 to 1960, vaginal douching with a Lysol disinfectant solution was the most popular form of birth control.[9] US marketing ads printed testimonials from European "doctors" touting its safety and effectiveness. The American Medical Association later investigated these claims. They were unable to locate the cited "experts" and found that Lysol was not effective as a contraceptive.[9]

I’m sorry… WHAT?

Lysol was a popular form of … birth control?

How is it that, (forget possible) plausible?

My brain is literally stuttering as I type this, trying to wrap thought processes around this. It seems absolutely asinine and ludicrous that we, as women, would do this to ourselves, until someone made us stop (ie, the AMA stating that it wasn’t ‘effective as a contraceptive’). Forget that the chemical make-up could probably do some not too nice things to your innermost female workings, but it just wasn’t effective enough as a contraceptive.

Where did our respect for our bodies disappear to? Is this the kind of thinking that has led to the twisting of some of our young minds today? Did our maternal lineage feel so alienated from their womanly selves and so angered, (so threatened!) with their feminine wound that they felt it ok to do such potential damage to themselves? And by correlation, they passed that feminine wound onto each subsequent generation, until it reached us, and in some cases, our daughters.

The idea of the feminine wound is not a new one. As a grown woman, I realized I felt it, hell; I fed it, my entire life. My whole being was centered on being as good as the guys. It was only as an adult that I realized this was society’s problem, not mine. I read Sue Monk Kidd’s “The Dance of the Dissident Daughter”, the first weekend I spent alone after separating from my (now) ex-husband. This book is easily my favorite and most read book, full of underscores, highlighter marks and dog-eared pages. I push it onto any one who might be interested in reading it. All who have read it come away touched in some way (even the guys). In her book, she discusses at great length, the feminine wound and how it affected her. As I read, I cried, because I realized how much of it touched me, and how I had mothered my children (to that point).

The feminine wound is when we, as woman, feel inadequate, just because we are women. We feel lacking and decidedly less than, because we were not born male. It’s why countless women feel compelled to apologize for giving birth to daughters, not sons (as recounted in the first person, by Christiane Northrup in ‘Women’s Bodies, Women’s Wisdom’) . Instead of being the best we can personally be, we strive to do it better than the boys. Because, of course, how the boys do it is the only measuring stick that has ever mattered.

But does the depth of that female wound mean that we have to deny who and what we really are, just to satisfy centuries of programming so deep it feels nearly genetic? At what point do we realize that the feminist agenda of our mother’s and grandmother’s may not be entirely on track with our beliefs, but it is much closer than denying our womanhood completely.

One of our first mistakes is trying to be all things to all people, and never being all we can be for ourselves. Believing in the ‘you can have it all’ propaganda has destroyed the womanhood of a generation of women. Yes, maybe we can, but do we really want it all? At what cost does having it all come? Countless women have had the corporate success, only to have familial issues at home because they spend so much time at work. Or, their work is considered mediocre, because they have to care for familial needs.

There is so much damage impressed upon us by ourselves. We beat ourselves up if the cupcakes for Johnny’s class party were purchased at the bakery and not homemade, like the ones that Susie’s mom brought. We have eternal debates over what is better for the child, a stay at home mom, or a mom that works, yet we never ask what is right for the mother. I always find it interesting and sometimes comical that once we become mothers, the life of the mother is then seemingly forfeit. The feelings, the yearnings, the desires, the goals, it all no longer matters. How does taking goals and dreams and desires away to be able to make the right kind of cupcakes make a mother whole and better capable of parenting our next generation of conscientious and contributing adults?

How much of our feminine right is sacrificed at the altar of twisted societal norms?

Women have strength and power and intelligence and natural born intuition. Too often, we stifle all those things so that we can go along to get along. I know I was guilty of that for the majority of my life. I think a lot of us did. For hundreds, if not a thousand, years, women have been disconnected from the true strength of their feminine life. They were led to believe that the very nature of just being a woman made them weak, thereby susceptible to less than virtuous behavior and generally treated as though we were less than intelligent, but a slight step above chattel. Historical and sociological studies prove this time and time again. Our own actions validate those studies on a daily basis.

I’m not stating that things don’t have to be done, that there no obligations we have to meet, but I’m suggesting maybe we choose them with a little more care. Decide what it is that you want from your life, and adjust your involvement and commitments from there. Yes, we all want to raise thoughtful, intelligent, productive, loving, nurturing children, but when they are grown, you are then left with your self and hopefully a life partner. Doesn’t it make sense that you continue to nurture yourself and your own inner growth chart, while nurturing theirs? I firmly believe that ‘empty nest syndrome’ comes from mothers not mothering themselves enough, and feel empty as women when the children are grown. They’ve lost themselves, going into a nurturing debt, if you will, to take care of everyone but themselves.

If you can’t walk away from obligations completely, cut back. If you find your child’s calendar is fuller than yours, most definitely cut back. Experience their childhood with them, not just be the chauffeur for their social and activity calendar. Take long walks, take art classes with them, or just finger paint on the dining room table. If you really don’t want to be team mom this year for (insert sport here), don’t. Taking license with one of my favorite Richard Bach quotes, ‘Argue your limitations (and obligations) and sure enough, they are yours.’ The point I’m trying to make is this… know and honor you. If you feel overtaxed and over committed, you probably are. Take, no make, the time to find your feminine wound and allow it to heal.

You are a beautiful, magnificent, powerful woman.

Trust yourself.

Do what feels good, laugh more, smile more, and for Goddess sake, put away the Lysol.

(Oh, and for the record, I throw and run like a girl and am damn proud of it.)

upstream or downstream?

2009-07-12T16:29:00.002-04:00

I’ve reached a point in my life where I realize, with a certain level of practiced detachment, that I have no control.

Let me clarify.I have no control over anyone but myself.Of course, you say, we all know that.We all know that none of us have any control over anyone but ourselves.And to that I’d say, well yes, you, we, are all consciously aware of it, but how many of us actually know it?

Not too many.

For those of you who are familiar with my blog, you are aware, more or less, with the journey that I’ve been on for the last several years.My life has been a series of lessons, of trials and tribulations if you will, through which I believe the universe has been guiding me ever closer to the source of my purpose.

Part of that journey has been a series of releases.Release. Letting go. Pruning.Call it what you will, but it’s been an ongoing process of studying and surveying what is important and why it is important.Getting to the bottom of what really matters and why.And in getting to the bottom of what is truly and essentially important in my life and leaving the superfluous by the wayside.

In the process of survey, question and release, there are items that come to the forefront that require additional thought and processing.This ‘should’ be important by society’s standards, but isn’t important to me… why?Why do I allow this person or this situation to continually vex me?What part in that continued frustration do I allow myself to, either consciously or subconsciously, play?

At what point is it okay to let go of anything that isn’t beneficial or fulfilling?How brave or courageous do we have to be to not only let go of those issues, but also of other people’s expectations of us in any given scenario?

How hard is it to relinquish the control that others attempt to have over us and be our authentic selves?

Buddhists have a philosophy/theory that Westerners refer to as practiced detachment.While going through my divorce, I became quite the student of practiced detachment, as it allowed me to deal with my now ex-husband without completely losing my mind.In the process of learning to cope with him on my own, through detachment, I also found a strong well of compassion for him, and for myself.I began to see how little control I had over anything outside of my own physical body and mind, and how much control he was trying to exert over our small situation.

You might ask how detachment and compassion can even be related.I certainly did.How can I feel compassion for this man who could make me cry with one glance, and yet, after much practice, detach myself from situations involving him in an instant, allowing me to think rationally and calmly?Doesn’t detachment infer some level of lack of compassion?No.Not at all.Studied detachment, which differs greatly from aloofness, allows you to take a step back, so to speak, to look at the situation/person/whatever, without emotional/mental issues that can cloud the judgment: possessiveness, defensiveness, jealousy, and passive aggressive behaviors, just to name a few.

What I began to see was that nothing I could ever do would have any effect on this man.

I had no control.

It was an earth-shattering revelation for me.Whaddya mean I have no control?I’m intelligent, witty and can argue anything with anyone.Yes, that’s all fine and good, but I still have no control.Nothing I do, NOTHING I could ever do, in attempting to control this man, or this situation, will ever work.

It was maddening, frightening, and yet utterly and completely liberating.

I sat back and pondered, why was I arguing to win?Win what? The marriage was already over; there was no value to proving a point other than fighting to be right.But…at what cost did I want to be right?

So, I stopped trying to swim upstream. What does that mean?I didn’t know at the time, I just knew that I didn’t want to fight anymore.I didn’t want to feel anger and resentment and hostility, towards anyone.I had had enough.Just because I knew I could be right, didn’t mean that I should be right, or that being right was worth the cost I had to pay.I was bone-weary of feeling what I thought was righteous and justifiable anger and resentment, but then feeling beat all to hell and back after proving my point of being right.

The only person I had control over was myself, and I made the conscious choice to not continue to swim upstream.Please don’t misunderstand, there were other control issues in my life.For the majority of my life, I lived life on someone else’s terms, living up to other’s expectations.When I started having these self-realizations about compassion and control and detachment and a million other things, I truly started seeing everyone, everything in my life in a different light. Others would try and tell me what they felt I was doing wrong, based on societal views, or lifelong views or their own personal expectations of me.

Quite simply, I didn’t want to hear it anymore.

It took a long time for me to both consciously understand and realize that I can be my highest, best self, and do it the way that I want to do it.I don’t have to follow anyone else’s conventions or theories to get there.I have to be still and listen.In the silence that follows, I have to actually hear my heart.In actually listening to my heart speak, I have to allow my intuition room to breathe and react and l have to listen to it as well.

For me, right now, in this moment, it’s all about not swimming upstream anymore.There’s a larger, metaphysical lesson I could go into here about vibrational energy and the laws of attraction and source energy, but I won’t.You can learn more about vibrational source energy and the laws of attraction, here.( I will briefly add this disclaimer.. it you are new to metaphysics, this all could sound a little weird, but if you give it a chance, it will probably make sense to you). Short version is this, when you consciously want something, when you positively affirm it in your continued thoughts on the subject, the universe/source energy hears you. When it hears you, it begins to actively work to give to you that which you want most.However, more often than not, we are the largest impediment to getting to where we want to be.We, most of us anyway, live life on someone else’s terms. We fight, upstream, to get where we are ‘supposed’ to go. To where other’s have told us we are meant to be.

Have you ever felt unhappy or beat up, or wondering why you are doing what you’re doing?Wondering to what end you continue to trudge in what has become the daily direction of your life?That’s what swimming upstream feels like.

When I stopped fighting upstream, against my natural current, I didn’t do anything drastic.I didn’t start immediately swimming downstream.I just let go of the fight.I relinquished control over those things/people/situations I can’t control, namely, everything and everyone outside of my physical mind/body.I still go to work, but I don’t stress over the people and situations that use to drive me batty. I still pay my bills, but I don’t stress over what I can’t pay.I can only do what I can do. I still parent my children, but I also am aware that, especially for my older kids, their path is their own.Outside of a guiding hand and love and compassion, they are on their own journey and as such, are out of my control.

What I’m finding, as I am guided downstream, is that life is easier.I’m living a more gentle life and as such, I’m happier.Life isn’t such a fight all the time.I’m being guided, when I listen, towards those things that truly make my heart and my soul, sing.I’m more in my element and able to stay a step removed from drama and doubt and worry. I see it, I acknowledge those situations for what they are, but I do my best to not consciously engage in the drama and the doubt and the worry.Why? Because I have no control over any of it, outside of my own self and my own actions. I can only control my responses to any given stimuli.

I’m still not actively swimming downstream. I’m going with the flow, if you will. I let go.And my life is still moving along at a fairly rapid pace, only this time, it’s moving more in the direction of my vibrational energy.As such, I get through my days feeling a hell of a lot less beat up.

And you know what?It feels kinda good to have no control…

standing in the rain

2009-07-12T16:29:00.001-04:00

it’s raining today. and it’s chilly. but i don’t mind. i have the door to my screened porch open, and i’m sitting in my kitchen, writing this. i can hear the rain falling on the roof. the soft sounds of it hitting leaves and branches and falling on the earth. i have the sound of benedictine monks chanting, coming from my beloved iTunes. i have a mug of green tea, with plenty of agave and lemon, and i couldn’t be happier.

the love of my life is here, my kids are asleep, i have a roof over my head, food in the fridge, a job, and people who love and care for me. i have people i love and care for.

i am grateful.

i am humbled.

i am alive.

i was outside this morning, before the dawn, standing barefoot in the rain. i could feel the Mother’s touch in every drop. Her blessing and restoration pouring over me. the cold, wet earth beneath my feet was soggy, and soft, giving way with every step.

i am grateful.

i am humbled.

i am alive.

as i stood underneath the great oak tree in my back yard, in the rain, in his arms, under the darkness of the new moon, it felt very much a sacred space. not to be intruded upon by the likes of mere reality. his eyes, staring at me in a way that makes my knees go weak and my heart beat a little faster. his hand, that hold me up when i’m most weak. this soul, intertwined with mine...

i am grateful.

i am humbled.

i am alive.

there aren’t sufficient words, not in my vocabulary, to describe today. things are slowly beginning to come full circle. there is a peace and a hope that haven’t been there for a while. in the words of Ellie Arroway...’Some celestial event. No - no words. No words to describe it. Poetry! They should've sent a poet. So beautiful. So beautiful... I had no idea. ‘

i am grateful.

i am humbled.

i am alive.

courage and letting go

2009-07-12T16:28:00.001-04:00

give me the courage to love with an open heart...i want to love with an open heart...

~indie arie – Testimony

16 years ago, standing in front of a high school, waiting, there was a brief conversation. It was a Beta Club meeting, or something like that, a chance encounter, nothing more. He was bound for West Point, always in a uniform, and she was ever the cheerleader, bound for college and sorority life. They didn’t travel in the same social circles.

He never finished West Point. She didn’t finish college (well, the first time). Life took them both in unintended directions.

But the conversation was remembered.

Fast foward 16 years. An email or two (Thank you Facebook) turns into ‘Can i have your number?’.

The first call, lasting nearly 3 hours, turns into a nightly routine. There are no boundaries, no limitations, nothing but freedom and joy... and laughter.

there was a rush decision to meet.. to see if the spark felt over the phone was really real. (Cause it really felt that surreal, as thought the faintest whiff of reality would take it all away.).

As soon as their eyes met, they both knew. An electric surge that intense couldn’t be anything other than real. His south to her north. Even now, she feels the flutter in her chest, remembering the intensity of his gaze.

From the very first time i rest my eyes on you, boy, my heart said ‘ follow through’.

~Annie Lennox

Vowing to take it day by day, to over come the distance and the obstacles, they part. Painfully, excruciatingly, as though the soul connection they felt was being ripped by the very fibers making it up.

The next week passes more slowly than any in history, as they both wait for the time when they can see each other again. He’s up before the sun, driving to her. She’s up early in anticipation of his arrival. The day is their’s and never are they more than arm’s length apart. Laughter, and deep conversation, Indian food, coffee, and a museum. Her arm in the crook of his elbow, as though he’s escorting her, they walk through the museum. His free hand covers her hand on his elbow, and staring into her eyes, he speaks of neverending devotion, love, and a life together.

He speaks of planting a seed that will become their life, growing as an oak tree would. An oak tree that in time will provide them shade to sit under, and, in the joy of their years together, a remembrance of their life, surrounded by their children and grandchildren.

In truth, he says it best when he says nothing at all. She knows, just from the intensity of his stare... the way his eyes can look into hers and never waiver... the pounding of his heart that she can feel when they are close... the way his hand tightly closes around hers when he speaks.

Parting was still as painful as before. But, there’s some solace behind it, as they now have each other. This ... this is real. This is the stuff fairy tales are made of.

He bears it better than she does, the distance between them, as he’s the strong one.

He’s the strong one.

Wow. She’s always had to be the strong one. This is new, and to a degree, she doesn’t quite know how to deal with it. When you’re used to carrying the weight of the world, and when most of the people in your life happily let you do it, how do you willingly let that burden pass to someone else?How do you allow someone to share in that weight?

How hard is it to just let go? How much courage must she have to allow this wonderful man into her life, letting him be the man in her life? He truly can be the stereotypical tough/tender man, when he needs to be. The burning question to her is this:

Can she... will she let him?

Never having been one to stand on typical gender roles, she’s not afraid of opening her own doors and doesn’t expect any man to stand when she enters a room. But he does both. Of his own accord. Without being sarcastic about it. He truly, genuinely respects her enough and is that much of a southern gentleman.

She can’t help but wait for the other shoe to drop. No, he’s not perfect. There are many obstacles to overcome, on both sides of the equation. At the root of all, he’s honest, and real, and solid. The rest of the games and issues and problems that have existed in the past, just aren’t there anymore.

The differences are many, but so are the similarities. Even the differences find similar truths, at their root. Their expressions are the same, their thought processes similar. The silence, when there is silence, is perhaps the most comfortable silence she’s ever felt.

She questions her courage, to love him, just as he is. Just as he loves her. Letting go of her fear of being hurt, letting go of the past and the past hurts is proving difficult for her. She finds herself taking many, many deep breaths every day, meditating more and more just to find that calm center. Just being, well, that just became a helluva lot more difficult.

Does she have the courage to not question? Does she have the courage to just accept?

Her day runs at 90 miles an hour, every day. She’s a fixer, a problem solver. Give her the problem and often she’ll give you the solution, whether you want it or not. Now she has a problem that only time can fix. She has to let go of her fear, of her pain, of her resolution to never let another man hold sway on her heart. She’s so tired of hanging onto every day, of having to dig ever deeper into that seemingly bottomless fountain of resolve that she has to dig into every day. She’s so afraid to let go of hope and just believe, convinced her heart can’t handle another breaking.

His pace is much slower, taking each step as it comes. Savoring the moments as they are, thankful for each and every one. He’s patient, and thoughtful.. steady.

Her logical mind tries to desperately reign in her heart... but it’s already gone.

And therein lies the issue. When the heart knows the truth, how do you convince the mind that all is well? That there is nothing to fear?

Her subconscious screams that patience is the way. Her heart already knows what her mind needs to wrap itself around. This is real. This isn’t going to go away.

If he hurts her.. he’ll make it right. She has no doubt of that.

The tears on her pillow are now from laughter, brought on by late night conversations, twisted inside jokes, or joy.

The distance between them will not always be there. Her mantra of late is that distance is a temporary variable.

Slowly, she’s starting to realize that maybe the other shoe isn’t going to drop, because both feet are already firmly planted on the ground.

a eulogy i wish i could write

2009-07-12T16:27:00.001-04:00

i’m going to be rather quiet this week. my grandmother died.

no, it’s okay. i’m sad, but not cripplingly so. before you think ill of me, let me explain.

my grandmother was not an easy woman to love. she married and divorced multiple times. she complained about everything under the sun. she was not, by modern standards, a good mother. if my dad was around, i’d tell you to ask him. whenever she called our home, when i was a child, he was always ‘busy’, so as to never have to talk to her.

she was gossipy, and judgemental, and downright crotchety at times.

she was grandma.

and now she’s gone.

if i’m painfully honest, i haven’t spoken to her in over 2 years. we had a falling out over her rendition of my father’s passing; her idea that the pain she felt was the only pain that existed. that some how, everyone else’s pain was negated by hers. i don’t stomach melodrama well, even my own, and certainly not anyone else’s. so, i just stopped talking to her, rather than hurt her feelings.

i realized today when my mother called to tell me, that she didn’t even know i was now divorced. well, at least she’d not heard it from me.

and that thought made me very, very sad.

i know better than this. even if she was so lost in her own heartbreak and sorrow, and regrets in her life that she couldn’t see past any of it, i could. and i didn’t.

it was easier to NOT say anything, to just let the sore fester and slap a bandage on it, pretending it healed. it was easier to take the disapproving lecture from my great aunt when she realized i hadn’t spoken to grandma in ‘how long????’, than to pick up the phone and call. to hear my step-grandfather’s disapproving tone on the other end of the line, simply because it had been so long since the last time i called.

and now it doesn’t matter.

i can tell you of endless summers on james island, just outside of charleston. i can tell you of learning to surf on folly beach, and the guy, ‘Buddha’, who made my first surfboard. i can tell you of learning to swim in grandma’s pool. i can tell you of the horror of hurricane hugo. and the horror of her cooking. she had a baby grand piano, and couldn’t play it, but damn it looked nice in her living room.

i can recount endless tales she told of growing up poor in southern georgia, and watching her dance around memaw and big papa’s house at the holidays. i can tell you how she taught me how to play canasta, and how she couldn’t stand the catawba worms my big papa ‘grew’ for bait in the back yard. i can tell you of hours spent watching her put on jewelry, and playing in her jewelry box.

i can tell you of endless hospital visits, never knowing when that would be the last visit. i can tell you of pill cases and bottles and medicine reminders. i can tell you of worry and pain and sorrow.

but i can also tell you that i know nothing of her as a woman. not as i know the other women in my life. i don’t know why she married and remarried as often as she did. i don’t know about her deepest, truest love. i don’t know her favorite color. or her favorite scent, or if her horribly fat ill-mannered dogs are still around.

there are so many things that i don’t know, or have forgotten.

and now i’ll never get the chance.

no, she wasn’t my favorite person in the last few years. but now i’ll never get the chance to say all the things i wanted to say to her, to tell her. that no, grandma, i don’t have to marry a doctor or a lawyer to be successful. to tell her, that i understand, i think, her pain.

i’ll never be able to write the eulogy for her that i always wanted to.

and that breaks my heart.

can you make your bewbs stop looking at my eyes?

2009-07-12T16:25:00.002-04:00

i have to rant about this, it’s driving me crazy.

I am a woman of some physical substance, i’ll freely admit to that. but in that vein, i’m also very (very) curvy.

very.

which is all fine and good. i’m beginning to learn to enjoy my womanly virtues, yes, even at my size, they can be considered virtues, while still working on improving my health.

i’ll even admit to owning a few bewb shirts, as they were so eloquently called in ‘must love dogs’.

but damn, really, just because i’m wearing one (aforementioned bewb shirt), does NOT give you the right to spend our entire conversation with your eyes bolted to my decolletage.

i find that this happens in conversations at work, at kids sporting events, anywhere where i’m wearing anything other than a t-shirt.

i’ve just about had enough. i spent an entire meeting today with two sets of eyes rapidly flitting just below the horizon and back again. a few weeks ago, my new boss came to my desk and while i was sitting and he was standing, the entire farging conversation was spent with me vacilating between, ‘do i laugh at his obvious staring’ and ‘ ohmigawd, i can’t believe he’s so openly doing that’. i wimped out and didn’t say anything, feeling all the more sleezy. before i go on, let me just clarify that this very obviously just isn’t about me. how many of us have had to watch your conversational counterparts eyes drift downward and stop, ever so delicately 6 inches below your neck, and then very rapidly move back to your eyes, only to act as though nothing happened. you can be honest, i know it’s happened to you, too. I have a very, very cute co-worker who can be downright sexy when she wants to be. she is also incredibly, fantabulously good at her job. but you can see the eyes of other co-workers looking her up and down when she walks by. it’s damn near infuriating, to me anyway.

why do guys think that this is ok? worse even, why do they think we are so dense that we either can’t see it or won’t say anything? (well, i didn’t say anything, but you get my point, right?)as brave as I pretend to be, I can’t even begin to imagine what to actually say to a co-worker or an acquaintance ogling the goodies. (if you have suggestions, lemme know, puhlease.)

really. do you think we can’t see that? honestly? like all women haven’t had to spend their lives dealing with being objectified to the point that we all recognize that look when we see it. and boys, yes, we do see it. we do, in fact, notice when you start mouth breathing, go all slack-jawed and the vacuous stare encroaches upon your whole face, nay, your entire being. shocking, i know, but the small portion of our brains that can function independently of our bewbs can actually reason and... AND put 2 and 2 together.

::sigh::

part of me wants to say, seriously guys, i’ve nursed 5 kids. without a good bra, the girls head south for the winter.even in the summer. keep it moving, nothing to see here, nothing to see.

is the fascination with breasts so great that they can’t even stop staring, right in the face of the object of their pseudo-affection? at what point it is not okay to ogle a woman in public? at what point does the respect of a job well done replace the desire to barely contain the drool collecting at the corner of your lip?

don’t get me wrong, i don’t mind when someone respectfully admires me. i think the female form is incredibly beautiful. there’s an art to the way it moves. but please, please, for all that is sacred and holy in the world, it is NOT okay to gawk at any woman over coffee in the break room. at the very least, if you’re gonna gawk, please make an attempt at being artful and discreet.

at what point must we sacrifice femininity to protect the girls from the scandalous glances we may or may not receive depending on the day’s attire? is a burqa the new black? must we have sister mary francis approve our clothing and give us an 18-inch ruler for personal space measurements before we leave the house anymore? maybe i’m just missing the boat and it’s de rigueur to be openly transfixed by the sight of a woman’s bosom.

i’m seriously to the point of attempting to flex my seemingly alluring pectorals, one after the other, like bodybuilders do, the next time i catch someone’s gaze drifting south of my hazel peepers.

i want to be like her when i grow up

2009-07-12T16:25:00.001-04:00

Silence.

All I could think was that there shouldn’t be silence. Why is there silence? All you could hear the rustle and whisper of cloth as the people in the room made inadvertent movements.

Suddenly the room was filled with a chaotic flurry of movement and noise, but it still sounded like silence to me.

She wasn’t crying. If she wasn’t crying, that meant she wasn’t breathing. Oh God, help me, she’s not breathing.

I lay there, helpless, so scared I wasn’t breathing anymore. He stood there, torn, between staying with me, or going with her. I still remember his face, the sheer panic. We were so young, I was barely 20 and he’d be 22 soon. Kids. Scared kids.

I screamed so loudly at him, to go, to go to her, that I think I scared the midwife and nurses. And then he was gone. they were gone.

I remember sitting there, afraid to move to breath. I couldn’t pray hard enough or fast enough. I don’t remember rational thought.

i didn’t get to see her. to hold her.

This was 14 years ago today. Zoe was born and changed my life forever.

Her dad and I weren’t married when she was born. We were young and stupid, barely aware of who we were individually, much less as a couple. We’d only been dating a few months when I got pregnant. We moved in together, into a crummy little basement apartment in midtown Atlanta. It was before the Olympics and ensuing glut of reconstruction came to town. Meaning, broke college students could actually afford to live in midtown then. It was a one bedroom, with a kitchen barely big enough for the cockroaches. But it was ours.

We were both in the Greek system at school, and so on the night we finally went into labor, the waiting room was packed full to brimming with cigar smoking, whisky swilling frat boys, and giggly sorority girls. Actually, there were more frat guys there than sorority girls. The girls, by and large, stood in stoic judgment over me for getting pregnant, with more than one advising me to abort the baby. The frat boys.. well, they were just happy for us. Life was such a celebration to them, and to this day, every one of those men holds a special place in my heart. No child could be blessed with better uncles.

it was hours before they let me see her. they’re afraid she’s not gonna make it. my first glimpse of my first born was of a scrawny little baby, laying in an incubator, tubes and wires attached to her feet, her arms, down her throat and her nose. if he hadn’t been there holding me up, i would have collapsed. this is my child. God help me.

i was afraid to touch her. she looked so... fragile. it was surreal. she didn’t move. i still hadn’t heard her cry.

i finally screwed up the courage to sit down next to her and i touched her hand, and honey, momma’s here. her heart rate jumped. she moved. she’s alive. he and i stayed as long as they’d let us, eventually shooing us out so that she could rest.

overnight, she pulled out her own oxygen line, and she never looked back. 8 days and one heart monitor later, they let her go home.

she’s 14 now, and the oldest of 5 kids. after leaving the hospital that day, she’s never been back. (knock on wood), she’s never needed stitches or surgeries, and just got her first ear infection this past summer. she’s got a pain tolerance that would make most grown men wither.

(the long haired one on top is her... look at her biceps!!!)

the child is fearless. no, really. not in a reckless kinda way, but fearless as in nothing, and i mean NOTHING ever holds her back. she, quite literally, lives life at full speed and never apologizes for who she is.

she never meets a stranger and has friends far and wide. she excels at making you comfortable the minute you meet her. her laugh is infectious. it’s loud, and sometimes a little obnoxious (especially at midnight when you’re ‘bout ready to crash and she’s just gearing up), but it’s deep and full and hearty. and real.

she’ll tell you straight off that’s she’s a member of the nerd herd (her words, not mine). she’d rather be smart than popular, but she’s both. things just come to her. hell, 4 years ago while i was working on statistics homework, she came by and said, ‘oh, the answer is blah de blah.’ and damned if she wasn’t right. she loves her friends deeply and her family intensely.

she’s strong in ways i could never imagine at 14. carries herself with an honest way, but sees the world more for what it is than i ever could, up until a few years ago. she has grace and (thinks) she has style. she’s into skinny jeans and converse and gawd help me, she has an affinity for a purple lace glove, only one hand. and she’s starting to garner second glances.

i want her to grow up wise, not naive, but not too fast. i’m not naive enough myself to think that in this day and age she’s going to make it through high school without experiencing things, but i don’t want it to happen too soon, or too fast. she wants to go to Stanford, and i don’t want to send her away, into the big wide world too innocent. there are too many wolves out there that will eat her up. ‘and then the lion fell in love with the lamb’ is a nice story, but we all know the lion usually eats the lamb.

she’s an athlete, a state and national champion in wrestling and she practices ju jitsu and muay thai. she plays soccer, as well. she has Olympic aspirations in wrestling (which scares the hell out of me, but makes me incredibly proud at the same time). her dad works out with her in the garage, and i swear when she and i are playing around and she locks up with me, it hurts. i’ve seen stars more than once and she’s still laughing. off the mat, she’s as clumsy as they come, but on the mat, when she’s practicing or competing, she moves with the grace of a prima ballerina. (and i swear, if she read that comparison, i’d be dead).

she plays the violin, and the piano, and is learning the guitar. she makes jewelry. real, honest-to-gawd chandellier earrings that i wear everyday. she reads voraciously and can even cook, almost better than me (which granted, isn’t saying a whole lot).

(she doctored this image)

she’s my friend. and no, i’m not the kind of parent that wants to be friends with her kids. i do believe in that particular separation of church and state. but in the last year or so, i find that i like her as a person... a lot. we sit up late, when everyone else is in bed, watching sappy chick flicks, laughing and crying together. i taught her to crochet, and she’s teaching me to knit. she helps with the math homework that i can’t do. she enjoys a medium rare thick cut steak, but weeps at the sight of needless and disrespectful taxidermy. she’s an anachronism and a juxtaposition rolled into a cream puff.

i remember when her dad and i were separated, the weekend that i decided the kids and i had to move what she did for me. he had moved out, albeit temporarily, and was threatening to come home. i was at an orchestra competition with her, and my mom was at home with the rest of the kids, when i got the call from dad. waiting for a break in rehearsal, i told her what was going on and that i was going home so i could send her grandmother back up to be with her. i needed to figure out what was going on. she started to leave with me, saying she needed to be with me. i made her go back inside to finish the day. when she got home that evening with my mother, and i had already found the house and signed the papers. she took one look at the paper work and said, ‘where are the boxes?’, and set about packing. i swear to you, i packed my bedroom. she did most of the rest of it. wouldn’t let me touch a damn thing. maybe the fact that i could barely contain my tears had something to do with it, but nonetheless, it’s indicative of her strength.

she has the spirit of a warrior, this one. i don’t know why she chose to be be born to me and her father, when arguably, we have more to learn from her than we could ever teach her.

she’s my light, my heart. my angel in black converse. my ferocious kitten.

grace and gratitude

2009-07-12T16:24:00.001-04:00

i read a blog last week that has stayed with me since reading it.
Swirly Girl’s Blog

it speaks of grace and gratitude and makes mention of the personifications of grace and gratitude.

there are several different definitions of grace, applicable in a multitude of scenarios.
the one that i feel particularly pulled to is:

a manifestation of favor

now, that favor doesn’t have to be granted by the Divine, it can come from another person. (although in some faith belief systems, we all carry the very nature of Divine love within us, so i guess that means it could come from the Divine... but i digress). grace can come from an unexpected smile, or a random act of kindness.
it could be a seemingly small act that reverberates through not only the person granted that grace, but through to the other’s affected by that grace.

grace, to me, also means wisdom. with wisdom, i think we are able to allow more grace to come into our lives, and by the same token, grant more grace to those we come into contact with. the fiery tempers of our youth can pass and the temperance of time and patience allow us to act more judiciously. to know where that junction of heart/mind/gut instinct resides within us, and to know when to follow that juncture through to its logical end.

i think that a lesson we sometimes either fail to learn, or fail to acknowledge is that grace can also mean knowledge. i’m thinking very specifically of the knowing one receives through time and experience; the knowing of what is truly important, and what isn’t.

grace can also be a countenance. if you carry yourself with grace, full of the knowledge and wisdom, and the ability to act in the manner of kindnesses that have been granted to you over time, you will notice a change in yourself. in finding that spirit of peace in that juncture of heart/mind/gut, when you’ve attuned yourself with yourself, there is just...

calm.

gratitude can be defined as:

the quality or feeling of being grateful or thankful

gratitude can be quiet, or it can be an all-encompassing soul wrenching affair. gratitude is just being thankful, something i know i don’t acknowledge nearly enough. being thankful for the dawn, being thankful for the simple things, being thankful for the grace that’s been shown me or others that i love.

we take so many things for granted in our day to day, not being thankful or even appreciative. more often than not, we are resentful of what’s not in our life, of what we’re missing, instead of having the grace to show our gratitude.

sometimes gratitude just needs to be verbalized. other times, it needs to be reciprocated. still others, exhibiting gratitude means acknowledging and learning a life lesson.

more often than not, grace and gratitude go hand in hand. we just need to find that juncture and join those hands.

a doorway

2009-07-12T16:23:00.001-04:00

I was at the beach last week, for thanksgiving.

I needed an escape, a sojourn for solitude.

I found it.

It was a beachfront hotel, with a room (and private balcony) facing the beach.As soon as I walked in, I dropped my bags and walked straight to the balcony, opening the door.The breeze immediately washed over me, the sound of the surf filled the room, and my ears, my heart, really, my very being.The seagulls squawking incessantly only added to nature’s narrative.

That door stayed open the entire time I was there.Even at night.My every moment was imbued with the sound of the pounding surf. Awake, asleep, there was always the surf. I only left the hotel property once, and that was because I ran out of Coke and beer. (don’t laugh).And even then, I ran to the corner store with the car windows and sunroof open, and had the surf with me the whole time. The sound of the surf was the physical reverberation of my spiritual side. Have you ever participated in guided meditation, with a drum in the background, helping you to focus on something other than your active mind? That is what this was like.The constant thrumming of the surf was ever present, ever ready to keep my mind focused on something other than active worries. Quieting and steady, the unending pattern of thump, whoosh, and then recession, thump, whoosh, recession, was a balm.

You might wonder why I had the door open the whole time.I’ve spent a lot of time pondering it on my return, as it wasn’t a conscious decision.I didn’t plan on going down there and leaving the door open for 4 days. On one level, it just felt right.the weather, outside of some rain on Saturday, was phenomenal and warm, so it hurt nothing to leave the door open.I went down with a cold and am attributing the balmy sea air with taking care of said cold before I returned back to Atlanta and the flurries (where of course, amongst cubicle hell and the office of sickos, I will pick up the first cousin my dearly departed cold within a few days).

On an unconscious level, I think it was about a physical manifestation of opening other doors, mental, emotional, physical, spiritual, and allowing things to both come in and leave. I’ve discussed, ad-nauseum, the issues with my life for the last couple of years.I’ll spare you the rehashing and suffice it to say, it’s been a rough coupla years.But, as my own spiritual studies have increased both in knowledge and in frequency, and my knowledge of self is ever expanding, I know that things will get better.But, the clutter of my reality weighs on me at times, and as much as I’d love to live up in the ether, my wordly tethers remind me of issues to be dealt with, both other people’s and my own.I’d really like to just take my own issues out, like you do the garbage.Bag it up and just sit in on the curb. That’s part of what this weekend was for me.Having that door open for change, reminding myself that the door is there for me to walk through (and dropping the trash off on the curb on my way out said door).

Have you ever reached a point where you just want to go through your life, much like you might go throw a junk drawer, and pick and choose what you want to keep, what you want to get rid of, and just clean house? I find that I’m in constantly in that state of reassessment.Ever changing, ever growing, and constantly taking out the trash. I’m a little afraid to see what my emotional/mental/spiritual carbon footprint must look like. Eep.

Anyway, back to the balcony door… once there, after keeping it open, it felt like sacrilege to close it.Like I’d be cutting myself off from something, although I’m not quite sure what. My ethereal connection to the Mother. My connection to myself.I was loathe to close it, even when I slept.I was lulled to sleep by the sound of the surf, and the smell of the sea breeze.When I woke in the middle of the night, that door, that connection was still open, and the sound rocked me back to sleep.For the first time in a long time, the sound of silence (even though the sea isn’t silence, the constancy of the surf became as much a part of me as breathing) wasn’t disconcerting.I didn’t need music or the tv or the blackberry chirping.I could just be.Keeping that door open allowed me to maintain that connection to the me that could be.

Peaceful, centered, full in the silence.

The discontinuity of that statement is shocking to me as I sit here typing this. In my other life, the one before the divorce, in fact, my entire life before the divorce, I was never… soft. The oldest daughter of man’s man, with two younger brothers, I didn’t do soft.Yes, I did beauty pageants. Yes, I was a cheerleader.I did those things to fulfill a need for what I supposed to do, what I was expected to be.I stop short of saying I had a lust for violence, but that’s part of what drew me to wrestling.The power and beauty incarnate in a wrestling match, was like a ballet to me. The artistry of movement, the strength and skill inherent to be able to move and conquer and vanquish, just awed me. I loved boxing, and martial arts, and mixed-martial arts. I came to college, joined a sorority and worked out with the wrestling team. Cheering when one of my kids (meaning, one of the wrestlers I knew, what I used to call my children by-proxy) broke someone’s nose, well, I saw no problem with that.The ferocious intensity that I applauded in my own brood, was disjointed from the meek way in which I lived my life at home, as I couldn’t be intense. I wasn’t allowed to be other than what was expected from me, by either my parent’s or my (then) husband.I was the mom in psychedelic tights, a ‘shit happens in all religions’ t-shirt, and combat boots. When I drank, it was tequila, straight. I loved fiercely and intensely and my beliefs were never meek or up for discussion. My outward presentation was hard-core, but inwardly, I knew I was a coward, because of how cowed I felt at home. I can’t go back and completely analyze where I was then, but I think it had something to do with protecting myself. By projecting strength, maybe I would feel a strength I didn’t really have.

Over the past year, maybe longer, I’ve had issue with letting go of the ‘strength’, or at least the outward display of it. But the longer I’m on my own, the more I learn about myself, the more it doesn’t fit anymore.I don’t watch UFC as much as I used too, and I find I’m nurturing the creative side with my Herd, more than the athletic. And I’m having SUCH a problem it. With letting go.It feels right, but it also feels like I’m watching me from some other place. I’ve had more than one meaningful person in my life, those that I’ve let past the outer core, tell me that I’m full of shit, that I’m much more mushy on the inside than I ever let on, and that I don’t always have to be as strong as I try to make everyone think that I am. And I know that they are right. I know, in my core, that it’s time to let go of that and grow in a new direction.But how do you let go of an identity that’s been a part of you for so long? I don’t know how to be any other way, and even if continuing to be this way is dishonest, it’s comfortable and I’m scared to death to be any other way.

But that door, that balcony door, felt like a real doorway to me, not just out to the balcony, but maybe to the me that I need to be going forward.I have a new friend, let’s call her Z, whom I met through Red (my tarot reading, metaphysical friend). Z is psychic, although, I don’t think she would call herself that.She can hear her spirit guides.Guardian angels, spirit guides, both more or less are the same thing.So, anyway, when we all got together a couple weeks ago, she was there and we were talking about things and she was telling me about my spirit guides, and how right now, I have two. One, the one that’s been with me the longest, is male, and that he’s been with me most of my life, but that it’s time for him to move on to someone else.The newer one, is female, and she says is representative of the feminine side of me that needs to come forth.The side that I’ve been most out of touch with.

So, pondering that, I’m brought back to the balcony door. I kept it open, the whole weekend. Did I feel the need to keep it open so that I could better connect to the me on the other side? (not ‘that’ other side, but the possibility of a more feminine me)? Was I hoping that clarity would fly in and alight on the balcony railing? I don’t know. But I do know that the more I allow myself to be open to that possibility, of growing as a woman, the more right it feels.The more I kept the physical door open, the emotional door was open as well. When I was sitting in the tide pool puddles, letting the waves wash away my worries, the door was open.When I was sleeping, dreaming astral dreams of far-away lands, the door was open. When I was just sitting, reading, or crocheting or meditating, the door was open. Every so often, I felt a pull to walk through the doorway, and look out.And more often than not, I found a cloud formation, the sun glinting off the water, a happy child playing, something that delighted my soul.

When I left, yesterday morning, I loaded the car, with the door opened.I came back to the room, before checking out, and walked through the door.I stood on the balcony, straining to take every nuance into my memory to take back home with me.When I subsequently felt rooted to the balcony, I knew it was time to go.I walked back into the room, and I closed the door. When I crossed the threshold back into the room, I left my emotional/mental/spiritual garbage at the curb on the other side. And honest to goodness, I cried.I stood there, in that room, and I bawled like a baby.It was almost a physical loss. It was that palpable.I don’t know if it was tears because I had found a sense of peace that I hadn’t found in years (and thus, didn’t want to leave it), or it was fear of not being able to execute the change in me that I know I should. I don’t know what it was.But I stood there and grieved; closing the door was a loss.

In that loss, though, is an opportunity. All I have to do is reopen that door, here, in this reality, and walk through it.

being buffeted

2009-07-12T16:22:00.003-04:00

So, here I sit, on thanksgiving day, in a hotel room, alone.

And I’m farging thrilled about it.

No, really I am.

I just needed to get away from the noise that is Atlanta and give myself some space in which to just be. I mean really just be. No noise, no distractions, no worries.

Just me and 2 really big bags of books, and a ton of crocheting and my camera.

And the sound of the surf.I’ve had the balcony door open since I got here, just listening to the surf pound against the beach.I swear to gawd that there is isn’t a more peaceful, soothing sound to me on the planet. I’m a little bit surprised that just the sound hasn’t put me to sleep yet.

Yes, yes, I brought my laptop too, but only at Renee’s insistence.She said, rationalizing this for me, how will you ever be able to upload all the pictures you’re gonna take if you don’t take your camera?(Insinuating, of course, that if I don’t do it while I’m on vacation, it sure as hell won’t get done when I get back from vacation). Point to Renee, so I sit here on my laptop, typing away, praying that the WiFi connection doesn’t drop out again.I’m on the 4th floor and I think that the IT person mebbe didn’t put a wireless hub on every floor… which would explain why I have one connectivity bar instead of the five I should have, and also explains why the connection drops every time I breathe hard in the direction of the laptop.

::sigh::

This was such a random trip.I barely planned it at all.I had had one of those weeks where nothing seemingly goes right, and adding it to the year of not everything going the way that I really needed it to, and adding it even further to the fact that the Herd (my nickname for the kids) was going to be with Dad thanksgiving day and weekend, I said screw it, and mentally checked out.

I spent Wednesday night and most of the day today with my mom and my family and it actually wasn’t too bad.Wednesday was the anniversary of my father’s death, and while it’s been seven years, it’s still tender enough that we all acknowledge it without ever mentioning it. (He left a monumental, gaping whole in all of our hearts).So I cuddled my niece and nephew, crocheted and watched mom and sister-in-law cook.My niece is autistic, but what they label as highly functioning.We spent a long time last night sitting on the living room floor, with me trying to teach her to crochet.My nephew is a defiant little snot, and while loveable, he’s two handfuls worth of kid.But when the mischievous grin peeks out from behind mom’s piano, and wants aunt merci to play, c’mon, how do you say no to that?

Today (being Thanksgiving, but I’m realizing as I write this at near midnight, today is quickly becoming tomorrow, so I felt I needed a qualifier), I was wrangled into going to my sister-in-law’s brother’s house for thanksgiving dinner, prior to taking my trip.I love her, but her family is a little circus-like, so I was hesitant. But as I sat on their back deck, in the most super comfortable patio furniture, the balmy November south Georgia weather was almost lulling me to sleep. They live in the neighborhood I grew up in, and since it’s on a golf course, the air always smells of freshly cut grass.Add the crisp fall smell in the air, and the wafting of fried chicken and Virginia baked ham, along with the smell of all the other kitchen goodies coming from the kitchen, well, I’m fairly sure that I came very close to declaring myself dead and having arrived in heaven.

I arrived tonight and it was nearly dark.I’d wanted to be here in time to catch the sunset, but I missed it by a half hour, at least.Well, I consider it a small solace to know that I get to watch 2 sunsets before I go home.

It’s a new moon tonight, which means the sky is black… blacker than black.Were it not for the light from the rooms here, facing out to the see, you’d not be able to see anything of the surf or the shore.You’d just hear the crashing of wave after wave as the tide comes in.the water, buffeting the sand, only you can’t see it, just hear it.. feel it reverberate in your sternum as you stand close to the water’s edge.

I sat on the beach for a long time this evening, in the dark. I was attempting to let go of the pain and worry and stress and angst and all the shit that I’ve just been holding onto for way too long.

I let the water lap at my feet, imaging that at every wave recession, the water was taking away a little of those stresses; taking them away, out to sea, as an offering to the Goddess.Not all of my burdens were carried away yet, but I got cold, so I came back upstairs to the room, pondering the burdens that were left to me.

What else do I have to learn from you, I thought.What other lesson is there in the pain you bring, or the distraction or worry that you exemplify?I think that is my task while I’m here, to find the lesson, and let go of the teacher.(the teacher being the negative stressor).Find the lesson, learn it, and let it go.

I could ramble on for hours, but I think I’ve doddered about in these pages for enough tonight.

In love and in light…

the 'good' mom

2009-07-12T16:22:00.001-04:00

My ex-husband have physical joint custody of our kids. we live about 5 minutes apart, the kids never had to move schools, and it more or less works. it’s not easy, to be sure, for either he or i, but it works out pretty well for the kids. our parenting styles are vastly different, to be sure, but this way, they get to see us equally, every week.

every sunday evening, i take them over to his house, and they stay there until thursday, at which point, they ride the bus home to my house. they are with me thursday afternoon through sunday evening. no, i don’t think it’s enough, and i ache like hell every minute they are over there, but it’s the best thing for them. so, i have to force myself to not be selfish. i remind myself of the relationship i had with my dad, and i know how much i want them to have the same thing with him, no matter how much he and i can’t get along (and no, we still don’t get along).

every thursday, i leave work a little early and head over to rockstar princess’s pre-k, where i pick up little miss attitude and we head home. the last several thursdays, she’s been giving me, ahem, helpful hints, as to what good mom’s do. and by doing so, i’m guessing that i’m not falling into the good mom category, because she’s deigned it necessary to give me these hints.

so, swallowing my pride, and my laughter, i listened, very intently to her pearls of 4 1/2 year old wisdom.

a good mom:

gets Mickey D’s whenever the kids want it

never smells their breath to make sure they brushed their teeth.

likewise, never smells them to make sure they used soap in the shower (this must have been for the benefit of 12 year old brother who has soap avoidance issues)

considers chocolate to be a food group to be included at every meal.

likewise never feeds them tofu or other ‘gross’ vegetarian food.

gives hugs all the time (which, i kinda thought i did already, but i can always give more)

never opens the bedroom door to check after being told that ‘yes ma’am, the room is clean’

knows that all bed times are flexible and up for negotiation.

never gets upset and yells (which, yes, i do, but in my ‘i’m trying to rationalize with a 4 year old tone, i try to tell her that if she wouldn’t throw things at the cat, or whatever, momma wouldn’t have to yell)

that’s pretty much where her demands list ended, but it put me in mind of some other things that ‘good’ moms do:

hold your uber tough 13 year old daughter, as she cries and snots all over your favorite sweater, after her first encounter with a ‘friend’ spilling the beans about a crush.

going from doctor to doctor, and hospital to clinic, watching your kid lay there sick, holding his hand and just loving him until he’s better (yes, you, ya ya)

holding back tears as the 7 year old draws a picture of mommy and daddy holding hands, knowing full well that’ll never happen, and giving her a big hug and telling her what beautiful picture it is.

spending from 8 am to 8 pm (no, i’m not kidding) split between multiple fields and multiple teams to watch football and soccer,every saturday from august to november. with, of course, the requisite cooler of crap and tote bag from hell with crayons and Dora and gawd knows what else.

buying a king size bed, rather than tell a princess she has to sleep in her own bed.

sitting through wrestling practice. ‘nuff said. (even though i love it, they reek after practice.. hell, practice reeks)

standing up for your kids, when they have no one else to stand up for them.

being tough, when you absolutely don’t want to, just to prove a point or teach a lesson.

giving them permission to be kids, to play, to run, to be loud (when it’s appropriate).

creating memories..whether it’s family yardwork, or sci-fi movie night (LOVE it), or the smell of banana bread, or mom’s famous lentil/quinoa/split pea soup.

taking an activist’s stand on any issue that matters, especially those that are dealt with on a daily basis (autism speaks.. well, so does love)

talking to them about sex. candidly, openly and honestly. it makes me as uncomfortable as hell to hear some of the stuff the older two ask, but dammit, they are comfortable enough to ask.. i’ll answer anything.

letting the warrior be the man of the house.. even at 12, he’s such a man in my eyes.

fight with being stay home moms, or 40 hour a week moms, and both have a struggle with which one is right.

allowing the rockstar to be the rockstar, the princess to be the princess, the warrior to be the warrior, the brainiac to be the brainiac, and mini me, well, to let her be herself.

to realize that i can’t live their lives for them. this is their journey. and as hard and as painful as it can be, the joy from experiencing life can be tripled just by letting them experience it themselves. i teach them nothing by shielding them from the world.

they are fabulous children... gifted, funny, athletic and musical... they truly have received the benefit of the best parts of their father and me... they are all the things that we ever hoped we could be. they embody all the parts of me that i can’t ever seem to make work just right, and i have a feeling that their dad would say the same thing.

so, at the end of the day... this ‘good’ mom is pretty damn thankful that my kids make me look like a helluva better mom than i consider myself to be. they make my job a piece of cake.

which, by the way, was one more of rockstar’s demands.. cake, every day...

for you baby, anything..

little demons

2009-07-12T16:21:00.001-04:00

It is better to re-enter Hell and become an angel, than to remain in Heaven and become a demon.

~ Victor Hugo

i threw my old life away.

crumpled it up like last sunday’s newspaper and tossed it, swoosh, right into the garbage bin. i can almost hear the announcer saying, ‘two points’.

i’m sitting here shaking my head as i write.

the older i get, and the better i get with contemplation and finding my own truths, i’m finding i have a lot of little demons running around. how i hate my little demons, even though they make up a large part of who i am.

i know, at the core of my being, that i am a good person. am i perfect? hell no. not even close. nor would i want to be. it’s like that tim mcgraw song, ‘i may be a real bad boy (girl), but baby i’m a damn good (wo)man.’

as i sit here tonight, writing this, i’m left to ponder the wreck that was my day... the wreck that brought nearly all of my farging little demons to light... (and oh how i wish they were little vampiric demons so that the light would have quashed them all to little piles of ash).

let me start by saying that i’ve been sick with bronchitis for the last couple of days. so, i’ve not been to work, even though my electronic leash has kept me in tune with emails and phone calls. and oh, how i love taking works calls with this lovely barking cough. but, demon number 1 of the day came to light, with my intense desire to be absolutely the best at what i do, and couldn’t let me just be sick for two farging days... so, instead of resting and letting the calls go through to voice mail, i answer them and talk to whomever it was that was calling. somehow, not taking the call, not really taking the day off, makes me feel like ‘less than’ as an employee. Then it hits me again, that i truly, truly, don’t get paid enough to answer the damn phone when i’m sick.

demon number 2 crept up as i lay here, hacking and coughing away, alone. yes, alone. it’s a damn weird thing. i couldn’t wait to be divorced, so that i could be alone; i soooo needed the space. but now, on days when i just can’t find it within myself to put on my superwoman costume, it’s the thing i hate the most, being alone. i find that i have this, albeit sometimes insane, need to be able to be superwoman, to be able to handle it all. that i don’t need anyone. but on days when i feel so incredibly small, i find that my demon of strength is the largest, in that, i’m not as strong as i want to be. that, some days, i just want to be taken care of. and really, that’s okay. there’s nothing wrong with feeling that way, i think. but i’ve got it so built up in my mind that it’s an issue, that admitting even that i do ‘need’ someone makes me feel small and insignificant.

demon number 3 reared it’s ugly head later in the day, when my resolve was weakened and i allowed myself to be hurt again. i literally felt like smacking myself in the forehead. d’oh.. what was i thinking? why is it that you can allow some people to hurt you, over and over and over? when is learning the lesson enough? or better yet, why does the lesson have to be retaught? i thought i had learned it, i thought i had it all figured out. and then, a few sweet words, from someone who knows they have the capacity to hurt, and then i’m plunged back into the pain of that which once was.

as if my demon trifecta wasn’t enough, i had to deal with the ex today, bringing up all the myriad of demons that he carries around in his back pocket, ready to unleash on me whenever he deems fit. i know, he’d like better than nothing, to somehow, wipe me off the slate of his existence, but it just doesn’t work that way. i swear, if i didn’t know any better, i would assume he was devil spawn (wait...considering the former MIL... hmmm). letting go of the power that he has over me has proven to be one of the hardest tasks of my existence. how do you just cut off someone you spent so long with. how do you just let it all go, so that they have no effect on you anymore. i know i still have some effect on him, otherwise, he wouldn’t be so vitriolic, but damn. does he have to make me feel like the world’s most horrible person every single flipping time we are forced to talk? the sooner i can let go of him, and his effect on me, this demon will... WILL be quashed.

all of this, led to another demon, wanting to drown my sorrows. and this.. THIS is the only demon i managed to voluntarily quash today. and having found the grace, in my solitude, in my silence, to turn that one away, was a jubilant, albeit small, victory.

there are so many other demons that i carry around, that we all carry around. can you imagine what it would be like to live, even one day, without the weight of any demons following you about? to go about your day with only the the featherlight touch of the angels hovering about you?

that is a thought that i very much relish.

lessons learned along the way

2009-07-12T16:19:00.000-04:00

so, today i turned 34. and really, it wasn’t as painful as i thought it was gonna be.

i didn’t wither away into nothing, and i awoke to hardly any aches and pains. well, except for my foot (broken many, many times, and the cold weather makes it ache). I didn’t require any special assistance to either get out of bed, or into the shower, and i was able to chew, not gum, my own food. i couldn’t find any new gray hair this morning. i couldn’t find any new wrinkles either.

i woke up and didn’t require any special medication for any health issues, and, while maybe i should, i didn’t have to be specific about the type of food i ate. i woke up warm, and sheltered, with a 4 year old rockstar nuzzling next to me, snoring ever so lightly as she sucked her thumb. i woke to the sounds of my boys fighting over who was gonna be what team on some Madden 2015 football video game. i woke to my mother, who’s visiting, teaching my 7 year old how to make grits ‘the right way’ ( i guess i don’t do it the right way, so ok). i woke to my oldest still snoozing soundly in that teenage way of never having enough sleep.

i woke to being uproariously greeted via text, Tweet and Facebook with a multitude of Happy Birthday wishes. i woke to knowing that a dear friend is treating the Herd and I to lunch (long distance), and that another sent loving wishes in a favorite book. i woke to find that another dear friend is treating me to a concert this week, and knowing that i get to hear all about Finland, wrestling, and just catching up with other dear friends tonight.

i woke knowing that no matter how much of a hard time my mother and i have with each other, she’s here, and she made me the most freaking incredible birthday cake ever (3 layer vegan carrot cake with cream cheese frosting – made from my favorite cookbook ever – The Grit).

these are things i’ve learned...

life, is good

life, is short.

life, is what you make of it.

you get out of it what you put into it. (and this applies across the board)

live well.

money matters, but not that much. (i’ve never been more (cash) poor, but i’m happier and richer in spirit than i’ve ever been).

real friends are rare.

take the time to speak your truth. always.

don’t be ashamed of who you are. there’s never been anyone else just like you.

beauty happens in unexpected places.

worthwhile things are worth the fight and effort.

don’t waste your chances. you may never get another.

sometimes love isn’t enough.

the value of compromise is unique to each person.

when it’s right, you’ll know it.

never, ever, ever doubt yourself.

love your children deeply and wisely. they are not a reflection of you, they are their own light. guide them, teach them, and let them be.

never judge anyone. you never truly know what anyone else is going through, or what led them to where they are at that moment.

there’s a time for compassion, and conversely, a time to withhold it.

value yourself.

i’m gonna cheat a little here and just list two other lists that i regularly read and re-read. they just make sense.

‘All i ever really needed to know, i learned in kindergarten’

Share everything.
Play fair.
Don't hit people.
Put things back where you found them.
Clean up your own mess.
Don't take things that aren't yours.
Say you're sorry when you hurt somebody.
Wash your hands before you eat.
Flush.
Warm cookies and cold milk are good for you.
Live a balanced life - learn some and think some and draw and paint and sing and dance and play and work every day some.
Take a nap every afternoon.
When you go out in the world, watch out for traffic, hold hands and stick together.
Be aware of wonder. Remember the little seed in the Styrofoam cup: the roots go down and the plant goes up and nobody really knows how or why, but we are all like that.
Goldfish and hamsters and white mice and even the little seed in the Styrofoam cup - they all die. So do we.
And then remember the Dick-and-Jane books and the first word you learned - the biggest word of all - LOOK.

[Source: "ALL I REALLY NEED TO KNOW I LEARNED IN KINDERGARTEN" by Robert Fulghum. http://www.robertfulghum.com/ ]

‘An Incomplete Manifesto for Growth’ (some of these sound to be strictly written for business, but really, if you take a step back, they apply just to life).

Allow events to change you.You have to be willing to grow. Growth is different from something that happens to you. You produce it. You live it. The prerequisites for growth: the openness to experience events and the willingness to be changed by them.
Forget about good.Good is a known quantity. Good is what we all agree on. Growth is not necessarily good. Growth is an exploration of unlit recesses that may or may not yield to our research. As long as you stick to good you'll never have real growth.
Process is more important than outcome.When the outcome drives the process we will only ever go to where we've already been. If process drives outcome we may not know where we’re going, but we will know we want to be there.
Love your experiments (as you would an ugly child).Joy is the engine of growth. Exploit the liberty in casting your work as beautiful experiments, iterations, attempts, trials, and errors. Take the long view and allow yourself the fun of failure every day.
Go deep.The deeper you go the more likely you will discover something of value.
Capture accidents.The wrong answer is the right answer in search of a different question. Collect wrong answers as part of the process. Ask different questions.
Study.A studio is a place of study. Use the necessity of production as an excuse to study. Everyone will benefit.
Drift.Allow yourself to wander aimlessly. Explore adjacencies. Lack judgment. Postpone criticism.
Begin anywhere.John Cage tells us that not knowing where to begin is a common form of paralysis. His advice: begin anywhere.
Everyone is a leader.Growth happens. Whenever it does, allow it to emerge. Learn to follow when it makes sense. Let anyone lead.
Harvest ideas.Edit applications. Ideas need a dynamic, fluid, generous environment to sustain life. Applications, on the other hand, benefit from critical rigor. Produce a high ratio of ideas to applications.
Keep moving.The market and its operations have a tendency to reinforce success. Resist it. Allow failure and migration to be part of your practice.
Slow down.Desynchronize from standard time frames and surprising opportunities may present themselves.
Don’t be cool.Cool is conservative fear dressed in black. Free yourself from limits of this sort.
Ask stupid questions.Growth is fueled by desire and innocence. Assess the answer, not the question. Imagine learning throughout your life at the rate of an infant.
Collaborate.The space between people working together is filled with conflict, friction, strife, exhilaration, delight, and vast creative potential.
____________________.Intentionally left blank. Allow space for the ideas you haven’t had yet, and for the ideas of others.
Stay up late.Strange things happen when you’ve gone too far, been up too long, worked too hard, and you're separated from the rest of the world.
Work the metaphor.Every object has the capacity to stand for something other than what is apparent. Work on what it stands for.
Be careful to take risks.Time is genetic. Today is the child of yesterday and the parent of tomorrow. The work you produce today will create your future.
Repeat yourself.If you like it, do it again. If you don’t like it, do it again.
Make your own tools.Hybridize your tools in order to build unique things. Even simple tools that are your own can yield entirely new avenues of exploration. Remember, tools amplify our capacities, so even a small tool can make a big difference.
Stand on someone’s shoulders.You can travel farther carried on the accomplishments of those who came before you. And the view is so much better.
Avoid software.The problem with software is that everyone has it.
Don’t clean your desk.You might find something in the morning that you can’t see tonight.
Don’t enter awards competitions.Just don’t. It’s not good for you.
Read only left-hand pages.Marshall McLuhan did this. By decreasing the amount of information, we leave room for what he called our "noodle."
Make new words.Expand the lexicon. The new conditions demand a new way of thinking. The thinking demands new forms of expression. The expression generates new conditions.
Think with your mind.Forget technology. Creativity is not device-dependent.
Organization = Liberty.Real innovation in design, or any other field, happens in context. That context is usually some form of cooperatively managed enterprise. Frank Gehry, for instance, is only able to realize Bilbao because his studio can deliver it on budget. The myth of a split between "creatives" and "suits" is what Leonard Cohen calls a 'charming artifact of the past.'
Don’t borrow money.Once again, Frank Gehry’s advice. By maintaining financial control, we maintain creative control. It’s not exactly rocket science, but it’s surprising how hard it is to maintain this discipline, and how many have failed.
Listen carefully.Every collaborator who enters our orbit brings with him or her a world more strange and complex than any we could ever hope to imagine. By listening to the details and the subtlety of their needs, desires, or ambitions, we fold their world onto our own. Neither party will ever be the same.
Take field trips.The bandwidth of the world is greater than that of your TV set, or the Internet, or even a totally immersive, interactive, dynamically rendered, object-oriented, real-time, computer graphic–simulated environment.
Make mistakes faster.This isn’t my idea -- I borrowed it. I think it belongs to Andy Grove.
Imitate.Don’t be shy about it. Try to get as close as you can. You'll never get all the way, and the separation might be truly remarkable. We have only to look to Richard Hamilton and his version of Marcel Duchamp’s large glass to see how rich, discredited, and underused imitation is as a technique.
Scat.When you forget the words, do what Ella did: make up something else ... but not words.
Break it, stretch it, bend it, crush it, crack it, fold it.
Explore the other edge.Great liberty exists when we avoid trying to run with the technological pack. We can’t find the leading edge because it’s trampled underfoot. Try using old-tech equipment made obsolete by an economic cycle but still rich with potential.
Coffee breaks, cab rides, green rooms.Real growth often happens outside of where we intend it to, in the interstitial spaces -- what Dr. Seuss calls "the waiting place." Hans Ulrich Obrist once organized a science and art conference with all of the infrastructure of a conference -- the parties, chats, lunches, airport arrivals — but with no actual conference. Apparently it was hugely successful and spawned many ongoing collaborations.
Avoid fields.Jump fences. Disciplinary boundaries and regulatory regimes are attempts to control the wilding of creative life. They are often understandable efforts to order what are manifold, complex, evolutionary processes. Our job is to jump the fences and cross the fields.
Laugh.People visiting the studio often comment on how much we laugh. Since I've become aware of this, I use it as a barometer of how comfortably we are expressing ourselves.
Remember.Growth is only possible as a product of history. Without memory, innovation is merely novelty. History gives growth a direction. But a memory is never perfect. Every memory is a degraded or composite image of a previous moment or event. That’s what makes us aware of its quality as a past and not a present. It means that every memory is new, a partial construct different from its source, and, as such, a potential for growth itself.
Power to the people.Play can only happen when people feel they have control over their lives. We can't be free agents if we’re not free.

(Source: Bruce Mau Design – http://www.brucemaudesign.com/incomplete_manifesto.html)

right.. i’m off to drool over my cake!

finding your art

2009-07-12T16:18:00.001-04:00

ok, so, growing up, i was what everyone expected me to be. i played the piano, i was a cheerleader, honor student, homecoming court, social and academic clubs, blah, blah, blah, blah... buhooring.

the only things that were encouraged when i was growing up were the good grades and the fitting in. being all you were expected to be (but no more). i can’t say that it was altogether a bad thing. i mean, my parents did their level best, and all in all, they did pretty good. i find myself wishing more and more that they had done a little more encouraging in the area of art, of creativity.

i take that back...i wrote a lot when i was younger, so much so that i met with writing groups consisting of locally published authors, seminars where i was the youngest by 20 years. the one creative burst of encouragement i received from the parentals was a trip to a writing summer camp at Duke University. my world began expanding there, i mean really opening up. i met kids from all over the country, from all different backgrounds, and all could do magick with the written word. our instructors were college professors from Duke, and it was two weeks of classes on how to write in every genre, every form. and after ‘class’, we lived in the dorms, as students. to my tender eyes and ears, it was downright bohemian.

it was freedom, it was expression. i befriended people that the ‘then’ me wouldn’t have dared be friends with at home. i learned about the beauty of art, and the art is in your soul. never having any formal art training, or any classes or instruction at all, i had some pretty sad misconceptions about creativity. well, all creativity outside of writing. my new friends opened my eyes to the art of the soul. drawing, dancing, writing, spoken word, singing, photography.. all of it gut-wrenchingly beautiful.

fast foward 20 years. i’ve been feeling a really strong pull towards creative energies and i’ll be damned if i know what to do with them. i can write, yes. but i’m really rusty, and the fluidity of my writing just isn’t there anymore. it’s a struggle, an effort. and really, if i’m being honest... i want to paint, to draw, to sculpt. but, never having had art class 1, i’m at a loss at where to start. i think i have every basic supply known to womankind for painting and there it sits.

waiting on me to get off my ass.

i realize, as i sit staring at the paints and brushes and canvases, that i’m afraid of doing it wrong.

yes.. yes, you’re right. you can’t really do art wrong. especially when it’s personal.

but what if i’m the one person in the history of humanity to do it wrong? trust me, if there was one person, it’d be me.

i have to get over the fact that my art might suck to high heaven, to everyone but me. but in this scenario, i’m the only one that matters. it is my expression, it is my release, no one else’s. and even if i think it sucks, it’s mine to let it suck and i can trash it if i want to and not feel guilty.

i’m very good friends with my tattoo artist, tom. i was with him last night, working on a new tattoo of mine, and i was watching him work, watching all of the artists there in the shop work, and the grace of their movements. the sheer audacity and confidence of their movement and knowledge and skill was breathtaking.

they create art.

(the black and gray is new)

i feel that creative energy in my soul, in my physical gut, but i don’t know how to get it all out. to make it a reality, to give it voice and life. to breath it into being onto canvas.

put simply, i don’t know how to start. i’ve spent so many years repressing that spirit, that i now don’t know how to release it.

i’m sitting in my breakfast area. well, that’s the purpose for which it was intended. since moving into this house, it’s really only been used as a dumping ground for backpacks and shoes and purses and a landing pad for my recycling center. two days ago, i started cleaning it out and cleaning it up. i’ve decided that it will be a studio, of sorts. a place to explore my creative energies and see if can’t figure out how to get this frenetic energy that’s building up inside of me, out!

a dear friend advised me to be still, and listen, and that the energy that i’ve been incubating will come. she said i would eventually have to ‘get off the egg’. indeed.

so, i’m going to finish this space.

and then i’m going to be still within it, listening for the quiet, small space full of densely packed love to open up. i’m going to play the music loudly and dance, and i’m going to play the music loudly and be very, very still, letting the melody and the rhythm wash over me, filling every nook and cranny of my soul, awakening it.

i’m going to listen to the flowers in my soul, not the snakes in my head, and i’m going to dance to the beat of my own drum. i’m going to try and reclaim the exuburant feeling of my youth at writing camp and direct that energy towards the liberation i know i’ll get from the canvas. i’ll invoke the muses to descend and if they see fit, to grant me release.

the soul should always stand ajar, ready to welcome the ecstatic experience.

~emily dickinson

Daddy's Girl

2009-07-12T16:14:00.000-04:00

I’d always been a Daddy’s girl. I’m the oldest of three, with two younger brothers.They both tower over me (as it seems I inherited the family short gene), so I can’t ever properly call them ‘little’ brothers.My parents were married until I was 22, a parent myself at the time, in an already unhappy marriage.I was absolutely devastated that they divorced and for a long time, blamed both of them.

While my childhood seemed idyllic, and truth be told, it was a damned good childhood by most standards, it still suffered from dysfunctionality as much as the next family.But, both parents worked, we lived in a country club (albeit, not a gated community type one), and had free run of the neighborhood and the country club clubhouse.Our parents were involved, with Daddy coaching all the sports teams (football and softball), and mom was like the uber room mom and team mom.They knew all the teachers and Daddy was on the school board.

I so couldn’t EVER get away with anything. I could sneeze funny and they’d know about it before I got home that night.

Anyway, I’ve always been close to daddy.I love my mother, but I’m more like my father and so she and I don’t always see eye to eye.When I got pregnant at 19, with my oldest, he was the calm, supportive voice that encouraged me that all would be okay.He also gave my then boyfriend/now ex-husband a tongue lashing that even to this day the ex won’t tell me about.I’ve always been secretly proud of that.

Daddy was a cowboy, in more ways than one.He was Citadel cadet, for a brief spell, before losing his cool and punching an upper classmen during hell week.Mom still has his sword.He was in the rodeo, when I was an infant and a toddler, riding bulls, and later, as one of those clowns that distracts the bulls when a rider is bucked off.He went to school full time when I was in early elementary years, and can remember the drive between the tiny small town where we lived to the nearest University town, and I’d sometimes sit in class with him.Often, he was as old as, if not older than the professor.Later in life, he sat on the Board of Directors for the junior college he first graduated from.

He was a stock broker and financial analyst back when ‘Wall Street’ was hip, and at the same time, he taught me how to be an all-star softball catcher, and deliver a speech when running for class president.

I won that election.

When I chose to be a cheerleader, no one could have been more proud, attending every single game, basketball or football.When I was on the homecoming court in high school, I could feel the pride emanating from him as he escorted me on the field.

He could quote literary giants from any era. My love of books, of literature came from him. He opened new worlds for me, exposing me to everything he could. Encouraged me to apply to any university I wanted to.Many I didn’t get into, but many that I’d thought it wouldn’t be possible for me to get accepted to, I did. He encouraged me to read history as I would one day grow to love it, even though I disdained it at the time.He swore he had taken part in the Boer Wars in Australia… could give you minute details about it.And he’s right, I love history now.

My love of amateur wrestling was encouraged by him.He was fast friends with many Olympic level athletes at the time, many of whom are now college coaches.When I started traveling to officiate tournaments, he’d always make sure I had all I needed. He taught me about the importance of volunteerism, by showing me how much time and effort he put into growing amateur wrestling in Georgia, as well as by the volunteering he did for political causes. I can’t tell you how many yard signs I’ve stapled and delivered and hammered into the ground.When, in high school, I was named Girl of the Year for the Boys and Girls club, Daddy, who was on their Board of Directors, presented me with the award. Whenever I travel in circles where Daddy used to roam, I always get questions about him.

He sent me flowers on my first mother’s day, and gleefully watched my children grow. I see his spirit so much in my rockstar princess. He didn’t live long enough to see any of them wrestle, and i can only hope he’s watching them kick ass from the summerland.

I don’t want to over glorify Daddy.He was painfully human.He drank too much (two hot toddy’s every night, without fail. First mixed drink I ever learned to make).He was less than faithful to my mother. He was difficult and ornery and not the easiest person to know.He was hard on us, expected a lot of discipline. I graduated with honors in the top of my high school class, and got a ‘you could have been valedictorian if you had worked harder.’ But, being on the school board, he was there, and gave me my diploma with the biggest hug. He was very hard on my brothers, raising them as strong southern gentlemen.Heh, most of it took.

But the bitch of it was, he was right.He was always right.

I’m writing this because he’s heavy on my mind today.He passed away nearly 7 years ago. He had cardiomyopathy and needed a heart transplant.Never one to enjoy doctors and hospitals and medications, shunning them at every opportunity, he refused the transplant.He lived 3 years, exactly how he wanted to live.He worked, he ran, he had a girlfriend.He LIVED even though he knew, more succinctly than most that death was waiting for him at any moment.He passed in his sleep, Thanksgiving weekend, alone (I’ve always regretted that).He laid down on the couch to watch football and never woke up.

He was 47.

My mother and brothers were distraught and spent the following week drugged out on Valium.I planned his funeral.He was always very spiritual, but not religious at all.We had his service in the chapel of the family preferred funeral home in South Ga.He wanted bagpipes as his service, but I couldn’t scare any up fast enough.He always said that he wanted a party when he died, and we did our best to honor that.I was shocked, and shaken, when arriving at the funeral home for the wake, there was a throng of people… there was no more room inside the building, and people were milling around outside.Just the site of all those people was enough to bring me to tears.Family I hadn’t seen in years, coworkers from decades ago.Women that he coached when they were young girls on my softball teams, men that he’d coached as boys on my brothers’ football teams, wrestlers, from all over the state… all there to say goodbye to this fantastically complex man who I was honored to be able to call ‘Daddy’.

He’s still with me from time to time, popping in for a visit every now and again, I can feel his energy as it comes into the room, and when it does, I can almost see his smile, hear his laugh, smell the smell of him. It’s a balm to my weary soul when he’s around.

As a pagan, I, and many, many others, belief that our souls, before we come back to earth as an infant again, we choose our families, we choose who are going to be born to, for a variety of reasons that only that soul knows.I realize more and more every day why I chose to be born to my wonderful parents. I realize the richness of life that knowing my father has afforded me.I continue to learn so many lessons from him, in how he lived, how he died, and how he loved.

SATC and an implied social commentary

2009-07-12T16:06:00.001-04:00

Last Friday night, me and my girls were going to make a ‘night’ of it, and go out for drinks and dinner and go see ‘THE’ movie of the, well, of forever, as far as we are concerned. Babysitters lined up, the date penciled in on calendars, written on dry-erase calendars in our cubes at worked, programmed into Outlook and Blackberry calendars, outfits picked out , discarded and picked out again. The shoes...OMG, the shoes...

Alas, I had a sick child for the majority of the week last week and feeling oh so terribly guilty about going out for a night on the town while she sat at home coughing and whining incessantly (as 4 year olds do), I flaked out on SATC night.
I hear they had a great time, but I’ve forbidden any of them from telling me one shred of anything about it, until such time as I can get my butt into a theatre to watch it, sans first night glitz and glam (I’ll be in my trademark jeans and Converse, thank you very much).

I have a very dear guy friend, bordering on best friend type, whom I also work with, let’s just call him ‘the dirty hippy’ (which is his nickname around the office). Suffice it to say, after hearing us yap, yap, yap about this movie incessantly for weeks on end, he is just over it. His incredible wife also watches the show, but didn’t do the movie thing either. Anyway, yesterday while we were eating lunch, the discussion came up about how guys just don’t ‘get it’, about this movie and he mentioned a blog entry he’d read over the weekend, discussing just that, the lack of understanding from the male perspective. (I’ll include it here, if you’re interested, it’s not a bad read). He forwarded me the link last night, and given that he’s way more of a night owl than I am, I read it this morning.

Not having seen the movie yet, but diligently and thoughtfully watching every single episode spanning the life of the show, I’d say the reviewer is right on in many aspects.
I think the fact that it has such broad based appeal speaks to general frustration level among women. Meaning, it offers a level of escapism that, cross culturally, appeals to all women. It is a seemingly fabulous life, even with all the complications and issues tossed in. But even still, those issues, complications, banalities and trivialities are relatable. We can feel the connection to the post-break up pain, or how he talks about dudes bagging every woman they come across with little or no societal guilt, why can't we? We can relate to feeling used in a sexless relationship that appears to have no purpose, and to the woman who's in an adulterous relationship (on either end of that spectrum).
I think that's the mass appeal. for maybe the first time, frivolities and fluff thrown in around it in the form of purses, shoes and rampant product placement, there is a mass media, broad based appellation of Everywoman.
We feel our issues, needs, and concerns talked about (which, is what we do), discussed and legitimised, right there on the screen. We may or may not have someone at home who either won't listen or who trivializes the issues that these 4 characters discuss, which makes women feel connected to the global "OMG, I'm Carrie/Miranda/Samantha/Charlotte" phenomenon.
Do i want to have a life like this? Uh.. no. not even close.
Do certain escapist features come across as appealing? Uh.. hell yeah.
Does the fact that this show, these characters legitimise and give voice to things that many women can't ever find another way to discuss make it appealing? Most definitely.
It can be trite, for sure. but in the day to day trudging of laundry, diapers, bottles, potty training, housecleaning, work, traffic, bills, etc., etc., ad nauseum, a little escapist fluff appeals to all of us.

Which of us wouldn’t trade, even for a day, to have fabulous and fluff, to feel fabulous and fluffy, just for a bit. To have the daily burdens of reality released.. To have that relationship with our girlfriends that we’ve always wanted... To be able to become that woman that we want to be, or maybe just to taste what life could have been if we’d taken a different path.

We all have our own reasons for watching and becoming enthralled by ‘our girls’. At the heart of it is, maybe not so much for the guys to ‘get it’, but maybe for us to get each other, and ourselves, a little better.

making time for sleep

2009-07-12T16:04:00.000-04:00

I’ve always been a night owl… always… I’d like nothing better than to stay up half the night reading, crocheting, watching movies, baking, talking, drinking… hell, anything but sleeping. Something about the stillness of the night has always appealed to me. It’s quiet, peaceful. Even if I’m just up folding laundry, that’s always been ‘my’ time. To the converse, I’ve never had much trouble getting up the next day , hitting the ground running and taking the day on with a full head of steam.

Then I ran, full head of steam and all, into my mid-30s.

Picture train derailment, any vehicle traveling at high speed with the wheels falling off, Alvin and the Chipmunks being worked to death (before the caffeine kicked in).

What the hell was wrong with me? I could not for the life of me figure out why my normally night owlish self was yawning by 9:30, unable to keep my eyes open through Grey’s (I know, a true tragedy). Nights when I did push the envelope and attempt to stay up later to read or catch up on work in the silence after the kids were in bed, found me waking at 3 am, book perched tent-like on my face, on the couch. *side note* I just noticed that I referred to staying up late as pushing the envelope. Geez…..*end note*.

I’m not quite sure what I was fighting, continuing to stay up late. Feeling old? Just because I could? Even now, I don’t really know. All I know is that yet another day of dragging my ass through work, yawning my way through belly dancing class, I came home, and at the grand ol’ hour of 8:30, promptly passed out on top of my bed. I woke up before my alarm the next morning (still in now really gross work-out clothes) and actually felt human. (mind you, I get up at 5-5:30 am to be in the office at 7, 5 if the kids are with me and I have to make a day care run).

I nearly didn’t know what to do with myself. I felt… really good… not that I felt bad, really, but to be rested… wow.. I found I didn’t even need caffeine to start the day.

It really opened my eyes to how I was treating my body. Yes, I’m carrying a few more pounds that I’m happy with, and my fitness level isn’t where it should be (enter said belly dancing class), but this was more startling than a size label in my jeans. This was immediately noticeable. One night’s sleep and I felt invigorated! It truly has made me take a step back and look at how I’m caring for my body. I mean, this is the only one that I’m gonna get, and it’s certainly not getting any younger. I’ve always said that I want to grow old gracefully, eschewing plastic surgery, Botox, extreme hair dying (unless it’s for fun), being healthy and content with me. Those are my decisions though, and not to be viewed as judgement. Whenever I have friends who decide to do such things, I applaud their empowerment to take steps to make themselves happy. We each are only accountable to ourselves, so (harm to others aside) whatever you need to do to get yourself to that happy place, go for it.

To me, that now meant, after my rest filled revelation that I need to take better care of me.

Meaning, making time for sleep. Making that time allows me to have so much more energy during the day so that I can work on all the things that I was putting off until the wee hours. Keep in mind, that doesn’t mean I’m entering the convent anytime soon. The late night hours still call, and I’ll still find myself asleep on the couch more often that not. But I’m learning to listen more to my body, and when it says sleep, I don’t argue anymore.

why i chose to walk away

2009-07-12T16:00:00.001-04:00

People, mainly women, ask me all the time, why I chose to leave my marriage of 14 years. I guess I can understand the questioning. We were college sweethearts, falling head over heels very early on. We had 5 children together, 14 years of marriage, owned 2 homes, several cars, 3 dogs, 2 cats and a couple of fish and turtles. We’d been together through new jobs, losing jobs, new friends, old friends, losing friends, losing parents, and we were actively involved in the community as a family. Seemed perfect, right?

The truth is, neither of us had been happy in a while. We were very good at going through the motions, but leading up to the separation, I don’t think either of us could remember a good day, much less debate the good outweighing the bad. I think that we all reach a certain point, when a relationship may be on a downhill slide, of deciding how much is it worth, to keep the facade in place, to continue pretending. We start to debate how hard it will be to actually be apart, to make perhaps the most drastic change in our lives.

We think, is it selfish? How will the kids handle it? Will they understand? Will they hate me? What if I’m wrong? What if I’m completely misreading the situation? And, gasp, what will people think? How will ‘we’ deal with the perception of things falling apart at home?

We both had our issues with all of these questions, but at the end of the day, what mattered most was making that each of us, and the kids, were okay. Dealing with perception was difficult. Answering questions from acquaintances was difficult. Reassuring the kids (and ourselves) that it would be okay was difficult.

The actual act of leaving was relatively easy. Making the decision, that yes, I am going to take MY life back and live it, that I’m going to be happy and not feel badly about it. That by doing this for myself, I’m giving him that gift as well, permission to try to be happy again. When we are really being honest with ourselves, he and I, we know it’s better this way. We both know, even though it was only ever discussed once, that if I’d not left, we’d still be together, and both still be unhappy, stagnant, not making the strides that we both are making today.

We have rough days from time to time, but the kids are happy. We are happy. Sure, I miss him from time to time, in old familiar situations, like sitting down to watch college football on Saturdays, or going to my favorite farmer’s market, or when the kids do something that I know he’d appreciate. Those moments are proving to be the toughest to negotiate.

Not everyone understands it. Hell, sometimes I don’t understand it. But everyday, I find a little more of the me that I had lost along the way. I find little bits of strength and courage and wisdom that are tucked away in places I forgot about. I’m learning more about the woman I am, and more importantly, the woman I want to be.

To take a line from my favorite book, Dance of the Dissident Daughter, by Sue Monk Kidd, ‘There is undreamed voice, strength, and power in the feminine soul’.

I want to find mine.