I wake this morning to a voice like a wagging index finger. It harkens from some hazy dream space but is crystal clear in her critique:
“You had all day to work on it, but you didn’t, and now it’s a whole ‘nother problem today.”
Well good morning sub-conscious!
I understand the ‘it’ she’s referring to. It is a work-related task that had to be tabled yesterday by no fault of my own. It’s a minor issue and her criticism stems from misunderstanding.
So, this morning I wake to being wrongly accused of negligence by some dream-time hall monitor. Hmmm….
Strangely woven between this dictator’s words are images of red hibiscus flowers.
Ok, I realize retelling your dreams to others can be yawn city. Interpreting them ourselves can be dicey. I’ll summarize here with a simple attempt: go easy, cool your jets and stop to smell the hibiscus (or at least look, there’s no scent).
I’m 11 days from the deadline for my submission and I’m in the phase of having read the piece so many times the letters begin to blur. I am gaining new appreciation for the economy of words by the sentence.
By Day 3 and 4 in my feel-good place, I was certainly more in touch with the feel-good. I’d overcome resistance. Had grooved and was moved in the Dance Church. I’d ventured into the Rise Up Singing! class and harmonized a gospel tune with twenty other singers. I’d had a cleansing cry with my workshop facilitator, confessing I was mending a broken heart. And of course, my daily soaking rituals were dissolving layers in ways that only hydrotherapy can do.
So by Day 4, I’d quieted down into a soft hum. I could sit in the meditation hut for 30 minutes of silence without struggle. Calm seemed to seamlessly transition from the hut’s round purple pillow out the door into my day. My mind was clear. My heart open.
As I walked along the seacliff, an old spiritual of which I only knew some of the words, would surface and lilt through my throat to the salt air.
Swing low, sweet chariot coming for to carry me home Swing low, sweet chariot coming for to carry me home
The song somehow soothed me. And I was truly home. In the midst of such external beauty, yes, it was my idyllic abode. Big forest trees, ocean, mossy rocks, succulents and cascading waterfalls to the sea. Steaming springs that bubbled forth from the earth. But it was on the inside that I felt that resting place of ease. Connected with my truest self – my own chariot – I was home.
…my love for him is enmeshed in the sound of that river flowing. He is in the water and the bowing cedar trees. Our love is grounded in this place. The trees sing of him, the paths hold the story of our connection, the rocks and lawns tell of the sweetness we found in Love, with each other. This Love is housed in my physical body- my very cells. The land knows. It reminds me.
Walking out of the meditation hut on Day 4, I realized that there was no extracting him from the wind in those big trees. And I did not want to anymore. The breeze was no longer bittersweet. What blew through the branches that whispered of him, more deeply held the essence of Love itself. Love that was shared between a man and a woman but was a reflection of my own heart. A gateway to a Love more vast than anything that could ever be ‘mine’, yet all that I ever was.
photo by Jessica Dofflemyer - all rights reserved
shine your light you don’t have to let go of that sweet essence the connection you made was your own true Beloved full and rich with open heart you stumbled forward arms outstretched to touch the grace in wonder
the essence is alive in you through you it’s what was is and always will be yours Love Home
On the advice of Hafiz, I got dressed for dancing last night. And for a few peak musical moments I think I may have lingered on the fringes of God’s Ward – no stretcher needed. But this morning I sleep in past sunrise, brew coffee at 8:30, move slowly.
This luxury is mine. Jeb is with Rex for two more hours and I continue to flip through old journals. Details for Excerpts from the Coastal Dwelling – my little series here about my time in California this past December – are housed on the pages of one journal. So I’ve been perusing and piecing together entries that can weave the story. Last installment ended with the question “Can I trust my heart?” (more on what I discovered in future “Excerpts” posts)
Committed to following the heart thread, I’ve decided to answer a call for submissions for a literary magazine. Deadline is at the end of this month. The story I want to tell takes place in ’95 and I’ve only got old journals to fill in the details.
Back then I was 23 and had left New England in my Subaru on a mission to park my car on the West Coast, load my backpack and catch a plane to Kauai.
Somewhere around Chaco Canyon, New Mexico, my life took a turn. Within three weeks I underwent a surgery that removed an ovary, abandoned my Kauai plan and drove to British Colombia, where I would live and heal on a remote island for the next year.
Pages from the journal of this time are full of questions about my life’s direction, my creative expression, and lessons in trusting my intuition. Old love letters fall from the binding. A candy bar wrapper hosts poetry from that Christmas when snow stopped the ferries and I was marooned in a houseful of French Canadians and Dead Can Dance. There is my hand drawn key to ancient Runes. And plenty of words about the male characters that touched my young heart on that misty island.
on that rainy day goodbye your lips were slippery and I didn’t know if the salt came from you or the sea grey beneath the apple tree you had stars in your eyes and the earth in your hair and my fingers in your hands all tangled with stones and shells and seaweed
the swans treaded ripples by the shore bowing to your mission
staff in hand life on your back I told you you were beautiful then passed you by
Oh, such a vagabond in love was I! Hardly. Love and leave has never been my mode of operation, which is probably why I wrote about that rare scene.
There’s a fifteen year span between two journals, yet the themes are still the same. I want to write. I love to sing. I walk in nature and wonder about love and life and my place in the world. I seek connection with myself and the Cosmos.
Twenty-three or thirty-seven, my hand keeps writing the word Trust.
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