Essay: Longings...

Our assignment is to write about longings. I have been in a semi-melancholy state for weeks. Just thinking about “Longings” fits my current mood.

I long for security. A security that comes from outside me. I know, I know …. “if that which you seek cannot be found within, it will never be found without”. Whatever! I honor a young girl's longing to be loved and nurtured. I would like to curl up in my grandmother's soft lap and be cuddled. I have on more than one occasion looked at my cat, curled up in a warm fuzzy ball in my lap…… and felt mildly jealous….wanting to trade places.

I long to have enough time and enough $$ ~~ both at the same time ~~ to lie back and relax. I wonder what, if anything, I could create if I had the absolute freedom to spend time doing it? When my son was little I volunteered to teach a class to small children on how to make rattles of leather. Daydreaming, I saw myself as a young Indian woman. I wondered what it would be like if my only job was to make one beautiful rattle this day. That was my responsibility to my tribe. I was not the hunter and the cook and the cleaner; I was the maker of fine rattles. What a treat!

I long to sit beside the stream and tone with the water spirits. This I will do again in the spring. I promise this to myself right now.

I long for a lover’s arms.

I repeat the mantra, “if that which you seek cannot be found within, it will never be found without”. But I long for a summer vacation on the coast, with gentle waves, sun, clouds, distant music, a loving touch and tender words. All in one picture.

I close my eyes and go within. It is a sweet place. “So be it. And so it is”

* annette

Essay- Learning to Thin & Prune

I have always loved the tangle of a garden gone wild—no boundaries, no empty spaces, filled with flower, branch and leaf. I have enjoyed throwing out seeds, letting plants grow where they will. They knew best the conditions that allow them to flourish. And I didn’t have to decide. Not surprisingly, my life has been this way too. I go with the flow, allowing circumstances and those around me decide what will happen in my life, grow in my garden.

One way to look at it is that I am very adaptable and appreciative.

Another way to look at it is that I lack will power and vision for my own life. Even my houseplants have had free rein.

But finally urged on by my husband’s fear that my plants would overrun the house, I have learned to cut them back and trim them to the size and shape that I prefer. They continue to flourish under the rulership of my scissors. I’ve even been able to get rid of plants I don’t really want anymore.

Having a vegetable garden this year has given me practice at thinning things out, so that beans and greens will grow to their full potential rather than be stunted by being too crowded. This seems to coincide with a new knowing in me of what I can prune to make room for new growth in my life. I am trimming those gnarled, twisted and barren old branches back, saving the growing ends to sprout into new plants that I might keep or give away as gifts. And I’m thinning out my activities—making choices about what I want to be bigger and more fruitful in the garden of my life.

by Terra

Essay: I DO KNOW

I know that I know. I am tired of pretending that I don’t. I DO KNOW.

It has been easier in the past to get all twitter-pated and run around like a chicken with my head cut off; to wring my hands in despair and plead ignorance or innocence. It is not true. I DO KNOW.

I do believe in the existence of a Creator force ~ God/Goddess ~ the Great Mystery ~ call it what you will it makes no difference. I am not in charge but I am one walking/talking/participating member. I am never alone.

For years in my fumbling attempts at meditation I kept hearing the message, “Be still and know that I am God”. It helped me feel calmer but I always questioned, “Who is this ‘I’ … the deliverer of the message or am I truly created in the image of God like the good book says?” Weaving their east with my west.

In herb school we used to joke around that we would need to hear something 17 times before we actually got it. Well I guess I read the book, sat at the feet, and heard it again for the 17th time. I am now ready to acknowledge the truth. It is an on-line dialogue and the connection is always open. I get it.

Ask for guidance. Slow down. Take a breath. Reach inside. (Even as i write this i am concerned of the consequences of these brash declarations. Who is writing this? ) I pray for the strength to accept the responsibility.

I do know………
I know nothing……….
I am “I”.
I know.

* annette

TV Tradition

My Mother began her love affair with television when she was 18 years old. That was when she got lucky in a raffle and won the first TV set in her small Wisconsin town. “Everyone came over—no one else in Falun had even seen a TV before ours!”

My Grandma Johnson loved it too. When Mom married Dad a few years after her win, Grandma gave them money to furnish their new home with a new TV and she kept that original lucky TV. As a child, I remember many a day sitting with Grandma, watching game shows or movies. Our favorite TV snacks-- popcorn, grapes, and ice cream. Many years, and a generation of TV later, my Great-uncle Fred found Grandma sitting in her usual chair facing the TV, probably with a bowl of grapes next to her on the little side table. Was it Jeopardy that was on when he arrived? She had given up her spirit in the company of one of her TV shows. I can't help but wonder which one.

The TVs were different in those days. The screens were smaller. The picture was black and white. Far from being flat, they were deep. And there were these tubes inside, little elongated glass bubbles with wires looped around inside that wiggled with electricity. Sometimes they’d burn out and the TV wouldn’t work until they were replaced.

Mom still loves watching TV-- game shows, polka time at noon, and her daily dose of soap opera. "I just watch one soap." The TV is her constant companion, now that Dad is gone. Her hearing requires the volume up high, making conversation often a shout across the room. When there’s “nothing on” we might play solitaire or read with that “nothing on” chattering in the background.

I’ll admit, I do the same thing when I am at home all alone. Often times I use music or the radio rather than TV, but it’s a feeling of needing to fill up the air space. Sometimes it's easier for me to concentrate when there is background noise than when there’s absolute quiet. Is it a habit from that constant childhood TV, after all these years away? Or growing up in a large, busy family? Years past, I know that it was a way to avoid thoughts that would constantly whiz around in my mind if there wasn't some kind of distraction from my inner world. That's mostly gone now. For whatever reason, I carry on the family's TV tradition in my own way.

by Terra, visiting Mom in Minnesota

Cascade Feelings

The rocky path around Cascade Lake, going towards the Falls, was hot and dry. The blue sky and unrippled water below were empty of clouds. My water bottle was drained by the time we made the Falls. There, the soothing sound of water against rock brought hope of being quenched.

An ample tree, bigger than I could reach around, had bark textured like a brown topological model, insulating its trunk. It's shade refreshed me. I wanted to hug it. When I leaned close, I could smell the faint vanilla smell that gave away its identity, like a lady wearing her signature perfume. I returned to that fragrance, over and over for awhile. It satisfied a hunger for sweetness. I asked Victor to take my photo there with the tree to commemorate that satisfaction.

We rested in that shade, teasing a begging chipmunk by throwing it pieces of bark and twig instead of food.

Then two mountain jays, blue merging into black, each topped off with a headdress of plumes, landed above us. We watched as they hopped, plumes swaying, through the branches, one moving right above me. Would he bless me with a gob of poop? I wanted a photo of him. Victor got his camera out again and snapped a few tries.

Suddenly I heard the crackle of something hard landing on the other side of the tree. A pine cone? No it was a gigantic beetle, as big as the palm of my hand. In a flash, one of the jays grabbed it and flew several yards away. The bird attacked it, driving its beak against the carapace to get to the soft inner bug flesh. The crackling sound repeated and repeated, relentlessly, and the frenzied movements of the bird nearby brought out an unfettered animal feeling in me. I feel the frenzy too. I want to devour my prize-- that savage sense that gets little freedom in this too civilized world-- the danger of nature-- death and life intertwined in one action, unsanitized by layers of middle men and packaging.

It's gone in a moment. Victor comments,” Brutal.”

I reply,” The circle of life in action before our very eyes.”

Hiking back to the trail head, I fantasize about catching and killing animal meat to feed on and the satisfaction of dying myself as someone's dinner, rather than letting my body go to waste after cultivating it for so many years.

By Terra

Walking the Labyrinth, July 08

I’m feeling hectic, unsettled and spaced out from too much computer time earlier this morning. Our writing group is visiting the nearby Labyrinth now. We descend the stairs and enter the room. It’s cool, dimly lit, and quiet. We take off our shoes and set down our bags.

The labyrinth in the center of the spacious room is painted in deep blue with the pathway left white. A circle of votive candles and similarly blue meditation pillows and cushions ring it.

Next to the entrance of the labyrinth is a small altar with a candle, bell and incense holder. Outside the circle are some cushioned pews, a larger altar, plants, and an altar to the Virgin of Guadelupe. I go to Her and light the candle of my heart, to honor She-who-produces-roses-in–the-barrenness-of-winter.

Then I take a deep breath. Another. And then another, as I slow my walk down, approaching the entrance. I ring the bell to awaken my consciousness, to vibrate at the same frequency as this sacred space.

As I step, I begin my affirmation. He restoreth my soul. She restoreth my body. As I walk, I notice how hard I am trying to walk. Silly me. The path is clear & easy, already laid out before me. All my worrying about what to do dissolves and is absorbed into this simple path with every step.

“Why can’t your life be simple?” my husband asked me recently. Walking, the rhythm of feet & breath, and the needlessness of thought or decision comforted me. Thy rod and thy staff they comfort me. The simple discipline of following a path with preordained boundaries is comforting.

As I continue my inward spiral along the Labyrinth, involution, going to the source of Oneness, calms my mind, calms my body. I am comforted.

At the center of the Labyrinth I bow. I bow down to the Father, the Mother and the Holy Child—to consciousness, to matter, and their joining in my existence, is the Oneness, the Center.

Time unfolds easily here like that path of the Labyrinth. I move easily when it is time to leave , unwinding back outward. The spiral of expression and creativity leads me back to the world. She restoreth my Body. He restoreth my Soul.

I notice myself inspired to write about women, about the choices they have now, that our paths are not so preordained anymore. And how to find our own simplicity, our own bottom lines & finish lines that can draw the lines, the boundaries of our own paths clearly enough to give us more peace in the midst of our choosing.

Exiting the Labyrinth, I ring the bell again. To awaken my manifesting, to vibrate new consciousness into this world. I am born again.

--by Terra

Faith

I have faith, I was about to write what I have faith in or for but I’d like to stay with I have faith as a complete thought. In and of itself….I have faith, deep abiding faith. I’ve put myself in a number of circumstances that have tested it…or even almost smashed it but always like the green shoots that emerge through asphalt or the flowers I’ve found growing right out of rock on the slopes of the Sierra’s ….it comes back….it never really leaves. I see faith as that bridge that takes us across the raging waters of life….all the challenges….and faith the bridge lets you walk on or over water. It opens doors you have never seen because they were opened when you arrived. It’s a strong thing…it conjures up a strength bigger then you are, because it is. Faith is out of our realm though it is very much anchored in this world. So faith is strong but also the gentlest of the gentle. For faith can allow the harder layers to melt as it reaches it’s tiny hand through the toughest of armor to remind us of what lies behind that hand. The pool of love where the bridge will take you if you walk on those faith shores long enough, realizing you never went anywhere…it was just a dream…but faith was your vision when the lights went out. The more you let it breathe the less you have to do. It helps me remember. Mary

Poetry: The Quiet Core

I wonder why the world seems to smoothly flow for awhile and then
Explodes into a splashy rapids that eventually reintegrates into
another smoothly happy flow.

I wonder why the splashy rapids has to be
a matter of drama and emotional upheaval.

I wonder why the quiet Core of my being
Continues to be quiet, even in the middle of
that drama and that smoothly flowingness.

I wonder why I forget that quiet Core
that could be my consciously safe cove
in the middle of any stormy drama or quickly flowing-by world.

--by Terra