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Fish

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When I was quite young, I often stayed with my grandmother.

Near her house there was a lake and the banks were perfectly brambled and muddy.

I found a secret place there and went with my fishing pole of stick and twine.

I sat there for hours, hidden, watching the bright orange giant carp in the pond lazily weaving through the murk.

Never did catch one on my hook.

But one day, I caught one between my two hands!

THRILLING!

But I was on the other side of the lake from my grandmother’s so I started running with this giant orange creature between my hands outstretched in front of me.

Probably took a good 15-20 minutes of running till I made it to the spigot in the bathtub and filled it up and put the fish in.

My grandmother came home and was horrified. We had a little ’sit-down’ right there on the edge of the bathtub.

Her point was that the fish was probably missing it’s brothers and sisters and I might want to think about reuniting them.

I couldn’t believe she wasn’t flipping out in excitement over my feat!

I took the fish back to it’s home (in a pail) and am still thinking about that fish today.

It was a very American thing I did.

I saw. I want. I take.

Totally self-centric.

Yes, I know this is a stretch, this metaphor as I was sssssooooo young and didn’t know better but still, I kinda think it works…

During the holidays I feel a similar kind of energy which takes me so far out of the peaceful and almost ecstatic ‘wriggle-watching’ I experienced with the fish as I just plain witnessed the life happening.

That energy VS…

I LIKE THAT.. I’m gonna BUY that.. My friend will LOVE this!.. This is the PERFECT outfit! I’ll look GREAT… I WANT THAT!!!!!!!! Hurry, We’ll be late… Come ONNNNNNNNN…

Last night, when I drove home from a party the new crescent moon was up.

It made so much perfect sense to me to see her there…adding to herself a little bit, night by night.

She was wise to put herself out of our arm’s reach…

Wings

_______________

Prayer:

Dear God, give me air
To make lighter
The weight
We all feel
That covers up
The perfection
You gave us
As your gift.

—

Love,
Cathy

Sit Down

___________________

Yesterday, I had a sobering appointment with a new physical therapist adept in working specifically with neurological issues.

I say sobering because I was able to see the weakness level in my body through another’s eyes.

It really did not match up with the story in my own head.

I have lost ALOT of function. Alot.

I could see the fear in the PT’s eyes.

It always shocks people a little bit to see a woman my age struggling to remain erect even holding onto a walker or turn from her back to her stomach on the table or, for God’s sake, put on her sock.

It all made me heave a big sigh…

Yes, everybody is always taken by my great attitude and I AM blessed to reside closer to hope than despair.

But it was only my dog in the car who saw me weep after that appointment.

It is time to sit down.

Time for the reality of adding more hardware to the litany of support apparatus in my stable here..

The wheelchair. The scooter.

My ego is cast iron.

I am vain and independent and stubborn.

We only change, it seems, when we get in enough pain or fear.

If I fall, I am in deep shit.

I love life too much to chance it.

I really have to laugh at how I write all the time about the unknown and how my creativity has allowed me to realize over these many years that it is that place.. the unknown.. that holds promise beyond anything we could EVER imagine.

And yet we cling to what we KNOW till our knuckles are positively RAW.

Essentially, I am pretty bored with what I know.

If I treat this transition like an adventure, I’ll be fine.

Better than fine.

Real. Supported. Secure. Curious. Real.

Solstice

________________

HAIKU FOR SOLSTICE:

***

THAT LIGHT!  She be comin’..

YES, she be very nearby…

AIN’T WEARIN’ A STITCH!

————-

-C.A.

Containment

I have been practicing putting my attention on containing my energy as I go through my day.

That means being aware if I am spreading any ’sloppy’ energy around possibly affecting anyone in close range.

Am I frustrated? Angry? Numb? Blameful? Overtaxed? Overstimulated? Afraid? Gossipy? Bored?

I see that in any of these states, I want to get rid of it so I often let it indiscriminately seep into conversations or meetings or even my relationship with my dog.

I resent it when people use me as a dumping ground.

But I do it alot, too.

There’s a big difference between times when depth is invited and when it isn’t.

Cathy: pay attention..pay attention..pay attention..

It is probably the biggest community service we can offer.

All Of Us

When I first moved to Santa Fe in 1989 and enamored of the newness and enchantment of it all (which I’ve never lost, by the way..),

..as the holidays rolled around each year I would choose a church to visit for the Christmas Eve service.

This activity REALLY surprised me as I am certainly not a regular church goer.

But somehow, as the Solstice comes upon us, I hunger for the sacred experienced as a group instead of my usual tendency of prayer in solitude.

I want to sit, stand, kneel next to another human and smell incense and raise my voice and settle into a sweet harmony with my neighbor beside me.

I want the structured time for drinking in the coming light.

It keeps happening each year, this winding down of Nature and in it’s due time, SHE PROMISES TO WAKE ONCE AGAIN!

Thrilling, when you think about it..

As the years rolled by and my yearly ‘church picks’ never really eased my yearning for community of a particular sort during the holidays,

I stopped looking there for solace.

I see that there is a distinct thread of the pagan in me.

I’ve traded the cathedral for a Native American dance in the frigid cold of an early morning.

I sing alot to my dog.

I practice marking the moon cycles with made-up ritual.

I light beautiful lights in my home.

I share a deeply reverent marking of the actual Solstice with friends.

I turn my eye to those less fortunate.

The sorrow I feel is the recognition we have become SO VERY ADEPT in our individuation process.

My life is a perfect example.

But what of it?

Where is the real opportunity to harmonize with my neighbor?

I don’t even know their names….

Leaving a bottle of wine on their doorstep as a thank you for the kindness they’ve extended over the year feels dry and lazy.

I miss the midnight walk through the snow headed toward the lit up cathedral and shuffling into cramped quarters with the dank smell of wet wool and eyes around me softened by the inner truth of the very real presence of some benevolent force much larger than our selves.

What can we agree on and raise our voices to?

Trust

I have been noticing the self-created distance happening between myself and my world.

Not beating myself up here.. just observing.

There have always been two distinct parts of me vying for airtime; the VERY private woman who thrives on and steeps herself in the kind of solitude that feels full of life,

…and the woman who finds the world and all it holds, unbearably beautiful and wants to be IN IT and splash around and hear people’s stories and brush away a tear and have an opinion and speak her truth, and catch some innocence out of the corner of her eye.. or some courage, maybe.. or arrogance or humility..

THE ALL OF IT.

But somewhere along the line I got my guard up.

And I can’t seem to get it down.

I am so very sensitive to the energies of the world at large and all that includes that I get quite exhausted exposing myself to it all.

And inside that truth is another that reads something like: “I just need time to figure this whole body disintegration thing out so just leave me alone until I can put enough pieces of this thing together so it seems like I’m on top of this bear.”

I’m not used to being SO EXPOSED.

I don’t like it.

But when I have lost the energy it takes to withhold the truth from others and myself, I open the door again and make amends to various loved ones and forgive myself for every innocent action and thought even if I imagine it reflects poorly on me.

For the deal is that NO ONE knows how a challenge like this might rest on them until you feel the weight.

In each and every moment there is the choice to collapse or rise to it.

Seems as though when I pull it together to begin again, there is often a big, giant and compassionate hand at the ready to help bridge that sometimes unthinkably broad river between grit and grace.

It has appeared so often for me that I am beginning to TRUST it will always be there… almost as the reward for my reach.

Something like: “WELL DONE, Cath…  You are seen and valued.  Here’s something to ease your heart…”

And then… I get up…and go on.  (With help)

Good Egg

A Mexican man works as a busboy at a local restaurant I like.

Every time I see him, I can’t stop watching.

He sort of glows…

He goes about his business ever-so-unobtrusively with an air of serenity I rarely see.

His attention is on the task at hand but who he is as he works affects those around him in subtle but unmistakable ways.

He is beautiful to look at but that’s not the point.

The energy around him is somehow contained and not sloppy, but really generous just the same.

Words like impeccability and integrity come to mind.

He is clearly at peace with the whole deal; who he is as he does his job, the quality of job he is doing, even those of us watching him.

I’ll speak for myself but I am drawn to him because of his quality of ‘owning the piece of ground I walk on’ he exudes and it and there isn’t even a HINT of ego. Just peace and a quiet and radiant enjoyment of the moment.

All his ducks seem like they are in a row.

But I’m sure if I asked him, he’d have another story to tell.

I think that, right there is the POINT!

There weren’t no story doggin’ that man..

He left it at home and had it in him to meet the day..

Fresh, like. Free of content.

And what a gift that was…

Too Much Information

This article came up today about symptoms which mimic MS:

Honestly.. I wish I had a resident (meaning IN MY HOME) doctor to translate all this for me.

It is just plain exhausting.

I am going to stop right here for today and go shovel the snow and try real hard to inject a little ‘ordinaryness’ into this life.

My mind is dog-tired from diagnostic gymnastics.

Today, feeding the birds feels like damn good medicine.

Virgin Galactic

New Mexico is host to Richard Branson’s big adventure.

For $200,000.00 you can experience 5 minutes of weightlessness and a 1000 mile view as the high points of your voyage from Earth to the edge of outer space and back again.

The plane was supposed to be unveiled to the public for the first time from the Mojave Desert day before yesterday but the flight was postponed due to high winds.

Check out this plane.

I love the over-the-top entrepreneurship of Branson.

He wanted something and went out and made it happen.

The display of this kind of passion and will helps me have hope that there are people out there that care very much about the eradication of MS and all neurological question marks.

And that results from their explorations are soon forthcoming.

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