Words from the Past

I was looking for a good quote on loss and grieving for a friend of mine, when I came across a collection of old journals. Knowing that I often write inspirational quotes and thoughts in the front few pages of my journals, I flipped through a few. Fascinatingly enough, I found something that I have no recollection of writing, but that I very clearly noted was written by me, for me... whenever I might find it in the future.

"Just because no one has been fortunate enough to realize what a gold mine you are, doesn't mean you shine any less. Just because no one has been smart enough to figure out that you can't be topped, doesn’t stop you from being the best. Just because no one has made the race worth while does not give you permission to stop! Just because no one has realized what a woman you are doesn’t mean they can affect your femininity. Just because no one has shown up to love you on your own level doesn’t mean you have to sink to theirs. Just because the Universe is still preparing your King, doesn’t mean you aren’t already a Queen!

Just because your situation isn’t progressing right now doesn’t mean you need to change a thing. Keep shining, keep running, keep hoping, keep praying, keep being exactly what you already are… COMPLETE & PERFECT.”

Screw Wine!

Today, I am choosing to age like a fine whiskey.

If you look at whiskey, aging of whiskey smoothes out rawness and greenness, it adds depth and complexity and smoothness, it adds flavors, it concentrates what's desirable. At the same time, there is the evaporation of what's less consequential and I think it's fairly easy to see analogies in human life with that process.

- Andrew Weil, M.D.

P.S. and on a completely UNRELATED note... if you have a moment, go read this! I haven't laughed that hard in a while. Thanks Dooce!!

Choices

One's philosophy is not best expressed in words; it is expressed in the choices one makes. In the long run, we shape our lives and we shape ourselves. The process never ends until we die. And, the choices we make are ultimately our own responsibility.-- Eleanor Roosevelt

The prospect of being unemployed is not one that fills me with a great deal of comfort. However, the actions of others around me (here at the office) have confirmed that my resignation was ABSOLUTELY the best choice for me to make. Alice in Wonderland once said, "I do not want to go amongst mad people," and believe me, I could not echo her sentiments more resolutely.

As the news of my departure leaks its way through the department, and then the company, many have approached to ask where my path is heading. I can give no answer other than, "I don't know... but sure as hell not here." An overwhelming abundance of choices are spread before me and I could pick any and do well.

However, some choices are not made with the mind, but with the heart, or the soul, or the very essence that drives you. I tell others that I don't know where I'm headed, but that's not entirely true. I know that my future must contain working with animals, and preferably working outside. Too long have I sat 10 - 12 hours at a time, in front of a computer, ignoring the fact that the sun rises and sets and I don't have a moment to get outdoors. Too long have I smiled and played "nice" within the snake pit of office politics. And for what? As Amandarin pointed out not long ago, "No one is ever going to reach their deathbed and find themselves wishing they'd spent more time at work." I'm pursing returning to school. I'm looking at nearby possibilities. And of course, I'm still reaching for my heart's mission.

One night, I was scouring the web, researching opportunities and I found myself weeping for all the lost years. I turned to Tag and said, "How did I get to be 36 without even KNOWING these jobs were out there?" To which he responded, "The good news is... you're only 36, and you know now."

Eleanor is right. This process takes an entire lifetime, and I'm not done yet. If I am truly in charge of shaping my life, then let me grab the sculptor's tools and create a reality I'm proud to call my own. Let me choose to be happy and fulfilled. Let me make the choices that make a difference.

Overheard at the Office

The Homecoming Queen is in her office, on the phone. Clearly it's a domestic call, becuase I just overheard:

"Oh shit Grandma, you're spending money like a crazy person."

It made me giggle.

Words to Catch at my Heart

"The soul should always stand ajar, ready to welcome the ecstatic experience."
- Emily Dickinson

"The world is composed of rival gangs of hypnotists, each competing for your entranced attention." --graffiti on the wall of a public restroom at Northgate Mall, San Rafael, California

*****************
That's it. Wish I had more for you, but the daily grind has sucked dry my brain like a grape left on the dashboard of a car in a Southern Summer. *sigh* I finished Eat, Pray, Love and now find myself in that same void that one feels when one returns from a blissful vacation, only to plunk back into the morass that is everyday routine.

Trancendance, Table for One

Lunch. It’s an infrequent luxury in my world, and as I walked away from the office today, I actually heard the “Rocky” theme music in my head…. As if unchaining myself from the desk for 60 min were a feat of Herculean proportion.

My intention was to pick up some Taco Bell and drive to a near-by park, where I would read my current obsession, Eat, Pray, Love. I believe that this book was an Oprah recommendation or something similar, and I admit that did not really fill me with confidence that I would find it either inspirational or motivational. However, my dance studio offered it up as the book for discussion one month, and I wanted to have some idea of what people were talking about.

I couldn’t be more pleased that I did. What an amazing discovery!! This book fills me with hope and drive and all things that feel bubble-bath good in one’s soul. It has been a long time since I repeatedly laughed OUT LOUD at a book’s passages, much less chased someone down (usually poor Tag) saying, “Wait… you have to hear this. It’s hysterical.”

Elizabeth Gilbert’s telling of her year long adventures in Italy, India and Indonesia rousts parts of my soul that had settled into the numbness of neglect, giving it both wings, and the urge to fly. It has lightened my heart and filled it with giggly madness and joy. This is the kind of book that poets weep for and established governments should fear, because it cajoles me to be bigger, to be more courageous, to be more alive, to be inspired, invigorated, & ignited into a sacred flame.

As such, I found myself driving past the Taco Bell, and instead to a restaurant (one of my favorites) where I had not been in a long time. There I settled into a table by a sun-heated window, ordered some white wine and a salad, and allowed myself to be indulgent, reading at the table, drinking mid-day, and not keeping any sort of strict eye on the “lunchtime clock”.

While I ate my organic turkey burger and sipped my chardonnay, I found myself entranced by the words on the page. Gilbert’s description of the daily routine of the Ashram is reminiscent of the fantasy I’ve often had about life in a convent, or other spiritual temple. (And yes, I am aware how conflicting that desire is with my inherent inclinations to take long, wine-filled lunch breaks.... bear with me. )

Still, it was all a fairly innocous until I got to the conversation on soul mates:

“People think a soul mate is your perfect fit, and that’s what everyone wants. But a true soul mate is a mirror, the person who shows you everything that’s holding you back, a person who brings you to your own attention, so you can change your life. A true soul mate is probably the most important person you’ll ever meet, because they tear down your walls and smack you awake. But to live with a soul mate forever? Nah. Too Painful.”

When I finished reading the passage, I had to turn my head towards the window, and stare into the bright California sun, blinking back tears and the gasp that was caught in my throat. It’s not that the words were foreign or some epiphany exploding inside of me. The words were much identical to a conversation I had with a dear friend when I lost my first “soul mate”. But perhaps, because so much time had past, and my heart was miles from hurt, I was able to take those words inside of me as I never had before. There was a sigh of relief from within my soul, and I felt both validated and set free.

There have been a few loves in my life, that when they appeared, I was swept off my feet by the disorienting power they had over me. The signs of the Universe blinked in neon, telling me in no uncertain terms “PAY ATTENTION! This one is VERY important to you.” Those loves were passionate whirlpools of intensity, swirling wildly from indescribable joy to unbearable fury and pain. Those loves were also, oddly enough, the shortest in my history. They swept in, broke through walls, ripped open scabs, spilt their iodine and left without so much as a band-aid in thanks.

And here was a book, years later, confirming that it just might be a part of the bigger plan. *sigh* It was an amazing relief.

I turned from the window, back to the room full of diners and felt… just a little different. The couple at the table next to me received from the waitress two plates of pancakes, and I laughed while crying at the beauty and freedom of that. (I can’t explain what I found particularly moving about it…. Just that I did). There was a brief moment of wondering if I was being watched; if anyone noticed the tears glistening in my eyes, or the smile I couldn’t seem to erase. Just as quickly as that thought appeared, I realized that I couldn’t possibly care. I was in that moment perfect and pure and enjoying a state of amazing bliss.

I finished my glass of wine, paid my bill, and returned to my car. A moment of transcendence, disguised as an everyday meal.

I really should make a point of taking lunch more often.

Being & Becoming

From "Words of Wisdom for Women" by Rachel Snyder

Be

Remember that life is in the being, not the doing. Be every bit of everything that you are. Be tough, be soft, be dramatic, be subdued. Be a little bit of this and a little bit of tha. Be the one who always shows up on time or be th eone who lives according to her own inner clock. Be the one who never forgets a detail or be th eone who never remembers. Be happy when you feel like it and be sad when you are down.

Be who you are-- not who they told you you should be. Be able to cry in front of someone you hardly know, if it's time to cry. Be willing to be real. Be talkative if you are; be quiet if you are not. Be ready to drop your masks and your protective armor and be genuine. Be in the moment. Be in the light.

.... And just when they think they know exactly who you are, be prepapred to be something altogether different.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Class was good today. Stirred my soul, moved my aching body (damn the migraines... damn them all to hell), and allowed me for a moment to slip the surly bonds of the everyday, and just Be. I wish the same bliss for you today.

Sunday Scribblings: Yummy

WOW.. what an easy prompt for me.

For years now, my alias has been YummyTeece. It came as a combination of my then boyfriend's nickname for me (Teece), and my favorite word, Yummy.

To me, Yummy is about so much more than taste. Yummy is the epitome of all things good. Sunshine after a rainstorm is yummy. The smell of newly-mown grass, which stirs memories of childhood's carefree summers... That's yummy. The warm glow of a first date gone wonderfully right... you know, that cloud you walk on for week after? That's the essence of being embraced by a big pink bubble of Yummy. It's the feeling of being loved, the feeling of self-confidence, the feeling of entering a room and stopping all the traffic in it.

Maya Angelou captured it when she said:

"The span of my hips
The stride of my steps
The curl of my lips.
I'm a woman
Phenomenally
Phenomenal woman
That's me."

Phenomenal women are Yummy!


Therfore when I embraced "YummyTeece", it was my way of speaking into the Universe the idea of me, to my highest power. Me at my most invincible. Me at my most self-loving. Me at my most courageous. Me- unfiltered, undiluted and unfraid.

I put Yummy out there to others when I meet them and have this conversation. I challenge them to find the Yummy in themselves, to embrace the Yummy in others. Paint the whole town Pink, a warm yummy bubble-gum pink of sugar sweet honesty and love.

Yummy....

I'm in such a better mood now. THANKS SUNDAY SCRIBBLINGS!!

Hot Cuppa Inspiration

On the side of today's tasty beverage, I found this:

"My father said being an artist was the shortest road to the poorhouse, claiming 'real' work is something you don't like. I ignored him through oppisitional behavior, later reasoning that only an idiot sets out to find the poorhouse, not to mention devote himself to something he doesn't love. Instead, I discovered an interesting back road to the unknown, and deliberately without a safety net.

-- Russell Chatham, painter lithographer, author, publisher and restaurateur"



I long for that backroad. I remind myself that I am an artist, and a dancer, and a writer, and whatever more I may wish to be today..... and I long to create without that safety net.

which reminds me.... I recently found out than an old acquaintance of mine is running a school for Aeiral Arts. I think it may be time for me to take that webwork class that I'd signed up for in college (the week before I tore all the ligaments in my right ankle and spent months on crutches). I long to fly, to spin, to be that girl on the flying trapeze.

What daring things will you do this holiday season??

Quotable: Security

Security is mostly a superstition. It does not exist in nature, nor do the children of men as a whole experience it. Avoiding danger is no safer in the long run than outright exposure. Life is a daring adventure or nothing at all.

-Helen Keller

Loving the Fool

Per Rob Brezney:

Declare amnesty for the part of you that you don't love very well. Forgive that poor sucker. Hold its hand and take it out to dinner and a movie. Tactfully offer it a chance to make amends for the dumb things it has done.

And then do a dramatic reading of this proclamation by the playwright Theodore Rubin:
"I must learn to love the fool in me—the one who feels too much, talks too much, takes too many chances, wins sometimes and loses often, lacks self-control, loves and hates, hurts and gets hurt, promises and breaks promises, laughs and cries. It alone protects me against that utterly self-controlled, masterful tyrant whom I also harbor and who would rob me of human aliveness, humility, and dignity but for my fool."

I've often thought it...

... but it's interesting when the Universe decides to remind me of it, by putting in my inbox.


People are where they are because that is exactly where they really want to be - whether they will admit that or not.

Earl Nightingale

Knotted Shoelaces

she said:

Here is to untangling. Here is to making different choices. Here is to forgiving ourselves when we forget to do the work or simply don't know how to do it differently.


And those words reverberate through my soul. Untangling. Oh god, how I need to untangle. I've been so wrapped up, thought upon thought, always in motion, going, going, going, and when my body drops into sickness because it's exhausted from constant commotion, I pop a couple of Vitamin C's and continue to go some more.

Ever get a knot in your shoelaces when you were in a hurry to be somewhere? You tug and you struggle and you fight and you get very very frustrated. You might huff angrily. You might give up. You might throw that shoe against the wall in a fit of pique, choosing instead something that slips on.... but the simple fact is that the next time you want to wear those shoes (and you'll probably be in a hurry then TOO), they will still have that damn knot in them. And they will continue to have that knot, until you slow down long enough to untangle it.

I"ve had a knot in my shoelaces (and a twist in my knickers) since... well.. probably 2004. When I walked away from a partner, when I attempted to go back to school, when I sold my soul to the evil Mouse theatre people. And even though I see it, this mad obsessive urge to run full tilt, and I get the costs of those actions..... I still keep going. I'm running as if my life depended on it. And the irony is, I seem to be running FROM my life.

If the first step to healing the problem is really ADMITTING the problem, then let me be here to say.... I have a problem. I can't slow down. I'm ... I don't know... afraid. If I look really closely, the disappointment, the resignation, the anger, the lack of hope.... it will swallow me. No... not swallow. Consume, with a violent gnashing of teeth.

So I keep going, keep running. Can't catch me, I'm the gingerbread man, in the best sprinting shoes Adidas or Nike can make. You know the ones, with the velcro strapps.... so i don't have to slow down and unknot those damn laces.

But in my pocket, there's a tiny piece of paper, which my fingers fiddle with, like the smooth surfaces of an over-used worry stone. And on that paper are the magic words.... "Here is to untangling. Here is to making different choices."

Sometimes My Tries are Outside the Lines

Picture me in a house with no lights on, soaking in salts blessed in ritual, doing what my friends call "the bathtub cry." A safe place when tears can sink into suds and no one knows the wiser. Looking at my life and wondering just how many mistakes one can cram in to 34 years of living.

Makes it a little hard to just get up and keep going the next morning, I tell ya.

And then on the ride in, I hear a song. Oh, I've heard it before....dozens of times. It's LA radio, they play the same 25 songs in constant rotation. However, today, I caught it right at the beginning, and it spoke to me, silly as it is....and as I pulled into the garage at work, I was singing along, rejuvinated (and just a little bit hopeful) once more.

"Unwritten"

I am unwritten, can't read my mind, I'm undefined

I'm just beginning, the pen's in my hand, ending unplanned

Staring at the blank page before you

Open up the dirty window

Let the sun illuminate the words that you could not find

Reaching for something in the distance

So close you can almost taste it

Release your inhibitions

Feel the rain on your skin

No one else can feel it for you

Only you can let it in

No one else, no one else

Can speak the words on your lips

Drench yourself in words unspoken

Live your life with arms wide open

Today is where your book begins

The rest is still unwritten

I break tradition,

sometimes my tries are outside the lines

We've been conditioned to not make mistakes,

but I can't live that way

(chorus)

She Makes Me Laugh

Quotable from a fabu girl chat last night:

"My pussy is like a Manhattan apartment.... and by that, I don't mean filthy and full of bugs. I mean tiny, exclusive and hard to get into."

Amen sister!

To Stir the Pot

So much of what I read on the blogs is about being true to oneself, being an artist, being alive. And as of late, I've found that I just haven't had much to put out there along these lines. I'm feeling stuck... Sold to a destiny that may not fit once I get there.

There is a general sense of this in the lives of those around me (both RL and online). Each one, in her own way, has tried to uncork the genie and get things moving once again. For many, the path to this release is writing. For some it's painting, or photography. For others it's cooking delectable foods, gardening with glorious floral audiences, or reading well written literature. All brilliant in their detail and their soul searching, I have soaked up these words and thoughts in hopes that they would dislodge the dammed up stream of things that want to be expressed. Rest assured.... you all do inspire me, enlighten me, and most importantly console me that I am not alone in this journey.

However, I realized that this communion of communication is just one of the paths to soul-speak... and for me, it's not always the most direct or most invigorating. Thus I was reminded of what does work best...

I'm off to dance class, folks. Stretch the body, stir the blood, awaken the goddess within. She hasn't come out to play in a while, and she's aching to shimmy.

"I don’t know what inspiration is, but if and when it comes, I hope it finds me working…”

-- Pablo Picasso

Dangerous Trail Hiking

May your trails be crooked, winding, lonesome, dangerous, leading to the most amazing view. May your mountains rise into and above the clouds.
- Edward Abbey

Themes are an amazing thing. You speak them, and they come into being. So when I said that this year, I would be Ferocious.... boy did the Universe ask me to step up to that one. ( and that's the "serendipity"part)

So much of my life, I fought doing things the easy way. In fact, for someone who has almost no Earth in their astrological chart, I have a huge stubborn, bull-headed streak. If there's a way to complicate a matter, I'm the one charging straight for it.

My father once said that I like to shoot myself in the foot, and (a) complain about the pain and (b) show my wound to everyone and ask for sympathy. My father is ALSO a huge Edward Abbey fan.

Come to think of it, my father also tends to do things the difficult way. Sorry Dad, but it looks like the apple doesn't fall far from the tree.... although I must say, if I'm going to be like someone, my Dad is a pretty fantastic choice. I've seen him go thru some pretty rough stuff, but he's discovered the joy of peaceful open place, and he honors his "inner wanderer" in wonderful ways. May I grow into that wisdom.

But I'm off track, I was going to speak to dangerous trails. The view is much more magnificent when you had to trudge a bit to get there. A road that challenges you beyond what you thought possible is the only way we get to experience our own growth. It blesses us with this opportunity to reach inside, and despite our doubts, pull something from within us, utilize some tool previously unknown, and conquer an adventure we would not have thought possible.

This seems to go hand in hand with this week's SwirlyGirl Figment, which asks us "if all expenses are paid and your safety is gauranteed, where in the world would you want to go?"

At first of course, my thoughts went to Scotland, the place that feels most like home. But I want to stay in Scotland, not just visit, so perhaps that is not the answer this week. I long to see the steps of Sacre Coeur in Paris again. The sun setting, turning the marble pink, as street musicians play is one of my happiest travel memories.

But then I thought, "Dream bigger... have anything."

I thought of OuterSpace. Watch the earth rise from the moon. See Jupiter close up. Swim thru the cosmic materials in the rings of Saturn. However, her question does ask where in "the world would I go, and so perhaps "space" might be outside the rules.

This turned my thoughts to the even greater unknown... The bottom of the ocean. It remains one of the undiscovered countries of our planet because of the physics of pressure and light. A human being simply can't exist down there, but OH, what wonders haven't we seen.

Safety gauranteed, I could swim with dolphins, killer whales, sharks, and creatures that haven't even been discovered. Would a see the mysterious Giant Squid? Could I, in some essence become a mermaid, and live as one of the beings of the sea?

Changing course again....what of my Big Cat love? Safari in Africa is another wild and wonderful choice. Not just a tourists' drive through the open plains, but a stay WITH the animals. Sleeping on the dry grass of the veldt and listening to the lions hunt. Wander with elephants as they search for water and food. View an endless sunrise and listen to the wild world waking up.

Or the most dangerous trail.... Mt. Everest. If I was fully funded and gauranteed to survive, could I... would I .... hike the tallest mountain on our planet? Surely the sights from up there are beyond imagining... top of the world, knowing you are there through your own strength, stubborness and determination.

Then again, isnt' part of the thrill of Everest that ever-lingering possiblity that you may die? So would safety gauranteed be a help, or a hinderance? If it's not all on the line, do you still have the same determination to push forward?

Do we sometimes hike the dangerous trails, simply for the fact that they are dangerous? Or is that line of thinking why I keep shooting myself in the foot?

Some days... it's hard

The test of a first-rate intelligence is the ability to hold two opposed ideas in mind at the same time and still retain the ability to function. One should, for example, be able to see that things are hopeless and yet be determined to make them otherwise.
-- F. Scott Fitzgerald.

If it were not for hopes, the heart would break.
-- Thomas Fuller.

Hope is a state of mind, not of the world. Hope, in this deep and powerful sense, is not the same as joy that things are going well, or willingness to invest in enterprises that are obviously heading for success, but rather an ability to work for something because it is good.
-- Unknown.

"There is a crack in everything, that's how the light gets in."
Leonard Cohen


Now, please pardon me as i grab my magnifing glass and look for that fucking crack. Grrrr!

20/20 Hindsight

2005 was challenging, to say the least.... and 2006 has not proven itself a cakewalk either.... but drama aside, let us look at the lessons from last year, shall we?

-- Feed the right wolf

One evening an old Cherokee told his grandson about a battle that goes on inside people. He said, "My son, the battle is between 2 wolves."

"One is Evil. It is anger, envy, sorrow, regret, greed, arrogance, self-pity, guilt, resentment, inferiority, lies, false pride, superiority, and ego. The other is Good. It is joy, peace, love, hope, serenity, humility, kindness, benevolence, empathy, generosity, truth, compassion and faith."

The grandson thought about it for a minute and then asked his grandfather, "Which wolf wins?"

The old Cherokee simply replied, "The one you feed."

-- In regards to matters of the heart, become a vegitarian

We desire
the way a twice-poisoned dog
eyes a
third piece of meat

Philip Milito
20th c American poet

-- Burned Bridges keep the village safe... Then again, ships in a harbor are safe.... but that's not what ships are for. So burn the bridges but sail the ships. Keep clear of storms when you can, and when you can't, fucking sack up enough to Captain your vessel appropriately. Body counts are sometimes unavoidable.

-- Laughlin is not my first choice for ideal vacation spot. Especially not in Summer.

-- The seed in the crack only needs the smallest amount of dirt to grow... and the largest amount of courage.

-- Even Muses need Muses.

-- I am a Big Cat. The veldt is beautiful, and dangerous. Hunt anyway.

-- People will fall out of your orbit. You will be better for it.

-- Friends who talk shit about you to other friends... aren't friends.

-- Snakes on a Plane. Says it all, doesn't it?

-- IN next life, do NOT come back as giant squid

Having such a big penis does have one drawback: it seems that co-ordinating eight legs, two feeding tentacles and a huge penis, whilst fending off an irate female, is a bit too much to ask, and one of the two males stranded on the Spanish coast had accidentally injected himself with sperm packages in the legs and body.

-- I have now outlived Jesus.

-- You can never have too much BOOTIE

Quote of the Day

SHE: "It's Period, Day One. I don't know why that says sauerkraut, but it does."