Today I quit work early, and found myself at the coast, enjoying the cool of the fog, and some time to reflect. Everything gets weathered clean where the land and sea meet.
Category Archives: Reflections
Excuse Me While I Kiss the Sky
The rain is pounding on the yurt, but it still can’t drown out the sound of thousands of frogs singing away. That was a brilliant stretch of beautiful days, but we really do need the rain. Today the wind was coming out of the northeast, weirdly, and the red-taileds were able to kite on the unusual updraft on our ridge.
I’m still catching up from a mini-vacation, a little break before the onslaught. I went on a birding trip to Klamath Basin with a small group of folks. What a treat! I haven’t been on a roadtrip in a long time, and this one was made even better being in the company of other birders. No one found it odd that we had our binoculars out at the ready as we drove up I-5, or that we wore them and used them as we lunched at a rest stop.
Klamath Basin, on the eastern California/Oregon border, is home to a complex of National Wildlife Refuges that teem with bird life throughout the year. In the winter, it’s home to the largest population of Bald Eagles in the lower 48 states, and many other wintering hawks, so it’s a favorite destination for raptorphiles.
I’ve been there before, but really wanted to return this year. If I do leave the country for 27 months, I want soak in as many US hawk experiences as I can, before I go.
So I went on this trip, which consisted mostly of riding around in cars and stopping to look at whatever we found was interesting. Mostly hawks, but also spectacles of tens of thousands of geese and ducks, and a landscape of colors so beautiful it almost hurts.
I kept thinking about Joseph Campbell’s exhortation to “Follow your bliss.” Because that’s what this trip was. Riding around in looking at stuff. Soaking it in. Thinking about life. Letting life in.
Watching a Peregrine Falcon make life nervous for a flock of Snow Geese, pointed wings pumping in powerful flight, catching afternoon light, every detail frozen for a brief second in an image in my mind.
Sorting through red-winged blackbirds to find one yellow-headed one, but having the flock of thousands suddenly lift and come towards us, a massive joyful kaliedescope of black and red overfilling the field of vision in our binoculars.
Eighty-eight Bald Eagles soaring out of Bear Valley at sunrise. Yes, eighty-eight. That we counted in an hour.
Rough-legged Hawks. Ferruginous Hawks. Red-tailed Hawks. Harriers. American Kestrels.
Eight Golden Eagles playing in the wind that kicked up that same afternoon. Eight. Unbelievable….they don’t congregate the same way that Bald Eagles do. And I really needed a good view of Golden Eagles. By this time I was in rapture. There was no stopping the tears leaking out of the side of my binoculars.
And in the Butte Valley grasslands on the way home, all of these plus the most stunning looks at Prairie Falcons I have ever seen.
And, oh, did I mention the bountiful Bald Eagles?
Click to view more trip photos
I don’t know how to follow this bliss. Maybe just to keep birding as much as I can, to keep watching the hawks.
Meanwhile, twenty-four mama goats grow heavier. We’ll probaby have kids by a week from now, and life will be busier than I can even imagine. I remember how grueling it got last year, and I don’t care. I still can’t wait to see kids leaping out of their moms and into life, watch those amazing moments of standing up for the first time, the gushy smell of warm baby goat. Another kind of bliss.
Sisters
I listen to women tell their story, and they tell my story, too. One part of my story I hear them telling goes like this: “I never felt like I got along with other women. I just got along better with men.”
It started at an early age for me. I never felt a lot of sibling rivalry with my brothers, but my sister and I were always at odds. It wasn’t that I didn’t love her…it was just that something inside of me always twisted itself up in envy at her success or hostility at her innocence. She just seemed to move easily within the world even though she had a certain vulnerability. Her feelings showed.
I was always fighting upstream against myself, trying to rein myself in until the pressure built too much and it came out in bursts of defiance and bad decisions. The part of me that demands honest self-expression always being dragged down by the self-loathing coward.
Of course, I didn’t see any of that then. I just stewed in resentment. It came out in bad behavior that I often came to regret.
………………………………..
It was summer and we were bored. A friend of the family, Curly, was visiting. Curly was an older bald guy, the father of my dad’s childhood friend, and he was something like a grandfather to us. He and Mom sat at the kitchen table chatting while my brothers and I played upstairs.
We had a big hard plastic toboggan. It was kind of silly, really…we lived in Ohio, on land that had once been The Great Black Swamp. It’s hard to imagine a place more flat…you had to drive in towards town, near the river, to find anything even close to a hill for sledding. We always went “belly whomping” in the ice-covered fields instead….holding the sled at your chest as you run, then leaping with it as if you were doing a head-first slide into second base. Not the kind of thing you do with a plastic toboggan…you need sturdy wood with metal runners for that.
Still, on that summer day I thought the plastic toboggan had a certain promise that was irresistible. What if we could ride it down the wooden stairs of our old farm house?
My brothers and I were at the top of the stairs with the toboggan thinking it over. We really wanted it to work, but we also really wanted to see someone else try it first. I was the oldest and always the ringleader in these kinds of escapades, but I always looked for someone else to take the risk. I was more the idea person.
My sister came down the hall, looked at us sitting there with the toboggan, and brightly asked, “Are you guys riding that down the stairs?!”
I looked at my brothers, and they looked at me, waiting for me to answer. Sis would sometimes report our activities to the authorities; caution was required. I remember looking at my brother and smiling before I looked back to her. “Yes!” I said enthusiastically. “It’s a lot of fun! Do you want to try it?”
We helped her get situated. She held the stair railing as we tilted everything downhill and I remember her saying, “Are you sure this works?”
“Oh yes.”
She grabbed the rope handles and we nudged the toboggan forward as it slid down the first few steps. Then it bounced funny. WHAM!
WHAM!
WHAM!
Sis screamed, grabbed the railing, legs flying, and the toboggan continued on its merry way, crashing onto the living room floor.
Curly and Mom came running. Mom saw Sis laying on the steps. “What are you doing?!!”
Curly stood looking up the stairs at us, and put the whole story together right away. He laughed, nodded at us and told my mom, “There’s the real trouble. Up there.”
………………………………..
My sister grew up to be the amazing person I always knew she’d be. I see her now with her family, still full of feeling and vulnerability, yet with a strength she’s forged out of her own being. I don’t envy her life now…I want something different. But even though the envy is gone, it’s still not so easy always to do the right thing. I screw up a lot. But it’s worth the effort to try to get it right. I need her.
If there is anything that I’ve learned in the past year, it’s how much I value the relationships I have with the women in my life. While I’m working on my relationship with my blood sister, I find that I now have a whole community of sisters in my life. Incredible women, full of the grace of feeling and vulnerability. Through them, I begin to accept appreciate those sides of myself.
It turns out that the feeling that I just “got along better with men” wasn’t a matter of getting along with men at all. It was really a rejection of women because they showed the same qualities I rejected in myself. It was fear.
It turns out that all along, I needed the kind of courage that women have. I needed my sisters.
Back on the Ground
What an pretty stretch of days we’ve had! Often when it’s this clear, it’s also cold. But there are some nights when I don’t even have to make a fire. Mornings are beautiful with color.
Yesterday I stayed at home all day, much to Laika’s delight. We walked down to the redwood grove, still able to cross the creek and go into the woods. The trees pump out oxygen and my lungs greedily suck it in.
Trees have fallen across the path; I find a downed Bay with sapsucker holes drilled in neat circles around its trunk. Sometimes finding the evidence of the bird is as interesting as finding the bird itself.
I spend the day taking care of mundane things like laundry and little repairs. But I also get to work on a painting. The process of these paintings has become as interesting to me as the work itself. Usually I start out by trying to force an idea, but the real painting whispers to me from behind. I try to push the idea away for days, criticizing it for being too dramatic, too over the top. But when I reach the point of taping paper to the board, I will get no peace until I go back to the whispered idea.
Oh, this is gonna be a good one. Way over the top. And exactly where I have been dwelling. Surrendered to the image that wants to be, the symbols appear in my life, making me laugh. Perfect.
I actually got paint down yesterday, and am watching the image rise up out of the flatness. I get to touch that other world, that world of symbol and image and feeling, and play there.
But I want to play it this world, too. Laika spends the day napping in the sun, and when her black coat is hot and glossy, she wades into the pond, then comes to see what I’m doing. “I’m deleting this account,” I tell her, and she seems pleased. “Don’t think,” I warn her, “that this means you get to sleep in the bed.” I walk out of the yurt with her, and she and Jasper seem expectant. “Do something!” So I do…I roll in the grass with them. There is something about getting down to dog level that seems to delight them. And me.
It’s a good life. I’m grateful for it just as it is.
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This morning I caught up on some PC blogs I’ve been following, and was stunned to see that they’ve shut down operations in Niger, evacuating all the volunteers. Many of them had just completed training and were in the process of setting up at their assignments. I’m pretty sure that that’s where they were planning to send me. I’ve been warned of the uncertainty, and to be honest, Niger has never felt “real” to me. My mind wants to keep asking, “then where, where?” Let it be.
I had the first part of my medical exam today. Have to go back Wednesday for followup, and also need to get some tests and such done. Then the dental and vision. Lots and lots of paperwork to wade through. Lots of poking and prodding; the squeezing and squishing yet to come.
Doc moves the stethoscope over my chest, listening. “Your heart,” he says, “is perfect.”
I wince inwardly and think, “Well. Good enough for government work.”
Why I Like Raptors
Mirror from the Past
Years ago, I lived down the road from a little country store. At the time, they had a tiny bar in a room off the store, and I tended bar and worked in that store for a while.
Late last summer, I was coming back from hawk watch and passed that store. I wanted to make a stop, but the owners had been on my mind and I wasn’t sure I wanted to see them right now. Besides, I didn’t even know if they were still there. So I went on, many miles down the road, and stopped at the next store.
I walked in, and there were the owners from the old store. They now owned this one. They remembered me, but not my name. We chatted a bit. Eddie smiled, “It’s nice to see you again.”
Weird, I thought. Well, now I know where to find them.
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Two days before Christmas, I steel my resolve, read over my notes, and head out. Stop in town and use the ATM at the bar in town…I hate the fees and I’m not crazy about being in the bar either, but I need to be quick before I lose my nerve. I get change for one of the twenties so I’d have a neat fifty dollar bundle at the ready in my pocket. And then head for the store.
Eddie’s wife is there. I shift uneasily, waiting behind someone buying beer. “Is Eddie here?” I ask, and immediately wish I hadn’t.
“No, he’s not. What do you need?” My emotions begin to get the best of me. Godammit. Now I’m standing here in this store, tears welling up, asking some guy’s wife if he’s around and if I can talk to him. I have to tell her why I’m there. I know what I’d think if I were in her shoes.
I make my humiliating explanation and then flee. I’m screwing this up.
——————————-
It’s almost a week later when I finally go back with my little fifty dollars. There’s a kid behind the counter, but I wait behind another person buying beer, and Eddie emerges from the back with stock for the deli counter. He’s a quiet man, smiles at me and looks down. Yes, he heard why I was stopping by.
I tell him that I was responsible for that big Red Wolf beer mirror being stolen from the bar way back then; I didn’t take it myself, but I allowed, even encouraged it to happen. When he asked me about it at the time, I lied to him and feigned surprise about the theft, even when he explained that it was going to cost him four or five hundred dollars because the stupid thing was on loan from the distributor and wasn’t even his.
I tell him now that I want to pay it off; that I want to make it right over the next few months. He smiles and says that he never had to pay for it after all. He says he’s glad that I’m telling him now. He won’t take any money, even though I want to give it to him anyhow. He sends me on my way with a, “Keep up the good work.”
I’m not sure I actually do feel better afterwards. There is a weight lifted, of having done this and at least stumbled clumsily through it. But there is a humbleness that settles over me, perhaps a truer humility than I’ve felt before. I’m not sure I like it. My mind races…maybe I can come here to do all my grocery shopping and give them all my business from now on! Maybe I’ll bake them a bunch of cookies! Maybe I’ll…maybe I can….
And I realize that probably what Eddie and his family would like the most is for this crazy teary woman to quit coming by the store and making them feel embarrassed.
I have to face my own imperfections, the factual wrongs that I’ve done. I have to face that there is never any going back to undo what has been done. There is no, “Oh yes, that was me but…” There is only, “Yes. That was me.” And I have to face the fact that my ego does not like feeling like Eddie and his family have one up on me. They know about some of my misdeeds and my ego really doesn’t like that. I also have to face the truth that my brain likes to try to tell me that I’m better than everybody else and it does not like being presented with the real facts.
Worst of all, there is no magical cleaning it all up and being perfect from now on. I will continue to be a human with faults.
Can I accept this imperfect human being? THAT is what’s nagging at me most, that’s at the core of this uneasiness. I have to move beyond this cycle of thinking that I’m going to get some fresh start, some clean slate, if I can only close the door on my past and suddenly be perfect in my future. I always thought that would be freedom and happiness. But there is some zen-like temporal shift in all of this; the past is. I can’t stop the past from being, any more than I can stop the future from happening. To accept who I am now means I also have to be willing to accept who I was then, and the imperfect me I will be in the future. To liberate myself from myself, one clumsy ugly piece at a time. A futile yet necessary effort.
There is nothing to do but to continue to work for it.
The Luckiest Day of the Year
I often say that the day of the Point Reyes Christmas Bird Count (“CBC“) is the best day of the year. This year it might have also been the luckiest.
I’m on the Tom’s Point team, also known as “Area 3”. We start, early in the morning, on Route 1 at a little area by Walker Creek. The first bit of luck: I made it with no incident, even though the day before I’d been having a bit of trouble with the car that involved getting a jump from a tow truck.
Anyhow, we trespass around Walker Creek for a couple of hours, and do our best to find our target species, the Rufous-Crowned Sparrow (RCSP). (Luckily, we found our RCSP’s with little effort this year). Then we head up to Tomales, have coffee and the most delicious pastries in the world, and an all-important restroom stop. Our area leader also picks up a loaf of bread for his wife’s Christmas present…it doesn’t seem like much, but he does a gazillion counts each holiday season, so I figure he’s picking up the jewelry and chocolate truffles on other counts.
Part of the thing that makes this day so great is the people who I get to spend it with. In addition to the area leader, there are two other friends that join in, and this year they brought their 11-week-old baby along to bird with us, which a beautiful thing.
After our break in Tomales, we head out to Tom’s Point proper, an Audubon Canyon Ranch preserve that is not open to the public. Here we wander around counting birds and looking at interesting things. This year we were lucky in many ways. For one thing, the weather was not nearly as bad as we expected. And we got a new bird for our area, a Short-eared Owl. I didn’t get a really good look at it, but luckily, others on our team saw enough to get a positive ID. And we were all treated to great views of a Peregrine Falcon doing his best to pick out a Bufflehead for lunch. I feel such a wonderful connection to this place, watching it over the past few years.
But it was back in Tomales that my luck really picked up. My car started! I was parked on a hill just in case I had to push-start it, but no need. Our area leader headed off to get a couple more birds out of our area, and I packed up my gear. Unfortunately, the car stalled and then wouldn’t start again, but I was lucky to be on that hill and then the people on our team showed up just at that time. They made sure I got started ok, and I was off to Point Reyes Station for the post-count dinner. Funny, I screwed up the push-start, but somehow the engine caught and started running again anyhow. I was suspicious that it wasn’t the battery, but I was glad to be on my way.
Many CBC’s have a post-count dinner. However, I’m absolutely certain that the Point Reyes CBC dinner is the best in the entire country. It’s like the Illuminati of birding all gathered in one place; each area is lead by someone that you’d normally have to pay to go birding with. It’s a lively bunch of bird nerds. My kind of people, though I’m pretty sure some day they’ll discover how poor my birding skills are and kick me out. Shhhh….we won’t tell….
After everyone gets their dinner, the count compilers read through a big list of bird species we typically see. As they read each one, you yell “Yes!” if you saw it that day. We usually have about 200 species marked “yes” by the end of that. Then it’s story time. Every group leader stands up and relates the highlights of their day. This is where we get to find out what rarities have been found, adding species to our list. And the stories are great, sometimes hilarious, sometimes with unintentionally hilarious delivery (nerds are nerds, after all). My favorite stories this year were about a mountain lion sighting that one team had, and another story about a coyote that seemed to be trying to play with a bobcat. Capping off the day with this dinner definitely makes it my favorite day of the year.
When dinner was over, I went out to my car to head home, and the darned thing wouldn’t start. Another lucky thing: my area leader helped me set up jumper cables so we could try jumping it. A passerby pointed out that it wasn’t my battery; the symptoms pointed to another problem. He was right, at least, that a jump wasn’t going to help me. But my luck still held: I had phone coverage, and was able to call my auto club with my cell phone. It was too bad, though, that they couldn’t coax anyone to come out to Point Reyes Station that late at night. My day leader also helped me try to push-start the car, but that wasn’t working this time either. He pushed the car a whole block! I finally got him to go home after that.
Luckily, the auto club gave me the number of a tow truck operator that wouldn’t contract through them, but could come out and I could pay them and then get reimbursed. After some calling around, I decided that the out-of-pocket was too steep, so I decided to try something else. I walked up to the gas station, but they were closed.
And then I had the super-incredible luck of coming back to find two last people leaving the dinner. One of them was a woman who’s son participated in the count, and she also happened to be a Point Reyes park ranger. She knew the local tow company personally, and suggested we go try to find them. So off I went with her. He wasn’t home, but we stopped at a local tavern and they called his numbers. No answer. It was here that I noticed that my wallet wasn’t in my purse. My heart lept into my throat, but luckily I’ve learned this prayer about offering over my will and by this point I was saying that prayer to myself about every five minutes. OK universe, if losing my wallet is also part of what needs to happen here, let’s go with that.
My good samaritan offered to let me sleep on her couch. At that point, I was prepared to sleep in the car, but I was grateful that I didn’t have to. This wasn’t luck, this was sheer goodness in another human being who turned out to be one of the most upbeat and positive people I have ever known.
We went back to the car and, lucky me, my wallet was right on the dashboard where I’d left it. And, also lucky me, I had a change of clothes, packed just in case we got soaked on the count, and a toothbrush and toothpaste in my purse. So off we went. I decided that there must be some reason for me to meet this person, so I let it drop that I’d applied to the Peace Corps and of course it turned out that she’s a returned volunteer herself. She had some interesting stories and good advice for me.
And so this is how I ended up waking up in front of floor-to-ceiling windows overlooking Limantour Beach at Point Reyes National Seashore, maybe the most beautiful place on the planet. And, although there was no phone service, there was a wireless connection and just enough juice left in my phone to get the word out to my ex, who was dog sitting, to let him know what had happened. How lucky is that — my dog was already in good hands that night! Any other night, and I would have been leaving her stranded alone at home without dinner.
In the morning, my good samaritan took me back into town. Super-duper lucky to find a pay phone that would let me make toll-free calls for no charge. I literally spent an hour on the phone with the auto club as they tried to find someone to come out in the stormy weather. (Luckily, the phone booth had a bit of shelter to make the big shower we had during this time much more bearable than it might have been.) While waiting on the phone, I tried to think of all the dry places on the earth where they would literally kill for this kind of rain. And pulled out that prayer in my head a few dozen times.
The auto club just couldn’t find anyone they contracted with to come out to such a remote area for such a long tow. But luckily they could arrange for the other tow company to take me for cash, and (incredibly lucky) this happened during a time in the month where I actually have money in my checking account. Also lucky: the tow truck said he’d meet me at the diner and take me to my car. I was going to get my coffee AND breakfast!
The luck doesn’t end there. On the way home, we saw some routes were flooded out, but we made it all the way back to the ranch. The trees I always see on “my” road have never looked lovelier. And I know more about the towing business than I ever imagined possible. I like to think that my tow truck driver needed to come up to Bodega today for some reason we’ll never know. Maybe he needed to be away from an accident that he might have been in on his regular territory. Maybe he stopped to help a disabled driver on the way home and maybe they fell in love and will have a bunch of kids and one of them will find the cure to cancer. Who knows. All I know is, at this point, I’ve convinced myself that everything that has happened had to happen, and I“m better off going with that flow than railing against it.
Best of all, when I got home I heard a familiar bark, and Laika came running out to greet me. She’d already been delivered home to me, so I no longer had to worry about anything else for the day. I could just enjoy being snug at home, taking care of us, and appreciating all the luxuries of warmth, tea, internet connections and phone coverage and electricity. Tomorrow, I’ll call a friend who’s a mechanic, and I’ll get his advice about what to do next, and I’ll take it one step at a time. If I try to think two or three steps ahead, a dozen hydra heads of potential problems crops up. So just one.
This is not to say that I’m some kind of paragon of virtue and serenity. There were moments when I just wanted to buckle and bawl in a giant pity party. I was rude to the auto club rep last night, hanging up sharply instead of saying goodbye politely. I spent a lot of time beating myself up about not maintaining my car better, about always depending on other people for help, berating myself for my whole lifestyle, ”if you just got a job like everyone else you would have more money for these kinds of emergencies“ and so on, endlessly. Envy at the park ranger’s home (when she and her husband have obviously worked hard for years just to be able to get into this, a rental through the park service!) Endless self-centered head chatter about endless details, ”shouldas“ and ”if onlys“ and falling into ”help me“ instead of ”I accept“, even now.
But I am grateful for all of the little things that went right. And I’m open to more of that kind of luck.
December Morning
Laika has been trying to get me back in the routine of going for a walk. She nudges me while I’m sitting at the computer, drinking coffee, and gives a little groan while tilting her head towards the door. She is irresistible, especially when she knows I’ve gotten the message and begins dancing in delight at successful communication. Besides, the walk is a good thing for me, too.
She’s been on my mind a lot lately. While filing away some papers the other day, I found her adoption ad from the shelter, and noticed that it included the date she was found as a stray. It was only a day or two after an utterly miserable February night for me. Home from a failed road trip to see some good birds (we’d been turned back because of snow at a pass), we were enduring a massive cold snap for Sonoma county.
I was full of anger and resentment and despair, with no real target other than myself. I’d started therapy less than a month earlier, and I think something inside didn’t like that. It was fighting to pull me into the darkness for good.
I’d’ had lots of beers when I decided to go outside and lay on the porch glider. If I could just manage to pass out there, I wouldn’t be found until the morning. Just a stupid drinking accident during an unusually cold night.
I hate being cold. I fear it. Too soon, I got up and went back inside. Had some more to drink.
Then went back out. Even at the time, I questioned how serious I was about this. Just tempting fate, like staggering down country roads at night, wearing black. Letting the accident happen if it will.
I made it longer the second time, but the blackout I’d been hoping for never happened. Finally, shivering and shaking, I gave up. I couldn’t even do this right.
Somewhere out in the night, there was a pup, only six months old, out on the streets of Ukiah. With her short hair and her own loathing of the cold, she must have been shivering and miserable, too.
It took us a few weeks longer to find each other, but we did, just in time.
I don’t know why some of us are saved and some are not. I haven’t done anything to earn it. I’ve seen better people than me buried. And I know that if I’m not careful, I could lose it all in an instant.
This morning I woke up, and I thought about the year before as I lay in bed listening to the owls and coyotes and thought, “This is real wealth…owls and coyotes!” I went through my morning routine, finished a painting, ate pomegranate and toast with almond butter. When we finally got around the taking that walk, the fog was starting to lift, making me feel as though we were walking in clouds. I stopped to say good morning to the goats standing in the mist, with the sunlight illuminating each drop. How can life get this good?
During our walk, I thought a lot about all of the people who have saved my life. People who say mysterious spiritual things about “dog” and show up to help you move, without any drama, and who never tell you how to live but you know they have something you want. People who tell their story with no idea that they’re saving the life of someone else sitting silent and hungover in the zendo. Friends who show up when you didn’t even know you needed them to, with lights or lattes or laughs. Women who circle their names on phone lists and insist that you come back. People who take a chance on you and give you work when you need it. Friends who call you on your own bullshit. People who listen and encourage.
And shivering, skinny black pups who are too scared to walk past the other dogs in the shelter, and have to be carried all the way home.
Thanksgiving
Sometimes “gratitude” seems overused and trite to me. It comes out sounding like I’ve been sitting at a table with a drill sergeant. “You’ll eat your gruel and you’ll be THANKFUL for it!” Yes, yes. I’m grateful for my gruel, because I know that so many others are going without gruel and they would be thrilled to be sitting here with you. Sir.
Gratitude is not something you can rationalize yourself into. It feels so cliche to write about gratitude. But it’s Thanksgiving, and sometimes you’ve got to write something. And I’m almost embarrassed to find that gratitude is on my mind.
I spent some time this week with my brother, sis-in-law, niece and nephew. They live on the peninsula, which is a world apart from the ranch here. Everyone moves fast, everything is kept so clean. When I walk Laika, she looks for overgrown patches on the infrequent run-down places to do her business. The manicured lawns of the CEO mansions we pass aren’t fit for defecation…that can’t be real grass.
My brother and his wife manage to keep a house full of love that is a sanctuary from the hum of silicon valley. Chickens in a neat coop greet us in the driveway, and dinner often includes something out of his garden. This little family has taken care of me, probably far more than I’ll ever know. Somehow I landed in a high place last year when I was ready to bottom out.
Laika and I came home to the ranch yesterday. I had a commitment to keep, otherwise I might have stayed through the holiday instead of making the drive back and forth another time. But as soon as I stepped out of the car, waves of gratitude hit me. The cold air was clear and fresh; there was real earth beneath my feet. I headed into the yurt and was almost giddy to go inside. This place is more “mine” than any other place I’ve lived. It’s held me, allowed parts of me to grow and expand within its radius. It holds some kind of energy, something that flows through me but is not me, not mine.
Sometimes my brain holds up ideals about How I Should Live. I remember reading adventure stories as a kid, stories about people who understood or had to learn how to survive in the natural world. People who understood the ways of animals, who hunted them or even trained them to hunt for them. People who understood the herbs to gather for healing, who knew how to ride a horse or read the land and the weather. The cowboys, the indians, the castaways, the explorers, the pioneers, the naturalists. I was entranced by those stories and tried to act them out in secret….always in secret, because I thought everything else in my world was telling me that was all silly. We don’t do that anymore. And you’re going to scar up your knees and won’t look pretty when you grow up, and then the boys won’t like you.
Eventually, all of those stories that seemed so real to me as a kid became like cardboard pictures. They flattened out with distance and seemed as lifeless to me as the picture I was trying to live, the one I thought I was supposed to want.
When I moved here, to such a comparatively rustic place, I was enthusiastic but not confident. I worried (I still worry) about being cold…it turns out to be one of my greatest fears. I worried about the drudgery of the inconvenience. I worried that for all my bragging about how I liked the outdoors, I wouldn’t really want to live like this. I had lost my ability to know what is right for myself. I wasn’t sure of anything anymore. But I took a chance on a feeling.
When I stepped out of the car yesterday and breathed the air and felt the earth, I was overcome with the feeling of gratitude. But it was less for the air and the earth itself, and more for the glimmer of courage I found last year to give this a chance. To reach back into the feelings that those stories stirred up in me as a child, and give them a chance to be enlivened again. To trust a tiny feeling that said, “this is what you need to do now.”
Those tiny moments of courage aren’t born in a vacuum. They grow out of love. And sometimes, the most pivotal points of courage happen in the tiny place where we are most unable to love ourselves. They catch us in our fall, like a tiny hook, and its not until we surface that we see that the tiny hook is attached to infinite lines of power…the love of friends, family, and people who know their place on this earth and have the strength to reach out.
Gratitude, yes. Overwhelming gratitude. It flows through me, through everything, an energy that can’t be stopped and held in a moment. Every expression of it fails; it must be lived.
Altered States
I almost drowned as a child. As my dad tells it, we were at the kiddie pool with relatives. They were sitting right there, keeping an eye on us, but suddenly he looked down to see me laying on my back, under the water, a sickly unfocused smile on my face. He leaned over, grabbed my suit, and hauled me out of the water…but also submerging the camera that was hanging from his neck. It was a nice camera, and it was ruined.
I remember it differently. In my memory, I’m swimming underwater, belly down. I taste a little vomit in the back of my throat, and the light changes; everything becomes brighter, the refracted ripples in the turquoise water.
Then the fish appear. Animated cartoon fish, swimming by me, then a friendly big black whale with a big smile. It is delightful.
Then I am yanked out of it, and the grownups are yelling.
I remember a feeling that used to come over me as a kid. I didn’t have a name for it, but I associated it with the feeling you get when you push a sewing needle through the top layers of the skin on your thumb…it doesn’t hurt…there’s just sort of an odd pressure of something there, under your skin.
When it happened, my sense of time (if you call it that; this is hard to describe) became stretched out. It was as if part of me was moving along slowly, like molasses, like slow motion, while another part was moving quickly. Physically it felt like I was in the back top of my head, with a lifting sensation.
I knew that what I was experiencing was internal; it wasn’t something others were feeling. It scared me. I didn’t know if I would come out of it, and I was fearful of surrendering to staying in it. I knew better than to try to explain what was happening to anyone; I didn’t have the vocabulary to do it.
It was as if, had I stayed in that state, I could have moved among people so quickly that they couldn’t see me, darting around like a hummingbird while they all moved in slow motion…not physically, but in a part of my mind that maybe was now separate.
Sometimes this would come over me at night; I remember once going downstairs to use the bathroom and being overcome by this surreal feeling, hyper-aware of the sensation of my feet and hands on the wood steps as I went back upstairs on all fours, slapping the steps with my palms as I went.
I’ve never tried to describe these in writing before, and it’s interesting to see how they appear when it is all set down. You would think that we know, then we write down what we know. But I learn about myself by writing. Sometimes I have to write it to know it.