A Birthday Lesson from Amach

Excerpt from "The Spirit Bundle”, Chapter 14, Birthday Lesson
(This is the second novel of my "Sacred Bundle Series". Selena and Flyn are traveling from South Dakota to California. They have honored the passing of his Grandfather, Eagle Boy, and will return in a year for the Wiping of Tears and Return of the Spirit Ceremonies. Flyn has been given the task of keeping his grandfather's Spirit Bundle for this period of time. Here is the automatic writing session in which Amach, Selena's long time spirit guide, offers a teaching about honoring oneself.  )

            The next day, when it was my turn to sleep, I sat on the bed across the back of the van and tried to review all my feelings and sensations. I knew I was cranky, but I also felt old, tired, used, sad, and God only knew what else. That’s when it came to me. My birthday had come and gone without my realizing it. 

            Disappointment flooded through me. Then I got mad. “That was it?” I thought. “That was all there was to hitting a major life milestone? I turned 60 and no one remembered? Not even me?” Here was a date I’d been preparing for, agonizing over, and waiting to step into for two years. Since I’d turned 59, I’d been announcing to everyone I knew I was going to turn a corner and pass into another decade of life. And, when it had happened, I had been so involved in Flyn’s life and the drama around his granddad’s passing, I hadn’t felt the shift, or celebrated it, or sobbed over it. I had forgotten the damn date.

            I sighed. On the other hand, I had turned 60 and had not instantly become an old woman. My breasts and butt hadn’t sagged any farther south. My hair wasn’t any greyer.  I didn’t have any more facial wrinkles; well maybe a few, since I hadn’t been doing my regular skin care. All in all, I had gone through the proverbial eye of the needle without screaming or screeching my resistance.

            “Be honest,” I whispered to myself, "you made it, old girl, and you're none the worse for wear." Tears swelled. “Oh, now, Selena. What are these for?” I asked myself. I searched underneath the wonder of sidestepping a wart growing on the end of my nose. There drifted a truth. Not only had Flyn overlooked my 60^th birthday, as well as I, but no other person had called or left a voice mail message, not my mother, my kids, my friends. No one.

            Tears dripped. My nose clogged. I searched pockets for a tissue and found a used one in my jeans wrapped around a ball point pen. Having sunk into myself, I barely felt Amach fitting herself between my cells, a sensation so different than when I was pulled into her body, her life. This feeling of fullness was accompanied by a gentle nudge at the front of my skull, letting me know I needed to find a piece of paper to go with the pen I’d just found. A teaching was coming from the essence of Amach who was like my overseer, my over soul. I scrambled for my journal in my back pack and readied myself for her wise words  whispering truths I needed to read as I wrote them.

            I’m here.

            “I feel you,” I thought.

            And I feel your sadness.

            “I don’t really want to talk about it.” Tears clung to my eye lashes. I felt embarrassed that I was crying over no one remembering my birthday, even me.

            I want to talk about it.

            I squirmed. “Why?”

            Because your point of view is invalid, out of context with being in balance.

            Annoyance clouded my feelings. “I can feel anyway I want to,” I said out loud, then slunk back on the bed, hoping Flyn hadn’t heard.

            True, but, when it stands in the way of your being all you can be, it is close to a travesty. You are holding sadness without reason, because you cannot see beyond your ego which thinks it is bruised.

            “Well, isn’t it? I turned 60, for God’s sake, a landmark, and no one cared.”

            This is true. But even you did not remember the day when it passed.

            I heaved a sigh. “I know,” I said, suffering another cascade of tears.

            Now you are practicing being a martyr.

            I thought, “Now, I’m going to stop writing if you don’t stop picking on me.”        
           No, you won’t. You’re too curious a person. You won’t let go until I leave you because you might miss something.

            I grinned and sniffed. “Got me! But, stop labeling my feelings. They just are, and I feel them.”

            True again. But you are on the verge of becoming them. Feelings are signposts for taking an emotional temperature. Extreme negative feelings are signs you are dwelling in the place of ego and are out of balance. Sadness, anger, frustration and the like are only telling you something needs to be looked at more closely. Time for a self-perception lesson.

            “So my point of view, as you call it, or what I call feeling sad and angry because everyone forgot my birthday, is a message for me to stop thinking of myself?”

            It’s more about starting to love yourself.

            I scratched my ear. “Go on.” A shift occurred inside me, and I thought, “Did I just fell you sigh?”

            Just write this down. Any day can be a day to honor yourself. Any moment can be a moment when you love yourself for your beingness. Any body can be celebrated for its uniqueness and miraculous existence. A birthday is simply a mark in time that can remind you to do it yearly.

            You can choose gratitude for the gift of your life every second of every day. Without your body, your spirit could not walk on the earth plane and do your work, learn your lessons, embrace your passions.

            Without your mind, you could not cipher your numbers, imagine paintings or stories. Without your emotions you could not sense the shifts in yourself and bring yourself into a point of balance.

            Without loving yourself, you cannot know when someone else is giving you love or how to love another.

            “Phew!” I was writing frantically, until she stopped; then I read her words. A different kind of tears filled my eyes. “Oh,” was all I could say.

            Don’t be so hard on your family. Remember . . . you chose them to help you learn this lesson.

            I waited. This couldn’t be the punch line, but she was gone. I was alone.

Thoughts on Solstice Eve

“Get into the Holiday Spirit” say the TV ads, the radio stations, Internet, and most every flier through the mail. This phrase would like us to think we can put on this state of mind like a jump suit.

Always, the admonition to feel better and brighter is equaled with generosity. The action of being generous, of course, has the underlying message of “Buy this". We are to believe our “holiday spirit jump suit” can be purchased from them in some form or another. I don’t ‘buy’ it anymore, and I haven’t since an experience I had many years ago.

It was in 1984, I believe, as I struggled with trying to do all, be all, have all, etc. Money was extremely tight. My husband, myself, and two pre-teens, were living in our 8X40, un-insulated, 24 year old trailer. The toilet was five doors away. Our shower was tucked into a different out-building with its own ancient pot belly stove.

Dashing back and forth between this home and town meant driving a curvy, five mile distance on a dirt road that took twenty minutes to navigate, and that was on a good day. When it was rainy, icy, or snow-covered, its navigation required more attention. I always felt as if I was clinging to the steep mountain rise on one side so as to prevent me toppling down the ravine into the creek on the other.

Consequently I tried to make only one round trip a day. One pre-Christmas day, I believe I was on my third trip. I was alone, gripping the steering wheel, wishing I could drive faster, but also aware of the multiple projects, school event planning, my three jobs, etc. dashing through the ethers of my brain. My stomach was in knots, my head hurt, and my chest could barely rise for all the pressure sitting there. I was stressed beyond my limits.

Snow had been gently falling all afternoon. One over-large snow flake caught my eye as it danced and swirled to the canyon floor. I pulled our VW van onto a shoulder of the road, turned off the radio and the motor, and sat in a space of silence that was profound. One deep breath didn’t penetrate past my wind pipe, nor did a second one. The third and fourth managed to be deeper. On my fifth, I felt my shoulders loosen.

A black blur crossed my vision from left to right. I leaned forward over the dashboard and spied a raven swooping up and down and around until it landed on an evergreen branch where a blob of collected snow toppled to the ground.

Pulling my keys from the ignition so my scooting out the door would be soundless, I stood ankle-deep in the snow. I wrinkled my nose at the cold wind and fumbled for my knitted cap in a pocket. Another sigh brought my whole body to rest.

Two more ravens joined the first. They sat heads tilted to the sky until one grunted. That started a series of ‘tsks’ and mutterings between them while they continued a kind of balancing act on their individual branches. They didn’t have special food, grandly wrapped presents, cheery music, or even a warm fire. They had each other, and they were sharing a moment in their lives. “How gorgeously simple,” I thought.

The Earth herself was there too, swathed in white, her presence nurturing the lives of all standing on her. The peacefulness in that moment was as comforting as it was intense. Now I was overwhelmed with a new reality, one of 'beingness'!

Stopping my life for a few minutes on a wintry day was the best action I’ve ever taken. I can still access that memory, even though I’ve kept the accelerator pressed to the floor board for a few days or years. The flight of a raven or drop of snow or even a splatter of rain can jolt the essence of that moment throughout my body. I slow down, and breathe, and consider my surroundings.

Recently during an illness that dropped me toward depression, I stood at a window observing a grey day, full of huge rain drops splattering on the cement walk to my front porch.

Chirping drew my attention to the top of my naked plum tree where a dozen chickadees flittered from one twig to another.  I watched as a few at a time plopped themselves onto the roof of my garage. They were queuing up, to bathe in the brimming rain gutter. They seemed to cheer each other on with cheeps, splashing themselves and anyone next to them. Each would jump out, fluff its wings, and then jump back into the flowing water. What was dismal to me was delightful to them. Another lesson in simplicity.

May the peace and simplicity present on our Earth lighten the burdens we all feel we need to carry on our shoulders.

May we slow down enough to share moments of connection with our loved ones, our friends.

May we all embrace, with gratitude, the blessings in our lives and fill ourselves with the Spirit of grace and harmony all year long.

(Christmas, 2014)

What I Think My Mom Is Saying

I want to go, she says.

And I will let you go,

I say.

But how and when? she cries.

I sigh,

You have to have something

to die from, Mom,

And you are too healthy,

Even at ninety four.

I know, she says on a moan.

What can we do but wait? she asks.

Wait until the day I may

Get a cold

Or fall

Or fail to eat food;

Wait til all my systems slow

And I no longer take deep breaths

But sleep and dream of your dad

And wait til he holds out a hand

To pull me from my bed so I can

walk with him

 in a better place than this one.

Then we’ll wait until you see him

So clearly, says I,

That I can feel him close too.

We’ll wait, I say, Together.

She smiles with her eyes closed.

History of a Flag

     Flying next to the post office in Laytonville, there is a special-to-me American flag. It's been raised every morning and lowered every evening for less than four years. It’s faded and frayed. I thought it would last forever. But I guess they don't make them like they used to or maybe the wind’s been stronger than ever and the rain wetter, the sun hotter. For me it’s been a beacon, something I could count on seeing whenever I went into town. I no longer live in Laytonville and I’ve learned that the flag is going to go to its own rest and be replaced. Now, I feel I can tell its story. It feels a little like offering the eulogy at a memorial for a special person in my life or saying a few words before a building or a ship is going to be demolished.  

     After August, 2010, when my husband, Yuwach, passed away, I received mounds of paperwork from the Veterans’ Administration. In between forms there came a voucher for an American flag. Y had served in the 32^nd Infantry Division of the Wisconsin National Guard beginning in 1959. In 1963, his division was activated during the Berlin Crisis. He and his new wife moved to Parkland, WA. That's when he discovered there was something more than cold winters and outrageous summer humidity. He was on active duty for a year, then finished his military commitment while attending Tacoma Vocational Technical Institute.

     I don’t know what made me fill out and return the voucher for the flag but I did. A month later I was called to come to the VA office in Ukiah to receive this symbol of The United States Of America. As I drove to the offices, I still pondered the question of what in the world was I doing? Both Y and I had believed in peaceful negotiation. Neither of us had thought that showing “might was right” was a way for our country to be in the world. In fact we both agreed that capitalism and democracy were causing our government to see war as a way to prop up the economy when other methods didn’t work.

     When the head of the local VA department brought the brown cardboard box out, I asked for another moment to prepare myself to receive this gift. I had to sit down in the midst of photos of our current president and the regalia often seen in military establishments. Each item on the walls and on pedestals were familiar to me, and I realized my life had been affected by the military since before I was born. My dad had been a top sergeant in the Marines and had served for almost thirty years before retiring. He had served in Iwo Jima, Korea, and the Philippines. When he died, he had not wanted any ceremony or flag. My first husband had retired from the Army and had served in Korea after that war and in Viet Nam during that one. Y’s son, Steve Gleisner, had served in the Navy where he held a high-level security position on a nuclear submarine as a Cryptographic Radioman from 1981 - 1984.

     I stood and nodded that I was ready. I remember tears filling my eyes and emotion clutching at my chest as I told the man I was accepting the flag in honor of all the men in my life who had donned a military uniform and gone off to do their part in keeping the USA free, whether I agreed with the sentiment any more or not. They had been willing to change their lives for a dream of making it a safer place. Their decision had been selfless. Each one of them had wanted to be a part of the greater good.

     So I accepted the flag and wondered all the way home, what was I going to do with it? Put it on a shelf? Display it in a cabinet or hang it from the balcony? It was huge!

     One day I took a good look at the flag outside the local post office and saw in 2010 that it was fraying at the edges and coming loose from one of its grommets. I asked the head clerk if they were going to get a new one soon. She said there was so much need for flags for coffins of vets from Iraq and Afghanistan, post offices were way down on the list to receive new ones. They'd been on the waiting list for over six months.

     I asked if one could be donated. She said they’d never had one donated before but if it had the appropriate grommets, the flag would be gratefully received.

     I thought about it and brought it in the next week. The flag honoring four of the five important men in my life had found a home. Now it too has done it's job and can be retired.