An English Day on a Western Plain

Fog has quietly crept in,
A stranger from another land

Hangs in heavy stillness
On the brown, flat plain

Bearing tales of English hills,
Green grass and purple heather

To tumbleweed and thistle thorn
Quaffing the cracked parchment.

Only my breath moves this quietude,
A vapor of lingering curls

Whispering of bog fires and gentlewomen
Who put mittened hands to heavy paper

And penned the mists
Of their minds,

Then it vanishes into the white blanket that
Softens sagebrush and spiny weed.

It’s an English day on a Western plain.
Call me Charlotte or Emily or Jane.

Ravings of a Lunatic

Have you been looking at the moon this week? I don’t think I’ve ever seen a moon so bright and beautiful! It casts big squares of light into my room at night. Moonbeams so bright it is hard to tell whether it is falling night or rising day. The Mother of the Night sending soft revelations into my walled world. Illuminations that turn my ordinary space into a sacred place. It seems almost a shame to close my eyes and sleep.

But the moon has been constant this week. She has watched over me through the night and awakened me each morning at 6 a.m. (well, OK, my full bladder helped). I usually stumble into the bathroom on my early morning potty runs, feeling my way along the wall and through the doorway, not wanting to open my eyes and wake up too much before I crawl back into bed for another hour or so of sleep. But when my eyes have fluttered open on these mornings, she has been waiting right outside my window, shining like a huge heavenly floodlight, a ridiculously brilliant ball so close I felt she was nearly within reach. It almost felt as if she were waiting for me to wake up and come out and play. I could not help but want to stay awake. She pulled me out of my sloom, and eased my early morning loneliness with some kind of Moon Magic. Call me Pagan or Lunatic. I felt a little bit of both.

Crawling back into bed vowing not to fall back asleep, I snuggled into my pillows facing the windows so that I could moon gaze. She was mesmerizing as I laid there trying to think of some poetic words to describe this experience. But none came. All I could think of were the words of Jason Mraz’s ballad to the moon, Bella Luna, going round in my head instead:

I'm just a singer, you're the world
All I can bring ya
Is the language of a lover
Bella luna, my beautiful, beautiful moon
How you swoon me like no other

I was so gratified when I had lunch with my cousin yesterday and she told me that her daughter had beckoned her out to see the moon the night before. And again when a co-worker walked into the office today and said, “Have you seen the moon this week?” I am so glad that I have not been the only one taken hostage by the beauty of Bella Luna, warming the winter sky. So often, our modern lives dictate that the only time we spend out of doors is the five second walk from our house to the car, from the car to the office, from the store to the car, and back again. We become disconnected from the natural world by our “inside lives”. Especially in winter. But every now and again, Mother Nature creates something so spectacular, like this week’s moon, she draws us out and we remember who really are. Though bordered and bound by concrete below and roofs above, we are children of the earth still.

I’ve always suspected that we are still pushed and pulled by unseen natural forces even though electric lights guide our waking and sleeping hours more than the sun and the moon these days. I’ve heard it said that emergency rooms are packed at the full moon. And that more babies are born during a full moon than at any other time. I don’t doubt it. Two out of three of my babies were born at the full moon. It brings me some kind of primal satisfaction to know that the moon, like an ancient midwife, pulled my babies out of me with the same power she pulls the tides out to sea.

Jason Mraz sings of the moon as if she were his lover. I’ve always thought of her as my Ancient Mother. And she has inspired poetry from me too, as she has so many other dreamers since the beginning of time. Mine is a scant offering. My widow’s mite, as it were, among many much greater gifts by minds far richer than mine, upon the alter of the moon. Yet I cast my simple gift upon it with a full and thankful heart, knowing it is accepted by my Celestial Mother.

Moonrise Prayer

Mother Moon
In the night,
Gentle glow dimmed
By city light.

Am I guided by you
More than I know,
Like my ancient grandmothers
Long ago?

In womanhood,
I recognize you now,
As one Mother
To Another.

Quietly light my shadowed paths
As a mother does for her child.
Comfort me in darker hours
With wisdom wrought of tidal powers.

Mother Moon,
Oh! Sentient Mother,
Shining softly on creation,

May my own mothering
Be given to such
Modest illumination.

Idaho Thanksgiving With Country Cousins

Thanksgiving has always been my favorite holiday. When I was a child, it
was because my birthday always fell on or near Thanksgiving Day. And there
was always a birthday cake on the Thanksgiving table for me. So I had this
big idea in my little head that this large meal and family gathering was ALL
ABOUT ME!!!

When I grew up and began to be the producer of family holidays, a.k.a. The
Mom, I began to appreciate Thanksgiving for its simplicity. No other
holiday is, for me, as authentic and beautifully uncomplicated. There is
just something so deeply spiritual and honest about taking a day to simply
gather together with those who mean the most in our lives to express love
and gratitude.

This year, I'm choking a little on the fact that I won't be in Florida with
my sister's family, eating the perfect Thanksgiving dinner that she and I
have honed into an art form over the 16 years we spent together on the East
Coast. Along with turkey and gravy and mashed potatoes, we would be having
our Sausage Cornbread Stuffing, Sweet Potato Soufflé, Green Bean Casserole
made with FRESH green beans, and Cranberry Jello Salad. Followed by Pumpkin
and Pecan Pie with Whipped Cream. We would be dining poolside and the day
would be wrapped up with a sunset walk on the beach.

This year, however, I'll be in the cold barrens of Western Idaho gobbling with my country cousins. A few weeks ago, when I tried to pin them down for dinner
plans, this is how it went:

Me: What do you all have for Thanksgiving Dinner? Anything special?

Them: Oh. The usual. Turkey, gravy, mash potatoes.

Me: Can I bring my Cranberry Jello Salad?

Them: Yeah! That'd be great.

Me: What about Stuffing?

Them: (in unison) Stove Top

Me: Would you like me to make my incredibly delicious Sausage Cornbread
Stuffing?

Them: No, we like Stove Top.

Me: But

Them: Stove Top!

Me: OK. What about the Green Bean Casserole?

Them: (They anticipated where I was going here) Green Beans. Out of a can.

Me: Well, would you mind if I made the green bean casserole with fresh
green beans?

Them: Yeah, OK, if you want.

Me: What about sweet potatoes? Do you guys do sweet potatoes?

Them: Yes. Out of a can.

Me: Well, I have a really nice Sweet Potato Soufflé I can make. Do you
want me to bring that?

Them: Does it have marshmallows on top? We like marshmallows.

Me: I can put marshmallows on it.

Them: OK then. You can bring it. But we're still making our own sweet
potatoes. From a can. That's what we like.

Me: OK. What about pies?

Them: COSTCO! (They nearly sang it in unison as if they were doing a
commercial.)

Me: You buy your pies. (Each word halted by a revelatory pause in
true Captain Kirk fashion as the gravity of this Turkey Day situation dawned
on me.)

Them: Yeah. You can't tell the difference from homemade. We are NOT
making pies.

Their words landed on me with a thudding finality.

Me: (My voice growing weaker as I dared to ask the next question)
OK....what do you put on your pies? Cool Whip? or Whip Cream?

Them: (There was a slight pause as they had to mull this one over a minute.)
Reddi-Whip. Out of a can.

My Aunt chimed in: What are talking about over there?

Them: Dinner. Lisa wants everything homemade. (Appropriate eye rolling
here)

Aunt: I'm bringing potato rolls, from Albertsons.

Me: Are you SURE I can't bring my Sausage Cornbread Stuffing???

Them: NO!!!! WE LIKE STOVE TOP!!!

So there you have it my friends. The only thing that'll be real on my
Thanksgiving table this year will be the potatoes, which will be appropriate
since we're in Idaho.

Oh, and the love. The love will also be real as I gather with a side of my
family that I haven't spent Thanksgiving with since we were children, on a
side of the country that is both old and new to me at the same time. And
for that, my heart will be full of Thanksgiving as I gulp down my Stove Top
Stuffing and Costco pie.

NOVEMBER

November is neither
Here nor there
But somewhere in between
Autumn
and
Winter.

When the year’s first snow
Falls on a November day,
While a few ruddy gold leaves
Still cling to the branches,

November is
Autumn and Winter
At the
same time.

Neither Pagan
Nor Christian,
November is content
To offer
Quiet Thanksgiving
Simply
for
Being.

Often overlooked,
Lost between
Radiant days of
Autumn glory
And
Winter’s hush,
November is neither
Here nor there.

Just somewhere in between

I was born in November
I am November’s child
I, too, am neither
Here
Nor
There.

11-2-90

Stone Age Music

The next time someone asks me what I do or who I am, I’ll say, “Woman”. I suppose that will sound rather primitive. I decided this the last time I went to a doctor appointment and had to fill out a stack of new patient forms. For the first time ever, on the line where I was to list my occupation, I drew a simple question mark. It hit me. I don’t know who I am.

I’m a wife but I live alone most of the time as my husband lives and works across the continent. I’m a mom but my children would rather me mother them from a distance, or not at all at this time in their lives. I’m not enrolled in any educational institution so I can’t really call myself a student, not officially anyway. I’ve never had a career outside my home. Worker, mother, daughter, wife, sister, friend, church member, student. I am all those things. But I’m not, really. That is me in relation to someone or something else. So what am I? Who am I? Just me?

Then it came to me. Overriding and underpinning all those things is the one thing that never changes. I am a woman. Yes. That is an occupation that I can be absolutely sure of that is constant and unchanging. Beyond all my relational titles that define me, I am a woman who feels most myself when I am engaged in things artistic: transported by a piece of music or a sublime piece of writing (my own or someone else’s) or a transcendent work of art. This is when I really know who I am in my deepest, most primal core and how I am connected to all that matters in this sphere of our existence.

I recently came across a picture of a Stone Age flute carved from the bone of a griffon vulture. It was eight and half inches long, had 4 finger holes with the end carved in a V shape to fit the primitive musician’s mouth. It was estimated to be 35,000 years old and was found alongside a carving of a voluptuous female nude statuette dating from the same period.

I find it fascinating that some of the earliest evidences of humanity are primitive creative expressions of beauty in the forms of music and sculpture. This means that long before humans figured out how to grow their own food, music echoed off the walls of an Ice Age cave. The creative impulse is not only what makes us human, but it is what taps us into the divinity within us. Art is the most primitive expression of humanity.

So, it gratifies me, in a primal way, to know that my primordial ancestors also discovered who they were through artistic creation and found transcendence from this existence through music and art. That knowledge connects me to the human family throughout all ages of time. It connects me to myself at the most raw and elemental core, when all other cultural accoutrements are stripped away.

The next time I, Woman (not unlike the voluptuous carved beauty found in the cave), sit in a concert hall listening to the likes of Mozart or Mraz, the ethereal tones of an ancient flute echoing through the dark hollows of an Ice Age cave, warmed by firelight and human artistry, will not seem so far away.

The Struggle For Happiness

In between my moments of ecstatic bliss, I often find myself struggling to be happy. Which has always mystified me because I think that I really do have a natural propensity for fun and happiness. So why do I have so much trouble accessing it on a consistent basis?

Was it Leo Tolstoy who said,”All happy families look alike. But all unhappy families are unhappy in their own way."? Perhaps that can also be applied on an individual level. I do think that happy people probably practice many of the same happy principles. Perhaps Steven Covey's book could be renamed The Seven Basic Habits of Highly Happy People............I do think that Happy and Effective are interchangeable because I think that effectiveness is a happy state of being. and I've often thought that maybe I'm not happy because I'm an undisciplined, ineffective person.

There are plenty of studies out there on Happiness as well as Unhappiness. Several years ago, I was intrigued by a Happy Study. I was drawn to the article in search of an explanation for my own unhappiness. It proposed that people have an inner "happiness setpoint." They found that some people are just naturally happier. And that when they go through life's traumas, they suffer for a time, then recover and go back to their high happiness setpoint. Whereas, less happier people suffer longer and then go back to their lower happiness setpoint.

This article gave me an explanation but it didn't give me a whole lot of hope. At least I now had a possible reason for my unhappiness, and I couldn't help it. That relieved some of the stress of unhappiness in a wierd way. I heard an interview with Michael J Fox recently when he quoted,”Happiness grows in direct proportion with your acceptance and declines in direct proportion with your expectations." Does that mean that in some wierd way, that if I accept that I'm unhappy that I will be less unhappy? That would certainly be in harmony with the first great law of Buddhism ”Life is suffering." And when you accept that life is suffering, it ceases to be insufferable.

But where does that Buddhist law fit with our American credo that the Pursuit of Life, Liberty and Happiness are our inalienable rights??? Endemic to being human. And where does that leave room for the concepts of goal setting and self improvement and hope for increased happiness, if we just accept that life sucks and be happy in its suckiness?

I've explained away my own unhappiness in many other ways: I was unhappy in my marriage. If I had another husband, surely life would be better. But that theory was blown out of the water when I separated from my husband last year and found that I was no happier without him than with him. In fact, I was unhappier without him! Luckily, it was not too late to reconcile and that particular circumstance has been remedied. I have found that a change of heart and perspective, in this case, had a profound affect on my happiness.

Perhaps I would be happier if I had more money. I really do believe that money buys happiness. Money buys 2 things that are essential to my happiness: Freedom and Beauty. It takes money to travel. It takes money to buy the room or the home with the view. It takes money to decorate my house with lovely, praiseworthy things. It takes money to buy a good bed and pillows and comfy sheets and blankets so that I can get good sleep, which is definitely essential to my happiness. It takes money to buy good health care, healthy food, good vitamins, good skin care, the good hair cuts and colors (essential to beauty), the teeth whiteners, the most becoming clothes. I had two crowns last year that cost me over $1000 a piece! Now I know why poor people don't have teeth! THEY CAN'T AFFORD THEM!!! Beauty, poetry, art, freedom, health, teeth, even life.....are all the province of the rich. Poor people even have shorter life spans than the rich. They work harder in physical jobs, wear themselves out sooner, and don’t have access to good regular health care. They die younger.

So, yes, maybe I would be happy if I had more money. But the reality is: I have enough. I travel enough to keep my wanderlust sated, though I'd sure like to travel a lot more. I have enough for good health care and good skin care, regular hair cuts and color and I am keeping my teeth. I buy art on postcards and posters and I frame it for my walls. It's not the real deal, but it gets me close enough to the beauty that I crave. I don't have an ocean view out my back windows, but I do have a cow pasture with cows and a corn field and big western sky. Every time I look out my window at that pastoral scene, I am happy, as I swat away the flies.

I've always felt deeply blessed that I did not have to work in the world to earn the money to put bread on my table. Yet, how nice it would have been to recieve some kind of recognition for the work that I do do. Every Mother's day, I read in a newspaper somewhere or on the internet the calculations of what a mother's/wife's, work is worth. It always comes out to over $200,000 per year. I've heard that in Scandinavian countries, that a woman's at home work is measured into the country's GNP. Maybe I would be happier if my work was recognized, if not compensated, by a measurable amount. I think money makes our world go round. And that the reason that at home women don't get the respect they deserve, except on one day in May, is that their contribution is not measured in financial terms. And maybe, if it was, I would get recognition and respect, and then I would be happy. After all, recognition and respect are components of happiness.

Maybe I'm unhappy because I'm a Sagittarius and being half human half beast, I'm eternally conflicted, thus incapable of happiness.

Maybe I'm unhappy because I'm a poet. I'm a deep, emotional, creative creature. And everyone knows that poets are all wildly unhappy, mentally ill, alcoholics, promiscuous, syphilitic people who all burn brightly early and die young. Maybe I'm unhappy because I've been a good Mormon girl and have not followed my creative instincts that would have led me into a wild life of debauchery, and creative fulfillment. No........that can't be it. Those poets were all creatively fulfilled but they were still tortured and unhappy. Maybe I can't be happy because I'm a tortured poet: whether I'm creatively fulfilled or not.

Maybe I'm unhappy because I'm chronically disorganized because I am creative and destined to be so. So my time, my stuff, my life, is always out of control and that makes me unhappy. Maybe I'm unhappy because I'm totally in a daze all the time and completely unproductive. Maybe I'm unhappy because I sleep too much and can't focus on getting things done. Maybe I would be happier if I could hire a housekeeper to keep my life straight so all I had to do was connect and create every day of my life.

Maybe I'm unhappy because I really do have a great capacity for happiness, the flip side of that being a great capability for profound unhappiness.

Maybe I would be happy if I lost weight.

Maybe I'm unhappy because I'm tired of trying to figure out how to be my best happiest self!!!!

This is what I do know: That I'm most happy when I'm connecting with other human beings who I love. (This is why I spend too much damn time on email and Facebook, then I don't get my work done and that makes me unhappy) I'm most happy and feel most in the flow of myself when I'm creating, whether it is scrapbooking, writing, cooking,any creative work. I'm most happy when I'm traveling and seeing a new place, discovering new things, people, and ways of life. I'm most happy when I'm transported by a good book or a beautiful piece of music. I'm most happy when I am in tune with my God, who I love with all my heart, whether that is in church or in my secret places or high on a mountain top. I'm most happy in the summertime when it is warm and the sun is shining and there's plenty of light. I'm most happy when I'm near a body of water, large or small, it somehow just speaks peace to my soul. I am most happy when I am in love. In love with my husband, my children, my friends, my home, my travels, my books, my art, my God and my life.

If I can infuse as much of those things in my life as possible, I will be happy. Problem is work. You know that piece about maintenance that I wrote about yesterday. Work is not on my happy list and life requires a lot of it. And that's a whole other stream of thought and I really must let this go now. However, that does take me back to the issue of getting a housekeeper, which I am SURE would propel me to greater happiness!

I go back to the modified Tolstoy quote: There are as many paths to unhappiness as people. And it can't be explained away in an article or book by a self help guru or any scientific study. It is too deep. Too complex. So that leads me back to....................ME!!! (maybe that's why I'm so unhappy, I'm too self absorbed). You see, here we go in rounds again. That makes me crazy as well as unhappy and does not answer any of the questions. It just creates more.

Are you exhausted????? I am! Now I must leave this unending round and lose myself in a bit of maintenance which may be its own kind of bliss today. (Light bulb goes on.) That is a whole other stream of thought……perhaps we NEED the mundane!! Wow! Now, that could be a whole undiscovered path to bliss for me…………… To be continued. Of course!

Of Maintenance and Bliss

Life is mostly maintenance. It’s a hard truth and there’s no way around it.

Bills always need paying. Everything seems to always need washing. The laundry is never done. In fact, nothing is ever done. The furniture is dusty again the hour after I polish it. Bodies need constant feeding and washing. Hair and fingernails begin their regrowth the moment they are trimmed. Relationships are often a long string of issues that need to be worked out. I, as well as my car, often seem to be running on about a quarter tank.

Life sometimes seems like an endless round of waking, washing, eating, pooping, washing, working, eating, peeing, washing, running, washing, eating, peeing, washing, washing, washing, sleeping… and waking to begin again.

But every once in awhile the monotony of maintenance is broken by a flash of joy. The baby’s smile washes away the afternoon’s stress. The scent of honeysuckle gives a moment’s heady pleasure during a walk to the mailbox on a spring evening. A vivid sunset stops me in my tracks.

These small moments of bliss break the chains of perpetual busy-ness long enough to remind me of why I am really here. They are little shots of spiritual adrenalin that renew and sustain me through another hour, another day, another year.

It is a challenge to hang on to these fleeting moments. They are like slippery, silver fish glinting in the sun, eluding my grasp as I wade through the life’s ocean. Much more satisfying and sustaining is to simply fill my life with these ecstatic bursts of momentary bliss. To develop a habit of recognizing the extraordinary in the ordinary, of finding something sublime in the mundane. Then life takes on a new perspective of joy amidst the constant pulls of upkeep.

This is a chronicle of my search for the hidden treasures beneath the surface of things, the gems of truth buried beneath the trash heap of trivia that clutters daily life. It is a celebration of those meaningful moments that make life worth living. These are my Confessions of Bliss.
Come! Blog of bliss with me!

Number the Innumerable

March 2, 1998

There it is. The date.
Number the innumerable.
Pin it on the wall
A day equals a number on a square of paper.

Tomorrow we will file it,
Or toss it.

What else shall we do with a day?
A gift beyond measure
A slice of the infinite…

Number it
Name it
Assign a category
List it on neat little lines
Bind it, Box it
Put a lid on it and put it away
Retrieve it
Toss it

At our convenience, of course.
What else can we label?

God-- Oh Yes!
Put names and faces on nameless and faceless things
List and number the Numberless
Measure the Infinite

A child-- Oh yes!
From the moment of birth we begin it,
The naming and numbering
Labeling, categorizing, organizing
Listing and limiting

This universe of possibilities that sucks
at our breasts.

Yes, set a boundary for the boundless
Make rules for wild and untamable things
Bring out our ropes and tie them up
Bind them to us forever

Find a pencil and paper, Quick!
Note a hundred inconsequential details
Write up a contract

And buy them watches and pencils and pads
So they can join the naming and numbering as soon as possible!

Try NOT to take a moment
To glimpse the infinite, boundless, indescribable beauty and possibility
Of the Soul
Whose cries emanate from the vibrations of unknown places,
Whose echoes of laughter will never end

Who cannot be bound by ropes
or described by numbers
Who can never by contracted.

Close your eyes.
It would all be too much.
A number and a box is so much easier.

Besides, I have other important things
to do…
Laundry
Phone calls
Exercise
Shopping

God! I don’t want to do it!

I need time!
Time to cry and ache with
other dreaming fools

Pull the lid off my box for
the infinite soul that
Demands tears
Demands time

Begs for life beyond the box.

Let me spend this day languishing in
the ecstasy
Of unanswerable questions and unquenchable yearnings

Ponder the infinite
Daydream and Sigh

All Day