Death is Generous

Life has Always Been Temporary

Chagall, Marc La Danse 1967

We weren’t surprised by the early morning email announcing her passing on a cold gray day in northern New Jersey. She was the last survivor of six Elders from the port side of our ship of life.

Although I shared no DNA with this woman, she was woven into my life tapestry through marriage and the golden threads of shared family. The depth of our response, was at first as imperceptible as a minor tremor in an area not prone to earthquakes; it was unexpectedly shaking. We knew how deeply the actions of others and the echoes of choices had impacted these lives. We heard the small whisper in each of our ears, “Family,” it said to me. My partner heard something private, and imperative. We pulled the winter wear out of Florida storage, to bring the only thing we had to give; ourselves.

I had met her only several times. A tiny woman with brilliant smile, her personality radiated literally without boundaries. She was legendary in her ability to bestow friendship on anyone and everyone within reach of her voice, her arms, her heart. With my limited personal experience I am unclear if she was the honeybee, or the flower. I would guess probably both. She lived some hard, soul breaking times. These may have been written on her heart but not on her face. Those that earned the WWII survivorship have a different understanding of fear, heartbreak, courage.

Death is generous

Life has always been temporary

She died smiling in her 97^th winter. Her soul mate had gone on ahead. Her mind, compromised by the faulty pathways of Alzheimers had been a mystery to her family for many months. She had floated on the wings of “nearly here,” held and protected by loving hands. There were no “if only” or “what ifs” left in her life. Even those left to cry knew there was no more to be squeezed out of her lifetime.

Chagall, Marc Blue Violinist 1947

When a well-loved woman passes smiling in her 97th year, there is reason to celebrate. Her family knew who she was and what she wanted, they requested joy to attend her ceremony and joy appeared. It was my rare experience that day to witness a family in evolution. Three generations attended their personal emanations, all holographs of a single life: mother, grandmother, great grandmother, stepmother, aunt, friend.

They attended her physical passing of soul to spirit by sharing her story and wearing her smile. Around the table, old friends and youthful faces talked story. Her story, as they knew it to be. They reached back into baskets of memory to bring forth a perfect rose of a tale, gifting everyone with their treasure.

Neighbors, friends, family human and canine sat in this spell, cast by those we couldn’t see. For those of us with less “skin in the game” it was clear; the living folk were only the first tier, layers of generations, ancestors, friends, even beloved pets came to dance her home. Their names studded the conversations like a 4^th grade roll call. Speak their name in story, and you will be shortly sharing a chair.

Death is Generous

Life has always been temporary

What is it about that space? What is the pristine clarity of the territory surrounding graduation from soul to spirit? When we of different realms can still touch each other, unsolvable problems melt like a March snowman. Insurmountable issues fall away, the unforgivable is swept out like so many dead leaves cleared off the unused patio. When the door into the next world opens, we all get to breathe deeper and sing louder. For a time.

In the dissolution of houses and estates, lies the absolute liquidation of worry and expectations. Common elements are rejoined in a new way; wiping away hurts, demanding that walls come down-forever. As lava slides down the mountain in Hawaii consuming all in her path, so it is with death. It’s hard to connect with pain that no longer exists, nearly impossible to link with that which has been healed.

As long as the food trays and the friends hold out, we all get to stand outside the material world. Yes we stand, plate in hand, fielding raw emotions that run free on wild horses. Emotions too long harnessed by distance, therapies, drugs and leaking body fluids, emotions that surface in a moment. Emotions that will continue to show themselves unexpectedly across another lifetime; our own.

Right now we can enjoy the euphoria. It precedes the dark windy place that is profound sadness. The lonely thin trail on the high windy ridge that is grieving. No need to look for this, it will find you.

Death is generous

Life has always been temporary

Chagall, Marc Heavenly Dream 1967

What is the “grace” of death? What is the music playing just down the hall and just beyond our ability to hear? When we silence our lives and turn our faces to a soul in transition do we too move closer to transcendence? In the presence of death we are kinder, wiser, more forgiving. We speak more carefully, as if suddenly aware of our words and their impact. Habitual motives of self-protection and separateness stand out in the sharp delineation like a cardinal on the snow. Suddenly it seems, there is another choice.

I wonder if the great angelic beings that come to lead us home sprinkle some “Dust of the Divine” about? Or is our loved one is standing right there and we are, as children are being “the best we can be?” Whatever the mechanics of the situation, I believe this is a huge opportunity to dip your toe into bliss.

If it’s possible to put all aside, to listen more deeply, feel more open, show more love, because someone is gone from this life?

“Why would we do anything less, anytime?”

To Molly- Thank you for letting me share your family, may your smile warm them always, may your dance give them joy

CHAGALL Marc,

LA DANSE, Sotheby’s, London

http://www.artvalue.com

Blue Violinist 1947 ackermansfineart.com

Heavenly Dream 1967 Found on indulgy.com

Know in Your Bones-Solstice 2015

Dec19

“Harvest Moon,” by George Inness

Here we are in the land of real winter.

Four p.m. and the sun is setting over my field of dried Goldenrod. The plant kingdom outside my window is playing the Madrigal of “darkness into light.” Having read the darkening days, the plants have surrendered into the season, dropping down into the underworld to rest and recover after three busy Quarters of generativity. I have watched green turn to brown, leaf into root, the spirit of each moving out of the light, away from the touch of cold. To the square cell folk, darkness means relief for a while, of the burden of “growing and expanding.” Yes, green things are dying all around us. December in the north end of the Northern Hemisphere is all about dying back, dying into the whole.

“In nature, darkness is neither good nor bad but simply a neutral condition in which things rest, take root and grow.”

Thom Cavalli, author of Alchemical Psychology

It would seem such a tragic loss, but we know in our bones that the light will come again. I wonder as I watch, “What did we as humans loose when we forgot how to sit in the dark?”

Everything that dies “out there” isn’t abandoned or lost. It is cheerfully chewed on, mopped up, and fully consumed by the hungry creatures of the single cell set. When the light comes back, when the air is warm, when last years achievements have sunk deep into the mud, new growth will appear. We have exempted ourselves from this process. We have no imperative to stay close and warm and dream in the dark. This “quiet time” is healing time. Time and space allows last years hurts to fall away. Was there an ill-conceived branch or a vole-decimated root? No worries! Dream a new dream. All will be used. Ever see a plant landfill?

What if we had this much resolve to utilize our own emotional flotsam? What if we were positive that after a quiet dark time of reflection, our painful emotional escapades would feed our present life with the great vitality of a rich fertilizer? The key here is to know in our bones that the light will come again.

Could it be that healing hurt and tragedy, allowing joy to regenerate us, requires time and the acceptance? If we want to fertilize our psyche with the richness of the experience we call “life,” then we need to acknowledge a time called Winter. We require seasons to process the growing and the healing. My intention for a full lived life would look like this:

“I have used all my tools at least once, I have been on both sides of almost all the major relationship quandaries and have reached the end of my life holding lots of love and not much else.”

I think a bit of naptime might be good for our culture. An improvement certainly over the frazzled, out of sorts, 24 hour a day tantrum that is our Americonsumer Christmas. Never met a 2 year old who didn’t feel so much better after a nap.

Home at Montclair by George Innes

So here we find ourselves knocking at the Solstice door once again. Not so much dark as…quiet presence in stasis. My “well lived life” scenario in the dark times of the year might be:

“I will work a shorter day, sleep more, sit by a fire and allow the rhythms of the season to rock my psyche into balance until the light comes back.”

All made possible because…

We know in our bones that the light will come again.

We all crave alignment to something more ancient than our own most recent manifestation. Nature is beyond the teacher, nature is how it works. Is there a time when we will cease to need the dark in order to describe the light?

That’s a question for the spring!

Wishing everyone a blessed return of Light in whatever form you find most beautiful.

T.F. Cavalli, Alchemical psychology, Old Recipes for Living in a New World, (New York: Penguin/Putnam, 2002)

George Innes (May 1, 1825 – August 3, 1894) was an influential American landscape painter. His work was influenced, in turn, by that of the old masters, the Hudson River school, the Barbizon school, and, finally, by the theology of Emanuel Swedenborg, whose spiritualism found vivid expression in the work of Inness’ maturity. Often called “the father of American landscape painting,”^[1]^[2]^[3] Inness is best known for these mature works that not only exemplified the Tonalistmovement but also displayed an original and uniquely American style.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/George_Inness

“Harvest Moon,” by George Inness, oil on canvas, 30 by 44 ½ inches, The Corcoran Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C., bequest of Mabel Stevens Smithers, The Frances Sydney Smithers Memorial, 1891

“Home at Montclair,” allpaintings.org

The Sound of Bees

Oct29

A Bit’ O Fiction on my alternate WordPress site

https://minervamartell.wordpress.com/2015/10/29/the-sound-of-bees/ BWOwl https://s-media-cache-ak0.pinimg.com/736x/93/1e/65/931e65ec26628feccab121ff10bd2fde.jpg

The Really Big Dreamer

Oct16

The imagination is not a state, it is the human existence itself. -William Blake

On a sunny Florida day in February our ‘round the corner neighbor erected a 10-feet tall wooden cross on their pocket sized front lawn. The towering rood mocked the cheerful “Alleluia” of pink plastic tulips lining church parking lot across Nokomis Avenue. Heavy beams tilted at an angle suggesting the bearing of weight. Red paint smeared and dripped from the bent spikes and onto the lawn. The assemblage was illuminated 24/7 against the dark southern spring evening with red rope lights. This was a serious installation, scaled to intimidate the passersby onto a one-way track of strong emotions: Fear Submission Repentance Anger Intolerance, they are all human flavors. What was missing was “Grace.”

When I first saw it standing right there in my temporary ‘hood, a chill of fear washed through my body. “That’s no way to get people to love each other,” I grumbled to myself, wiping sweaty palms on Khaki shorts. I felt bullied. There was more going on than a rapid heart and manipulated anxiety. A wordless wave of recognition swept through in my inner landscape. The first psyche searchers returned with only garbled bits and thought fragments.

“I have forgotten something important, was it a memory? Was it a task?

No, it was a dream. The far seeing elves of Onus and Obligation were dispatched immediately to the misty corners of my right brain. They mined memories, poked the unprocessed, systematically uncompiling countless bits of dream imagery. Unearthed bushel baskets of half processed emotions stood before soggy cartons of unfinished business.

In this well-guarded corner of my psyche they exposed a dream box marked:

“Really Big Dream”.

It was there, on a dusty shelf, towards the back of an unconscious cave labeled:

“Probably Shouldn’t.”

As it came back into the light, I remembered the dream in Technicolor detail. It was a vision really, and we all have them. The revelation caused a small explosion of nervous sweat that gathered about the hairline at the back of my neck. By this time the alarms had sounded in my stodgy, conscientious, yet cautious left-brain. Verbal abilities coming back on line, this regulator of reason announced, “Your revelation could be another’s blaspheme! “

http://www.tate.org.uk/art/artworks/blake-the-night-of-enitharmons-joy-formerly-called-hecate-n05056

A far distant ancestor unfurled her flag from my DNA to remind, to warn, to encourage. She had such a dream as this one in a far away time. Its beauty was trussed up with stout cord to the memory of toasty toes and the smell of burnt hair. But a dream unspoken is only half dreamt.

In my dream I walked down an empty dirt road and came upon Jesus Christ on the cross. In my dream, he looked exactly like a million crucifixes I have seen; blood, thorns, mutilation, agony, disappointment, pain

… until he looked up with a most beatific smile and said,

“If you take me down and put me back on the ground again we could get something done!”

https://s-media-cache-ak0.pinimg.com/736x/93/a9/c5/93a9c5349eda3e21c43b9d78747dfda1.jpg

It was a scene plucked right out of Wizard of Oz.

I recall the sensation of illumination; the divine being was rummaging around in my psyche for just the right memory and experience to keep me from ejecting myself out of this modern day Passion Play. Even when the iconic image is deeply embedded in our physical experience and collective mind, there are actions that must come from mortal hands. We must participate; we must step forward in support of divine causes.

So I did. I helped him down off that instrument of torture and he stood beaming with joy, his feet once again on Mother Earth. The rest of the dream was a colorful expression of love and exquisite beauty in all manner of things. Hate, separation, sadness, cruelty all receded like a storm tide: no longer needed.

The high Winds of human conflict and injustice were replaced with gentle waves of acceptance of our ignorance, the offering of wisdom, and endless boundless compassion. Compassion for our lack of evolution, compassion for our wounds. Compassion for our fear. It was beautiful. It was Peaceful. There was no fear.

It was a dream.

In dreamtime, all thoughts are acceptable and miracles are within reach. It’s when the dream drops into the circumspect atmosphere of my “self-conscious” conscious that the bonfire of potentiality is extinguished.

I suppose it is my humanity that shuts down this unreasonable magnificence. Communing with Divinities, and experiencing “Really Big Dreams” must be trimmed to a more manageable size.

There were no rules, no judgments about my worthiness.

It was a dream.

After all, who am I to question 2000 years of belief and dogma intended to explain why we aren’t all personally responsible for creating a loving and just world in this magnificent magical world?

Am I to imagine that I can report,

“We have all been fearfully frozen long enough! Let’s get back to he business of loving and learning see what we really have “under the hood!”

The possibility and potency of this high-octane dream was quite overwhelming. I wrote it down and put it away, for a year, and then another. The first year I was in a transitional place. My parents were now gone from this life, but there was still childhood furniture in my psyche. Rocking the Religion boat felt risky. It has been yet another year and the dream remains untold.

A dream unspoken is only half dreamt.

This dream was about love and acceptance, peace on earth, honoring and acknowledging a divine being. Not so controversial, but I still put it away. Is it easier to express negativity, like a bloody cross, than love and compassion?

This is the Wizard of Oz paradox.

Hope and pray for something extraordinary.

Receive that gift, (wisher beware: true change is like getting a puppy)

Immediately upon receiving your prayer/wish we then deny its beauty and holler to go home where it’s “safe.”

And all that we, “Send me over the rainbow type” folks, actually require for our safety and sanity in this new reality is a bucket of water, and a wish.

You will have to figure that one out yourself.

Found on ngv.vic.gov.au

https://s-media-cache-ak0.pinimg.com/736x/7d/3c/7f/7d3c7fa0245da4f11e794840f243b67b.jpg

What if Christ, Allah, Buddha are all walking around somewhere? Or everywhere? Or even… together? What if they ARE that child, that old man, that smelly street person?

And wait, where’s the divine women? With rare exception on this planet it requires male and female. Her voice is here, can you hear it?

I can’t imagine that our best shot at peace, beauty, and love was 1000s of years ago.

“Keep your eyes peeled” we used to say, they must be here someplace.

William Blake Biography

Born: November 28, 1757
London, England
Died: August 12, 1827
London, England
English poet, engraver, and painter

http://www.blakearchive.org/blake/

http://www.philipcoppens.com/blake.html

The Trust

Oct10

http://www.adirondack.net/new-years/popular/2014/#12

I looked for this today. It was a file, named “The Trust,” waiting patiently on my virtual desktop. Good thing it’s virtual. The location of the laptop where it lives has been as mutable and mercurial as the air sign of Gemini in a stiff wind. These past weeks I have been in constant interaction with the concrete and friendly entity known as my Dad’s Trust. While some might regard this legacy to be an untouchable resource, I take my lead from Dolly Levi.

“Money, pardon the expression, is like manure. It’s not worth a thing unless it’s spread around, encouraging young things to grow. “

We have been doing a LOT of encouraging around here.

I wonder if the abrupt movement of “saved to spent” has been the origin of my recent dreams? In this week’s highlights, I saw Dad etherically ease dropping on a “not so quiet” gathering of his four daughters. Sitting silently, forearms on thighs, he cleared his fingernails with a small penknife. He listened, nodding occasionally; he smiled some, and sighed more.

It was a 3D dream space where we acted out thoughts and stifled emotions while simultaneously witnessing the event. Behind closed eyes in the early morning I reviewed the dream; it seemed like a Psychodrama gone Schizoid. I think maybe it is just my Spirit remembering the task of my life is to live it as no one else can.

But that’s the end of the story this is the beginning.

http://www.adirondack.net/new-years/popular/2014/#17

“The Trust” and so it goes:

“Today is June 13 2014.

I am in Flying Star, (pricey coffee house in Santa Fe) reading the packet from Marilyn, trusty Trustee from The Bank. I crawl through the pages, not comprehending the details, but discerning the worry for the future in the “cover every contingency” investment strategy. I can feel him pouring over the Wall Street Journal, stock analysis, and last year’s numbers. Pages of numbers in columns, pie charts and percents all described in unemotional numbers; the reason and residue of my Dad’s life work. Inside this package there is love, there is pride, there is intellectual fun I think, I hope; I think he really enjoyed the game. “

“I can imagine he puts these questions into prayers and asks for guidance because that’s who he is in this life.

I see him lost in thought, concentrating, an unseeing gaze out a long frozen window. In the quiet of his upstairs office room he sits at the giant oak desk, its finish rubbed silky smooth from his flannel shirted elbows. He is there, leaning into see the numbers on the monitor when he learned the mysteries and miracles of the Internet. He removes his glasses, cleans the lens, rubs the sore places on his nose where the too tight glasses rest and digests what he has seen on the screen.”

http://www.adirondack.net/new-years/popular/2014/#12

“We can recall that shortly after his death this desk had to be cut in half by his mourning son in law before it could leave that room. As if it was too burdened with the time and energy of spirit spent there, it had to be halved before mere mortals could remove it. Had the wood itself had soaked up the mysterious emotions of our father? His intentions and feelings were rarely witnessed nakedly, until he was dying.

We can remember further back when another son in law did his daily work on that desk. Despite the dying in the next room, he needed to make a living. He supported our family between quiet requests for help that could only be answered by another man. Miracles happen in these times. Foes become allies. Propriety slinks away to less imperatives places. There is only room for love and laughter anything else seems to be pushed back beyond view. Fear pounds at the door, but if one can stay in the second, there are quiet opportunities to realize the incredible beauty of a life in metamorphosis. We are witnesses, yes, but the view is blindingly beautiful. Sometimes the scene is too raw and ready for those of us expecting to stay a while longer in the land of the living.”

http://www.adirondack.net/new-years/popular/2014/#12

But let’s get back to the desk.

It was surrounded by crayon drawings, photos, school pictures, clay creatures from children, grand children, and great-grandchildren. It was an environment really. I hope it was a reflection of Karl’s heart. It was the land where his children prevailed. We honored him, we threw love at him in seasonal missives and over-taped construction paper constructs.

“On a sad day in April, he gave these back. He demanded the privilege of an elder at the end of life. He wanted all of his precious bits to be returned to their givers. When the quiet flurry of removal was done, his walls were bare and we held our offerings in our hands. I remembered that day with these papers spread in front of me on a brilliant day in Santa Fe.

Hands wrapped around my teapot of Jasmine tea for warmth, I remembered what I had put away for a time when I hoped it wasn’t too sad to recall.

“Images of the creaky desk chair with over worn cushion. His wife’s warm and fuzzy decorating paradigm was abandoned at the doorsill of his office. This room was our Dad condensed. So long missing, so long missed. A desk the size of an average kitchen table. Snow was falling outside the window for the 4th cold month. Failing physical health; worry about last days, unthinkable dependence… Strife in the family; steps and sisters, old wounds rising up like the bubbles in his ginger ale. Red plastic bowls to hide any blood. Exiting his home in the strong arms of two medics in a hammock too reminiscent of a body bag. His cry of surprise or pain when he found himself on the stairs. That giant man saying, “It’s all right Honey.” It would never occur to refer to my Dad as “Honey” but he calmed, relaxed and closed his eyes. So much easier with strangers.

I can’t find the part of me that knows if he ever really looked at us again. My head thinks that’s when it was safe to apply himself to getting out of his body.

He had felt responsible for so long what did it take to have the faith that everyone would be OK if he left?

http://www.adirondack.net/new-years/popular/2014/#17

Thoughts on this day:

It is Friday the 13^th, from the ancient calendar it is the day to honor Minerva. There is a full moon tonight and most importantly this is the day that my father will be released forever from this burden.

I spoke directly to him then.

“Our hands and minds are capable Dad. We will all be fine. Know that your life’s work will be held, or paid, or spread around. Most of all…deeply appreciated.

We will all create possibility to all issue; present and future. There will be four completely different ways, all good.

Seems a good reflection of your investment strategy, but it is our own expression.

Go ahead now Dad to whatever you dreamed of, or prayed about sitting at that big oak desk. You are free now, no more worries about scarcity or disability.”

Be free Dad, you are loved

It is our job now

Thank You My Friend

Jul28

For as long as I sit at this desk, I will see the place where we put your body back into the earth just this morning. This is the longest day.

Time has stretched out like shiny taffy, pulled until it came to an end and “snap” you were gone. I need to remember on this loneliest of days, how many times we celebrated your exquisite integrity and your command of the language of unconditional love. I need to remember your companionship as a gift, your faithful heart as an example.

Eleven years ago we found you, my mystical guru of devotion and discernment. You were waiting there, at a City of Albuquerque annual adoption event, calculated to propel hundreds of stray dogs and puppies out of shelters, and into adoptive homes. The plan is simple: every adoptable shelter resident in the city is transported to the Fairgrounds, add radio stations and sponsors, and see what happens.

On that day, we wandered through the cages. We past Pits and Rotties, through the “toys”, too tender and tiny for rural New Mexico, and away from the baying Hounds. There was discernible desperation in these long nose faces. The dogs had a handle on what was at stake, they seemed to know their clock was ticking. BearBWright

Our daughter spotted him; black muzzle, tiny ears, almost past a puppy with matted fur reminiscent of an old used bath mat. His card said “Stray-found downtown.” He was an “inner city” dog. Where he was headed in the breed pool was anyone’s guess. She saw his magic and skipped to the head of the “Do we really want a dog?” line by presenting him to her Dad, with leash, and the casual suggestion that he take him outside for a “get to know you walk.” Then and only then, did she find me pondering a Pomeranian once owned by an infamous animal hoarder, a single Pom, from a Pom family of 50. I was taking “rescue” too literally.

By the time we reached them Bear was calm, and Dad was smitten.

Of course he also had a touch of Parvo, but we didn’t know that yet. Dad looked as if he had reclaimed a soul part named, “My Dog Loves Me,” approximately age 10; his face was dazzling. The pup, soon to be named Bear, due to his uncanny resemblance to a Grizzly cub, offered me a ”heart to heart” communiqué. It translated into an intention somewhere between Star Trek’s salt monster, “I am for you..!” and “We need to do this Mom.”

And so we did, we made an interspecies partnership for the promotion of higher consciousness through living in the present with as much unconditional love as he could model. The timing was perfect. Our children had embarked on their own adventures and we were Midlife adults carrying substantial backpacks of leftover Nuture.

Bear’s gloriously inclusive heart developed over time and ripened with maturity. Mac, an unexpected and initially unwelcome addition developed into an unflagging devotee of the infallible Alpha-ness of Bear. Mac’s selfless love of his fearless leader has no human counterpart. It is an egoless canine adaptation that strengthens everyone in the pack. Bear recognized one ultimate Alpha-Dad and his alternate-Mom.

A particularly notable aspect of Bear’s prodigious relationship skills was his ability to discern the potential for discord or danger. His signature move was to come between any newcomer and his “family”, of which he used a very loose and comprehensive definition. All children, everyone’s children are family, as are people attached to, or smiling at “His People.”

Bear’s creed of Serve and Protect was elegantly simple based on his awareness of his own great power.

There was no need for scary growling, no show of force. He did nothing overt to raise the awareness of the detainee. Most never recognized, that the Bear Block was essentially a character analysis. His wagging tail would erroneously signal friendly canine acceptance. He would stand as an impenetrable roadblock across any incoming legs, when he found their owners lacking.

For those of us under his protection, we looked for his opinion; we respected his opinion. If he went back for the second pet, all was well. Occasionally there was a over the shoulder look, a wide mouth pant and uneasy eyes that asked, “This guy is lying, deceitful, dangerous or inebriated, what do you want me to do with him Mom?”

For eleven years I have had the privilege of being in Bear’s family as he is in mine. We buried him today, in a hole we dug ourselves, in a gentle green yard that we call home, in a blanket that smelled like us.

I have nothing better to give you then my love and gratitude. Wait for us there, we will come after a while.

For my Family, you know who you are

Reality is Overated

Jun11

http://bertc.com/subfour/truth/hubble.htm

I’ve added a sidecar:

MinervaMartell Dreams Journeys Story

This is Minerva on the Road unencumbered by gravity or time. A bit edgy is this ether information, but truth is worth the trip.

I Am Sure

Jun1

: http://c300221.r21.cf1.rackcdn.com/michelangelo-the-delphic-sibyl-c-1509-fresco-1349572131_org.jpg

We are struggling out of a dark time.

The Age of Aquarius has dawned. There will be peace and prosperity for all. There will be no hunger or hatred. Love will prevail. The only snag in this Opus de Optimist is the pesky detail of responsibility. Who will recognize love, hold the light and pass it on? Certainly we can’t expect some dusty saints and oft-misquoted prophets to mould the whole ball of wax. This is our time, and our planet, and we are responsible for what we put in our minds and how we live our lives.

Whose job is it to hold the frequency of love and respect?

This morning it was my task to take a few bags of “camping” dirty clothes to the modern day riverside flat rock. Laundromat USA has taken the place of pounding stones and water to clear the sweat from garments of labor. I have never understood how beating anything with rocks would cleanse, but it certainly makes a rich metaphor for so many misguided efforts.

The narrow storefront held two aisles of machines in cramped space, ringed by tall-unadorned white walls and high ceilings. With two other Washers present, we did the bob and weave, avoiding all but the most rudimentary contact. “Excuse me,” and “Is this your sock?” was the only exchange. There is something a bit too intimate about seeing your delicates pirouetting about in the dryer face to hold any face-to-face conversation with strangers.

In these places of public necessity; the intersections of life travelers, I have often found pithy notes in strategic places. Direction and guidance from an invisible overseer of the laundry, thumb tacked, wrinkled missives written by hand in block print.

It’s OK to open the door

As long as you close it

A meter long TV was mounted from the ceiling, volume loud enough to be heard over dryers and humming front loaders. I initially ignored the Beelzebub over my head until I heard the sound of piteous whimpers, screams for help, pleas for mercy. Over my head glared the image of a young girl being tortured and sexually assaulted in High Def clarity. Gut churning horror reached out to wrap cold fingers of “what if” around my neck. Without warning the shadow side of humanity loomed dark and large. The media gods laughed at my shock, demanded my attention and manipulated my nervous system. Right there in the pleasant mid morning of small town USA I was played. I wanted to vomit.

http://www.picturalissim.com/t/michelangelo_cumaean_sibyl_l.jpg

Some might say “Not to worry, it was TV, nothing real here. “

Except to my nervous system, the fear was palpable, her pretend agony; visceral. Hands fisted, my heart pounding: I was having the appropriate human response to danger. Out of the three preset mammalian programs for danger: flight, fight, or freeze. I was experiencing freeze. Thankfully I have an intact cerebral cortex and I thawed fast enough to experience the next rush of emotion with all its colors.

It was anger. How could something so evil as torture is used for entertainment? I was enraged that images of such horror create fear that is sent mindfully into the ethers, infecting innocents with violence. I felt repulsion that this cruelty to psyches is a vehicle for creating wealth for some, at the expense of all. I felt profound disappointment, realizing that some still watch the pain and terror of others for pleasure. These images go into our homes by choice our choice,

http://altroncolor.com/johanneandchristine/wp-content/uploads/2012/02/libyan-sibyl.jpg

I felt shame in our culture.

I felt the eyes of real people upon us. People who live in places where torture is a real and daily event, an inescapable part of their lives. Human to human violence is served up here in our living rooms on a big screen over the fireplace with a Crucifix on the wall.

I imagined a “tyrant of terror” tossing daily doses of fear to the masses through the TV. Hyperaroused newsrooms searching for the worst of humanity. As tame ducks on a pond, the viewers snap at the easy garbage, ignoring the riches just beneath the surface. Their wild relatives know better. Fear is the most potent weapon of controlling mammals. Too bad the tyrant is us, no one to blame but ourselves for continuing this charade of good and evil. Evil isn’t just “out there,” it exists with our permission.

Is it possible to pollute your mind? Is it possible to hold love and light in the same consciousness that contains these images? Why eat poison when there is nectar available?

I asked the other Washer the name of this atrocity.

“CriminalMinds” she said.

Her eyes moved quickly back to the screen.

“It’s terrible! How can that be on TV?!” I asked.

She appeared not to hear, the heroes were about to solve the murder with comic book dialog in flat intonation. Lost in adrenalin nirvana, she leaned in closer to the screen, gaze unflinching. Her hands clenched and released around the hard plastic handles of her laundry basket filled to the top with neatly folded children’s clothing. Her body was trying to regulate her nervous system; but the images just kept coming.

I could see the super hero underwear; toddler size, and the tiny jeans. I imagined the big TV and the small children listening to the victims cries for help as they pretended to sleep. I asked again,

“How can that be on TV?”

She wiped sweaty palms on mechanically ripped jeans and ignored me.

Believe in yourself and deny the bête noire his nightly meal of innocence.

The planets aligned, the earth shook and we all returned to center by gazing into our iPhone faces. Flood and drought, disease and miracle; we turn on the TV to monitor the catastrophe and never turn it off. The vapid and the violent have taken up residence in our homes, with our permission. They sell their fabulous elixir of emotions and hormonal highs for a high price. Are we selling our souls for a jolt of adrenalin, a fleeting feeling of being alive by witnessing the trauma of others?

I would sooner bathe in a sewer than then let that darkness in my soul.

Fight back, turn it off, and live free. Feel the real emotions: your own. In this glorious time, we all hold a piece of light; let’s shine it at each other and laugh at the pitiful darkness.

Addendum February 17, 2018

The darkness felt powerful this week. I thought of this blog written three years ago and wondered how far we have come down this path. Our constant connection to “electronic senses” mainlines a relentless stimuli of anger, fear, sorrow and “warm fuzzy feelings.” We are emotion junkies living for our next fix, just “Tell me what to feel…”

The images from a school in Florida were real. Lives ended in senseless violence by a person whose mind was in disconnect. We could find a scapegoat. Or we could ask what part did we each play in preventing this tragedy. How can we do it differently next time?

I came back to this; fight back. Fight back with love for everyone, no exceptions. Fight back with exquisite attention to what we plant in the gardens of our mind, and the minds of our children. Fight back with actions that neutralize; answer a fearful face with a smile, and a hunched stance with a handshake. We are responsible for the way we wear the privilege of being a human being. We all have the power to change to change everything.

The Goddess Showed Up Today

May1

Arthur Rackham

The Goddess showed up today in an Empress gown, as did the ecstatic Fool, and the Devil with his beguiling face. The Motley crew of truth rode in on their magnificent horses; Fearless, Freedom and Fun. The trio showed up in full form, squeezing themselves into our tiny nomadic living room through a doorway half their size.

Power of Horse and Archetype permeated the narrow living space so completely that there was no breath to breathe, but their own. They stood heaving their barrel chests, lungs pushing ribs in a rasping pant. Sweaty withers twitched, frothy from their swift charge across rolling green hills and shadowy deep valleys of my still mysterious unconscious. I was there, but unaware. I remained bent over the photos on an ipad, lost in my own soliloquy. I didn’t note their grand entrance or the ringing in my ear.

I was there, but unaware.

Scraping hooves laid deep grooves in the thin linoleum. Nostrils the size of my fist, billowed steamy breath rising to the ceiling. Their collective prana gathered into swirling black thunderheads that roared their own mission through the small, unheated space. Fueled by infinite possibility, the clouds towered upward, ricocheting off the low ceiling, condensing against the cold windows. Mist from the breath of hallucinations purified the atmosphere of worry with sacred rain.

I was there but unaware.

While our heroes stomped impatient frustration, I remained hunkered down on the small polyester clad dinette. My shoulders bent by the weight of “What if, is it possible, and maybe we shouldn’t”. Trying to create the future without dreaming it first is a wrench. I was there but unaware.

Le Char d’Apollon (Chariot of Apollo), ca. 1910

Fearless, being the closest, leaned forward with the Devil of Humanness on his back. He stretched his bony finger at a spot between my eyebrows. Water ran down his hand, dripping on my computer.

“Move on!” He bellowed. The words rang with crystal clarity, banging a direct hit on the closed door of my solar plexus. The phrase from Sondheim’s song, finally heard and understood. “The choice may be mistaken, the choosing is not!”

“Move On!!” they roared.

“The door is open, the dirt is dark, so go already!”

I remembered the mission, finally linking action with intention. The blessed Aha! Moment. Is it Illumination or illusion? Some might question my counsel. I would not. They have led me too many times in and out of dark pathless places to doubt their motives. An Archetype’s only agenda is truth.

I am here and I am listening.

Days on the Edge

Apr23

ndian-Village-Adirondacks-Painting-by-Winslow-Homer

Minerva has been still and silent. She has stood mute these past months in her dark quiet garage, while the lake froze, plants died, and Persephone journeyed down into the underworld. The Minervas; metal and zoetic, have been in hibernation of a most useful variety. Now it’s time to converse with mortality and investigate the inevitability of rebirth. There are tasks to be completed here. It’s time to get busy, time to gather up those soul pieces and bits of self left laying around the fields and forests of my childhood.

We sprung Minerva out of her fancy RV accommodations on the 7^th day of April and she thanked us for the winter comfort by starting right up. She was holding the same air from October, strange thing; we went out and came back in the same atmosphere. It snowed that night, and the one after. We laughed at our foolishness of flip-flops and searched for socks.

Appropriate motor home respites are appropriately closed here until the threat of freeze and guarantee of snowless camping returns. Minerva has yet to clear her internal cavities of the pink elixir that makes it possible for her to survive in this climate. She is out of the garage, but operating “without services.” We have been reminded that life for man, woman, and dogs, can be indeed very simple. We need to be warm, we need eat and we need to eliminate. The order of importance changes with the weather and the time of day. Spiritual enlightenment appears to take a backseat ala Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs, and yet I am always brushing shoulders with she who created this story.

Winslow_Homer_-_North_Woods_Club,_Adirondacks_(The_Interrupted_Tete-a-Tete)

http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File%3AWinslow_Homer_-_North_Woods_Club%2C_Adirondacks_(The_Interrupted_Tete-a-Tete).jpg

Lest you imagine an isolated off-road campsite at the icy edge of a granite cliff, sporting a plucky Minerva going “self contained”, not so. We have three wheels on blacktop, watching life unfold in a suburban community. We are indeed parked amidst the tall white pines and leafless oaks at the edge of the Adirondacks. This edge is also the driveway of open hearted family and their Ark-like home with actual working plumbing. School buses and garbage trucks, spring garden clean-up and curious neighbors, all staples of our past lives are just outside our nifty dinette slide out.

We are in search of a home, here where home was, a long time ago. This quest calls for senses more ancient and finely tuned than can exist in one lifetime. The work of the soul is best done under dark rich dirt too deep for cold. It is the timeless place where our Mother’s heart beats out the rhythm of the waves and wind. It is the place we remember who we are and who we have always been. That is the quest. This is the place.

Blessings on those who have wondered about Minerva’s whereabouts. Words have not been the chosen medium. Minerva is in a right brain free fall, a Zen-esque “how close to the bone can you go and not bleed to death?” The Koan for this month is

Where is Home? It is nowhere but here.

Koan – Definition and More from the Free Merriam-Webster …http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/koan : a paradox to be meditated upon that is used to train Zen Buddhist monks to abandon ultimate dependence on reason and to force them into gaining sudden intuitive enlightenment

Not Pegasus, but not too shabby

Feb13

I have this day had the opportunity to spend 10 hours in meditation. Airport meditation that is, which is a horse of a different color. The view from the window was extraordinary in its complexity. ATL is the busiest airport in the nation. The “hive” mind is alive and well here, cooperation reigns supreme on this tarmack. This is my photo essay of the day. It is said that in meditation there is a place where reality drops away and we become aware of the sacred forms. I am aware that I am yet 2 hours away from my chariot heading west into the sunset.

Call in the Valkyries

Feb10

For two days it had been blue grey drizzle, punctuated by periodic deluges that slapped at the windows, sending the dogs under the table. The unexpected monsoon shook loose the dead leaves from my live oak and washed them across the lawn into rusty mounds. My potted tomatoes split across their plump half ripe bellies, unable to refuse more water than they could hold.

Without appointments on these days, this discerning being chose to “hole” up at home. I donned socks, curled in a chair, and attended to my extraordinarily patient paperwork. I created dreams of a tidy weather tight home in the North; smugly green and beautiful in it’s efficiency. Our home would be steadfast beacon of comfortable living with minimal planetary impact.

I am allowed the luxury of imagined living in “other places” by virtue of my big brain human-being status. This, and the prevailing postulate of my species: Humans have the right to dominate over all other life forms. This philosophy allows great latitude in our dealings with all other nonhuman cohabitants of the planet, and it’s so convenient! Omnipotence feels great as long as one hums loud enough to drown out everything but ourselves.

do·min·ion noun

sovereignty; control.

“man’s attempt to establish dominion over nature”

supremacy, ascendancy, dominance, domination, superiority,predominance, preeminence, hegemony, authority, mastery, control,command, power, sway, rule, government, jurisdiction, sovereignty,

“at the time the Spartans had dominion over Athens” (Vocabulary.com)

It was still early, we found only two cars at the beach lot. A deserted beach was surprising on this bright morning in February, at the apex of the Southern Emigration season. It was snowing heav Arthur Rackham ily for the second day in the Northern tundra. On this day in southwestern Florida, the sky was an exquisitely clear robin’s egg blue. The southeast winds pushed hard across the face of the Gulf. The waveforms pulsed endlessly, rhythmic heartbeats of a restless goddess radiating throughout her domain. Amphitrite doesn’t miss anything in this; her personal providence. It may be frozen someplace else, but the blood is flowing here, pounding really; pounding in our ears.

I felt it, even before I saw the refuse. I felt the moan under the waves and the scream in the wind. The water was milky, churned up and opaque. The wind didn’t create this howl; the wind was mourning the losses.

Offshore the sand dredger stood anchored above their next prey. Working day and night for weeks, they had plunged the impossibly huge mouth of the vacuum into the belly of the Gulf. Grabbing all, suffocating all, moving the sand with the empathy of a Giant’s foot on an anthill. It was pumped up to plump up the pricey beachfront that had of late, looked wan and gangly. The hanging roots of the beach grass lay exposed to the sun. The dune barely stood; sliced open by wave and wind.

Seize-The-Despoiler-Rescue-The-Gold-Help-Us-Help-Us-Woe-Woe,-Illustration-From-The-Rhinegold-And-The-Valkyrie,-1910 The expensive condos at the legal edge of the dune are winter home to beings with ownership sensibilities and the “wherewithal” to protect their investment. The privilege of living close to a barrier beach had not taught them to see. These condo folk have “dominion,” and a pretty short life span. What chance do a millions mollusks and a some unconscious crustaceans have in the face of such obvious entitlement?

As long as “gravity” holds out on this planet, sand and water will ebb and flow, swirl and sway. They are in perpetual dance; forever and for all time. It’s a perpetual call and response with these two, the mediums of elemental architects.

Form + energy /time=natural forms

We walked amidst deep piles of small shells, small mountains of amorphic sponges drying in the wind, a sea cucumber, even a dead raccoon lay eyeless and rolling at the edge of the angry waves. A red sand dollar just recently alive in a nearby aquatic suburb lay drawn and quartered across the sand. The red color suggested the color of blood. Insinuating, if only in my soul; what if this was a human body? What if we were ripped from our comfy chairs and supermarket parking lots and sprayed out into the universe for some “higher purpose?” Suddenly this clear windy day at the edge of the sea became an apocalypse.

On this day, life at the edge of the sea was about domination, disrespect and death. This wasn’t a hunt for lunch, protection of young, or survival. What gives us the right to destroy so much?

Call for the Valkyries, there be heroes here. Although not human ones. Valkyries are the mythic women who carry swords they never use, who chose the heroes that will die in the man-made battles, women who scoop up those that will live forever. They are the place where good and evil are not clearly distinguishable, they are the same.

Bring them to Valhalla; it’s not safe here

All artwork by Arthur Rackham (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arthur_Rackham)

All artwork by Arthur Rackham Images from http://www.1st-art-gallery.com
Born	19 September 1867 Lewisham, Kent, England
Died	6 September 1939 (aged 71) Limpsfield, Surrey, England
Nationality	English
Known for	Children’s literature

Singing the Solstice Blues

Dec27

Solstice 2014

We chased the sunset; flying due west across the Southern United States at sunset on the Solstice of 2014. This final day of descent into darkness in the Northern Hemisphere has always been notable to me. In the last few years Solstice prayers and hopes have been etched on heart and they played out their mysteries in the months that followed. It isn’t the darkness that catches my attention. It is the echo of rituals past when people and the earth sang together, danced together in mutual care and respect.

Solstice is an intractable physical event; like puberty or menopause, birth and death. An astrological alignment of sun and earth described in light and shadow expressing constants floating in a sea of other potential outcomes. All this drama played out right here in our own intimate corner of the universe. These behemoth players dance the archetypes of sacred interrelationships on a planetary stage of constant change. For the early watchers, when survival was more primordial, the daily sunset was mortality, the sunrise a prayer of gratitude.

The Solstice is the shortest day, the least light, the final exhale of this solar year. Seems worth a few moments of contemplation amidst digital distractions of pre Christmas cheer. Our 21st century world is not a jazzy hologram or fantastical computer generated image, but a living breathing entity. We the humans, are here, because there is a “here.” All that happens in the physical realm is “that” which allows us a life in the physical. We are all part of this beautiful planet earth and one of her children. It would seem reasonable to listen to “Mom” now and then, give a hand up to those in need, and say thanks once in a while for our ride on this fantastic space ship.

I was reminded this year to mark the darkest day by an explorer in the realms of plant devas. An in-training Anam cara of the apple tree has reminded those of us who listen of the olde practice of wassailing. A sweet and chilly practice of going to the trees that feed us in summer to give encouragement in their hardest and darkest days. The grace of warm breath amongst chilly trees, human voices singing out support, grateful hearts banishing dark spirits who would bruise and maim the creators of food and fruit. Marking miracles makes sense.
Attend the last breath
makes the next breath feel so sweet.

In Search of…..What? In Search of Who..? Revisited

Nov24

The Devas hold the schedule, I hold the hose.

I am accustomed to tending my own garden of Psyche daily. I work each morning as a medieval monk tending the medicinal herbs. It’s solitary work. Strong medicines need quiet voices and patient hands. In this garden of “Know thyself,” and its corollary “Know Everyone Else”, the Devas hold the schedule, I hold the hose.

I seek the smallest of keys, the softest of voices whose demands create heaven or hell here on earth. I am a devotee of the siren called Relationship. Without relationship, love is lost, if love is lost; all is lost. The answers to the “good life” quest are all right there, floating in the rich soup of interrelatedness. It is appropriate then, to find myself here. Queries of life should be answered in the field, library research is far too easy, far too clean. It is a shock to witness the deep clouds of aged aloneness that are all around me. Their solitary presence as palpable as the gnat that floats in my coffee, right under my nose.

Why do so many fragile elders live out such lonely endings to their “Well-lived” Lives?

These are the superfluous thoughts that I ponder in my garden. In Florida, the hearing is hard and time runs short; endlessly. Thoughts are cheap; connection requires deep attention and careful listening. If I wish to hear them, I will. Once heard, I will have to listen, and I already know the sound is deafening.

Deva

Indo-European, Sanskrit word for God, originally thought of as feminine. The modern word Goddess has changed connotations to represent a lesser form of divinity. Deva had the meaning we typically think of as the word God today, however God was thought to be the Great Mother.

In Buddhism Devas are highly evolved beings who inhabit different levels of existence. Devas are commonly associated with great beauty and bliss.

Modern New Age versions of Deva’s are thought of similarly to angels, nature spirits, or fairies.
Pronounced Day-va.

Is there anybody there?

In the heat of August, our 1960’s era Florida ‘hood seemed nearly abandoned. Air conditioning and cicadas hummed in unison, shades pulled against the relentless sun; we are all hunkered down in our separate oasis. In gentler October, I came to discern the fainter life force: there are many more people here than meet the eye. Empty carport and weekly mowing does not necessarily denote a Michigan snowbird’s empty winter escape. Is it a clever vacation timer changing channels in the late night TV glow across the street? Or is there a gnarled hand on a sticky remo becomingRedon te picking endlessly at the arm of a single recliner in that darkened room? When I look at the blank face of that picture window, I wonder what looks back at me.

By November, my own lack of critical agenda mixed with the timeless energies and endless ebbing of those in 30-year retirements. Only then did I begin to hear them. I accepted the possibility that hearts too fragile to be “out and about” lived amongst us; close by and yet unseen. Yes, some of our neighbors have been here a very, very long time. Current wisdom calls this “Aging in place.” With enough resources one can stay home until you die, sometimes alone, sometimes leaving another alone for the first time in many years. Sadness and fear are the concrete reinforcement of loneliness, once hardened, it must be hard to get free.

How can I help and why don’t I want to?

An opportunity to interact with a silent neighbor arrived via Postal indiscretion. West Field Drive became East Field Drive and a misdirected piece of mail prompted an impromptu visit from a frail neighbor. I didn’t recognize the Deva in the doorway right away. She stood no taller than my chin. Her razor-sharp blue eyes shimmered above the optimistic, quickly applied swash of pink cheeks. Our visitor knocked on the door with authority belying her tiny stature. I was surprised by the friendly face; she took that in stride; she needed to sit down. Lowering herself into the nearest chair, she announced herself and her mission. Panting a bit, she noted my painting of wings on the wall nearby and identified herself as a fellow painter and designer.

Had I not been wearing my Florida Fairy foiling earmuffs, I would have identified her immediately as one of the “nature folk” or “faerie people.” Diminutive in size but powerful in Spirit, these beings are part of mythology worldwide. Mythology means “replaced by a different idea,” it doesn’t mean “extinct.” It has been my experience that occasionally one of these Folk will drop into our amplitude to whisper in our ear

oldangelRedon or whack us up the back of the knees while screeching “WAKE UP!” directly into our hearts. She had appeared at our doorstep, having trekked down a half block on slippered feet to deliver a bulk rate package gone amiss.

“He” was just out of the hospital that very afternoon from a hernia operation. The timing of this sortie was just so untimely. I was so taken by this elf in my living room and the stream of wordless language flowing out of her that I forgot myself and offered her whatever help I could.

“Oh no, we’re fine. He just isn’t feeling very well.” She said. Another sign of the Wee Folk; reverse hyperbole.

Then I heard the Deva, “She wants you to come with her…”

I walked her home, offering first to drive the span of four driveways and a street. She reminded too much of the gentle gray doves we see splayed out on the road because they just won’t hurry. She told me of his stomach pains and his surgery, of her cancer and her painting, “He” was installed on the couch when we got back. There would have been surprise on his face as we walked in together, but it would have taken too much strength. He was saving what he had to speak gently to his partner.

He told me he came here for the small airport; he was a pilot then. She said they bought the house for the pool; so much fun for his grandchildren. He said, “They are grown now, haven’t been here in such a long time, but they used to like to come.”

There were ghosts of good times watching them; the reapers of regret piling their sheaves high. I sat and listened. I learned about life and longing and love. I called on every angel I knew to help them, and to help me know how to leave this house without bundles of baggage that I didn’t pack.

She showed me the pool; vacuum bubbling away on its appointed rounds. When had someone last jumped into that clear water? Was there ever sand on the floor and food in the fridge? When was there last a child sleeping in the three empty guest rooms with sheets on the beds? My silent questions were sucked into flocked walls and thick carpet and left unanswered. The density in the room dared me to stay longer.

“No food, no wine, no fun!”

She waved at the artwork layered on bookshelves and the cases of small cans of liquid diet stacked in the Formica kitchen. Paints were laid out on a card table in the sun. “Do you paint now?” I asked. She said smiling, “Not in DeathRedon a long time, my back hurts too much.”

I asked if it was hard to not eat food anymore, cancer had taken that too. “No food, no wine, no fun!” she said.

I sat for a while in their living room, taking in the dire straits in this home. Health completely gone, mobility quickly disappearing, they were collectively a ship with ravaged sails facing an oncoming storm. I looked for despair but couldn’t find it, neither could I feel anger. It did seem that sadness took up the best part of the couch. The professional part of me asked, “How long could these two support each other and their own disabilities?”

The partner part of me knew the real answer: until “Death do they part”, and probably beyond.

I walked home with my bundle of information in a language I didn’t understand. It was heavy and bulky, it smelled a bit rancid. I resented carrying it home, but I did. I put it in my studio room under an unfinished painting. I hoped they would talk between themselves and get back to me on its meaning.

Well they did. It came to me in the form of a recommended article from a dear old friend from my ancient past. A fellow sojourner in the early days of our “We can do more.” The basic theme was: ideas in the Ether, stay in the ether, unless they are processed via focus and form into concretized products. She wrapped love around that article and sent it out. This my friend, is the product of that bundle. Thank you

To our silent neighbors all around

I know you are there, I hear you and I send you love

Addendum

January 20,2016

I revisited this story written when we lived in Venice Florida

Our tiny sweet lady’s husband died shortly after this was written, she followed, just a bit later. One of the children moved into all those empty bedrooms with a shiney clean pool.

Our “across the street” invisible TV-watching gentleman also died that winter while we were away for a weekend. Turns out he did have family. Shortly after, I was holding the hose on some parched Gardenias when I saw a young man move away from the foul voices of the “house emptying crew. ” He moved behind the dumpster to sit on the back bumper of an old van. Out of sight of the others, he bent over and sobbed a river of tears into his hands, shoulders heaving; it was a heartbreaking scene.

All that sadness, anger, depression, whatever the emotions that existed in that living room must have been still there. There’s always someone in each family who chooses, or is chosen to hold that basket. The house had been foreclosed upon, and those that went in, didn’t stay long inside. The living conditions inside were just that bad.

I said a prayer for this sad boy and I thought our tiny neighbor from the wee folk was right there next to me. When we were done, she looked up at me with a look that told me, “You don’t understand now…but you will.” She patted my arm, gave a little wink and walked back up the street to her old house. I was happy to see a bit of Spring in her step now.

The younger 60’s hippie neighbors to the left of him also left quickly, they did it with a rented truck and a friend’s pickup. We followed a bit later, selling most everything we had gathered there to a “picker” with a turkey vulture mentality. On Ground Hog Day we will set off to revisit old territory. Thank you Florida, for the good lessons well learned.

All paintings by Odilon Redon

http://www.odilon-redon.org

http://terrainwalker.wordpress.com/2011/01/09/native-american-little-people/

Color Me Yellow and Sing Me a Song

Nov3

closeupred

If you believe your life is random and separate, read no further

Move along down your uncertain path, unencumbered by mystery

Pay no attention to the music that underscores your life

It will only confuse and befuddle an only ME

This life I have chosen a fine concerto written for the key of WE

Optimistically performed in the chaff of a corn field, on a stormy day in October

A melody of connection sent out on the wind, set free by design

Not a prudent choice, but mine to make, this time ‘round

We imagine the perfect phrases from a polished instrument

A clear tune moving through time- forward and back, illuminating the revered

Human egos and the flotsam of strong currents render their divine melody

Be lost to whirling winds, gnawing teeth, and inattention

I am not a mid age woman with a crow on my head

I am actor and audience in the Opera of matter, movement, and miracle

The symphony of connection is a birthright, a codex to be savored; one life at a time

Perfect phrases from a polished instrument we can all hear

watergap

We took a ride to see the leaves in October.

We went to celebrate our harvest of good health with the glorious colors of autumn.

We went in search of apples, cider doughnuts, blue skies and red Maples.

We went with a sense of immediacy; defendable to those living close to the earth, or those not long for this world. “Hurry let’s go, before they are gone….”

It is one of the miracles of impermanency that in their last glorious days, any leaf, on any tree, will individuate with glowing authenticity. Even as it drifts back to its Earthly origin a single leaf shouts out “This is who I am and this was my experience here, let me sing my song and shout my colors. Let me share this with you!”

We took to the road to witness our world as luminous, by the leaves made numinous

North out of Florida, through Georgia and into the mountains, we journeyed heavy of tire, but light of heart in the roving ranchette that is Minerva. Having spent many months in a forced retirement community known as “Storage,” Minerva was ready to rumble. The quest to savor and sample the glorious days of Harvest is an ancient tradition in my family. Three generations wandering country roads on a Sunday afternoon after church. Our elders named the trees, read the colors for weather omen, happily radiating us with multi- generational layers of earthly experience.

“Remember the Nor’easters last year that took them all down? The ice storm of 58?”

The colors on Kodachrome forever preserved in my mind. Musty sweaters and piles of squash, an over ripe apple, the last yellow jacket; sounds and smells illuminated by the Halleluiah chorus of falling leaves in sun bright colors, these images live in my soul.

Life isn’t a sure thing. Learn from the imperative of the “Beautiful Day.” Go now!

The Leaves were honored in countless tributes in October.

We saw them. Red Maples and rusty Oaks, Hickory and Beech standing against a clear blue sky swept clear of humidity. After the brilliant but monochromatic gold of New Mexico, then multi-textured, perpetual green of Florida, I thought I would weep at the beauty. I think my brain hadn’t processed color and light at this magnitude for a very long time. I drank in the colors by the gallon. My ancestors wiped pie sticky fingers on worn aprons, and smiled.

The leaves sang their colors simultaneously. A vast chorus, all singing a different song. They had been the subtle back up musicians of green; anonymous and safe. These individuals in their last days were accorded all due respect as they announced their own demise. Remember the childhood celebration of the single leaf? The favored one plucked out from thousands by a small hand. It’s beauty enshrined between ironed wax paper and hung in the window.

Individuation is a philosophical, spiritual and mystical experience (Jung, 1989b, p. 294). It is the goal of our psychological development and in metaphysical terms amounts to God’s incarnation (Jung, 1989b, p. 157). Individuation is the central concept and purpose of Jung’s Analytical Psychology (Jung, 1989a, p. 209

So much diversity; clear and brilliant as they prepare to fall and rejoin the ultimate unity. All is exposed in the autumn of life; nature and nurture, character and cultivation. Attached and entwined, the scarlet poison ivy insinuates itself into the heights crawling its way up on the bark of trees. The woody grapevines and their clever corkscrew wrappers; we can see their trickiness clearly in October. The artifice of expansion is useless in Fall. Drop the yearning; a leaf life is but one season long. Better to go out singing.

In what was once a wall of analogous green, each different species is shouting out their identity, “Look at me! I am not a Maple or an Oak. I am a Beech and my essence is yellow!” Each leaf differentiating their experience from the thousand on the same branch. A fungus here and caterpillar there, a sunny spot or shady struggle, its time for the finale. As a leaf, in the bright short days of October, is this the best time to self actualize? Or the only time?

This magnificent display of innate creativity just before returning to dust, is it a last ditch dump of all the glory you came with, but never used?

Are you really any wiser or more beautiful than the “Greenies” of July? Or are they just too engorged with tomorrows to create extraordinary colors today?

Or is it the grace of clarity that arrives when we realize we are leaves and not the tree.

Happy Harvest

A self-actualizer is a person who is living creatively and fully using his or her potentials.

“What a Woman can do, she must do”

http://psychology.about.com/od/

theoriesofpersonality/a/hierarchyneeds_2.htm

Ghost Crabs and other Fables

Sep11

Great Blue Heron

You only need sit still long enough in some attractive spot in the woods that all its inhabitants may exhibit themselves to you by turns. Henry David Thoreau

Early every morning barring serious thunderstorm or domestic demands we go to the Beach. This routine is simple and soothing, wait for the first light, drink some coffee, brush teeth, don bathing suits and go. Some ancient ritual marking the miracle of each day calls us to the edge of sand and water. Empty in mind and belly we seek communion and supplication with “the Shehe” that inhabits saltwater, wind and sand. Beaches are sacred ground, where all worlds mingle, earth and sky, life and death, dreams and despair. These polarities are nothing new or unique, it is just so much chowder in the Pot. Ask the empty Conchs, the turtle eggs, the faster fish, the stealthy Ghost Crabs. The living and the dead, real and imagined mingle freely here, and without apology. Each a foundation and food for the “other.”

Humans come to fish, to soak, to walk, to see, to rest. When we come to the beach we are home. We come to wash away pain, to heal brokenness, to find joy in living and in being alive, to accept death as inevitable, to see the magic in an earthly manifestation; no matter how difficult this assignment may be, on this day or any other.

The sea is the beginning and the end, always and forever.

Look! Look! Look deep into nature and you will understand everything. Albert Einstein

This being summer Vbeach in a Florida winter beach town the beach is gloriously empty of people. It is a 3 minute trip in the sand lined and musty “beach car;” my immortal 2004 Toyota highlander. This relic of a different life, sporting New Mexico license, is packed with what most weekend beach revelers might feel essential; chairs and coolers, towels, umbrellas, noodles and sand toys. Through constant practice we have whittled the daily needs to mangy beach hat, bamboo mat and a single wacky noodle. We have several rainbow colors but there is a crusty favorite.

On this day, as everyday, there was magic. The familiar long legged Great Blue Heron; sultan of the fishing pier restrooms was entertaining today. Three heads turned. Size equals aristocracy in the bird world. These three giants feigned deep insult as we passed. They sized us up with a side-eye stare, the only choice really, with their eye placement. No fishing pole=no bait=no interest. Beak in the air, we were dismissed. Turning with their best slow motion “giant step” each hurried off in the Great Heron way, as if the air was molasses thick, a visual of a 78 record played on 33. The Great Blue heron and the Hummingbird must represent the entire Bird Time Continuum.

What compels human beings to stand in moving water, watch the clouds, and feel for the movement of the sea? The universal fraction of change: Movement + Element over Time sings a compelling chant to the bodies here at the edge of water. While one of us walks down the beach talking to fish and sky, another enters the warm water and begins the sacred water healing pipefish ritual. Petitioning the sun, practicing unity with wave and wind, the salt water is substrate for the healing of bone and muscle finally relieved of their constant trial.

And forget not that the earth delights to feel your bare feet and the winds long to play with your hair. Kahlil Gibran

The clouds were in their most impressive “Thunder Being” arrangement over the western horizon. The sun rose behind the three tall slash pines on the edge of the beach. Their shade reached across the sand and far into the water. Down the beach, a familiar head bobbed on the small waves, far, far out on this very low tide. A nearly full moon reflected the blue sky in the west.

I was well into my Spirit cleaning, calf clenching speed walk down the empty beach. This practice is my own body-mind-spirit vehicle for mind clearing, family support, and personal expansion; whatever is up in my world. Cutting through my walking meditation, a leaping silver fish caught my eye. He leap once, twice, three times, giving new meaning to “walking on water.” I stood in the water, watching the fish take wing, witnessing the life and death dance of “feeding time.”

Many miles to the West, hovering near the tower of cloud, a huge ball of bright Magenta color was forming. As it grew larger and brighter, my mind went at it. Rainbow? Burning boat? Why only that color? Why only that direction? What does this mean!? A round single color rainbow? Does anyone else see this? tallcloud

But there was no one else.

Thankfully when the not so wise Mind runs out of small individual human thoughts it gets quiet, shuts up, or shuts down. Then the really Big- “We are all connected” thoughts move in, albeit at the speed of a Great Blue Heron. If you wait for it, get quiet and breathe, they always show up.

I imagined that my family in the West was seeing this first color of sunrise. My thoughts were reaching out to children and grandchildren, Family and Friends. Even reaching family so far west from here that it is Far East, the mind warp of living on a sphere! Thoughts and prayers, making their way across the water and the miles, time and distance made meaningless. Love and light travel together is what the fish told me.

I watched that glow of color and connection, swaying with the waves until I realized I was buried in the sand with the coquinas. The gentle relentless movement of sand and water had pulled me back into earth with each wave. I was in halfway up to my knees. Someday I won’t move my buried feet. I will stay and see if the sea can bury me completely feet first. But this is not that day. On this memorable day, I appreciate the grounding.

hubblesnail

We could explain everything with water temperature, salinity, negative ions, and light refraction, everything except why we all feel so much better after being at the Beach!

Remember the Ghost Crab, small transparent sand crabs that don’t survive beaches with people, because people have big feet.

They were once described as an “occult, secretive alien from the ancient depths of the sea”. There are swarms of them at the beach now. Life is easy and hard, good and bad, dark and light: all at the same time. The real trick is to learn to love ALL of it. The best way I know to do that is to stand in sand up to your knees, let the waves get you wet, and marvel at the beauty of the sky.

Study nature, love nature, stay close to nature. It will never fail you. Frank Lloyd Wright

Florida in August is perfect…..

Aug25

Florida in August is perfect…..if you are a lizard.

It is the outside air oozing in through an open door, thick and steamy, just this side of liquid.

It is the sun searing the innocence of transplanted leaves, or the unprepared skin of pale tourists. Both have left their genetic comfort zones. Both have grossly miscalculated the desiccating power of unlimited Prana.

It is the drama of turbulent clouds reaching into the Gulf for yet another cauldron of water to pour on summer stagnant swamplands. Monstrous storms move desert lifetimes of water in spontaneous torrents, rinsing and washing, rinsing and washing until every plant comes shiny and clean under a rainbow.

It is the whine of the Cicadas and the cacophony of tree frogs so loud that some days it is unclear if the sound exists inside or outside of my consciousness. cloud

There are Primal forces at work here in the near Tropics and they “strut their stuff” in August.

They bow to no one on these dense days.

These are the Titans, the soul of all life here on Earth:

Sun, Water and the Urge to live. And live they do, in bright colors and with leathery resiliency. The work of Earth will prevail here in Florida, despite our human hindrance and hampering, poisoning and pruning. Life will continue, although the prevalent form may be a lizard

or humans that act like lizards!

It’s all about Adaptation

Humans

Humans scurry to join the Outdoors in the early morning and nearly dark evening, leaving the bright days to pass in the electric oasis of central air conditioning. If you weren’t born to live here, better lay low until later.

The only living that goes on Outside at noon is car bathwindow ried on by the professionals; Lizards, Bougainvillea, Palm trees and very hardy Landscapers.

We are the human versions of the sweating ice tea glass, go outside and unimagined amounts of water will begin to roll off your body. The weather calls the shots here, adapt your schedule or “fry.”

Palms, Palms, Palms: every size and every guise

Palms look the way they do because they have done their best to maximize a challenging assignment. Compare a Palm to a Peony and tell me who will be standing in this climate? Tropical sun, Biblical proportion deluges and circular winds of summer’s tumultuous thunderstorms have created the perfect survivor.

Palms can sport thick trunks of spikes and spears, shields studded with razor sharp points or spindly, spongy 60-foot stems holding a single mop of leaves. Somehow, they are all Palms. What they don’t share in shape they share in attitude.

Their magic is accommodation. They share leaves that bend, split, unfold, and shred as they dance the wind spirit. Leaves on branches that ride the top o’ the gale, always illustrating wind, never “bracing against.” No matter how fierce the blow, they flow in non-resistance. Palms win their survival by yielding; being one with what is present. No good to burn, and hard to get close to, these are tree survivors.

I give them full measure of respect and keep a good distance as they are also- full of

“those that shall remain nameless”…the “insect survivors.”

Lizards Lizards and more Lizards

There are thousands of lizards in our yard this month, every color, every size and everywhere you look. From out of the ferns they leap; tiny “two inchers,” swinging on a leaf, to the full-grown Grand Poobahs.These behemoths challenge at eye level with a “come hither” throat swell and a raised eyebrow. This could suggest a great deal about the power of a positive self-image. They also remind us all that the human brain is built on this very same “reptilian brai lizard n” substrate as well.

It’s all so familiar. The population of lizards surrounding the giant Live Oak suggests the machinery and mysteries of reproduction are in full swing out there.

Our chemical free yard has become a version of the “Whole Foods” olive bar for snakes, birds and any and all creatures that find a lizard tasty. A Red tailed hawk left a tail feather “Thank You” note on the driveway, as did the Blue Jay. The Rat snake was a surprise; he was so full he could hardly muster himself off the driveway. It’s not easy to be “prey.”

The Poobahs and their minions are particularly fond of the car that resides in the shade of that giant “Live Oak. Most will leap off tires and shimmy out of the front grill when the locks click open. There are some that won’t leave, be it territorial or recreational; they stand their ground. Maybe they feathers claim dominion over Fords?

They are tenacious despite their diminutive stature. Some of these cowboys have a penchant for riding on the hood, sticky toes spread, gripping the metal, face into the wind. Others, caught napping in the windshield wiper well, climb their way up despite gale force windshield winds, to glare at the driver, clearly irked at the unexpected journey. More than once I have pulled over and commanded them off. I can’t drive safely and watch for raised eyebrows and panicky looks when I have to stop fast. I do wonder how they know where to find the driver? I try not to envision the aftermath for one of these unexpected emigres marooned at the grocery store or the beach parking lot.

I’m unclear if I will sign up for the next “August in Florida” Cotillion of sweat and swelter. I can dream and ponder on cooler realms for next August. For the present, seems a page out of the book of palms might serve:

Adapt, Modify, Accommodate. The Quest?

Bloom where you’re planted.

Fly with Me

Jun23

Air travel is wonderful.

In a culture that demands space and privacy, the security process alone is therapeutic. There you are, standing barefooted and beltless, questioning what is a jacket and what is your shirt. On the queue amongst strangers, we are all in the same state of affairs. We are travelers adrift in search of sanity in safety. There is eye contact, shared experience, and compassion for the one chosen to play a “bad guy” that morning. Vulnerability is a powerful tool in community building. But that’s the adult perspective. For kids, it’s a horse of a different color.

http://www.blogcdn.com/www.gadling.com/media/2009/05/kid_plane.png

Traveling with children on a plane can be hilarious. Especially if you are not their parent, and seated a few rows back. I have not yet had a plane trip that was not improved by a few rows of kids, swaggering down the aisle their bulging backpacks of snacks and excitement, whacking any unsuspecting passenger foolish enough to not recognize the size of their joy. Nothing more giddy and gleeful than “kids on vacation.” It is beyond a good mood, it reeks of unlimited access to parents, relaxed rules and excess ice cream. I could be biased. I’m fond of travel myself.

The atmosphere is contagious. Those who are not kids, or active duty parents, should always have the good sense to breathe in this air of anticipation, and enjoy the view. I think traveling adults behave better in the presence of traveling children. They smile more, complain less or they move much further back. Who could ignore the sticky face cherub that pops over the top of the seat with the “Is this great or what” smile? Suddenly, it IS great; we are flying! Those are clouds out there and the buildings are tiny. Talk about empowerment for the not so silent minority!

Most kids address their day with a sense of adventure. Give these cosmonauts a ride in the sky and their worldview has just exploded. We may find it cramped and uncomfortable in 16D. These mini explorers spend all their road trips strapped into tight seats in the back row. The view is so much better from the sky, and your parents pay more attention.

On a recent trip from Florida to New Mexico we were seated in front of a pint size philosopher with the comedic timing of a Borscht belt comedian. I wrote this down. Nothing ever made up by an adult can top a child’s raw experience. As the plane eased out of the gate at Tampa, preparing for the runway, his voice could be heard over the engines.

“Are we there yet??” We left the runway on laughter, even the sincerely cranky enjoyed that classic.

A few minutes later swooping over Tampa bay at a rakish angle. “Sometimes I get scared Dad. Dad? Did you hear me? Sometimes I get scared!” Dad, it turned out was a combat veteran; I’ll bet he understood that very well.

“Dad, you have something up your nose. What IS that up your nose?? We were in the aisles.

“Where’s our hotel Dad, is that Texas? Calla, Calla we’re in Texas! Dad everything in Texas is so small! Where’s our hotel Dad, is it that box?” (Circling Houston)

Diagonally we have a small, but fully cognizant being. Impossibly skinny legs in purple knit leggings sticking out from under a flowered ruffled mini dress shaped like a bell. Two pig tails of different lengths, wrapped in rubber bands, sticking out at revolutionary angles. It appeared as if she had done her own trim recently. She was succinct and cool. Eye contact, appraisal, approval and back to her iPad. A few bumps, a few mini rolls, and we are all stapled in for the duration, she took it all in stride.

The toddler next door began a sleep song as plaintive and intricate as a Robin’s end of day parable. She repeated the song in its entirety; same tone, same cadence, same vocables, three or four times before she sang herself to sleep. She created her own song and was singing it for herself. Awesome self-soothing, wish I could be as self aware. How much do we really understand about being a child? And why do we rush to make them adults with sad eyes and nervous hands? Maybe some research into the basis of their wisdom might serve better. Maybe we could sit in the back seat more often.

Children and angels are of the same fabric

They’ve forgotten their guile and

Left their façade at home

Don’t even try to keep them

From standing too close and looking too deep

They can see you anyway.

Maybe the sea is heaven, Maybe heaven is the Sea

Jun17

What is a beach? What is the sea? Do I reflect her or does she reflect me?

We went down to the beach early this morning. It is a miracle to have unlimited access to “the beach” in the heat of a Florida summer. Few things feel better than immersion in sun warmed salt water. The Gulf is that; a bowl of gathered water and suspended “stuff” all assimilating into the Atlantic Ocean and beyond. Despite the human need to name and claim, it is not of Mexico, nor of the United States. It is the cupped hands held under the spigot of North America’s rain. Water from the sky holding by force of attraction all the flavors and flotsam of each place and experience on the journey.

The same water that existed on Earth millions of years ago is still here.

But did you know it is all the same water? We are a closed system here on planet Earth, a giant terrarium. Water moves around, as water vapor, liquid water, and ice. Water is a shape shifter, changing its form as conditions dictate. Never lost, only changed.

“Although some matter, such as meteors from outer space, are captured by Earth, very little of the Earth’s substances escape into outer space. This is certainly true about water. Therefore the same water that existed on Earth millions of years ago is still here. The global water cycle dictates that the same water is continually being recycled all around the globe.”

http://science.nasa.gov/earth-science/oceanography/ocean-earth-system/ocean-water-cycle/So there I sat on the nearly uninhabited beach, sun drowsy and half immersed at the edge of the water in a yellow beach chair, communing with the fishes. From a suggestion of an unknown source, I began imagining that I could dissolve into that water, let my molecules float across oceans, and still be conscious. I envisioned drifting without fear through Amphitrite and Poseidon’s domain. And what is the beauty of being dissolved? No concern for fear, or pain, or survival, water always survives. Weightless and worry free; “going with the flow,” in the most literal sense.

I wonder if this is what physical death feels like?

I imagined the behemoth polka-dotted whale shark; the vacuum mouth, filter feeder seen here recently. She swept me up but I passed right through her; no harm done. I wondered about visioning such peace at the time of death, on the anniversary of my birth 59 some years ago. Life is just so tricky.

I think I will call it “Aqua Therapy.” Becoming suspended in the Sea is the perfect solution for the raw chafe of human beings and the pesky nymphs of modern living. Too many electronics? Too many miles? Too many words? Go sink in, soak up the magical medium of life on this planet. Mystical, mercurial changer of shape and form, carrier of life and death, water is the ultimate denominator of life here on the Blue planet. She is the ultimate balancer as well.

Is it an accident of creation or invention that all things electronic can’t survive a simple swim? What does it say about our constant E-companions? TVs, phones, pads and pods are all neutralized by our mother liquid. Yet we are that, a structured container of dissolved minerals. We are that: a very elaborate canteen of fluid and form holding tiny beings, vast communities of differentiated cells, infinitesimal chains holding all human memory.

Maya, Maia, Me

Maybe it was the color of the sky, or the warm gentleness of the water. As the chair sunk into the deep shell sand of the shallows, I contemplated the impermanence of my temporary liquid neighborhood. The tiniest of fish moved rhythmically towards beach, back and forth with the breath of the waves. The edge of water and sand renegotiated with each wave, endless infinite shuffling of inhabitants amidst water, wind or predator.

What came next was a “what if” epiphany. For a moment there was a swirl of illumination. We protect ourselves a lot. We focus without pause on the survival of a body that will not survive… no matter what. We always look up to others and out to belief systems in search of our meaning of life, and our “after life” address. Separating death and life with definite parameters, – like having a human body.

What if heaven is like the sea? What if heaven is the sea? What if we are heaven?

In a Google search for an attractive “Water system” illustration I found this; exploding all facts and theories thus far in place on what water can do, what water can be, where water came from.

Deep Underground, Oceans Of Water May Be Trapped In A Crystal ‘Sponge’

by L. CAROL RITCHIE

June 15, 2014 3:27 PM ET

Science teachers may have to add a whole new layer to the water cycle. Scientists have discovered evidence of a vast reservoir of water hiding up to 400 miles beneath the surface.

“The discovery could transform our understanding of how the planet was formed, suggesting that Earth’s water may have come from within, rather than from collisions with large, icy comets.”

The water is trapped in a blue mineral called ringwoodite that sits in the mantle, a hot, rocky layer between the Earth’s crust and outer core. That means the water is not the familiar liquid, vapor or ice, but a fourth, mineral form. We reported earlier this year on a rare diamond containing a microscopic piece of ringwoodite that bolstered evidence for the vast wet zone.

It is likely the largest reservoir of water on the planet, and could be the source of the oceans’ liquid. The study was published in the journal Science.

The study is also remarkable for the discovery that melting and movement of rock occurs in a layer of the mantle known as the transition zone, between the upper and lower mantles, the Guardian reports. Most melting was thought to occur at much shallower depths.

“Geological processes on the Earth’s surface, such as earthquakes or erupting volcanoes, are an expression of what is going on inside the Earth, out of our sight,” said Geophysicist Steve Jacobsen from Northwestern University, co-author of the study.

“I think we are finally seeing evidence for a whole-Earth water cycle, which may help explain the vast amount of liquid water on the surface of our habitable planet. Scientists have been looking for this missing deep water for decades,” he said.

The study relied on seismometers across the U.S. and lab experiments simulating rocks under high pressure, says Nature World News.

“Ringwoodite here is key,” it notes. “Its crystal-like structure makes it act like a sponge and draw in hydrogen and trap water.” It could be a vast amount of water, says the Guardian. “If just 1 percent of the weight of mantle rock located in the transition zone was water it would be equivalent to nearly three times the amount of water in our oceans, Jacobsen said.”

http://www.npr.org/blogs/thetwo-way/2014/06/15/322246690/deep-below-oceans-of-water-may-be-trapped-in-a-crystal-sponge

Nice to meet you ringwoodite.

And where do we go from here?

Maya, Maia, Mothers

May13

http://woman-taken-by-the-wind.tumblr.com/post/11722633819

Mothers

Not all women are Mothers

Not all Mothers are women

Being a Mother is an identity, a job, a wish, a life’s work, a calling.

Blessed Mother, Mother Teresa, Maia, Brigid, Florence Nightingale, Mother Goose, June Cleaver, Mother Nature.

These are the icons, the heroes, the giants in the care taking game. We can admire, imitate, even emulate, but these are at best two dimensional. They radiate, but do they participate? What is a real blood and bone Mother anyways?

The standard Hallmark Mother’s Day archetype embodies unconditional love, and impermeable safety. She is an ever-smiling font of wisdom and unselfish acts. All children know that their Mother is more complex than this cardboard cutout.

Real time Mom is a dynamic entity. Her emotions and parental interactions impact her offspring for a lifetime. A really great Mother is not just what she puts into the world. She is equally formed by what the world puts in her. The “real deal;” the penultimate “keeper of the caring”, has lumps and bumps, scars and fears. She comes fully loaded with plenty of buttons to push. She is permeable and malleable and as dangerous as a female Grizzly with cubs.

https://minervaontheroad.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/05/bear-attack-4.jpg

In search of “Mother” the verb

Some Mothers nurture and hold precious and sacred those in their care. Needs are anticipated, cries answered, and for all time, “Watch me Mom!” is a redundant request. For the rest of your life, someone is watching and that person’s name is Mom.

Other Mothers devour their young, feeding on their life force until they are no longer strong enough to leave her willingly. Some women conceive in tragedy, give birth and have nothing to offer their children beyond hunger, fear, and the agony of abandonment.

Enter here, the Mothers who will scoop up those lost babies, and hold them tight forever. From the dark world of lost souls comes a gift so precious that a Mother is born from the longing heart of the child given over to her care. Why does this salvation matter to the rest of us? A lifetime of love will be deposited into the universe and we will all benefit. Like a good rain in the desert, we all benefit.

So who inspired this celebration of the Perfect Mom?

Ann Jarvis from West Virginia was that Mom. She pushed and persuaded until wartime medics gave equal care to both Yankee and Confederate wounded in her town. No small feat in the midst of the Civil War.

http://mentalfloss.com/article/30659/founder-mothers-day-later-fought-have-it-abolished

Her daughter Anna, wished to honor her Mother’s lifetime of work for peace. Anna relentlessly haunted officials to make a “Mothers Day.” That they did, and Mother’s Day quickly became a sensationally successful capitalist vehicle.

Anna was very vocal about how she expected her Mother’s altruism to be honored. Following years of protests against the appropriation of the beauty and power of Mother Love by materialistic endeavors, particularly the floral industry, Anna was deemed “crazy.” She later died penniless in a mental asylum. No doubt sharing this indignity with other women of the era who couldn’t behave nicely.

Seems a wise choice not to tangle with a Mother, or a daughter

Any Woman really,

We ARE all a force of Nature.

Life has Always Been Temporary

Death is generous

Life has always been temporary

Death is Generous

Life has always been temporary

Death is generous

Life has always been temporary

“Why would we do anything less, anytime?”

CHAGALL Marc,

LA DANSE, Sotheby’s, London

Blue Violinist 1947 ackermansfineart.com

Heavenly Dream 1967 Found on indulgy.com

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Here we are in the land of real winter.

“In nature, darkness is neither good nor bad but simply a neutral condition in which things rest, take root and grow.”

“I have used all my tools at least once, I have been on both sides of almost all the major relationship quandaries and have reached the end of my life holding lots of love and not much else.”

“I will work a shorter day, sleep more, sit by a fire and allow the rhythms of the season to rock my psyche into balance until the light comes back.”

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William Blake Biography

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do·min·ion noun

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The Devas hold the schedule, I hold the hose.

Why do so many fragile elders live out such lonely endings to their “Well-lived” Lives?

Is there anybody there?

How can I help and why don’t I want to?

Then I heard the Deva, “She wants you to come with her…”

“No food, no wine, no fun!”

Addendum

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Deep Underground, Oceans Of Water May Be Trapped In A Crystal ‘Sponge’

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