Solitude

My husband has been on a bi-coastal hejira for nearly two weeks. This is the first time I’ve been alone in my home since his last trip two years ago. He returns immanently, putting to an end this extended time of solitude for me.

I tend to fear such solitude when I know it is coming, because I’ve always loathed being by myself at night. A childhood filled with strange relentless abuse by my mother and the early death of my only protector, my father, left me with free floating night terrors that are only mitigated by the presence of someone else. This presence does not need to be actually in my bed. Somewhere in the house is sufficient. I understand it is an illusion that I am protected by the presence of another, but it is an illusion I do not care to challenge.

This time, except for the nights, I was actually looking forward to the solitude, an opportunity to clear my mind and cater only to my own needs and thoughts. I have a job that demands my catering to dozens of people daily, and a dear sweet husband to whom I always seem to wind up catering, whether he needs it or not. His recent retirement and subsequent constant presence at home has wiped away the little islands of solitude I am used to experiencing in my home: twenty minutes early in the morning before he would go to work, an hour when I return home before he would do the same, an hour on Sunday mornings when I tend to arise before him. After a few months of this, I was surprised at how ill tempered, intolerant, and nasty I became, having to be “on” all the time, having to think about someone else all the time, having to plan out everything with another all the time, even the littlest events, a process that is time consuming and takes me off the track of my inner process.

I have a busy little inner world, and enjoy residing in it most of the time. I have multiple interests, which I’ve learned to intertwine in a constant balancing act so that I utilize the time I’ve been given optimally. I am, as my son says, on a mission, a mission to complete as much of the work I was put on this earth to do as possible, and a mission to enjoy the blessings of my life, which at 60 years old, I am pleased to have. So many of the dear beloveds long gone, from their own fates or foolishnesses, so many others beginning to drop away from ailments of the body or the mind or the soul. Time ticks away at me. I do not want to waste any.

Do not get me wrong. My husband is among my highest priorities. Thirty one years of happy marriage. To paraphrase the Beach Boys, God only knows what I’d be without him. I hope for another several decades with him.

But there has to be some part of me that is not me in a marriage or me at the job or me as a parent or me as a grandparent, the me’s that I am identified as by most who know me. As I wrote recently in the margins of a notebook:
Not just the worker
Not just the wife
What and where
Is the rest of my life?

And so I put my husband on the plane and set out to investigate who I am outside of those well established roles.

The first thing I discovered was how tired I really am. Not sleep deprived tired, because this is not an issue for me. But bone level, molecular level tired. Tired from trying to be all things to all people, many of whom get downright irate if I do not fulfill their needs immediately and in the way they have envisioned. Tired from attempting to process all the losses of the past decades, trying to readjust my psyche to being able to survive at all without this or the other beloved around whom I had structured segments of my life. Tired from worrying about those who remain, trying to influence them or foresee for them so that they do not befall the same fate, thus adding to my burden of endless grief. Tired of driving myself all day every day, to overcome the myriad of chronic physical and mental health problems I live with and sally forth into the fray, trying to keep all the loose ends from unraveling. Tired of remembering that those who fail me by not fulfilling their promises to me, and thus stealing more of my time and strength and leaving me feeling used and misunderstood, must be forgiven. Tired of fighting my mountain of obligations and my own stubborn internal resistance to be able to find the time, energy, and passion to pursue my own artistic and spiritual interests and needs.

Just plain tired.

I spent great chunks of my alone time just languishing. Sitting in the comfy chair in the living room catching up on my soaps and reruns of The West Wing. Sitting in the screen tent in the yard in the comfy lounge chair, resting on my softest blanket and pillow, listening to Celtic and New Age music as I stared at the sky and trees, watching the gentle breezes move the leaves in their little dances and whispered songs. Lying in my bed for naps, cuddling the giant long pillow, feeling my skin against the smooth flannel sheets and my mind drift along to the sounds of the sunshine caressing my face. Walking through Alaskaland or the Fair, observing the small turns in the weather and the endless mini-dramas of my fellow humans walking around me. Taking short breaks from my job in the library thumbing through old copies of Aperture, soaking in the images and their stories. Driving into town, gentle music on the radio, watching the band of heavenly impressionists paint the late summer landscape with sunlight and pastels.

To my surprise, I have slept very well by myself in the house. At the beginning I did some shamanic work on the house, calling in the spirits and rattling protection into every room. I have trusted the small clear voice of the Divine in my head that told me no harm would befall me in my home during this time. What used to be hours of severe terrors became mild nervousness for a few minutes, then good, solid sleep.

I have treasured this gift of time alone. Now, in the next several days, everything jacks up. My husband returns to town. My new boss arrives from his own hejira. My front office partner returns to her desk, the new Teaching Assistants arrive for their training, all the faculty and the admins from the other departments come back on contract, and the engines will rev faster and faster. This little island of peace and rejuvenation will come to an end.

My goal is to maintain the inner peace I have been developing. I feel re-centered, I can breathe better, I have patched some of my breached boundaries. For everything, there is a season. This season of my solitude is passing, and new season is cuspy and tangible.

I will walk into the new season, with an improved centeredness and calmness and with some salved nerve endings. I will embrace all that will come, reach for the sweet song within it all, allow that song deep into my soul, and walk through the miracle of each day.

Solstice Time

It is 6am Sunday June 27. Two weeks of my vacation are over, three weeks until I must place the mantle of my job back upon my shoulders.

A light rain has been falling for hours. The gentle sounds of the rain on the roof and tree branches softly wakened me. I wrestled with my choices: enjoy a bit more Sunday morning sleep, or get out to the yard to right our small errors in judgment from last evening.

I arose, tiptoed down the stairs, donned a hooded jacket and rainproof boots, and headed out to the yard. Yes, we had indeed left the sheet of clear roofing over the bed of rose impatiens, had put the small plastic table over the flat of petunias, removed the top pot of petunias from the wrought iron tower and placed it on the porch.

The weather last night had called for possible thunder storms with high winds and hail. So we had gone to Def Con 1, and initiated the protections of the most vulnerable flowers. In typical fashion of shutting the barn door after the horse had escaped, we learned to go to this protocol after the first hail storm of the season, marble sized and relentless, had beaten the rose impatiens nearly to death. But now, with just misting rain, the protective barrier was merely keeping the impatiens from the water they needed.

I moved about the yard, silent except for a few morning birds, and returned the plants to their normal status. The petunias in the long front box had the look of passengers waiting without umbrellas for a train, lined up in semi-order, soggy heads bowed.

The snapdragons I had just planted stood tall and proud, covered in dew. I had purchased them yesterday at Risse's Greenhouse's customer appreciation day, to fill some old boxes that had been placed randomly in the yard by a lawn patch that needed soil. The grass in the patch had already grown in, so the boxes awaited autumn to have their contents dumped onto the spot. These were the boxes John had built from scrap wood 16 years ago when we first bought the house. They had housed pansies on the back porch every year, but were falling to pieces now and needed to be discarded. But seeing them sitting in the tall grass, weathered and tattered but still filled with soil, I could not help but picture them filled one last time with flowers.

I moved about the yard with my camera, snapping the various flower areas, including the irises in the perennial bed. John had salvaged the irises from being tossed in the dumpster when someone where he worked decided to change the landscaping. They grew for two years with only tall green stalks, but no flowers. This year, this week, at last they have come to fruition, sporting delicate purple blue blossoms, each of which is a poem of delicate Victorian silk handkerchiefs.



I pause at the hammock that hangs from two tall trees. Yesterday I had lain on that hammock, sticky with tree sap, in the beating sun, feeling the heat on my skin, watching through closed eyes that heat penetrate red and brownish gold. Those moments of hammock time are treasure coins in my mind, to be taken out on dark winter days and rubbed between my fingers, to rub their gold onto my white fingers.

Solstice has passed, and we begin to lose sunlight, a little bit at a time. The rich fullness of summer is upon us, green growing things everywhere, specks or cascades of color bursting from them here and there. People are in the parks and malls, arms and legs bared, squinting from the relentless light.

I breathe it all in, try to remain mindful at every moment, to actually live in this moment, and the next moment, of this time, this warmth and light, to store it in my skin and eyes and soul for the dark times, to live it as it is now, so as not to sleepwalk through my own life.

Transformation and Resistance

I am now on my 5 week break from my job. I am three years from retirement. My husband John is two weeks retired.

How do I transform my current living pattern into the vision of myself I see with my third eye?

The person I see, whom I wish to become, to transform into, has the following qualities:
* Physically peak heath
*Focus from the spiritual center outward
* Mentally alert and wise
*Creatively powerful and productive in my writing, music, and art forms
* Living in an uncluttered clean home
* Running Soul Star Arts and Sunhaven Institute fearlessly and effectively
* Fabulous and proactively engaged relationship with my family members and friends
* Fiscally stable with adequate means to achieve these goals

The person I perceive typing this into the blog right now has the following qualities:
*Overweight, out of shape
* Paying minimal attention to spiritual matters but feeling quite proud at the little I do
* Mind over-multi-tasked and weary
* Dreaming in frustration about my creative work but actually producing about 1% of what I dream
* Home borderline hoarder-ish and unclean in a way that is embarrassing and so far gone as to seem hopeless to fix
* A few small bazaars for my jewelry each winter, no musical gigs at all this year (due to repeated illness that trashed my voice), writing in snippets and pieces with no goal or order, and no time prepping to send out manuscripts so thus no new publications
* Phone calls and emails with some family and friends, and at least, blessedly, a videocam arrangement with my son so I can see him and my daughter-in-law and three of my grandkids.
* Money situation paycheck to paycheck with minimal savings and retirement now looming or here. I don't even know when John's retirement checks begin arriving or how much they are exactly. And yet we continue to spend as normal.

Could I be any more off my vision? Well, I suppose there are hundreds of ways I could be farther off. But let us not go there.

So how to transform from the perceived self right now to the envisioned self?

Just asking this question produces this feeling of resistance inside me.
You mean I have to do something different?
You mean I have to move out of my comfort zone?
You men I have to confront those fears I have avoided for so long?
You mean I have to put myself out there to people with my work?
You mean I actually have to leave my comfy good job of over two decades?
You mean I actually have to DO all those correct healthy things, like control my eating and exercise the correct amount?
You mean I have to purge stuff from my home, not just the junky stuff, but good stuff that there is either no real use for or too much of? Including tons of memory stuff, stuff belonging to or reminiscent of all the dear beloved dead?

The answer is YES, THAT IS WHAT I NEED TO DO.

To which I answer,
AAAAARRRRGGGHHHHH!!!
Run and hide! Stop talking about this!
Keep the status quo!
Don't shake it all up!
Who knows what will go wrong, how much worse things can be than they are now?
What you have now is stable and working.
Something different is threatening in a dozen horrifying ways.
Do you want to be a homeless bag lady?
Or living in one room in Golden Towers eating dog food?
Do you really want to confront all you fears?
Think of the pain and discomfort and the unknown outcome!
And - what if you do all the right things and STILL FAIL?

The wall of resistance is high and wide, and talks in the voice of fear.
Stay as you are, it says. Better the devil you know.
Why risk fear, loss, humiliation, pain, and ridicule.

But within is the stronger(I hope) saner voice, softly persistent, reminding me that this is why I am incarnate on the planet right now. That there is work I came here to do and need to do. That I have 22 to 24 more years of life in which to get it all done.
That I can contribute to the common body of knowledge and wisdom and healing for humanity and the planet. That I, like everyone else, have my unique piece to contribute, and that it therefore behooves me to give it my all.

I have paid a lot of lip service over the years to what I can do with my gifts and talents.
Now is the time for action, to overcome all the resistance and move forward, with focus and power, to bear fruit.

What tools do I have to overcome resistance and move forward?
That is a topic for the next blog entry.

Zen Writing and the Essence of Writing

This blog has become for me a virtual palette for Natalie Goldberg's Zen writing exercise. In Writing Down the Bones, she suggests this exercise daily:
Set a timer for, say, 10 minutes.
Put pen to paper and write.
Do not edit or stop until the timer rings.

I have done this exercise sporadically over the years. It is helpful to flex one's writing muscles, to get used to the idea of writing daily, and to just allow words to spill out from you onto the page. I think of it like singers running scales, or a pitcher doing warm up pitches.

Of course, here in blogland, these writings can actually be seen by others, whereas with my pad of paper, that is not the case. So this is also an exercise in opening my writing to the public.

Isn't that the idea? To write and then send it forth for others to read?
One would think so. But that entails a willingness to be seen in such a personal way, and a trust that others will read what is written and perhaps interpret it as was meant. It is a lot like standing in your underwear on a crowded street corner.

One lesson I learned after 13 years as admin in the Department of Communication is that message sent is never message received. How frustrating for a writer! My goal has always been to write words so clear and true that my meaning cannot be misinterpreted. But that is never possible.

The audience gets to make of the writing what they wish. Reminds me of the old Melanie song, What Have They Done To My Song, Ma? And in this electronic age, the misinterpretation can spread instantly and ubiquitously, leaving little or no trace of the original idea.

Why is it so important to me for my words to be read and understood? Because writing is what I am, my yoga, my way of interfacing with the world. Because I could no more stem the tide of my words as I could cease to sweat. Because this is the essence of me, or my one best manner of presenting the essence of me. Because the wondrous body of human writing is a miracle, a record, a delight, and source of such wisdom and poignancy and truth, that I must be a part of it. It is my link from my soul to my own conscious mind, and to the minds and souls of my fellow humans.

What is your link? Your expressive obsession? Can you boldly exercise it and then present its results to your fellow humans?

The Powwow Eagle

The picture above is of the eagle that was released at the Intertribal Powwow July 2009. The eagle had been injured, rescued, healed, and brought to the Powwow for ritual release back into the wild.

This creature, master of the skies, had survived near fatal injuries and had been given the opportunity to heal. This meant being taken to a strange frightening place by beings with powers and intentions unknown. Helpless in its injuries and status, the eagle had little choice but to endure the experience. Every instinct in it had must have screamed for escape. Wild is the eagle, and wild means not tameable, not in the nest of the humans, but completely free and independent, shackled only by its own instincts and the limits of its mind.

The eagle had no capacity to understand why this all had happened; the injury, the capture, the treatment. As time passed, it succumbed somewhat to trusting its rescuers. It grew stronger as it rested and healed. But there was, in the eagle's mind, only one goal.

So on that day at the Powwow, the cage was brought to an open area.
The elders in full regalia chanted and drummed. The cage door finally was opened.

The eagle swooped out of its confines and flew across the blue sky. Its sense of regained freedom was palpable to all who watched. Master of the sky once again, it flew from treetop to treetop, confused by its new surroundings, shaky in its wings, but free.

This moment lasted about two minutes. Suddenly every raven and gull for miles around were drawn to this new addition to the sky. Usually they would have run in terror from the eagle, the most powerful of all birds. But they knew that this eagle was disoriented, weakened, and filled with uncertainty. They began strafing the eagle, flying right into its face, challenging it.

The eagle looked overwhelmed at first, ducking the attacks, flying from one treetop to another in an attempt to protect itself. But the ravens and gulls were relentless. For an hour they continued their attacks. The eagle fought them off, every one, growing fiercer with each attack.

Eventually the ravens and gulls tired of the game, or they felt the full spirit of the eagle growing stronger the more they swooped at it.

The eagle flew off to places unknown to us humans, to regain an eagle's life. The eagle never could know what it had given to those gathered for the release, to those who had rescued and nurtured it, to any who heard this tale. It could never know that it had become for all who met it that day the embodiment of Eagle, spirit animal and guide.

Did the eagle know that its life had been given back, that it had been given a second chance to stay in this precious world and rule the skies? We can never know. We can only salute the eagle and wish it a good strong happy life, until the moment we all must face, when this life is truly at its end, and its splendid soul returns to more infinite skies.

Memorial Day Weekend Reflections

Lots of changes in the air right now.

John retired from his 24 years of civilian personnel service at Eielson AFB yesterday.
Two faculty in my department have retired.
Dozens of my students have graduated, are packing up their belongings and their lives, and are trying to reconstruct themselves for the next phase.

The sun is shining round the clock, illuminating all the Fairbanks world, including all the wasps buzzing outside and inside my home. We have a humane method of removing them, which involves chasing them about with a hand held vac, waiting for them to land, sucking them, like Dorothy's house in the tornado, into the device, then taking it all out onto the porch and releasing the frightened agitated creature.
This method is preferable to me than killing them, since I abhor killing any living creature. Having begun my college career as an entomologist, and having spent countless hours in my youth befriending insects as not only objects of study but as pets, I have a respect for the little guys.
There are exceptions, of course. One wasp was in my bedroom, too close to the possibility of sharing my bed. The portable vac was downstairs. Afraid to lose track of the wasp, I wound up killing it with a rolled up magazine. Which begs the question: How much bad karma do you invoke by killing a wasp with a Buddhist magazine?

John has retired and everything that has been on a standardized stable plateau in our lives is now about to change: our morning and evening routines, the times of the month that money arrives, images of ourselves, what aspirations we choose to work to actualize.
My own retirement is about three years hence. So much to do: Assist John in his transition, walk my true path, overcome my fears and chronic conditions, appreciate the unspeakable miracle of everything at all times, try to live a well written life.

It is Memorial Day weekend. I must of course remember the fallen:
* My father, who died of a service connected disability, and who would don his army uniform on Memorial Day weekends to march in our local parade and to lay wreaths on the graves of the dead.
* Michael, who served his country in the Air Force, and who even in retirement remained engaged in his mind and heart with his mission. He is gone 11 years.
* Pat, who served in the army as well. He is gone nearly 15 years.
* All those WWII vets to whom I was the mascot at the Jewish War Veterans meetings that my father would cook and prep for.
* Rippy, who served against his will, who suffered and eventually died in part from the traumas of the Viet Nam war, that damned war that cut like a deep and near fatal scar across my entire generation.
* Artie, who served in Nam as an unwilling draftee as well, who survived all that and wound up dying in a car accident in California a few years after his discharge.
* Sam, who wound up in an interment camp in WWII, living through it only because he buried his dog tags so the enemy would not identify him as Jewish, who lived into his 90s. Such a bastard in so many ways, yet a war hero.
* All the unknowns, who have no one to remember them and what they sacrificed for us all.

Will we ever find another way to settle our disagreements besides armed conflicts? How much must we sacrifice for this fashion of dealing with our "enemies"?

Whether we agree with the cause or not, it behooves us to honor those who serve. Each generation makes its own sense of war and warriors.

My personal war is against unconsciousness. The only real hope for humanity is the evolution of consciousness. Everything we can do, big or small, that enhances the evolution of consciousness brings humanity closer to the tipping point where everyone wakes up, deep archetypal problems can be healed, and the true genius of the species can rise and shine, like that sun that endlessly appears in every window and skyscape in Fairbanks this summer.