Category Archives: Spirituality

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Exuberance

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The laughing inside met the laughing outside. They rode together for days. Laughing became a rejoinder to being blessed. I’ve been feeling more trusting of the idea of being blessed. It’s scary; Trusting. For me at least.

I’ve felt comfortable in my skin recently. Exuberant. Sometimes I can see myself in all my bumbling truth and just go with it, just notice. And if I let the noticing rest, it takes on a sweet life of its own. I float a bit lighter. I imagine my life as it is. No walls.

On my way to Bethesda last Wednesday I floated down the highway in my white bullet Volvo S60 T5. My butterfly tank, the Swedish SchmetterLink. I listened to the new Niel Young, “Prarie Wind”, the new Bonnie Raitt, “Souls Alike”, which is excellent, Cecelia Bartoli doing Italian love songs, the fantastically talented and sexy blond clarinetist Martin Fröst, who plays opera inspired music so sensually, and Steve Reich, which is hypnotic “phase” music, perhaps best described as acoustic sound textures. I love listening to music while I drive long distance. I do some of my best listening that way, as a captive audience.

A few hours after I arrived, we sat to a simple feast of steamed lobster and steak, surf and turf. Sipping a glass of wine, I chatted with Mom and Sis and her husband, Bill. Bill is a grand spirit, whose scope of observation is wide and inclusive. I believe his 1/32 portion of Native American blood affords him a deep, peaceful perspective on any subject. (Note to self. Date more Native Americans.) His tall, lanky body seems to bounce with generosity of spirit. He’s a professional gardener. Yup. He cares for a small, wealthy private estate in NW DC. He works hard, and knows the value of relaxation. He’s a boon to the Thomas family nervousness.

At some point in our bubbly conversation, I mentioned my stiffness from the drive and that I needed to do some yoga. Bill asked if I could do the plow, a pose where, while lying on the back, you bring the legs and hips up over the head and touch the toes over the head. Exuberantly, I jumped up to demonstrate. The half folded sofa bed looked like a good thing to lie on and demonstrate my limberness. I flopped my legs up over my head. I did it with such energy that the sofa bed folded up, swallowing my head and shoulders, while my legs flailed in the air. It must have looked cartoonish, the big sofa mouth with lanky legs flopping about. I wasn’t really stuck, but I couldn’t bring my weight down without bringing the whole couch with me, so I just stayed there, laughing so hard I couldn’t breathe, while the family tried to rescue me. They were seriously concerned, which made me laugh even harder for some reason. I haven’t laughed that deeply and completely in many years. As I wiped away the tears, we returned to our meal. Laughing at myself feels so good.

Sonya the Platinum Princess (Mom’s Papillon) is a perfect match for Platinum Glamor (Mom). But for some reason, she has closed membership to her private club with only two members, Platinum Glamor and me. (who could perhaps be called Platinum Glitter) My sister and her husband are not included. (we’re working on that) So the Platinum Sisters have their little parties, and no one else is invited.

Sonya is particularly happy when the three of us go outside so she can do her duty. We saunter across the front lawn while she sniffs around. Mom’s life is finely tuned to the delicate, intricate life of her personal angel, Sonya. I knew this for sure when as we spoke, Sonya spiraled in a smaller and smaller circle, and then, just before she stopped and squatted to pee, Mom uttered, “She’ll pee right…now.” And then, a few minutes later, it was pointed out that she would poop “now”, and, pointing the flashlight at it, noted how firm and healthy it was. Now that’s intimacy! Seriously, a pet schedule is healing to the human soul. Sonya’s exuberance is healing for Mom.

Among other things, the Platinum Sisters made Welshcakes, which are cookies cooked like pancakes on a griddle. It’s more fun with someone, so one can roll the batter and the other can flip each cookie. The Welshcake is a light, cakey butter cookie, with currants and a touch of cinnamon and nutmeg which goes great with tea. The recipe is my grandmother’s, from my father’s side. Though it’s a common cookie in Wales, my grandmother’s recipe is particularly yummy. I cook them every year in memory of Gramom, and send a few dozen to Dad.

While Mom and I cooked, Sonya pranced around, danced to her own electricity. If Mom’s moving, she’s dancing. She never rests unless Mom does. She looks so busy, twirling and pacing behind and around us, one wonders what she’s doing. There seemed to be a dozen or so cookies missing soon after we finished. There’s NO way Mom and I could have eaten them.

I connected with Sis Amy better than ever. I’m finally grown up enough to let down my “big brother” hair and just be her friend and fellow musician. I have great respect for my dear sister, who teaches 40 students a week privately, and freelances, managing her own flute and harp duo, plus plays principal flute and manages all the personnel of a small orchestra. She quit smoking over a year ago, after 25 years. Go Sis! I’m in awe of her sometimes. She is more efficient and organized than I’ll ever be.

On the way back to Columbus, I listened to the same CD set as on the way out. But I felt the music even deeper. As the beautiful rolling hills of Western Maryland uncoiled before me, I rejoiced at my good fortune. A bellow of life sprang from me unimpeded as the white bellies of snowy hills presented themselves to me with such perfect gullibility, trusting me, because I trust them.

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Incandescent Nectar

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Poem, with photo of yellows roses in snow

Anybody read German? When Ralf and I lived together, he transtlated this poem of mine so we could print out cards for both our American and German friends. The photo is one i took of roses he gave me, which I thought looked stunning against the snow.

This poem was inspired by Rainer Maria Rilke’s Sonnets to Orpheus. His mystical style touched me deeply. I read a version which had the German and English side by side. So I picked up a little German, too.

Man the Juice

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moon through bare limbs

I skid across black ice. The Volvo’s brakes grumble with anti-lock distress. Their distress is my safety. My mind spins, fresh and raw, voluptuous and hungry, animal. I float the ship into its cave, slide in to the warm cavity. Ok, I like my garage. I like it, but not as much as Johnny. Oh Johnny boy, take me to your haystack and shine your sun on me!

Yes, Johnny redeemed me, resuscitated me, brought me back to reality, to the reality of sense, of sensation. He reminded me to cherish the sweetness of life as it happens, from as early on as you possibly can. Johnny “hungry skin” was perfectly hungry, salient. Connecting with his velvet skin, giving my pleasure back to him, sharing it just for the moment, carefully, formally, we did a little dance of mutual healing in a crowded bar. He danced and shimmyed up to me as if I were the only one for him. Yearning, but with open eyes, embracing, a shocked vermilion flare engulfed me. Then he moved on to say hello to the next hungry skin. There is one lesson. There is only one lesson. Cherish.

I don’t try to kid anybody. I take it as it comes. I flop around a lot. There is no turning back, no redemption, just gratitude, giving in, giving over, finding the music of just being, just breathing. Man the Juice. Be mindful of the juice. The juice is what pulses through us with joy. It only happens once, each second, each moment of pleasure.

Panting, I get out of the car, push the buzzer button hooked up to the auto garage door. I walk out into the huge, silent cold. I pause, facing the scene I’ve seen dozens of times a season, tonight crushingly new, daringly new. My breath hovers around me, ghostly.

I glance over at the Christmas lights decorating the house across the street. Electric icicles hang along a steep roof angle of the A-frame. Expensive, adorable, kitschy, gay but not gay, they are annoyingly perfect, Martha Stewart-like. But it’s ok. We need to feel that something can be just right. We need beautiful illusions. We need to feel complete, like we’ve arrived, if only temporarily. I smile at those lights.

I stand in the driveway, pausing, knowing I’ve paused safely here before. The wind chimes barter their wares, seductive questions, partial answers, sampled sirens messages. Their alto pings swim between two notes, a chant of poles, tides of a question.

I look up at the magnificent beast looming over my house. It reaches anciently toward the sky. 300 years gives this green sage some perspective. How does it see our frantic lives? Now denuded of its summer cloak, its gnarly limbs pose dramatically, frozen time, at least to me. One of it’s great, gentle hands, with long, almost grotesque spindly fingers, cradles the three-quarter moon like a baby.

The wind chimes pause, hold their breath. Silence.

Regal yet demure in her shroud, she notices me. Facing sideways, alluring, she looks somewhere beyond what I see, gazing across the neighborhood, over the house with the perfect lights. She draws clouds around her noctilucent face, swirling them in a slow liquid, curled silver glass.

She listens as I watch her hover in the oak’s stringy fingers. She calls deeply, shows me myself, my weakness, my perfection, my meaning. She somehow touches inside me, calls up my innocence, my child, my hurt. She tells me it’s ok. She lets my tears out. They flow from far, far inside me. They wash over me. I stand there, looking up at the moon through the arms of the great, gentle beast. I cry, wailing inside. I wail silently, not wanting to wake the neighbors with the perfect lights, not wanting to disturb them, their contentment. I cry for all I cannot do, all I have failed to do, all I wish to do, all the things I fear. I cry for those I cannot help, those I have not helped, for the love I’ve failed to give. I have so much to learn. I have so much to live. The moon gazes gently beyond me.

The chimes tap my shoulder, resume their muted sighs. Chilled from the steely cold air, I go inside the house. I am greeted by my two little furry friends, Merlin and Punker, whom I ignore way too much, as I do many of my friends. Why do I do that? Why do I let pass so many perfect, sweet, gentle moments in favor of some kind of thrill, a rollercoaster ride? My interior life demands me, snares me. I get hooked on far out orbits, swinging low, way low on a glittering chariot.

My little purring pals, free, reliant, so poetic, they know me and cannot speak. Yet they ground me, tell me things, remind me to eat, to sleep, to breathe, to love, to hug. They wait. I am sure they embody some subtle, effulgent fragments of a great spirit. I see this and I am afraid. Afraid and somehow comforted. Something cradles my fear. Merlin and Punker gaze at me, kiss me with their eyes, waiting for food.

How come we do the things we do? Why do we feel so much, and know so little? How can we be so sensitive and seductive and still so dull, as we crash and flop across exquisite landscapes, barely noticing, just passing, blinking, wandering into some strange night?

I cross the bridge, walk away from the river into the open fields. The moon calls me. The trees stand guard. I weep quietly in the long, dark night. I begin.

photo by Sharp Bokeh
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Daunting

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frozen pond

The 5 senses are so complex, so varied so rich, daunting. Each sense takes infinite lifetimes to live, to experience, to be experienced, being sensed by the mind of gods. Smell reverberates deeply, huge landscapes which either flatten you or keep you grounded, gnarly real. Eyes feel the minutest palpitations of life, whimpering perfectly, alight. Sounds are magic carpets, or bumpy roads, or rivers of passion. Taste, brings us below, tide washed, prime lassitude. Touch, essence of life, from which all other senses spring, careful loss, love’s darling, touch loses herself in her offspring, loses the bucket to the well of love’s air, waiting for breath, quietly talking as s’he waits to be breathed, quivering, alive.