Summertime here is less about committing to anything, unless absolutely necessary, and more about not knowing and seeing where it all ends up. I have been existing and thriving in the in-between space, that place where we know we are changing, just about ready reveal the changed woman, but not quite yet. Not quite enough guts to go ahead and be born, release the new and really make it new, none of the old left except a book of gratitude for every moment that has brought me to here. This is a process of patience. I watch life breath and translate it like a foreign movie. I observe. And wait. I ask the sun to come out and burn faster. Just like my greens grow when they get solar love, I look up and Hope. And I am with them, those three. I look in their eyes and know they are my circle; those girls {and him, too}. My sacred ground, as always, and nothing even so new can change that. I have to have faith in that. There is no grass. There is no other side.
We wander the backyard not knowing what’s going to happen and end up being half naked and soaked with the hose. Or finding the chicks just about hatching from their thin little eggs. Some die. Some live. The rhythms of life is learned in such simple, natural ways. Or we just spend days with greasy chips and Rainier cherries on a tiny little beach against a shimmery lake and chase ducklings.
It’s been about movement. The other day I was thinking maybe there is something wrong with me. Maybe I’m not facing the fact that I should be sitting still. But I am repelled by that notion and keep moving, like a pathalogical need to keep on going, anywhere, everywhere, nowhere. Even when I sit still, I am humming, vibration happens and inspires. Nothing, not even a rock can be still. We all began with the word and the word was a sound and a sound moves and moves fast, low or high or mid-range, but it moves. My husband feeds me thick bread pizza and puts really earthy tasking sake in from of me and says, Sit. Relax. And I can’t seem to explain to him that everything right now is buzzing, swirling, moving. I can’t even find one photo of myself where there isn’t noise.
My kids teach me, as always to slow it. They are expert loungers. They like nothing more than to cut up a bunch of fruit and throw it in some ice water and take their blanket outside with a bag full of Archie comics and be there all day. Sula says to me, Read a big book, Mama. So I get one and I sit down with them for hours turning pages. I sink in the life of my novel, trapped in Joyce Carol Oates beautiful, morbid storytelling, chained and locked in literary prison, one that I happily stay shackled in. And when the urge to get up comes rushing over me like white water, we just go hammock to swing. Swinging is good. I am supported in stillness, yet moving, flying through the air below 2 apple trees and a murder of crows hoping we forgot to close the chicken coop doors.
This summer’s garden has to be the most pathetic one in a long time. We haven’t been around much to take care of it; although it’s loved and nurtured by my tribe while we’ve been nomadic, it still knows those who birthed it aren’t raising it. We got everything in late. And then the sun wasn’t present until July. JULY. Really crazy that we had our woodburning stove on as late as the end of July in the morning to warm up the house. This is something I will try hard not to complain about. Every type of weather I am learning to give thanks for. Weather alone is a gift. I want to tattoo that on me arm. 4 summers ago I was sweltering in the desert, unable to go outside without burning my feet on the sidewalk. So this summer, I remember, and I trust Nature’s ways. Echo loves to garden naked. I beg her not to sit down in the dirt with her bare bum. Worms, I tell her,worms. Please. Not worms.
We’re in Portland right now something to do with glass tiles and stone floors. But anyway. I love this mural in the Alberta Arts district. I love this energy. I love the idea of rising up and being ready to let go of everything I have been taught, to surrender to death so proudly and honestly and walk my Path, the one that seems risky. The one that seems hard and genourmous and totally overgrown with sharp things on vines. But to say hey, it’s mine. I’m here. Yes, here I am. Bring it on. Rise.
Also here in Ptown this lovely lady gave me a bit of love on my head, which was pretty wild and crazy. While her hands moved like hummingbirds we spoke of things near our hearts: voodoo, Catholic rituals and Stregheria. When she was done with me, my dreads were so tidy that I could have walked right into a business meeting without making everyone feel uncomfortable.
I lust after the city at night, I am so happy to be here this week. Way past our bedtimes, and the girls are taken care of my others, we fly across bridges and find hole-in-the-wall sushi with the best sake ever and cuts worthy of awards. And then across town even more where we get close and silly and dance. Bass. Skin. Low. Wide. High. Roll. Bend. Dagger. It’s all fun until another dude’s wife decides you and her are meant to be One. But that’s another story for another time.
Last month we were in Montana. That involved a lot of things. Wood. Bears. Black Wolves. Decks. Yoga. Blood. Sweat. Exhaustion. In the end we soaked here, because hot springs heal even the most tired traveler. They are like the earthen nectar, warmed like sulphuric elixir for the soul; a mountain tea infusion for the muscles. A mind pool where you can unleash and release and get all frizzy and wrinkly and drunk on thermal moonshine. Jerry Johnson Hotsprings. You really should go and tell me if you are and I’ll hop in the car and go back there in a flash. I swear I saw the Virgin Mary visit wearing fringed leather and a wolf head, bones necklace and holding a red candle. She smiled at me and told me everything is going to be just fine, that the world is perfect and stop treating it like it’s not.
I’ve been a little off on the blogging thing lately. I have been writing a lot, in other places than here and I am not sure what this is any more for me. But I know what I want it to be for you. I want whatever I say here to affirm something, I’m an advocate of one thing: whatever makes you Feel. Something. You know the something, I don’t. I’ve been skimming through lovely blogs lately and it seems these days people give advice, some kind of considerate poetry and manifestos on the how to’s for your world. Inspiration, I am assuming and most times, it truly is. But I want my inspiration to be real simple. I don’t want to be your cheerleader or self help guru, cause really I’m a fucking mess myself. You don’t need any advice and neither do I. You don’t need any wisdom from me on how to live or write, or sell or speak, or birth or parent or whatever. My inspiration is: do whatever you fucking want. Do what the fuck you want and what makes you Feel and do it with your heart leading you. I don’t know or care if your heart is wide open or slammed shut, doesn’t matter. Just stick your heart, the way it is, out there. Don’t be sold on someone else’s story. Just tell your own, or change it, or make it up completely. Just know you are doing it, and you are doing fine. You are your own Goddess.
We all are.
