Vagabonds and Gypsies

I lost my job a few weeks ago.  While disappointing, I suppose it isn't all that surprising.

What was surprising, (to me anyway), is I'm moving again. 

I was talking to a friend on the phone the other night, letting her in on the news.  I also needed to ask if she or her husband could try to be there for my daughter when the baby is born.  I don't know if I'm going to be able to make it.  While I'd give anything to be there myself, it isn't really about me.  I want someone there for my daughter. 

I told my friend, "I felt it coming, the change was in the wind, and I didn't want to accept it, 'cuz I got so tired of moving."  I needed some stability for awhile, a space to restore.  I needed to do some reclaiming of myself.  (Which, I suppose, I've received, thanks to my roommates :)  My friend replied with a chuckle, "Cindy, when are you going to accept that you have a gypsy soul?"  She and I do that for each other, point out the obvious.  It can be really irritating.  I told her I'd already come to that conclusion...but it doesn't mean I like it. 

Her observation, however, reminded me of another friend who made a similar remark to me in a letter, a little over a year ago.  He said we aren't settled people, and went on to point out the highlights for being that way.  I recall reading his words at the time, and, well, it unsettled me.  Ha!  How can I not be amused by that?  Unsettling or not, his reflection hit it's mark, the heart of the matter, and now, a year later, hearing this woman echo his words, I felt something within me slide into acceptance.  I shared all this with my daughter, and she was surprised, because she thought I knew, and said she'd come to an acceptance of it in me a long time ago.  Evidently...I'm the last one to know, and accept it.  Weird...and funny.

It all makes a strange sort of sense now.  I could never understand why folks I loved so deeply had a fear I would leave them.  Being unaware of this as part of my spirit, it confused the hell outta me.  I am nothing if not loyal.  Damn near to a fault even.  Once you're in my heart, it takes a whole lot of doing, (on the other person's part ), for me to close the door of my heart to you.  ( There are some folks I know who would readily testify to this aspect of me.:)  I don't shake off easily.  So I know I'm not some flake that folks can't depend on when and where it matters.  Wherever I am, those who I love are there with me.  I don't forget them.  I don't even try to forget.  They live and have their being in my heart.  They are with me, and I am with them.  And I'll do what I can to be there for them in the physical...if it's meant to be. 

There have been times, in an attempt to relieve them of their fear, I'd do things that went against that spirit in me.  But nothing I could ever do made them stop being afraid.  They saw what I didn't...I would eventually need to go.  I hurt myself in the attempt to allay their fear.  They don't know...I would have taken them with me if I could have.  So I carried a piece from them in my pocket instead.  And they'd always have my heart.

I told my friend on the phone that it doesn't really matter why I'm moving, or why I lost my job, because I view things as one big conversation with Spirit.  I went and visited the woman who is offering me a place to stay, ( bless her ), and while we were talking, a thought struck me, so I shared with her an incident that occurred some years ago...

I used to own a Toyota 4x4, and my gawd, I loved that thing.  I get attached to my vehicles, they become like an extension of me, and I'll keep them forever if I'm able.  One day, a man showed up at my door, out of the blue, and asked me if I was selling my truck.  I told him no, go away.  A couple of weeks later, another guy shows up asking the same thing.  Spirit now had my attention.  I don't believe in coincidence.  Finally, another man showed up and offered me 5K for the truck.  I pondered it for a full second, and then told him no, I ain't sellin' it.  Well, not long after that, some guy pulled out in front of me, and my truck was totaled.  I was okay, he was okay, but my truck was dead.  The way it all flowed after that to bring me the vehicle I own now, (with the bonus of a moon roof!), still surprises me.  And the way the vehicle has been used since tells me there is no flippin' way my little beat up Toyota could have done it.  I am amazed at how I can possibly have doubt in this Universal Whatever called God, but I still do, especially when I'm standing at the edge of the cliff called the unknown.  ( And it seems I kinda live there more often than not ).  He sees around corners I can't, and provides in the most astonishing ways to meet what's coming. 

I realize now most of the change that has occurred in my life has been like that.  Not having come to an acceptance for this very important aspect of myself, it can sometimes, literally, take a crash to get me to wake up, and move to where I need to be, most times kicking and screaming.  It's not so amusing when it happens, but I've had it happen often enough, that I can't escape the fact that my going along clueless has been a big part of the problem.  People will tell you I'm a good listener.  Yeah, well, I haven't been listening to myself so good. 

It's been there, the evidence of it, for so long.  Even in little things, small ways...driving along with the heater/cooler on full blast, but absolutely needing that open crack in the window.  The need for one foot to be out of the blanket while I sleep, no matter how cold it is.  No rings on my fingers...I can't breathe, lol.  I've been that way since I was a child, so it has nothing to do with marriage, or relationships.  And more...

My aunt was talking to my mom the other day, and told her she has memories of me when I'd visit her as a child.  She said I was always going off by myself somewhere.  That got my mother to thinking back, and she said it was true.  I was always taking off somewhere.  Always so quiet.  By the same token, she wrote me a note not long ago that said she got to thinking about what her answer would be if asked to describe me.  Her answer?  "She is full bodied passion."

There are, I suppose, some things we can change about ourselves, and some things that are never meant to be changed, because, well, we just can't.  There is purpose for us being who we are, even if we can't see it just yet.  And we hurt ourselves tryin' to change it.  As much as I have a love and respect for home, family, and all that good stuff, I don't think it's meant for me.  I'm too much of a free spirit to be able to hang around for long.  And I know of at least one person who knows just how much it's taken for me to come to this place of admittance and acceptance.  It doesn't mean I don't live and love with full bodied passion in my moments with folks.  And it absolutely shouldn't be taken as something personal.  I've had enough experience with it also to be aware that there always seems to be some purpose behind my being where I end up, even if it takes me awhile to get in alignment with it.  At first though, I just hear music in the wind...calling my name.

And off I go, moving again.

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Faith ~ The Gray Area of Doing (Pt. 2)

"Experience is a brutal teacher, but you learn.  My God, you learn."  C.S.Lewis

  "What we have to learn to do, we learn by doing."             Aristotle

We take it for granted, I think.  Or perhaps we aren't fully conscious of it, this powerful thing inside us that gets us to move, to do.  We think nothing of putting forth effort to give ourselves a drink of water.  We feel thirst, we get up, we fill our cup, we drink.  

When I was young, I pondered why it was I couldn't bring a desire, a dream I had inside me to manifest.  I'm here, I'd say to self, so very (seemingly) far away from what I desire.  I was at point A, and didn't know how to get to point C, which I at first mistakenly thought was Point B.  I didn't know Point B was the middle ground, the proving ground, the ground I had trouble navigating.  I'd take a step into point B, and at the first sign of resistance, I'd give up.  What was that I just bumped into?  It's too hard, I'd say, I can't do it.  Or I'd fool myself into believing that the resistance was proof that it wasn't meant to be.  As a result, I'd find myself falling into some quagmire of disappointment, self pity, etc.  Of course, I didn't put those two together until much later.  At the time, I didn't even know those emotions were connected with my failure to do, to follow through.  Now, when I find myself feeling disappointed in self, I very quickly ask myself what it is I failed to follow through on, because I don't like feeling that way.  The quicker I nip it in the bud, the quicker I get back to feeling better.  

It didn't help that I was told, frequently, "If you can't do something right, don't do it at all."  I heard those words as "Be perfect."  The frustration and impatience I sensed from the person who said them didn't help either.  Like I was expected to win the race as soon as my foot stepped out of the gates.  Of course that confused me, and brought with it feelings of anger and resentment, which had the effect of evoking that famous stubborn streak that runs in our family, with me inwardly crossing my arms and thinking, "Mmmkay then, I won't do it at all!"  So there I was, making like a tree and taking root, not budging, but who does that hurt in the end?  Unfortunately, it took me years to finally see that it only hurt myself, taking that stance.  Anyone outside me wasn't touched by it at all.  In fact, they'd completely forgotten about it.  How rude!

It wasn't until I began writing that I finally became fully aware of that troublesome Point B area.  For the life of me, I could not understand why it was that I could not produce on paper, in writing, the words I heard and saw so perfectly in my head.  It was so easy in there, falling nicely into place, but the very moment I moved to put it on paper, manifest what was inside me, Point B came into play, where I noticed my words suddenly making a bumpy journey through some sort of weird atmospheric interference.  I hadn't yet experienced "the Zone," that place of flow, where we drop everything else but what we are doing, surrender, and lose ourselves in it, where the art of what we are doing virtually trips all over itself coming out of us.  I didn't know that Point B was the place we had to enter first before manifestation, before reaching the flow of the Zone.  I didn't know Point B was the birth canal to manifesting our desire, our art, our expression. 

As babies we are given water and food to quench our thirst and hunger.  Then one day we hear our parent say the most confusing words, "get it yourself."  (I've often thought it might be better if, instead, parents said, "Give it to yourself."  But that's me, and I suppose it's a question of semantics, but I wonder if it would give a different message, and lesson, to a child.)  Anyway, there is one tiny moment when confusion reigns, and we are brought to a halt with how to fulfill our own desire for water.  We might even have to ask what appears to be a stupid question, "Where are the cups?"  Never having given ourselves water, we may not know the steps to quenching our own thirst.  Yet once we learn, once we do it, the going gets easier, and we give ourselves water without a second thought. 

Some desires, some dreams, appear bigger than others, and may take a period of time to grow into.  As much as we long for the maturity of adulthood when we are 13, we must grow into it, and take the necessary steps to get there.  It is a gray area indeed, and one in which we feel the sense of maturity coming, and with our young hearts yearning, full of impatience, if not disciplined, we can impulsively attempt to step into it out of time.  Yet even that is a lesson in itself, and teaches us, through the doing, when to wait, when to go.

Yesterday marked the one year anniversary of when I created this blog.  The road to here, this moment, has not been easy.  I've stepped through a shit ton of gray area to bring what I have inside me to manifestation here.  My roommates and I were discussing it yesterday, one of them pointing out that if not for him buying me batteries, I wouldn't have begun it when I did.  The only thing getting in my way at the time, I thought, was I didn't have the money to buy batteries for my camera.  He bought them for me, and I ran out of excuses. 

At this blog's inception, I had a different idea, a different direction, one with pictures involved, a kind of before and after kind of thing, but I now realize the premise was the same.  To others, with their eyes pinned solely on outcomes, and winning the race, (whatever that race is.  I've not been real clear on the matter), it may appear I've not been successful in this endeavor.  Yet I see this landmark as a success in it's own right, and am proud of myself for sticking with it, even through the times when adhering to it wasn't so easy, and didn't always appear practical.  I've been doing it.  Walking that gray area.  And I find myself growing into, and experiencing myself in a whole new way, as this practice finds it's maturity. 

And a funny thing happened on the way to the well, to give myself a cup of water...my thirst was already quenched when I got there, for I had made the move on the desire like it was already a done deal.  Which it was.  The fulfillment of it, the actual drink, was nothing more than stepping into what was already there, had always been there, waiting for me.

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The Moon Shines On

What does the moon
see in the dark?
Better to ask
what it is
and why
you attempt
to hide there
in the shadows
where the light
of the moon
cannot see.
And something
you may have failed
to consider,
your focus only
on hiding
your secrets,
the owl
is the moon's companion,
whose flight
and presence
are silent,
the light of the moon
in his eyes
doesn't know the dark.
Everything he sees
walks in daylight.
He makes
his presence known
when he is ready,
patient, wise
territorial
The moon shines on
trusting him completely.
It isn't the moon
you need to worry about
it's her guardian
the silent witness
who sits in your dark.

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Speak To Me

I like the lyrics to this song so much that I want to share them with you.  They speak to me. 


"32 Flavors"
lyrics by Ani Difranco

squint your eyes and look closer
I'm not between you and your ambition
I am a poster girl with no poster
I am thirty-two flavors and then some
and I'm beyond your peripheral vision
so you might want to turn your head
cause someday you're going to get hungry
and eat most of the words you just said

both my parents taught me about good will
and I have done well by their names
just the kindness I've lavished on strangers
is more than I can explain
still there's many who've turned out their porch lights
just so I would think they were not home
and hid in the dark of their windows
til I'd passed and left them alone

and god help you if you are an ugly girl
course too pretty is also your doom
cause everyone harbors a secret hatred
for the prettiest girl in the room
and god help you if you are a phoenix
and you dare to rise up from the ash
a thousand eyes will smolder with jealousy
while you are just flying past

I'm not trying to give my life meaning
by demeaning you
and I would like to state for the record
I did everything that I could do
I'm not saying that I'm a saint
I just don't want to live that way
no, I will never be a saint
but I will always say

squint your eyes and look closer
I'm not between you and your ambition
I am a poster girl with no poster
I am thirty-two flavors and then some
And I'm beyond your peripheral vision
So you might want to turn your head
Cause someday you might find you're starving
and eating all of the words you said

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