forty-three

I am filled with thoughts

they drift in and out of feelings

swellings

dwellings

and I still sit

waiting for my crumbs.

sitting

still. 

Why?

why.

y.

Jagged Edges

The disconnect between reality and 

the inside and

the outer world

and

then there is me.

standing, usually

somewhere between.

What is real?

How do you know?

How do I know?

When those worlds do not intersect cleanly

and leave their jagged little edges

who is there to turn to 

and remark upon their beautiful shapes

the dancing that the light makes when traveling across them?

and I

still standing

see and absorb

yet

for what?

For whom?

Is it for no one? 

A New Folder: Therapy

I thought a lot about therapy these last few months/years.

It is hard to go into a person’s space and try and explain what it is like for me to live in my own space which is not my own yet one that this society makes is believe is my/our own

yet not to label people by what they look like

even if they are what they look like

and not to trust our judgments

yet to trust our judgements

and to make our own decisions

and our own thoughts about life

when the thoughts we have are fleeting strings disattached from reality

and we can string together anything.

how does one do this life thing?

I had it all figured out so young

and then I had to fit into this world

and I had to comply with its rules in order to not stand so far out

and be spotted as something so different

and that process wore down my shell which was my home

and now I am not a turtle with the shell on her back

I am more the thing that crawled out of it

like the hermit crab

but I am not able to find the right fit of my shell

I am in a tank with those painted idiotic pieces from some dine store shit hole

and I am stuck with my lot.

Yet, I was;t eaten

I have a home

I am fed

I have a shell - just not one that I like

and I keep trying to make it work

or I keep switching

yet

something just isn;t right

and I can’t find my stuff in here.

Where am I?

I feel like the girl from The Secretary might have had the same feelings.

Who am I with all this other stuff inside

yet

I feel so fine when I am alone inn y room with my secret box of comfort.

And

trying to fit in.

She fights for it

when she feels it

when it clicks.

She becomes a woman 

without that step being defined by society.

It was her claimed moment.

And I?

Where

oh where

am I? 

The Day After

Hooked up Google home
Does this mean I am forever done?
All status of off-the-grid gone
All thoughts and feelings
No longer my own?

NYC

Oh my
how I have missed the churning pavement
beneath my feet.

My pace,
My Own.
Makes for finding me
easily.



***

I was brought to tears by a painting
John Singer Sargent
Mrs. Hugh Hammersley.

I brought my spouse to it.
He was not moved.
He had another agenda.
Understandable.
But my eyes were full
and my heart,
stirred.

Awakened,
to something
dreamy.

Migrant mother, mother we are

I wonder about this mother role that I jumped into without knowing.
After searching this famous photo of Dorothy Lange's for answers within the lines of worry and life upon the subject's face,  I thought about how our functionality of being human has altered us -the current mother having so much choice. ..too much?
We are just looking to have the space and place to make and birth the babies,  right?
Yet now,  so different.  With the competition to be "men" and handle everything.
Brings it's also to interesting launching points for the role of men- when we used too argue that we were just a uterus for the men,  now we can say they are walking sperm.
Swung the other way the pendulum has, no?

And i, sitting with this book of photos,  reflecting upon my own world- what do I have to say?
Where is my space and my place?
Do I get to find it even if I have already had the children?

Procrastination

Some believe that their talents were given to them.
I am not so lucky.
I have to dig around for mine
without using tools
without knowing there are tools
without seeing that there were gifts to awaken within.

Later,

I thought about what brought up peace, happiness, contentment, joy

and it is moments when we were all home

all doing our thing
mother is in the garden
weeding in the rain
father is at the computer
playing - or creating - a game
sister is sorting books
putting them in oder
and I
me myself and I

hover

by the sidelines

waiting. 

All Pointing Signs

All Pointing signs can be avoided rather than pricked on...however, this does not change the fact that they are still very much there.

This, from Galactic Rabbit:

Libra

Every couple of years I notice articles circling the internet describing the passing down of intergenerational trauma. How our fears and sorrows, our deepest sources of grief, are etched into our DNA and delivered into the bodies that come from our bodies. A sadness like a vampire inside you—immortal. These sorts of scientific findings compel me to wonder how quiet pain is measured. I think about the way my mother’s face turns dark at the mention of sex. I think about my father’s bad heart and how, when we were states apart, my body felt him fall to the floor. I fell down too; I cracked my chin open. Unconscious, I pissed myself and was ashamed.

In an essay about Serena Williams, in Citizen, Claudia Rankine writes:

Yes, and the body has memory. The physical carriage hauls more than its weight. The body is the threshold across which each objectionable call passes into consciousness—all the unintimidated, unblinking, and unflappable resilience does not erase the moments lived through, even as we are eternally stupid or everlastingly optimistic, so ready to be inside, among, a part of the games.

 Libra, yesterday your body was a living record of all that has happened to you and before you. Today, your body is just a human body—it is muscle, blood, and bone. In order to protect it, the stories that evoke shame must have a different ending.  You must be brave enough to write them.

anyday everyday

I put this blog out in the open in a few places.
because,
well,
dark times reign at certain intersections
and I have read that opening up channels
of any sort
may shed light
of any sort.

So.

Selective Destiny

The 41 club.
My doll.
The fact that my friend Tory is a forest fairy.
Wallie & Steven

My beautiful gold cards.
The seasons of my youth.
The Library experience.
Esalen... for real?

Rhythms and Eurythmy.

Rhythms & breathing.

Books. Author. Bodywork.

Get back up on the horse, walk, meditate, track the circle of the sun and the light it hits.
Sing to the birds.
Build garden houses.
Write, read, breathe, walk, run, dance, sing, be.

Making Things

I'd like to make this...
Now, if only time rolled along for me but stopped everything else for a bit.

Swimming

Moroccan style.

Just because & why not?

I went to a women's writing group this eve- as I came about it in a serendipitous way I figured I would try and go.
We are all so very different, the 5 of us, and with writing bringing us together it just might work.

Next meeting, 2 weeks and I shall have something to read aloud to this new audience. I am looking for prompts as to which of my many ideas I will go with to develop and...why not...consulted my Purpose cards as I found them frighteningly right on the mark twice now. I was called an Oracle by the younger set so it seemed fitting to get the cards for our weekend away.

Tonight, I asked what to dream about, a three card spread. And, this is what came up.

We shall see if I can remember.

Until then, stories abound!

Ok, listening.

So, you can't make this stuff up.

10 minutes at the end of Friday

Friday night, weekend away. A place in some dry hills, cooler temperatures, farm animal sounds drifting through the air.

I wondered about doing my 10 minutes here, out loud, rather than in the book by hand.

It is so easy to delete here - which I have already done so. The waste - of time - or space - of stuff. It is a waste that I wonder what will happen with the stuff. Is there anything to do with the stuff?

Yet, all in all, it really doesn't matter if I do anything with it or if I do not. Just that I sit here and time the 10 so that I can fulfill my goal - the idea is in the practice.

Not drinking alcohol amongst so many who do is a string of moments to write about.

In this moment, I sit in my bunk, next to the window and nearest a door, as intended, with a party of sorts going on outside and around the corner and a quiet space in here for myself and two others. We do not talk. We are alone with ourselves yet I wonder if they feel my presence as strongly as I feel theirs?

In this moment I am thinking if this is unique to me and perhaps why I like to be alone so often - unburdened then by the intake of all their projecting. Information stretching out from their pores and beyond like a wave hitting me

and I sputter

trying to breathe

and still hold my own self afloat.

Yet, in this manner,

who am I?

Just the flotsam reacting to their jetsam.

or

vice versa

it really does not seem to matter.

And this phrase - about the phrase it doesn't really matter - which has been spoken a lot, this is what is on my mind now and how I have used it for effect rather than gathering together my intentions and feelings (both before and/or after) on what I wanted to say. Am I cruel to myself on purpose? Is it because as another mentioned in the circles today that I am still procesing the way in which I was developed before I was even born?

I have been exhausted by all the thoughts lately - all the plots for happiness and 100 days of this or that.

Why not just be by myself and live amongst my own thoughts to see how I really am?

Then I wonder about the other component - the relationships with others - would these come to me on my own accord or do we live seeing the supposed perfect scenario and mimic without thinking.

Am I really just this debbie downer when around people all the time dowm deep and joyful when alone in the deciduous forest?

Do I care to stretch the moments together to test out the theory?

And

does it even really matter?

thoughts going round and round with 11 days to go.

October.

Wrote for 10.
Plank for 60.
10 squats.
Read a book.
Cooked dinner & didn't set table or clear.
Got little boy to bed after bath & books in time.
House clean.
Yard ok.
Halloween decorations in progress.
Talked with friend.
Planned a future event.
Daydreamed a fun scenario.
12 days till 42.
12 days till tipsy.
12 days to get through 41.
Took a photo.
Walked the dog.
Laughed with a big boy.
Thought about decorating improvements.
Sat in the shade.
Concentrated on breathing.
Did a good deed.
Planned a better one.
Experienced a creative moment.
A random postcard brought me to tears.
Received a compliment.
...all in this day.
Thanks.

New found self

Although not writing here doesn't mean not writing anywhere
tho diligent I may not have been.

Discovered a place where my efforts on paper can be appreciated
by me

spent 4 hours on an agenda
feel confident
and free.

It seems as if that little voice
whispering upon my shoulder
when not shushed by the no-can-dos
actually can do.

And
with the reminder
that I do not need to guess
predict
anticipate
the ending
For anyone else but me
I can live free.

Last challenge before 4:15am
find a passage of harmonious truth
to share with other souls

Looking...
looking.

Goals

Meditation is up to 7 minutes,  yikes!

Still haven't written the gratitude letters, making no good clear time for myself...

Writing sporadically, almost every day however in Evernote and not here.

Fell back in old habits, kicked them out (sort of).

Back walking almost every day.

Interested in this 6 month permaculture class, ohmygee- it would be amazing.

School begins this week and I find myself wanting more in-house-alone-time... big boy needs a job.

Byron Katie is amazing. Keep folowing.

Mountains & ocean, who can choose?

Trees, trees, it is all about the trees.

September.

Days till something happens,
Days till nothing happens.

All the signs point in one direction
Yet
I look away.

The ground, 
Sturdy.
My footing,
Even.
My heart,
Yearning.
My eyes,
Ahead.

And...
My bags,
Untended
Unfriended

And

Yet

Blisters
remain.

The Sewing Room

material is what I bring to the table.
cloths so thick with it

and some threadbare
whispy
downright invisible.

and me
wrapped in tapestry
with bells
and a sideways smirk
which hides
on the inside...

materials.
of those,
I have lots.