Duel of the Personalities

I am two people these days, and perhaps I’m more but I can only define this morning two primary personalities.

The one who has lived without many technological comforts for 32 yeas has a reclusive streak.  She enjoys hearing the silence in the walls when no electricity hums.  She feels the blessing of the beauty that touches her eyes and skin every day.   The quietness and deep darkness allows contemplation and creativity, and she relishes having the space and time to pursue all that interests her in reading, writing, sewing, quilting, beading, praying.  Her days are a rhythm unto themselves and she needs no one to tell her what to do.   Her complaint is that she is less able to do her desired activities because she must maintain her home and land, be aware of systems that support her, and she’s out of sorts when these things fail.  The manual labor to maintain the house and ditches and the road and fallen trees are beyond her.   Contemplation is denied; only yearned for.

For years, she had the indoor duties taken care of and a few of the outdoor one, but splitting wood is more than a chore.  It’s an impossibility.

The other woman wants to play, to sing and dance, be with people without a care.  She loves the thought of acting, swimming with dolphins, singing in a choir, make –up, fashionable clothes, volunteering.  She likes to talk on the phone when she wants to be available for other friends, and do projects with them, plus plan her own.  She likes to flirt and dance crazy dances and be seen.  In the past two years, she’s driven across country by herself and back, she’s stood in the middle of a prairie and inhaled the fresh air.  She’s walked the streets of a few cities, trying to decide if she wants to live in a walk-up and relish the incessant sounds of people.  She is forever looking for new experiences and talks to anyone wherever she is.

The move back and forth between these two within the same body is disturbing.  They don’t know how to deal with each other.

Sometimes, they fight over who’s going to be present and make the body in which they dwell so tired it just curls up and naps or conks out for ten hours of sleep, starting at 8pm.  Sometimes one wakes the other up.  The inside woman wants to write.  The outside woman wants to party.  Both can’t be done at the same time, so they better learn to get along or I’m going to have to find a new me that incorporates them both.

Mental Beasties

Memories are strange creatures.  They creep alongside me like a stalking wild cat, staying out of sight and only on the fringe of my vision until they become discernible through the foliage of my mind.  Then, their form appears, and I react with all the various emotions attached to the situation or person brought into my mind.

Sometimes memories hover behind closed blinds or doors.  They hide when I try to open the locked portals of my brain.

Then again a word or gesture, a smell or sound, can trigger a memory to pounce out of nowhere and land right in front of me,

How do the cells of my brain bring forth so many memories in a day?  What enzyme or chemical illuminates a corner of a brain cell and causes a whole scene to play behind my eyes as if it were a movie screen?  How can I dwell within a memory for days or watch one flit across the same screen as if it were a shadow?

Where can I forcibly tuck distasteful memories so I don’t run the image through the camera again and again?  How is it I can turn a key in the lock of a mental door to sequester a memory in solitude only to discover it has escaped and tracked me down to shock me with its re-entry into my vision?

The mechanisms of memories baffle me.  I wish they could be tamed, brought to heel, told where to lay and when to speak, but that’s impossible.  They are independent critters, and all I can do is learn to live with them.

Progress, I hope

In a movie named, I think, “28 Days”, Sandra Bullock played a recovering alcoholic who was counting down the days of her first mandated incarceration in a detox/rehabilitation center.  One of the counselors offered this sage bit of wisdom.  I’m paraphrasing here.  “If you want a relationship, first try to keep a plant alive.  If you succeed for a year, then get a pet and tend to it.  If the pet survives and still loves you after a year, then you are ready to give yourself to love.”

            I was thinking about this philosophy when I noticed many of my plants were languishing.  It’s been a long and hot summer, but that’s no excuse for the pitiful display of wimpy vegetable plants in the garden or the wilting violet on the window sill.

            I am comforted by the thriving ivy plant in the bathroom and the newly transplanted potted plant in the living room.  My petunias also seem to be flowering beautifully.  Not sure I can take full credit for them though, since they are so very hardy.

            I realized, when I remembered the counselor’s words, I haven’t been talking to my plants for a while.  I either barely remember to water them, or I drown them twice a day and they turn yellow from too much water.  Fertilizing has not been on the schedule either.

            What I’m hoping is that the fact I even started paying attention within the last week or two will count as the first step in reconnecting and nurturing something outside me.  That would be a very good sign regarding how I’m re-entering the lives of all that is around me.

Ravens Abound

Ravens came from everywhere when I placed the food offering outside this morning.  I watched a noisy teen have morsels chosen for it by the large female who I have dubbed ‘The Matriarch.’  She chased all the others away then filled her beak to overflowing before waddling off to the side and dumping it in front of her squawking young one.  Then she waited while others fed before chasing them away to feed herself.  Before she’d pecked twice, her young charge was squawking for more.  Not much different for any mother of any species.

Moms are always feeding someone.  That’s at least how it once was for me.  As soon as that first husband came on the scene, the food preparation was endless.  Breakfast, lunch, and dinner with snacks were the order of the day, and now, well, I’ve got myself down to snacks and one meal a day at least.  I finally do not over-buy only to throw out rotten food, but it took me almost a year to correct that habit.

A friend gave me some guidance about downsizing my kitchen.  She looked around and commented, “You know, you only need one large pot.”

I have six.

In these last fifteen years, I’ve fed dozens of people at one meal or over a weekend, and, on occasion, have fed more.  That doesn’t seem to be happening now, nor does it look possible that it will ever happen again.  So, I can’t make decisions based on what has been.  Since I can’t see into the future, decisions can’t be made based on what will be.  More to the point, it would seem I need to make decisions based on what is.

I can only sort through the collection of goods I’ve inherited from my mother (she’s now in a skilled nursing facility), the motor home left-overs (it’s been sold), the boxes  left forgotten by two grown children with families of their own, my late husband’s shop tools and unfinished projects, and all the accessories that have made this place my home.

I’m dis-assembling lives and a way of living.  It’s tough, and I find I have to seek solace on my bed with its new duvet cover and plenty of pillows.  Floating there, I sleep, write, read, think, cry, and wonder what’s next.

That is until I hear the squawking of teen-aged ravens, reminding me the sun is up, and I’m late with my morning prayers and spirit offering which they consume daily.  I hope they’ll follow me or pass the word regarding my morning ritual to their friends.  It would be nice to have something stay the same when I move.

Another Blessed Messenger

Today I had another ‘out of the ordinary’ visitation, this time from a moth.  I seem to be getting any number of contacts with all kinds of animals recently, so I must be ready for their messages.

Most often I’ve already had a primary experience with one of my visitors.  I believe everything and everyone is created with the ability to provide insight, a kind of spiritual medicine, for anyone who takes the time to build a relationship with them.  You and I can do this also for others when we stay conscious and connected to the present moment and to all that is.  As to animals and insects, we can have an affinity with certain kinds, while others don’t seem to resonate with or for us.  For me, when one, who has offered me a message or insight previously, comes again in a new eye-catching way, I feel it is their method of reminding me about what I already know or have learned.

During a three day fast, many years ago, I had watched moths hover near a specially-fashioned prayer object in one corner of my designated area.  This object was a physical representation of the Great Spirit here on Earth; I came to realize the moths were being drawn to it for more than the fact it was made of red flannel and tobacco.

Moths traditionally are so drawn to the light, they will sacrifice themselves by getting so close to the brightness and heat they become part of it.  These particular moths danced to and fro, forward and back, for hours.  By the third day, many had begun to rest on the cloth.  I wondered why they had settled so comfortably when the words came, “They had faith it would be alright.” 

This is how moths have come to represent faith for me.  It is their message among the constellation of messages I have learned from the many contacts I’ve had with animals and insects over my years of questing and visioning.

This morning had brought me sudden tears as I was doing my morning offering and prayers.  Life is moving along.  I've cast a lay-line along which to proceed down this mountain into town.  I’m worried and anxious, excited, and all jumbled up, but I have kept to my list of things to do and was working on the deck with my flowers.

Going in and out of the screen door, I finally noticed this small brown moth, just below my eye level on the outside of the door.  Stopping to take a good look, I closed the screen and stood outside wondering why it was clinging so tightly there.

Suddenly it flew toward me and landed on my left chest, that place where my hand goes to represent my heart during the Pledge of Allegiance.  I asked, “Are you reminding me to hold faith in my heart”

It fluttered its wings as if shaking its head ‘yes’, then rose in slow motion and flew away.

Too Close For Comfort

Thankfully, my house, garden, and outbuildings survived my ten days of house/cat sitting in Carmel so I could be close to my mom for longer than a weekend.  She had good days and bad, as did I, and we made many new memories, at least I did since her short term memory is shot.

            Seeing home intact was encouraging and being in my own bed was lovely.  The next day, after a cookie baking marathon with Simone, my granddaughter, I grilled some hamburgers.  We were eating when Simone looked over her shoulder out the kitchen window and did a double take.

            “What’re you looking at?” I asked.

            “A bear,” she answered very quietly.

            “You’re kidding?” I joked.

            “No Grams, it’s a bear.”

            I approached the window and watched unbelieving as a brown, shaggy bear with cob webs all over its head ambled between the fenced garden and the green house, sniffing the air.  He/she investigated the corrugated building but continued to follow its nose toward the open kitchen window. Now that I look back, I realize my heart was pounding, but I hadn’t really felt fear.  I was numb with a mixture of awe and wonder that this living being could be so close.  All life was in slow motion, and I believe I could have stood and watched until he/she had wandered past.

            However, a picnic table stands on wood blocks under the window so Y could have a place to work at waist level.  This bear, standing on all fours was taller than that table, and I swear, along with Simone, it was proposing to climb it and come through the open window.  For bears, it’s all about the food, and nothing gets in the way of their eating.

             “I don’t remember,” I said in a low voice, “do we stay quiet or make a big noise?”

            “Big noise,” Simone answered.

            I grabbed the plastic bag of recycling with its empty tuna and baked bean cans.  Shaking it to make any kind of sound while I searched for something louder, I watched as the bear lazily backed away, then walked toward the deck where the grill lives.

            I stomped out the screen door and said “Shoo!”

            Darn bear stood and looked at me as if to say, “Is that all you’ve got?”

            I felt foolish and a little helpless so I banged the recycling on top of the metal hood to the grill.  With what looked like a shrug, the bear sauntered down the hill, over the dry creek, and into the forest on the other side.  I never heard it crash through the trees so I can only assume it had merely moved out of sight.  I didn’t like the feeling it might be waiting til I went to bed to sample whatever it could of the meat that had clung to the metal of the grill, so I charred the remnants with a high fire for ten minutes

            Simone said, “I don’t know, but it seemed like a very sad bear.”

            “Maybe,” I said, “I’m glad I had a chance to see it that close, but it’s one more reason I really don’t want to live here anymore.”

And there was a light. . .

           “Mommy, Mommy!  There’s a light in the refrigerator.”  I remember hearing the thrill of my five-year-old daughter’s call from the make-shift kitchen of our ancient farm house rental in Watsonville close to 37 years ago.  I had been divorced two years, struggling to get by while working swing shift at a local convalescent hospital.  We were renting one half of a 100 year old farmhouse.  I’d finally gotten around to scraping the layers of wallpaper off the bathroom walls, patching the falling plaster, and painting.  However, any further repairs were hampered by an overwhelming tiredness brought on by working swing-shift full-time, raising two small children alone, and trying to reconcile myself to being divorced at 30.

            I’m feeling the same numbing dullness now at 67 as a widow of almost two years.  Awake at 5am I check email and play ‘Words With Friends’ on my Iphone until I can almost fall back to sleep.  If I can’t, I accept the positive view of at least I got six hours of being horizontal.  Some mornings I stand my body up and begin my day.  Others find me rolling around in the rack battling memories.

            This morning I entertained myself with the panorama of questions around the idea of moving.  I realized wherever I go, there I will be.  That’s no problem.  What baffles me is: Do I rent?  Buy?  Couch Surf?  Do I sell?  Rent?  Hire a Caretaker?  Hell, I don’t know.  One possibility has surfaced that is intriguing.  It involves trading houses, mine for one in Willits.  Attention to that scenario holds the emotional nuances of “OMG! That could really happen!”  I sidestepped my worries of what I might be getting into with that solution along with some of the sorrow about leaving the home Y and I had built by searching for some kind of bright thought that could lead me into my future.

            That’s when I stumbled over the memory of my daughter’s thrill of a light in the refrigerator.  We’d been using a frightfully old one with no light since we’d moved in, and a friend had brought a used one he’d had in his garage to replace it.  Lynnette had gotten out of bed before me and must’ve become curious so opened the new door that morning.

            Funny how a small thing like a light in the refrigerator can blossom into a high point.  Every time I have opened any refrigerator since then, I’ve remembered the timbre of her pleased voice.  The whole idea has even more importance when one understands that in 1981we moved into a 20-year-old trailer in the woods where we didn’t even have a fridge, just a hole in the earth with a trash can inside to hold our perishables.  I’ve had various propane refrigerators ever since.  None of them have had a light because it requires electricity, and small propane refrigerators rarely have light bulbs.

            When I move, I could have a refrigerator with a light in it.