Dear Jesse,
Before you were born, 19 days didn't seem like a very long time.
And then you came in so challenged to even breathe, your heart one open chamber right in the center of your chest, and changed for me the very nature of time.
Because you were born at night, your first day was only 55 minutes long.
On your second day, you had open heart surgery, and if we measure the passage of time by the significant events that we experience, you had already done more living in 24 hours than I had done in thirty years. The rawness of that realization took my breath and humbly sent me to my knees.
By your third day of life, "day" and "night" no longer existed, and I had learned not to watch the machines for a sense of how you were doing. Women wiser and more experienced than I, those nurses whose ministrations seemed more calling than profession, focused my attention on you and said, "Leave the machines to us." When alarms would sound, Dad would smile and whisper to you, "It's just a truck backing up."
We started singing to you after a few days, because "how can I keep from singing" those songs that your Dad had written like a missive to our future selves? From the moment I met him, I knew that your Dad was a prophet, but only when we started singing to you his songs, written years before he had even met me, did I fully understand what he had been preparing us for.
Remember this one?
"On wax wings of fire,
I climb
Higher and higher.
Before diving to the sea,
effortlessly.
And I know
that I won't live
forever.
But I'm gonna sing a song,
before I go.
And when the wind is crisp and clear,
my thoughts
well
they follow my ears.
To the desert of my dreams,
where my inspiration streams.
And I know,
that I won't live
forever.
But I'm gonna sing a song,
before I go.
I try to speak my mind,
and embrace the sound.
Dig down in my soul,
when nobody is around.
Oh,
but it's scary.
Oh oh,
the hope
I have found.
And when my day comes,
I won't lay down.
I'll pick up this guitar and strum.
Til the nighttime washes over me.
Then I will be free.
And I know,
that I won't live forever.
But I'm gonna sing a song,
before I go.
On wax wings of fire,
I climb.
Higher.
And higher."
Four or five days after you were born, I had to be taken to Brigham and Women's Hospital because I was hemorrhaging. A lesson a mother learns the hard way: I can't be there for others if I don't take care of myself. Of course, your Dad was amazing, a rock. I know that he was terribly frightened, facing his deepest fear, but he stood strong, got me the best care, and tended to me with gentleness and love.
A week into living with you at Boston Children's Hospital, I realized that I could not, for one moment, defer living. You placed me in the perpetual present and left me there. As difficult as it was at times to face the loss of the fantasy of past and future, I am so grateful to you for giving me the gift of Now.
One evening, a little more than a week after your birth, a new nurse asked me, "Do you want to hold him?" as though it was something we had been doing every day. I was stunned, and I said, "Can I?" She held her tongue, but I could see that she was disappointed and even a little angry that no one had yet thought to create an opportunity for us to hold our son. It took a great deal of work, shifting wires and tubes, but then you were in my arms and I was the happiest I had ever been. I cried with great relief and joy, and your Dad and I sang, and I smiled so much my face ached. I will never forget cradling you close in the rocking chair, breathing in the scent of your newness and singing, "Boom boom, baby goes boom boom, baby goes boom boom now. We all cry, everybody does it, everybody boom booms now.." over and over, like a mantra.
Eleven days in, on Valentine's Day, we received news that a local artist had arranged a benefit concert at Fire & Water, in your honor. At first, the thought of leaving your side felt impossible, so we told our staff of volunteers not to expect us. But then your Dad and I talked about it and decided it would be like taking you on a day trip and giving the people back home a chance to come to terms with what we could see was happening. We knew intuitively that you weren't going to be staying, and we wanted to bring others closer to this understanding, and closer to us. So, we left you with your nurse Jane, knowing that you could go while we were away, and drove west in the van we called "Home." We assumed that no one would show up on a frozen February night, but when we pulled up to the back door of the cafe and climbed out of the van, a young guy leaning against the doorframe said, "Good luck getting in there. It's packed!" Your Dad and I walked through the door, and the room got very quiet. People parted to let us pass, offering hugs, a squeeze of the hand, a smile. Dad was as shocked as I was to see all of those people gathered in support of you, of us, and we held onto each other to keep from falling. It was a night full of love, the real kind of love that seeks only to nurture spiritual wellbeing. I was awakened by the outpouring that night, as a room full of strangers showed us that we had indeed accomplished our goal of building a community around you.
A day or two later, the doctors told us that you needed another procedure, which they believed would allow you greater blood flow and provide you with more oxygen. We consented, preparing ourselves for the possibility that you would not survive it, but hopeful that it would bring you greater ease and maybe get you off of the ventilator.
The procedure went very well, but, two days afterward, it became evident that the removal of the obstructions was now causing too much blood to rush to your heart. Your chest was filling with fluid and the doctors had to insert drainage tubes in your sides to deal with it.
A few days later, you developed an infection which quickly became full-blown sepsis. Your Dad and I could see that you were working so hard just to stay with us, and one evening, you opened your eyes and looked first at Dad and then at me with a gaze that galvanized our resolve. Later, in the privacy of the room we had borrowed from friends, we spoke and realized that we had seen the same thing in your eyes. We had both felt you saying, "Haven't I done enough?"
The next day, the doctors affirmed that you were, indeed, very sick, and told us that although they could try to do more to help you stay longer, it seemed that you had gone as far as you could go. Your Dad and I quickly agreed that when night came, we would remove all the tubes and wires, and sing you out. When the nurse removed your breathing tube, you opened your eyes and looked at us, and your face glowed like the full moon on a crystalline night. Later, I fell into bed and felt your spirit flood my body, felt that I was you lying inert on that hospital bed, my limbs limp and sprawling. I slept deeply that night for the first time in weeks, and dreamt of other lives, distant and overlapping.
Our moments with you were so long, Jesse, and every day felt like a privilege so great that I could not imagine being given, or even wanting, more. Never before had I been so alert. No detail escaped, and this careful attention to every moment altered time as I had previously known it. I am well aware that people believed we were living their nightmare, but, honestly, we were blissfully happy being there with you. Sitting by your side, holding your hand or cupping your fuzzy head, singing to you, was all of life. You came streaking through this world like a comet, your bright message of love indelible.
My beloved Jesse, I have been living those 19 days for 19 years, taking every available opportunity to tell the people I meet something I learned from you: when every moment is sacred, 19 days is an eternity.
Sunday, February 23, 2014
Friday, September 28, 2012
The Woman Drummer
Rock and roll culture made drums a man's territory, but long ago the drummers were women. In the ancient cultures of the Mediterranean and Middle East, as well as parts of Europe, before patriarchal Christianity put its stamp on everything, the divine feminine was worshipped in rituals led by women frame drummers. Then, the female body was a holy thing, rightly worshipped for bringing the life of humanity into the world. The goddesses of ritual were feminine beings writ large, the macrocosmic expression of the spectrum of female experience and possibility, and both women and men worshipped them.
In time, women were disavowed as holy beings and shamed for an original sin: the dispensation of self-awareness, the encouraging of self-knowledge. Childbirth, no longer holy or honorable, became our "burden" and its blood and pain our "punishment" (imagine, we were sold that lie, we fell for it! That the miracle of Creation, itself, moving through us in service to Life is a punishment!). Our deep connection to the tides of nature and our temperament for healing were criminalized. Men led ritual, and women who continued to practice the worship of the feminine, and all that she represents, were harassed, publicly humiliated, imprisoned, tortured, and killed in the most atrocious ways.
That history lives within us all.
More and more, I see women reclaiming the divine feminine, and more and more I see them doing it to the beat of a drum. Admittedly, I am one of those women. I've always been excited by drums of every sort: frames, kits, hand drums, drums of every type, size, and sound. The tone can be visceral, commanding, trance-inducing, alluring, enticing, awakening, and transportive. The beat of the drum resonates throughout the entire body, a pulse-beat, a universal tempo to which we all respond, willingly or otherwise. Though I have no training on the drum, I have a natural sense of rhythm that encourages me to converse with it. I often turn to the drum when I feel that there is so much to say that nothing can be said. The drum speaks for me when I falter. I put my hands to it and the sound reaches back into my body and my psyche, and further informs the conversation. I sit or stand, drum positioned between my thighs, and play until I am quieted, until my hands are no longer moved by the creative, expressive force so mysterious and beautiful, until being alive in this body once again feels like an honor. The drum banishes fear, shame, expectation, deception, and woe, just turns it to dust and sets it on the wind. The drum plants my feet beneath me and affirms my courage.
More women should drum. Drumming is good for us: for our hearts (synching the drum's beat to that of our most precious organ); our throats (saying what we cannot or do not say with our voices); our imaginations (dreaming our world into being); our psyches (healing the scars of history, both personal and collective). Our vitality and integrity is our gift to the world, and the knowledge and exercise of this reality makes women extraordinary beings.
In time, women were disavowed as holy beings and shamed for an original sin: the dispensation of self-awareness, the encouraging of self-knowledge. Childbirth, no longer holy or honorable, became our "burden" and its blood and pain our "punishment" (imagine, we were sold that lie, we fell for it! That the miracle of Creation, itself, moving through us in service to Life is a punishment!). Our deep connection to the tides of nature and our temperament for healing were criminalized. Men led ritual, and women who continued to practice the worship of the feminine, and all that she represents, were harassed, publicly humiliated, imprisoned, tortured, and killed in the most atrocious ways.
That history lives within us all.
More and more, I see women reclaiming the divine feminine, and more and more I see them doing it to the beat of a drum. Admittedly, I am one of those women. I've always been excited by drums of every sort: frames, kits, hand drums, drums of every type, size, and sound. The tone can be visceral, commanding, trance-inducing, alluring, enticing, awakening, and transportive. The beat of the drum resonates throughout the entire body, a pulse-beat, a universal tempo to which we all respond, willingly or otherwise. Though I have no training on the drum, I have a natural sense of rhythm that encourages me to converse with it. I often turn to the drum when I feel that there is so much to say that nothing can be said. The drum speaks for me when I falter. I put my hands to it and the sound reaches back into my body and my psyche, and further informs the conversation. I sit or stand, drum positioned between my thighs, and play until I am quieted, until my hands are no longer moved by the creative, expressive force so mysterious and beautiful, until being alive in this body once again feels like an honor. The drum banishes fear, shame, expectation, deception, and woe, just turns it to dust and sets it on the wind. The drum plants my feet beneath me and affirms my courage.
More women should drum. Drumming is good for us: for our hearts (synching the drum's beat to that of our most precious organ); our throats (saying what we cannot or do not say with our voices); our imaginations (dreaming our world into being); our psyches (healing the scars of history, both personal and collective). Our vitality and integrity is our gift to the world, and the knowledge and exercise of this reality makes women extraordinary beings.
Thursday, September 27, 2012
Fall
It astounds me how interconnected the seasons are, how shifting into one so profoundly calls up the other three. I am feeling the urge, as I do every fall, to lie down like a leaf in the deep forest, where no one treads, and become the soil. Just lie there as the fall deepens and turns to winter, as the snow comes and then piles up, foot upon foot, until spring awakens me again to the wonder of sunlight, warmth, and greenery.
The prospect of weathering another winter is wearying, yet I must prepare for it. Part of preparing for winter is preparing for spring. I was raised (I use the term loosely) in a California farming town in the San Joaquin Valley- that wide, fertile swath of land that joins Southern and Northern California. There, then, I was unaware of the seasons; though they, of course, occurred, the changes they brought were on a much milder scale than here in Western Massachusetts. There was less urgency, less need for the average person to weatherize their psyche.
I moved to Western Massachusetts in the winter of 1994, a record year for ice storms. I owned no parka, warm sweaters, hats, gloves, boots- no winter gear whatsoever. People told me that I would need to become a "snow bunny" to enjoy living here and to that I thought, "Fuck you." I longed for the beaches of Hawai'i, pined for the sheer cliffs, grand volcanic mountains, towering waterfalls, massive bamboo forests, and warm, wild ocean. I was miserable.
As the years passed, I acquired the appropriate winter gear that, at least, allowed me a modicum of comfort in a season I despised. Slowly, I began to accept that this is where my life was taking place, whether I liked it or not, so I'd better get with the program or I was going to become a bitterly unhappy, damaged person. I don't remember when I began to see myself as part of this ecosystem. It was years into living here, certainly. For so long I considered myself a foreigner, but at some point it dawned on me that adaptation was all that I had on my side.
Now, with each seasonal shift, I watch myself, I observe the shifts that happen within me and see how they mirror what is happening without. My son exclaimed, two nights ago, "It's 7 o'clock and it's as dark as midnight!" Indeed, the night comes sooner and falls darker than it did mere weeks ago, and with that darkening I watch my mind shift into a deep introspection, I witness myself preparing, mentally, for the long, cold season of darkness.
Because I live in a New England farming community, where we are so subject to the seasons, I have come to see myself akin to the flora and fauna surrounding me, I have come to identify with both the farmer and the crop. The farmer, in fall, is pulling the very last good food from the field and storing it for winter sustenance. In winter, the farmer has plenty of time to ponder, plot, and plan in preparation for spring's planting. "What will I plant in spring?" the farmer is thinking, and, in a way, those "seeds" have been planted.
Like the farmer, I find myself drawing in my late harvest, choosing what will sustain me for the winter and what I should discard. I am acknowledging that winter, that season of fallow fields, is coming very soon and preparing myself to meet its demands. Here, winter demands that we submit to its will. Yes, we can find ways to play with its snow, its intense cold, the ice that forms on the ponds, but these are still a submission. Winter wins.
As fall deepens, I recognize that winter will, once again, have its way with me, and ask me to decide what seeds I will plant in spring, grow in summer, and harvest again next fall. One season can never stand alone.
Today, I watch the gray and white clouds move swiftly across a blue sky and feel the forest calling. I want to walk for hours, until I can walk no further, then lie down like a leaf and merge. I don't want to face winter standing, I don't want to have to be so strong.
The prospect of weathering another winter is wearying, yet I must prepare for it. Part of preparing for winter is preparing for spring. I was raised (I use the term loosely) in a California farming town in the San Joaquin Valley- that wide, fertile swath of land that joins Southern and Northern California. There, then, I was unaware of the seasons; though they, of course, occurred, the changes they brought were on a much milder scale than here in Western Massachusetts. There was less urgency, less need for the average person to weatherize their psyche.
I moved to Western Massachusetts in the winter of 1994, a record year for ice storms. I owned no parka, warm sweaters, hats, gloves, boots- no winter gear whatsoever. People told me that I would need to become a "snow bunny" to enjoy living here and to that I thought, "Fuck you." I longed for the beaches of Hawai'i, pined for the sheer cliffs, grand volcanic mountains, towering waterfalls, massive bamboo forests, and warm, wild ocean. I was miserable.
As the years passed, I acquired the appropriate winter gear that, at least, allowed me a modicum of comfort in a season I despised. Slowly, I began to accept that this is where my life was taking place, whether I liked it or not, so I'd better get with the program or I was going to become a bitterly unhappy, damaged person. I don't remember when I began to see myself as part of this ecosystem. It was years into living here, certainly. For so long I considered myself a foreigner, but at some point it dawned on me that adaptation was all that I had on my side.
Now, with each seasonal shift, I watch myself, I observe the shifts that happen within me and see how they mirror what is happening without. My son exclaimed, two nights ago, "It's 7 o'clock and it's as dark as midnight!" Indeed, the night comes sooner and falls darker than it did mere weeks ago, and with that darkening I watch my mind shift into a deep introspection, I witness myself preparing, mentally, for the long, cold season of darkness.
Because I live in a New England farming community, where we are so subject to the seasons, I have come to see myself akin to the flora and fauna surrounding me, I have come to identify with both the farmer and the crop. The farmer, in fall, is pulling the very last good food from the field and storing it for winter sustenance. In winter, the farmer has plenty of time to ponder, plot, and plan in preparation for spring's planting. "What will I plant in spring?" the farmer is thinking, and, in a way, those "seeds" have been planted.
Like the farmer, I find myself drawing in my late harvest, choosing what will sustain me for the winter and what I should discard. I am acknowledging that winter, that season of fallow fields, is coming very soon and preparing myself to meet its demands. Here, winter demands that we submit to its will. Yes, we can find ways to play with its snow, its intense cold, the ice that forms on the ponds, but these are still a submission. Winter wins.
As fall deepens, I recognize that winter will, once again, have its way with me, and ask me to decide what seeds I will plant in spring, grow in summer, and harvest again next fall. One season can never stand alone.
Today, I watch the gray and white clouds move swiftly across a blue sky and feel the forest calling. I want to walk for hours, until I can walk no further, then lie down like a leaf and merge. I don't want to face winter standing, I don't want to have to be so strong.
Friday, July 13, 2012
The Metaphor of Dance
As a lifelong writer of journals, poems, short stories, and long letters, I have found metaphor to be a comforting companion. Allowing one idea, image, symbol, experience to stand in for another helps me to be a person with a flexible mind and an open heart- the kind of person I enjoy being. Throughout every day, I find opportunity to reach into my experiences of past and draw into the present lessons learned from them. Maybe this is what wisdom looks like? I don't know. I can see, though, that as I mature, I have this well-spring of deep experience which feels like solid ground beneath my feet, and I find this comforting.
I dance. A lot. With a group of extremely kind and supportive people. Lately, I have been finding that what serves me in dance also serves me in other areas of my life. For instance, initiating dance movement from my core allows me to be more centered and balanced, and infuses my movement with greater strength and purpose. Allowing my limbs to follow the movement of my core muscles translates into more fluid, satisfying, beautiful dance and helps me connect with my partner more openly, because I am grounded in my own strength and bodily intention.
Something beautiful which is growing from the development of core strength and sensitivity is the ability to transition easily between "leading" and "following," something that I have found challenging in both dance and everyday life. Reading circumstances, trusting my senses to perceive accurately, and fluidly responding with one or the other role is something that I am learning through dancing with partners, and this burgeoning ability is finding a place off of the dance floor, as well. I no longer have to be dominated by my hyperactive drive to control, to lead, for I am finding trust in my own body's ability to respond to the cues it is receiving. Following is not a passive activity, in dance or otherwise! It requires physical and mental engagement, muscle development, and a willingness to get intimate with my inhibitions.
Dedication to dance is like cultural immersion. The more I dance with other, more experienced, dancers, whom I consider the Denizens of Dance, the more facile I become with the non-verbal language of balance and counter-balance that dance instills and demands, and the more a part of the human culture of dance expression I realize I have always been. In dance, I feel at home- in my body, in my emotional expression, in the company of people who, like me, find joy there. Dancing with others is an exploration of the boundaries of body, mind, energy; most often, I find that there is little that separates me from you. To find this on the dance floor tells me that I can find it anywhere I put my body.
So often, I catch myself ossifying into a state of isolation and individuality. Certainly, there is a time and place for boundaries, but possessing the ability to see through those boundaries and acknowledge that our true state is unity, that we are all made of the same matter, shimmering with the same impulses, feels important to me. I don't want to make myself so singular that I cannot see myself in everyone else I encounter. Ultimately, I am no different from any other human on this planet and dance allows me to see this so frankly. When I move onto the dance floor with another person, and we engage in the tension that exists between our two bodies, I imagine that I have been given the opportunity to jump out of my body and into theirs. I want to feel their bodily impulses move through me, and so I allow myself to be led, to feel my partner's core expressions as a physical roadmap: here is where we are going. I can't know where we are going before I set out, though. I have to just get right with myself at the outset and accept that for me to get anywhere I will have to pay attention to where I am. When the music ends after such a dance, I find myself feeling immeasurably peaceful and full of joy. Moving through space in synch with another person's body is so freeing and so beautiful. It moves my heart to the point of awe.
My entire life, I have dreamt, literally, about dance. I dream about flying an awful lot, also, but that is another story. In my dance dreams, I possess abilities that I have not yet realized in my waking life: I soar, I leap, I turn, I possess muscular acuity that my waking self has never known, and I choreograph the most beautiful dances for myself and others. Sometimes, I long to sleep just to dream these marvelous realities into being. In my dreams, I possess no self-limitations, I am unabashedly alive with dance. As I move more deeply into this undertaking of dancing with others, I am consciously challenging myself to summon up this dreamlife dancer that is me, to tap into what my unconscious knows about how to dance while I am awake. The limitations that I possess are of my own making, in all areas of my life including dance. Dancing with others lately, I see that I can have what I want: free body, free mind, bodily and emotional connection, happiness. It all comes to me in that place, and if it is there, it is available wherever I am.
In the space where I dance, amongst this ever-windening group of people, there exists a remarkable degree of acceptance of one another. I have seen people break wide open and sob on the dance floor, heard spontaneous wails, cries, animal sounds, and songs erupt from the mouths of fellow dancers, witnessed people moving in ways that wouldn't appear much like dance to the average observer, and generally been privy to a vast spectrum of human expression. I am accustomed to a high degree of emotional intensity- I realize that my intensity threshold is very different from many people's- and even I have been startled at times by the rawness of what people reveal to one another at the dance. And I am affirmed by this witnessing, I am humbled by the trust- in themselves and in me- that is shown by the members of my dance community, I am inspired to allow myself to drop into the whatever lurks, lingers, hunkers, slumbers, swims, darts, dashes or dwells within my psyche when I am in this stunningly safe environment.
Lately, I watch myself carrying into the world what I have found on in the dance and I am grateful for the power of transformation, the power of metaphor. Dance is awakening qualities in me that I want to share with the world, so when I feel challenged I pause and summon up the dance floor where I have seen that the strength of my core's intentions is expressed by the rest of my body; fluidly moving between the active states of leading and following makes me a more flexible, responsible person, which in turn allows me to move out of my habitual state of isolation and extreme individuation and engage in synchronistic flow with others from whom, on the most basic level, I am no different; recognizing and disabling self-imposed limitations is a constant possibility; and the safe and vast expression of emotion is fundamental to well-being. Time and again, the practice of dance and its many lessons, so easily transferred to my everyday life, lifts my spirits and fills me with joy.
I dance. A lot. With a group of extremely kind and supportive people. Lately, I have been finding that what serves me in dance also serves me in other areas of my life. For instance, initiating dance movement from my core allows me to be more centered and balanced, and infuses my movement with greater strength and purpose. Allowing my limbs to follow the movement of my core muscles translates into more fluid, satisfying, beautiful dance and helps me connect with my partner more openly, because I am grounded in my own strength and bodily intention.
Something beautiful which is growing from the development of core strength and sensitivity is the ability to transition easily between "leading" and "following," something that I have found challenging in both dance and everyday life. Reading circumstances, trusting my senses to perceive accurately, and fluidly responding with one or the other role is something that I am learning through dancing with partners, and this burgeoning ability is finding a place off of the dance floor, as well. I no longer have to be dominated by my hyperactive drive to control, to lead, for I am finding trust in my own body's ability to respond to the cues it is receiving. Following is not a passive activity, in dance or otherwise! It requires physical and mental engagement, muscle development, and a willingness to get intimate with my inhibitions.
Dedication to dance is like cultural immersion. The more I dance with other, more experienced, dancers, whom I consider the Denizens of Dance, the more facile I become with the non-verbal language of balance and counter-balance that dance instills and demands, and the more a part of the human culture of dance expression I realize I have always been. In dance, I feel at home- in my body, in my emotional expression, in the company of people who, like me, find joy there. Dancing with others is an exploration of the boundaries of body, mind, energy; most often, I find that there is little that separates me from you. To find this on the dance floor tells me that I can find it anywhere I put my body.
So often, I catch myself ossifying into a state of isolation and individuality. Certainly, there is a time and place for boundaries, but possessing the ability to see through those boundaries and acknowledge that our true state is unity, that we are all made of the same matter, shimmering with the same impulses, feels important to me. I don't want to make myself so singular that I cannot see myself in everyone else I encounter. Ultimately, I am no different from any other human on this planet and dance allows me to see this so frankly. When I move onto the dance floor with another person, and we engage in the tension that exists between our two bodies, I imagine that I have been given the opportunity to jump out of my body and into theirs. I want to feel their bodily impulses move through me, and so I allow myself to be led, to feel my partner's core expressions as a physical roadmap: here is where we are going. I can't know where we are going before I set out, though. I have to just get right with myself at the outset and accept that for me to get anywhere I will have to pay attention to where I am. When the music ends after such a dance, I find myself feeling immeasurably peaceful and full of joy. Moving through space in synch with another person's body is so freeing and so beautiful. It moves my heart to the point of awe.
My entire life, I have dreamt, literally, about dance. I dream about flying an awful lot, also, but that is another story. In my dance dreams, I possess abilities that I have not yet realized in my waking life: I soar, I leap, I turn, I possess muscular acuity that my waking self has never known, and I choreograph the most beautiful dances for myself and others. Sometimes, I long to sleep just to dream these marvelous realities into being. In my dreams, I possess no self-limitations, I am unabashedly alive with dance. As I move more deeply into this undertaking of dancing with others, I am consciously challenging myself to summon up this dreamlife dancer that is me, to tap into what my unconscious knows about how to dance while I am awake. The limitations that I possess are of my own making, in all areas of my life including dance. Dancing with others lately, I see that I can have what I want: free body, free mind, bodily and emotional connection, happiness. It all comes to me in that place, and if it is there, it is available wherever I am.
In the space where I dance, amongst this ever-windening group of people, there exists a remarkable degree of acceptance of one another. I have seen people break wide open and sob on the dance floor, heard spontaneous wails, cries, animal sounds, and songs erupt from the mouths of fellow dancers, witnessed people moving in ways that wouldn't appear much like dance to the average observer, and generally been privy to a vast spectrum of human expression. I am accustomed to a high degree of emotional intensity- I realize that my intensity threshold is very different from many people's- and even I have been startled at times by the rawness of what people reveal to one another at the dance. And I am affirmed by this witnessing, I am humbled by the trust- in themselves and in me- that is shown by the members of my dance community, I am inspired to allow myself to drop into the whatever lurks, lingers, hunkers, slumbers, swims, darts, dashes or dwells within my psyche when I am in this stunningly safe environment.
Lately, I watch myself carrying into the world what I have found on in the dance and I am grateful for the power of transformation, the power of metaphor. Dance is awakening qualities in me that I want to share with the world, so when I feel challenged I pause and summon up the dance floor where I have seen that the strength of my core's intentions is expressed by the rest of my body; fluidly moving between the active states of leading and following makes me a more flexible, responsible person, which in turn allows me to move out of my habitual state of isolation and extreme individuation and engage in synchronistic flow with others from whom, on the most basic level, I am no different; recognizing and disabling self-imposed limitations is a constant possibility; and the safe and vast expression of emotion is fundamental to well-being. Time and again, the practice of dance and its many lessons, so easily transferred to my everyday life, lifts my spirits and fills me with joy.
Monday, February 6, 2012
Student Life
In the fall of 2011, I embarked on the journey to a new career. I had to begin at the beginning, so I researched local colleges and universities which specialize in my area of interest and decided on Bay Path College, a small, women's college in Longmeadow, MA. The enrollment process (including financial aid) was painless, as the administrative staff is composed of a team of well-informed, can-do ladies who practically handed me the money to make my education possible. In the last days before starting classes, I learned that I had not turned in all of my medical forms, so I spent my first week of classes running around from doctor's appointments to medical labs, making a slew of phone calls to connect my college with the information they needed to approve me as a healthy student. It was an error I will not be repeating.
Adjusting to campus life was hard. At first, because of the difference between my age and that of the rest of the student body, I felt out of place and awkward. Walking around campus was like walking the gauntlet, with hundreds of curious eyes trying to figure me out. Getting myself from one class to the next, budgeting my time thoughtfully, and remembering how to most efficiently learn a giant body of new information all proved challenging. A few weeks in, though, I finally found my stride and began to enjoy the entire process. The connections being made between the various subjects I was studying were exciting; not confined to my mind, the "AHA!" moments were visceral.
Because I had not previously studied American Government, the Constitution become the central point of all learning I did last semester, as it factored significantly in not only that class but in my Introduction to Law and Violence and Non-Violence In North America courses, as well. Becoming more aware of our country's constitution immediately caused me to more highly prize the freedoms that document has awarded me, while making me a more politically aware person. I better understand the process by which our legislation is made and more clearly see the need for greater oversight of our legislative body; we, the people, need to demand more of Congress! Also, I began to understand why there is debate between those who view the Constitution as a living document, the language of which must be interpreted via the context of contemporary society, and those who cling tenaciously to the linguistic intent of those who framed the Constitution asking, "What did the Framers mean when they said..." I learned more about the American Civil Rights movement than I have ever known and feel privileged to live in a society that produced people of such magnanimity as the leaders of that movement were. Supreme Court Justice Thurgood Marshall, via his judicial authority and great personal conviction, forever altered the course of race relations in America. His contribution to our society could never be overestimated. Examining the amendments to the Constitution, I was deeply moved by the fact that people just like me fought long and hard to widen the scope of language that was too vague at the time of the Constitution's creation. Due process of law and equal protection under the law, made the supreme law of the land via the 5th and 14th Amendments, are the foundation of our legal system. Imagine life in civil society without them. Without doubt, learning about the Constitutional foundation of the law illustrated clearly how necessary it is to fight to protect the very rights the Constitution gives us and affirmed for me my purpose for studying law.
I started my second semester a few weeks ago. I'm taking six classes, four of them legal studies. At this point, they are all reinforcing one another so well that I cannot remember in which class I learned what. All that matters is that I'm getting it. We don't sit around committing theories and statistics and vague hypotheticals to memory. We're just jumping in and doing it. In my Business Law class, we've been divided into groups of three and each group is going to start a business. By doing this, we will take every step together and learn about the legal principles guiding and present in the business world. In Introduction to Litigation, we are, as a class, constructing a civil litigation case which we will see to its resolution. In Legal Research and Writing, we are doing just that- researching cases, writing briefs, drafting letters, etc. Being directly hands-on makes all of the work more real- I'm not just a student, I'm a burgeoning Legal Assistant! The transformation is wondrous.
Dedicating ourselves to constant betterment is incredibly rewarding. Not satisfied to rest on the laurels of my past achievements, I feel challenged to, always, unearth the best of myself and transform what I find into a gift which can be of some service to others. It is this process which gives me a true sense of purpose and fulfillment, something I feel truly privileged to exercise.
Adjusting to campus life was hard. At first, because of the difference between my age and that of the rest of the student body, I felt out of place and awkward. Walking around campus was like walking the gauntlet, with hundreds of curious eyes trying to figure me out. Getting myself from one class to the next, budgeting my time thoughtfully, and remembering how to most efficiently learn a giant body of new information all proved challenging. A few weeks in, though, I finally found my stride and began to enjoy the entire process. The connections being made between the various subjects I was studying were exciting; not confined to my mind, the "AHA!" moments were visceral.
Because I had not previously studied American Government, the Constitution become the central point of all learning I did last semester, as it factored significantly in not only that class but in my Introduction to Law and Violence and Non-Violence In North America courses, as well. Becoming more aware of our country's constitution immediately caused me to more highly prize the freedoms that document has awarded me, while making me a more politically aware person. I better understand the process by which our legislation is made and more clearly see the need for greater oversight of our legislative body; we, the people, need to demand more of Congress! Also, I began to understand why there is debate between those who view the Constitution as a living document, the language of which must be interpreted via the context of contemporary society, and those who cling tenaciously to the linguistic intent of those who framed the Constitution asking, "What did the Framers mean when they said..." I learned more about the American Civil Rights movement than I have ever known and feel privileged to live in a society that produced people of such magnanimity as the leaders of that movement were. Supreme Court Justice Thurgood Marshall, via his judicial authority and great personal conviction, forever altered the course of race relations in America. His contribution to our society could never be overestimated. Examining the amendments to the Constitution, I was deeply moved by the fact that people just like me fought long and hard to widen the scope of language that was too vague at the time of the Constitution's creation. Due process of law and equal protection under the law, made the supreme law of the land via the 5th and 14th Amendments, are the foundation of our legal system. Imagine life in civil society without them. Without doubt, learning about the Constitutional foundation of the law illustrated clearly how necessary it is to fight to protect the very rights the Constitution gives us and affirmed for me my purpose for studying law.
I started my second semester a few weeks ago. I'm taking six classes, four of them legal studies. At this point, they are all reinforcing one another so well that I cannot remember in which class I learned what. All that matters is that I'm getting it. We don't sit around committing theories and statistics and vague hypotheticals to memory. We're just jumping in and doing it. In my Business Law class, we've been divided into groups of three and each group is going to start a business. By doing this, we will take every step together and learn about the legal principles guiding and present in the business world. In Introduction to Litigation, we are, as a class, constructing a civil litigation case which we will see to its resolution. In Legal Research and Writing, we are doing just that- researching cases, writing briefs, drafting letters, etc. Being directly hands-on makes all of the work more real- I'm not just a student, I'm a burgeoning Legal Assistant! The transformation is wondrous.
Dedicating ourselves to constant betterment is incredibly rewarding. Not satisfied to rest on the laurels of my past achievements, I feel challenged to, always, unearth the best of myself and transform what I find into a gift which can be of some service to others. It is this process which gives me a true sense of purpose and fulfillment, something I feel truly privileged to exercise.
Saturday, November 5, 2011
I'm Back!
It's been far too long since I posted here and I hope that I've not lost your interest. Thanks for showing up again to catch up with me.
We had a snowstorm here in Massachusetts last Saturday which knocked down trees and branches and took out the power for many days. What a wake-up call! I was woefully underprepared for such an event. It's time for me to stock up on necessary supplies and have them at the ready for the next disaster. In just a handful of months we've been touched down upon by tornadoes and engulfed by torrential rain which caused massive flooding in the region. Following up with this freak, October storm, which dumped over two feet of heavy snow on leaf-laden trees, just about broke the camel's back. We're rebounding, but it's been surreal.
The power outage cancelled school for me all this week, as the campus is located in a town that was particularly hard-hit. The power was just restored today and classes will resume Monday. School has enveloped my life so completely that I was utterly bereft this week, without a compass. I did not know what to do with myself! Missing a week of school is like missing a month of normal life; we cover so much territory in just one day! Falling away from the continuity of lessons is tough. How will I get back on track? It's like starting over again! I know that I'll do it but right now I am daunted.
I love being in school! It's incredibly fun, completely engrossing, so empowering. I know what I am there for and I am making it all happen for myself, which feels great. I haven't wanted anything the way I want this in a very long time. I'm so ready, totally committed. I forgot what that felt like! My classes are interesting and I love the way that one builds on and dovetails into the next. What I learn in American Government fortifies what my Into to Law professor is teaching us which relates to what's being covered in Violence and Non-Violence in North America. Statistics is surprisingly fun and fascinating, and Fine and Performing Arts, a massive, lightning-fast-paced survey course of art history, is blowing my mind. Can't wait for next semester when I can begin to study law with greater focus.
What I'm discovering, or re-discovering, is my passion for learning and inquiry. I am surrounded by impossibly young women, whose curious eyes follow me on campus; they can't figure me out. But, I know them and I realize how important it is for them to witness me doing what I'm doing cuz this is what a lifelong learner looks like. I know that some of them are inspired, because they've told me so. My instructors are my peers, which is terrific fun, and they really appreciate having me in the classroom. I love the synergy and excitement we share for the process in which we're engaged, which naturally pulls the more motivated students in and gets them going, too. I'm finding the leader in myself, finally.
I'm happy.
We had a snowstorm here in Massachusetts last Saturday which knocked down trees and branches and took out the power for many days. What a wake-up call! I was woefully underprepared for such an event. It's time for me to stock up on necessary supplies and have them at the ready for the next disaster. In just a handful of months we've been touched down upon by tornadoes and engulfed by torrential rain which caused massive flooding in the region. Following up with this freak, October storm, which dumped over two feet of heavy snow on leaf-laden trees, just about broke the camel's back. We're rebounding, but it's been surreal.
The power outage cancelled school for me all this week, as the campus is located in a town that was particularly hard-hit. The power was just restored today and classes will resume Monday. School has enveloped my life so completely that I was utterly bereft this week, without a compass. I did not know what to do with myself! Missing a week of school is like missing a month of normal life; we cover so much territory in just one day! Falling away from the continuity of lessons is tough. How will I get back on track? It's like starting over again! I know that I'll do it but right now I am daunted.
I love being in school! It's incredibly fun, completely engrossing, so empowering. I know what I am there for and I am making it all happen for myself, which feels great. I haven't wanted anything the way I want this in a very long time. I'm so ready, totally committed. I forgot what that felt like! My classes are interesting and I love the way that one builds on and dovetails into the next. What I learn in American Government fortifies what my Into to Law professor is teaching us which relates to what's being covered in Violence and Non-Violence in North America. Statistics is surprisingly fun and fascinating, and Fine and Performing Arts, a massive, lightning-fast-paced survey course of art history, is blowing my mind. Can't wait for next semester when I can begin to study law with greater focus.
What I'm discovering, or re-discovering, is my passion for learning and inquiry. I am surrounded by impossibly young women, whose curious eyes follow me on campus; they can't figure me out. But, I know them and I realize how important it is for them to witness me doing what I'm doing cuz this is what a lifelong learner looks like. I know that some of them are inspired, because they've told me so. My instructors are my peers, which is terrific fun, and they really appreciate having me in the classroom. I love the synergy and excitement we share for the process in which we're engaged, which naturally pulls the more motivated students in and gets them going, too. I'm finding the leader in myself, finally.
I'm happy.
Monday, September 12, 2011
Riding the Wave
It is a time of great change: school has started for both Rain and me, I have scaled back my hours, considerably, at the cafe, my birthday has come and gone, and Summer is making way for Fall. Of course, there are smaller shifts happening all around these bigger changes, as the cascading effect of change is inevitable. Being in school means that I am less available for all of the other activities I either enjoy doing or have, over the course of time, become responsible for. Fortunately, we humans are amazingly adaptable. Week three of school has arrived and I am starting to feel as though the aftershocks are subsiding and the ground beneath my feet is settling again.
Still, it took tremendous effort to get myself to that first day of school, which was not everyone else's first day of school. I haven't been a student in a handful of years and never at this level, so I just had no idea how much preparation was involved in starting college. Summer came and went without me knowing I had long ago been assigned a school email account, so unbeknownst to me emails full of important information had piled up all summer! Several of those emails were on the topic of medical forms (all of you former college students can sigh in commiseration here), more specifically the issue of vaccinations. Good heavens! I had no idea that it would require three whole weeks of bureaucratic hoop-jumping to resolve this issue, but it did. A multitude of phone calls made and received, a dozen visits to my doctor's office, a flurry of faxes sent and received later, my medical hold was lifted and, on week two, I walked onto campus, a college Junior. Talk about a happy woman! I was giddy! It amused me to glance about the room at my classmates, most of whom are 18 and freshly graduated from high school, and see their faces glazed with either boredom or incomprehension, their bodies fidgety and flighty, while I was totally relaxed and utterly absorbed. I am there to learn and to apply what I learn to very specific goals, which gives me focus, excitement, and energy.
Rain came home from school a few days ago and said, "You're studying the Constitution, right?" I nodded. "Yup, in two of my classes. "He smiled." We're studying the Constitution!" "Oh, cool!" I exclaimed. "I guess we'll have a lot to talk about." He smiled again, nodded knowingly. "We certainly will." School has the power to bring me even closer to my son's daily reality, instead of dragging me further from it, and perhaps it can give each of us opportunity to see ourselves in the other, to find empathy and correlation. Anything that keeps me connected to my son is a blessing.
I have loved the Fall my whole life, and I guess for many reasons. School has always been "my element," so Fall has always been "my season," with back-to-school being a welcome imposition of structure, order, and focus. School forces me to harness and channel my energies in very productive and illuminating ways and provides me great opportunity to express myself in ways that are helpful to others. It creates an environment in which I am not only free to indulge my curiosities, my analytical tendencies, my expressive drive, but required to! What a luxury! What a joy! Fall is also the season of my birth, so it feels like the beginning of my new year each and every time. I get so energized and excited about possibilities, dreams, goals. Not only do we harvest in Fall, but we glance forward from that harvest with a sense of what will be required of us to succeed in the following season. At the threshold of every ending is a new beginning.
The nicest thing about not being at the cafe so much is that I get to wear my hair down. It's a silly thing, but I'm ready for the freedom of it. I feel liberated! Also, I get to put on clothes in the morning that are still pretty clean when I take them off at night (not infused with the scent of chili and cupcakes or streaked with stains of every sort), and almost no one asks me to do anything for them. If they do, it's not because I am standing behind a counter that infers my subservience, but because they see that I have skills that can help them get where they want to go. A welcome change. What I have found difficult is letting go of all that has defined me for so long. I walk into that space, any space really, and see all of the details which add up to a feeling of harmony and order, all the little things that make a space welcoming, and I attend to them efficiently and with vigor. I perform about six people's jobs! Knowing that no one else does what I do has me concerned that those things just won't get done and I know how important they are. Lately, I've been taking note of those almost unseen tasks and teaching others how to see and perform them, too. I guess it's one way to stave off the nagging notion that I am abandoning something that truly needs me. But, maybe it's only ego that has me believing it needs me. Perhaps it really doesn't. I guess I'll find out as time passes.
I have dropped in on a wave of change and I am falling, feet beneath me, heart giddy with excitement, down its face, feeling the pull of its power. I have committed myself to change and, soul surfer that I am, I know that once we've committed all we can do is ride that wave.
Still, it took tremendous effort to get myself to that first day of school, which was not everyone else's first day of school. I haven't been a student in a handful of years and never at this level, so I just had no idea how much preparation was involved in starting college. Summer came and went without me knowing I had long ago been assigned a school email account, so unbeknownst to me emails full of important information had piled up all summer! Several of those emails were on the topic of medical forms (all of you former college students can sigh in commiseration here), more specifically the issue of vaccinations. Good heavens! I had no idea that it would require three whole weeks of bureaucratic hoop-jumping to resolve this issue, but it did. A multitude of phone calls made and received, a dozen visits to my doctor's office, a flurry of faxes sent and received later, my medical hold was lifted and, on week two, I walked onto campus, a college Junior. Talk about a happy woman! I was giddy! It amused me to glance about the room at my classmates, most of whom are 18 and freshly graduated from high school, and see their faces glazed with either boredom or incomprehension, their bodies fidgety and flighty, while I was totally relaxed and utterly absorbed. I am there to learn and to apply what I learn to very specific goals, which gives me focus, excitement, and energy.
Rain came home from school a few days ago and said, "You're studying the Constitution, right?" I nodded. "Yup, in two of my classes. "He smiled." We're studying the Constitution!" "Oh, cool!" I exclaimed. "I guess we'll have a lot to talk about." He smiled again, nodded knowingly. "We certainly will." School has the power to bring me even closer to my son's daily reality, instead of dragging me further from it, and perhaps it can give each of us opportunity to see ourselves in the other, to find empathy and correlation. Anything that keeps me connected to my son is a blessing.
I have loved the Fall my whole life, and I guess for many reasons. School has always been "my element," so Fall has always been "my season," with back-to-school being a welcome imposition of structure, order, and focus. School forces me to harness and channel my energies in very productive and illuminating ways and provides me great opportunity to express myself in ways that are helpful to others. It creates an environment in which I am not only free to indulge my curiosities, my analytical tendencies, my expressive drive, but required to! What a luxury! What a joy! Fall is also the season of my birth, so it feels like the beginning of my new year each and every time. I get so energized and excited about possibilities, dreams, goals. Not only do we harvest in Fall, but we glance forward from that harvest with a sense of what will be required of us to succeed in the following season. At the threshold of every ending is a new beginning.
The nicest thing about not being at the cafe so much is that I get to wear my hair down. It's a silly thing, but I'm ready for the freedom of it. I feel liberated! Also, I get to put on clothes in the morning that are still pretty clean when I take them off at night (not infused with the scent of chili and cupcakes or streaked with stains of every sort), and almost no one asks me to do anything for them. If they do, it's not because I am standing behind a counter that infers my subservience, but because they see that I have skills that can help them get where they want to go. A welcome change. What I have found difficult is letting go of all that has defined me for so long. I walk into that space, any space really, and see all of the details which add up to a feeling of harmony and order, all the little things that make a space welcoming, and I attend to them efficiently and with vigor. I perform about six people's jobs! Knowing that no one else does what I do has me concerned that those things just won't get done and I know how important they are. Lately, I've been taking note of those almost unseen tasks and teaching others how to see and perform them, too. I guess it's one way to stave off the nagging notion that I am abandoning something that truly needs me. But, maybe it's only ego that has me believing it needs me. Perhaps it really doesn't. I guess I'll find out as time passes.
I have dropped in on a wave of change and I am falling, feet beneath me, heart giddy with excitement, down its face, feeling the pull of its power. I have committed myself to change and, soul surfer that I am, I know that once we've committed all we can do is ride that wave.
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