Posted on by Jessica Dofflemyer · 3 Comments

Crowning

It’s 5:28am and today marks Jeb’s official eighth birthday. His excitement will rouse him from bed early, I’m sure, which means there’s not much time here for me to wax poetic on that auspicious day eight years ago.

Besides, I’ve written about it before. Various versions, that is, as there are always more than one perspective on an event, especially one like birth.

Last year produced two accounts. “At the Threshold” (which my dad said was a bit hard to read) and “Getting the Darkness” which was a combination of heartbreak and spiritual crisis.

Ok, ok. So where’s the joy? The story of the miracle of birth? It’s actually all part of the tale, just complexly woven in, like most things in life. But yes, my journey through motherhood, beginning on the day the pregnancy test strip went pink, has not been all white in a world of b and w. There have been shadows of blackness. Definite greys.

But there, too, have been crowning moments of exhalation.

Playing with the verb (the majority of my birth experience was with Jeb’s head just short of crowning but not fully coming out into the world) I thought I’d gift both Jeb and myself with an honorary crown today. Acknowledgement of the Divine Yoga we experienced together on December 5, 2003. That we lived. And continue to live this life together. Learning, growing, loving through all of the whites and blacks and greys of in-between.

We are royal in our efforts. Regal in our path as mother and son in a vast world of shadowed doorways and opening skies.

courtesy of Jeb ~ all rights reserved

This morning I come across this featured photo. Taken by Jeb when he was six years old. I love his photographs because I get to see the world through his eyes.

The location, Polihale. Roughly translated as “the house of the dead”, where it is said that all human souls make a final pass through the earth plane before going on to the spirit world.

With a theme of the full spectrum of black to white, it seems fitting to include a rainbow. A burst of color and sunlight among the shadows in the place where life meets death. To feature the house of the dead on my son’s birthday. Mix all of these symbols and metaphors into one big potpourri of Everything.

This is Life, I think. All of it.

I’m still learning.
We are still living.
Maybe we are all still being born.
Crowning.

Posted on by Jessica Dofflemyer

Rock Paper Scissors

“Kámen, nůžky, papír!”

Jeb, the Bohemian and I are throwing our hands in the circle. Fists, flattened hands and peace signs.

This is Roshambo. Also known as Rock, Paper, Scissors and apparently this ancient game is universal.

courtesy of wikipedia

Jeb’s absorbent eight-year old mind has grasped these foreign words with ease and he not only exclaims them with solid vigor, he remembers them all day long.

Me, on the other hand, I’m in alien territory and my thirty-eight year old brain is dull.

In the evening at the dinner table, roshambo comes up again in our conversation.

“Ok, so it’s kámen…something…and then papír, right?” I ask.

Jeb laughs. “Nůžky!”

The Bohemian smiles.

“Right. Kámen, nůžky, papír. Ok, I got it.”

But I don’t’ feel like I’ve got it. This foreign language thing is slow going.

I wish I spoke five languages. The Bohemian speaks English, Polish, some Russian and I think he’d do alright in Germany.

Me, I grew up in California, exposed my whole life to Spanish. I studied it for years in school and I fantasize that if I lived in a Spanish-speaking country, I’d become fluent enough to start dreaming in that language. Though for now, I stumble clumsily through the most simple of Spanish conversation.

And then there’s Czech. Now that is truly foreign. These beautiful sounds that emerge from the mouth of the Bohemian have letter combinations I’ve never heard before. I am in a strange and unknown linguistic land where the exotic sounds wash over me in rolling ‘r’s’ and lilting ‘ch’s’ (although I think ‘ch’ is actually a letter in the alphabet that sounds sort of English ‘h’-ish and the English ‘ch’ sound is actually denoted in Czech by a ‘c’ with some cool diacritical mark. Whew. Anyway…). Just listening, I’m swirled in a spin where I cannot grasp the letters and hold them.

Give me a Czech word and half the time I cannot repeat it back correctly. There are subtle sounds, new combinations. Altogether different letters in the alphabet. ‘R’s I can’t roll. ‘H’s made from deep in the throat.

I fumble like a typical American. The Bohemian is patient, like his typical self.

My head is thick. My mind conditioned. I’m not used to something so radically different. I am realizing that some things need to be very close and in my face to really grasp, especially the unfamiliar.

WHOOOOHOOOO!

Ok. Staying ever-present in the Now and ever-dedicated to offering you the real and true Daily Chronicles, I will report the moments as they occur.

No sooner did I punctuate that last sentence (“…especially the unfamiliar”), ready to describe to you the moments when I shine most truly in foreign terrain, than  Jeb emerges from his bedroom – 5:20am – reporting that he is ill.

My Mother hat is donned instantly in a flurry of thermometers, juice, cold wash cloths and lavender oil. He does have a fever. Emails are sent to Dad and today’s work clients. No school. And Jeb’s birthday celebration scheduled for tomorrow is now in question.

It is currently 6:08am. Still dark. Jeb rests. I reach to complete a posting for the Archives while still staying attentive by his side.

Where was I going with all this?

courtesy of wikipedia

Rock, paper scissors.
The universal game of random chance that transcends all language.
My exploration into new territory.
Attempts to learn the subtleties.
Practicing grace among detours.

A reminder to have fun with the game.

Posted on by Jessica Dofflemyer

Relaxed Grip

Feeling currents swooping about me in swift and rapid swirls, I seek that center point of balance where I can rest in solid calm.

It’s a lifelong dance I haven’t mastered.

But I keep trying. These days you’ll find me gripping the wheel as I drive the two-lane highway, listening to Eckhart Tolle in my Toyota. The passenger seat may be filled with a laptop computer, a stack of someone else’s mail, a jar full of water with a squeeze of lemon, and a bag of some kind of portable lunch snack (granola bar, carrot sticks, maybe Jeb’s junky Chex mix if I’m desperate).

The dash needs to be dusted. Shells are scattered in the cup holders. Meher Baba‘s image is propped to look at me in his youthful beardedness with the quote “Search for God within, the only treasure worth finding.”

courtesy of http://www.sedonacreativelife.com

Text messages may be coming in through my iPhone. Voicemail messages stacked. I’ll be slowing down where they’re doing the road work to make a new turn lane, easing through the aim of radar guns.

Who knows what I’m mulling over as I drive. My reckless, active mind on auto-pilot. Thinking thoughts a-plenty, while all the while the Albatrosses soar. The whales are making their way through the Pacific back to our shores. The mango tree in my yard is blooming.

Where am I as Eckhart’s voice, clear and calm with that indistinguishable foreign accent, is reminding me through car speakers that time is an illusion? That all that ever exists is now. Right now. Here. In the exquisite, unfathomable existence of being.

He says our minds resist. Persist. They’re locked in a timeline that does not exist. We are everywhere but here.

Eckhart Tolle

My heart knows this is true while my bull-headed mind quips, “Oh, yes, give me Now! But don’t forget to add first grade spelling tests and that after-school dental appointment.”

That’s me trying to be witty as I dance toward the balance, skipping steps and squashing toes as I go.

Playing with timelines (only momentarily, Eckhart) I look back at these Archives to this same time last year. (Was I still here in WordPress-land 365 days ago, asking questions and typing out my heart?)

The thread still seems the same. Then. Now. I’m practicing. Trying my best to flow with the current of life. Then, “Best Laid Plans” was dealing with a broken down washing machine but finding Venus and the moon through the detour of my plan.

Now, “Mystery Tour on the Road Less Traveled” draws on the curiosity of the future.

In one year, so much has changed, and yet, these basic truths remain. I’m still right here, right now. Sifting in the amorphous sphere of movement. Breathing somewhere between past and future. Susceptible to gentle or explosive changes in a plan.

It’s here I seek some loose parameters. Try to keep Jeb’s teeth clean. Make sure I eat my vegetables. Return phone calls within a day or two. Don’t text while driving. Hold the steering wheel but keep my grip relaxed.

Let Eckhart remind me of the power of the Now.

courtesy of http://www.thebirdguide.com