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Twisting Turning and Folding In – ND #18

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All that wrapping paper was exhausting – Photo: L. Weikel

What’s going on? Am I simply noticing the effects of growing older? Or is time actually twisting, turning, and folding in on itself?

While this may sound facetious, I’m asking this question in all seriousness.

I literally just sat here on the couch for a good hour, basking in the multi-colored glow of our Christmas tree, staring off into space. I can barely articulate what I was thinking about. Past, present, future perhaps? Possibly.

Mostly past and present, I suppose.

Lately, when I think back on Christmases past, they feel more like snippets from different lives. And to be honest, I never thought they’d feel so foreign.

Pacha’s First Christmas – Photo: L. Weikel

More to Come

I’ve caught myself thinking about this a lot lately. I’m starting to conclude that it’s a natural progression that happens to almost everyone – like aging – even though we think it will never happen to our family. In some ways, I suppose, it’s probably essential to our survival as a species. Siblings head off in different directions, each spinning their own webs of stories, memories, and interconnections.

Photos viewed decades later conjure feelings that could easily have been felt yesterday, or as freshly generated as at this very moment. Others jar our concept of ourselves and screech us to a halt in our tracks. “How could I have thought what I remember so vividly ‘knowing’ back then?” and the perennial favorite, “What was I thinking?”

It’s possible I’ll be sharing more of these musings. Santa brought a VCR converter cassette that will allow us to watch the ‘family movies’ we created over the past 30 years. How the first converter managed to get lost is a mystery. But it’s barely been missed, as the reality is that we’re not a family known to gather ’round and watch home movies – a curious fact, when you look at all the tapes we’ve amassed.

30 Years and Counting

Karl and I sprung for one of the newest video cameras available back in the day. It was ‘the’ family gift for Christmas 1991, to be precise. The sad thing about that, for me, is that my mother died that previous August – so we never got the chance to record her voice and image on video. As a result, Sage has never heard my mother’s voice or her laugh. That grieves me.

I imagine it’ll be fun and poignant watching some of these videos. Painful, too – since so many of the videos will feature Karl, of course, being our eldest.

Our memories of holidays and the people we were so long ago morph over the years. So I imagine it’s going to be a bit weird now, especially since we haven’t been priming ourselves for these memories by watching the videos year after year.

They’ll probably feel a bit like blasts out of left field, even though we’re anticipating them.

We’ll see. I’ll keep you posted.

In the meantime, we’ll keep on creating new memories. That’s what we do, right? Most of these, though, will be recorded on our phones. I wonder: will we (or our kids? or our kids’ kids?) be inclined to look back on them even less frequently?

(T+18)

Two Amazing Sightings – Day 953

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Not the One From Today – Photo: L. Weikel

Two Amazing Sightings

I experienced two amazing sightings today – and I’m chagrined to admit I have not a single photo to prove either one of them took place. It makes me want to cry.

The first one occurred while I was sitting outside on my porch having a conversation with a client. I was lost in thought, focused on my client’s side of the conversation. I was barely aware of what was in front of my face.

Suddenly, bursting into my awareness like a shot from across the road, a burnt orange splash of fur tears toward me from across the road, traverses my driveway, and streaks into my neighbors’ back yard. I’m sure the coincidence of their chicken coop in the back yard had nothing to do with the direction this sniper was headed.

Totally Different

Today’s Foxy encounter was substantially different than the one I had with the adorable little kit pictured above. (I may not have been quick enough to get a photo of the teenager I saw today, but it is a good excuse to post kit’s photo again.) That time, the cutie seemed oblivious to me as it meandered unselfconsciously near the culvert at the side of the road.

It was as if the fox that crossed my path today was fired out of a cannon. It streaked across my field of vision, tail straight out behind it. For once, I had a momentary (extremely momentary) appreciation for the excitement of fox hunting. (Seriously – I loathe this so-called sport.) But watching this sleak, gorgeous animal hurdle seamlessly over obstacles and run with such adroit finesse and speed, I could see why trying to catch one is so difficult. It doesn’t excuse it; but it sort of helps me understand why it might be considered a challenge to outsmart one.

Also Not the One From Today – Photo: L. Weikel

Number Two

The second sighting I made today was of an Eagle. The Bald Eagle I saw flying up the Tohickon Creek was just a little bit above eye level with me. The nonchalance of its power and dominion over the wildlife on the Tohickon was stunning. This raptor has nothing to prove to anyone.

The slow, audible flap of its wings was the antithesis of desperation – or even of hunger. I got the distinct sense that the Blue Jays losing their minds as it flew past their nests were screeching from painful past experience. Lucky for them, neither petite Blue Jay tartare nor Blue Jay omelettes were on the menu.

Come Back

At least in our area, it’s obvious the Bald Eagle population is making a comeback, which is outstanding. But I have to admit – no matter how pedestrian an Eagle sighting may become due to the success of conservation efforts, it will always be an utterly thrilling experience for me.

An Eagle sighting, to me, represents the potential for contact with the Divine. Eagle feathers are treasured spiritual tools for native North Americans. They are a direct connection with Great Spirit.

And honestly? I remember when they were endangered. I was 31 years old and all the way up in Maine before I even caught a glimpse of an Eagle for the first time – and even then, I barely saw some tail feathers. Nevertheless, the experience will remain a treasure in my heart forever. A girl never forgets her first Eagle.

Who knew I’d be so lucky when I was twice that age to have them virtually in my own back yard. It feels absolutely miraculous.

(T-158)

Stormy Weather – Day 906

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Stormy Weather Approaching – Photo: L. Weikel

Stormy Weather

There’s nothing like some stormy weather to bring sky visions that make me want to swoon. Actually, instead of falling away in a faint, I simply find myself stopping every several yards to gape in wonder at the magnificence unfolding across the aerial landscape.

When I have to walk alone (I should clarify: when only Spartacus and I are on a walk) I find myself snapping impatiently at the poor pup, who only wants to keep moving to the next scent station while I insist on taking yet another photo. I can almost hear him whining “But Mommy, you just took three photos. We need to keep mooooviiiing.” And so he tugs on his leash, which jerks my arms and jiggles my phone, and causes me to mess up the photo.

But the shifting clouds and sunlight, the shapes transforming before my eyes, the shafts of light creating elevators to the Hanaqpacha (Upper World) beckon irresistibly. I know first-hand: if you blink your eyes they’re gone. And just because the sky is full of mysterious permutations at the moment does not mean they’ll be here tomorrow. Far from it. They may not be here five minutes from now. Thus, I must seize the moment, puppy impatience be damned.

Soften your gaze – North Wind – Photo: L. Weikel

North Wind

Much to Spartacus’s chagrin, I couldn’t stop stopping today. The magic was relentless. I was simply happy we were managing to get a walk in at all. Just as my ‘work’ day was coming to a close, the aforementioned stormy weather really kicked in and I started to doubt. But the wind and rain only lasted for an hour or so, and Spart and I soon decided to risk it.

Look at the above cloud bank. Soften your gaze. Do you see the face within the great blue grayness? It’s reminiscent, to me at least, of the bronzed face of Harrison Ford (as Han Solo) in the second Star Wars movie. I didn’t see that face until I got home. I took the photo for the simple purpose of capturing the power aloft.

Good Boy

Maybe ten minutes later at the most, I couldn’t allow the exquisite beauty unfolding before my eyes to go unrecorded one more moment. “Spart! Hang on! Come ‘ere!” My commands punctuated the shushing of the wind as it worked to unfurl the newly budded leaves of the ash, sycamore, and maples behind me. The setting sun illuminating wisps of clouds in peach colored garb wouldn’t wait.

He listened – for the most part. Well enough to deserve two treats after Mommy took her dumb photos. What a good boy.

(T-205)

Today’s Number – Day 888

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Framed Brilliance – Photo: L. Weikel

Today’s Number

I barely pay attention anymore to the quantity of posts I’ve written. After all, it doesn’t matter where I am exactly in my 1111 Devotion. What matters is that I show up. But if you’ve read my posts for any length of time, you know I notice and pay attention to patterns. So I guess it’s not a stretch to imagine I’d sit up and give a nod to today’s number.

Today I’m on Day 888 and tomorrow there will only be 222 left to write in order to fulfill my homage to our son. It’s funny; I often feel like an alcoholic as I write these each night: honestly, I can only contemplate fulfilling this devotion one day at a time.

So when people occasionally ask me if I intend to keep writing posts after I reach my goal, I can only, in all honestly, shrug my shoulders. Heck, I’m not counting my chickens about reaching the goal; how can I predict with any credibility at all what I may do if and when I finally get there?

Today’s Photos

I’ve mentioned before how utterly impossible my 1111 Devotion task would be if I couldn’t take photos each day and easily upload them with my iPhone. The visual cues that remind me of each day’s magic are probably a bigger and perhaps better reflection of what really matters to me than the words I write.

Hmm. As I reflect upon that statement, I have to admit it’s not entirely accurate. The reason for that is because I so rarely post photos of the people in my life. And the people with whom I interact in my life, my family and friends, of course – but also my clients and the people I encounter on a regular basis and honestly care about, and even the random people who cross my path (or whose path I cross) in life  – matter to me.

Yet I rarely post photos of people. Mostly, I guess, because it doesn’t feel right to do so. There have been a couple of exceptions, but those were usually more of a ‘crowd’ shot than a personal statement or revelation.

But while the people in my life do matter to me, it’s the gifts of Mother Earth that are the treasures that never cease to provide inspiration and hope. And occasionally even some insight – almost always courtesy of my encounters with winged ones or other Beings.

A Bright Spot

Karl and I spent yet another day going through ‘stuff.’ I think we kept hoping the sun would come and out and coax us into taking a walk. But no. The sky remained overcast the entire day, sporting just a tad of a chill, too.

Finally, though, we tore ourselves away from our tasks and set off for a walkabout (the four mile trek). We both knew we needed more than ‘just a two.’

As we rounded a corner on one of the legs of our journey, we gasped at the splash of color that appeared in the midst of not only the gray and dismal day but also the haphazard arrangement of sticks and briars and the dark edge of a forest at dusk.

“Ah,” I said out loud. “There’s something to share on my blog.”

And so I am.*

Photo: L. Weikel

*And what this has to do with today’s number, I’ll never know.

(T-223)

Shouting Into the Wind – Day 672

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Tohickon Creek – Photo: L. Weikel

Shouting Into the Wind

I’ve had a frustrating couple of days, but today was by far the worst one yet. I’m not ‘challenging worse,’ as they say (which I am loathe to do), just comparing today’s struggles with the challenges of Friday and Saturday. Pretty much everything I tried to accomplish today felt like I was shouting into the wind.

Nothing seemed to get anywhere. I sent emails and it felt like they went into black holes. And I’m not in any way offering commentary on the recipients of my emails! I frankly doubt whether the emails were ever received.

You’ve heard me complain before about the frustrating lack of speed photos travel when I send them from my iPhone to my computer. It happens randomly, so the best way to try to thwart the issue is by being disciplined. If I think I may want to use it later, I try to remember to send myself – right away – photos I’ve taken during the day. Well, today even emails I was sending to myself seemed to be taking their good ol’ time arriving in my inbox.

And some of them still haven’t arrived. Remember, these are emails I sent to myself. While that’s bad enough, the worst part is that I wouldn’t even know if other people aren’t receiving my emails. That’s frustrating.

My Pick Today

Just as I was writing the paragraph above, I realized that all of this makes sense. I can try to cross things off my list, but when I’m thwarted by silly or little things that I can’t control that literally keep me from taking next steps, it’s wise to take a step back and just breathe.

I chose Salmon2 today – meaning there was a blank card on the bottom of the deck when I chose Salmon as my main card. We interpret that to mean the top card chosen is going to give us a double dose of its medicine or we should pay particular attention to the lessons it’s here to teach us.

As you can imagine, and as I’ve described before, Salmon is all about returning to the place of our creation. An excerpt from Medicine Cards*, by Jamie Sams and David Carson, states:

“Salmon medicine honors every encounter in life as a gathering of wisdom. It teaches that even when the flow of life seems to push you back, you can tap into the hidden resources of your human spirit and personal inner knowing.”

Well, I definitely felt like I was being pushed back in a variety of ways today. Just running into unexpected obstacles, making it impossible for me to complete the tasks I’d written in my ‘to-do’ list.

It’s probably a blessing I’m being reminded now that I chose Salmon2 today. My frustration eases when I recall Salmon’s message. Funny how I forgot.

“The proper use of inner knowing comes when you flow with your authentic feelings, embracing all the experiences you encounter in life as learning lessons rather than hardships. Salmon teaches you to see every bend in the river as a new adventure, with a lesson you need to learn in order to grow.”

New Moon Coming

Later this week (Thursday) the moon will ‘go dark’ as a new moon. It might be a good idea for all of us to evaluate how we’re approaching this fall season of 2020 and ask ourselves if we want to plant some new seeds, some fresh intentions regarding what we want to create in our lives.

I know I’ll be starting something new. Perhaps you’ll join me. Stay tuned.

*affiliate link

(T-439)

My Favorite Prompts – Day 389

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My Favorite Prompts

Following up on my conclusion to last night’s post, I hope you had a chance to go outside tonight and check out the moon.

Karl and I ended up taking another walk well past sunset tonight– thus decidedly in the dark – and once again found the moon to be surprisingly brilliant given that it’s a week shy of being full. The shadows cast by the moon’s light were surprisingly crisp as the bare branches of the trees lining the road grasped and clawed at the sky.

She’s growing in apparent size again tonight as she makes her way toward the western horizon. And the clouds are just as compelling.

I was disappointed that we didn’t hear any owls calling to each other as we walked. But I suppose it’s a bit early. I’m pretty sure it’s not until January when they start in on the call-and-response that’s played when it’s mating time.

Photos

As you may have figured out by now, my favorite prompts are the photos I take as I go about my day.

I took only one photo today, and not only did it not warrant inclusion in this blog, it also failed to spark a single iota of creative thought for me to extrapolate upon this evening.

I have to laugh at myself, actually. I may not have gleaned a creative thought from that photo – but I did manage to excruciatingly wring a couple sentences onto the page describing how it failed to inspire me! Guess I should give credit where credit is due.

The World

Perhaps it’s the fractious angst of the events unfolding in the world right now that’s making me want to close my eyes and escape into the dreamtime.

Perhaps it’s my background in the law and my love for the fundamentals of our government and legal system that makes the high drama of what’s unfolding before our eyes so compelling to me – and so personally exhausting. I feel as though most people in our country take our system’s resilience for granted. Everybody (for the most part) assumes it’ll survive. Assumes we’ll  survive.

And ordinarily, I would say we would – and we will – except these aren’t ordinary times.

All of which leads me, I guess, to appreciating the need for us to bring our attention back to the little things again.  Back to the kindness. Back to creating miracles for ourselves and the other people we’re bumping into along the way.

Actually, I do have a couple stories brewing. Hopefully they’ll mature soon. Or rather, hopefully I’ll start telling them before my eyes simply refuse to stay open one minute longer.

Have a wonderful day – and know that I appreciate you taking the time to read my posts even when they’re hopelessly mundane.

(T-722)

Five More Days – Day 360

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Four Beasts – Photo: L. Weikel

Five More Days

Tick tock. Yeah, I notice.

And you know what? It’s strange.

The past couple of posts have felt harder to write than the prior 260 or so. Prior? Previous? (Ha ha – this bugged me and I kept vacillating on which word was more appropriate, so I looked it up. Each used the other in their definition, pinging me into a self-reflective loop. Ugh. So I guess either one is technically ok to use, even though I sense a subtle but distinct difference. Maybe that’s what I get for using dictionary.com?)

And right there is yet another example of how easily it is for me to go off on tangents sometimes.

My Point

My point is that I’m closing in on the one year anniversary of my commitment to posting every single day for 1111 days in honor of our son Karl.

The first ten, fifteen, twenty days were tough. The very enormity of what I’d declared publicly loomed large and verged on the cusp of insurmountable. And then, surprisingly, I seemed to get into a rhythm.

When I realized the benefit of taking at least one photo during the day, the game (which is most definitely not a game) changed. Those photos saved my bacon many a day by giving me something to write about. A starting point. A platform from which I could dive into the twists and turns of an invisible tunnel.

A Journey of Sorts

I never actually thought of my posts in this way before, but in writing that last paragraph, I realize that the photos I use as instigators of my posts are portals, in a way, leading to unique and distinctive journeys that I map out before you with my words.

They each are completely unique because I rarely use the same portal more than once. That means that each portal has the potential to take me to unfamiliar territory.

Funny thing? Tonight I searched desperately for a photo I could use that would give me something to write about tonight. You see what I chose.

How did those four beasts (and yes, there is actually a dog completely submerged under the covers toward the front right of the photo) lead to this discussion?

I have no idea.

I guess that’s the magic of this process.

(T-752)

An Unintended Consequence – Day 289

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Spartacus and Sheila – Photo: L. Weikel

An Unintended Consequence

This is probably going to be TMI for many of you. But that’s what happens when you’re writing blog posts 289 days in a row. Some days you just get stymied for something to write, and stuff gets personal. It’s an unintended consequence of the 1111 Devotion.

Honestly, though? It’s not just the number of consecutive days I’ve written. Another contributing factor to my ‘having to go TMI’ is that Verizon Wireless sporadically, haphazardly and maddeningly sends photos around the world a couple of times before delivering them, via email, to my laptop. This ‘long way home’ for my photos occasionally means that I will send myself one or two that I’d like to include in a post that evening – and they mysteriously do not arrive until 10:00 or 11:00 a.m. the next day!

It’s ridiculous. And there’s neither rhyme nor reason to it (as far as I can tell). It’s happened before – many times – but this is apparently only the second time I’ve mentioned it in a post. I’m surprised by my restraint! Ha ha.

The transfer lag time means that I can’t take advantage of photos I deliberately took during the day so I might share them with you (and by extension, give me something to write about). So…we all lose when VZ Wireless drops the ball.

The Original Premise of This Post

Back to my initial proposed over-share: An unintended consequence of my engaging in this Act of Power, this daily commitment to writing a post every night, is the fact that I have not taken one long, relaxing bath in the evening, even after a really hard day of physical work or even after a massage.

And I have to tell you: it’s been a sacrifice.

I used to love taking a bath before bed. Sinking into a tub of steaming water that’s had Epsom salts generously heaped into it, plus some aromatic oil to indulge the senses… Oh yum. And those hot baths with Epsom salts do work wonders to remove the kinks and soreness of lawn mowing or weeding.

Baths Cannot Be Short-shrifted or Compromised

The reason I’ve had to give it up is precisely linked to the fact that I just glanced at the time and see that it is 12:54 a.m. I will need to go to sleep as soon as I publish this (and ‘share’ it on my FB pages). I will be too tired to take a bath tonight.

And I refuse to take one earlier in the evening because I become completely relaxed when I take a long, hot bath. There is no way I have any desire to fight all of my bodily instincts in order to drag my consciousness back into the requisite hyper-awareness I need to write my posts. (Believe it or not!)

An odd, unintended consequence of my 1111 Devotion indeed.

Oh – and since I didn’t acknowledge the completely fabricated “Dog Day” (or whatever it was called yesterday) by posting a photo of my pups online, I’ll add this one again ‘from the archives.’ Here’s to Spartacus and Sheila!

(T-822)

So Many Photos – Day Seventy Eight

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So Many Photos       

I am in the midst of being seriously distracted by the discovery of the astounding number of photos I recently removed from my iPhone and placed on an external hard drive. (You know…to free up space on my phone for more photos.)

I’ve been frustrated by the fact that I knew I had a ton of great photos I’ve taken over the years, both with my camera and my iPhone, but I wasn’t sure where I’d stored them. Well, at least I’ve found some of them. But I’m absolutely certain there are a lot more yet to be rediscovered.

Writing this blog has made me acutely aware of how much I have that I do not use.

Wow. Just writing that sentence whacked me upside the head with its ugly truth – and not just with respect to photos (although that certainly does apply).

I hate to admit just how many photos I discovered on this external hard drive. Something like – no lie – 9,000 photos and videos. How could that be possible? I think a big culprit is how I tend to take about 50,000 shots of the same subject. That’s a real and present danger with digital photography. The tendency to take a million shots of the same stupid thing over and over again in an effort to capture whatever it is ‘just right.’

I’ll bet if I patiently wade through the photos I just discovered, only about 1,000 are actually worthy of being kept at all. And of those, probably only 200 would be worthy of being printed.

And There Are More Where They Came From

Perhaps even worse is the fact that, for as many photos as I just discovered, I know there are exponentially more stashed on some other external hard drive (or two) somewhere else here in the house. For instance, I know my photos from my first trip to Siberia (Tuva) are somewhere. I need to find them.

The thing is, I’m not one to make people look at photos I’ve taken of my trips. Indeed, I tend to wave off requests to share for fear of making people’s eyes glaze over. As a result, I honestly don’t know if I’ve shared any of my photos from any of my trips: to Tuva, Peru, Ireland, the Netherlands…and elsewhere. And since I never bothered to show them to anyone, I’ve not taken the time to organize them.

Hmm.

The Pitfalls of Digital Photos

This is definitely yet another very strong negative about digital photos. The first is that tendency to take too many photos of the same thing. The second is that I don’t organize them. And the third is perhaps the saddest of all: I neither look at them myself nor share them with anyone else.

I have to wonder where this odd habit of being loathe to share my photos with others comes from. Part of me suspects it comes from the years I sat in the dark watching slides taken by my parents and their friends. ‘Looking at slides’ was an extremely common past-time when I was growing up. It was always a big production: setting up the screen, getting the projector out, loading the carousel on the body of the machine.

Let’s Gather Round the Projector and Screen

I can still hear the whir of the fan inside the projector and the smell of the air it expelled – there was a distinct aroma to the machine as it heated up and the light bulb used to project the images documenting our lives became so hot that your skin would blister if you accidentally got too close to it. I distinctly remember the dust motes dancing in the beam of light broadcasting our images across the room, onto the screen, bigger than life.

I’m transported to what feels distinctly like another life as I recall sitting on the floor, leaning against a couch or laying flat with pillows under my head, through endless hours of “whirr, cuh-chunk, click” as each slide dropped into place before that withering light bulb.

Even though I declined to chuck those Kodak carousels filled with family memories, they’ve simply moved from my parents’ attic into ours. I used to have a projector of my own for some of the seminars I gave about 30 years ago, but I’m pretty sure it doesn’t work anymore. I’m equally sure I could get them transferred to digital media…if it were worth it. But I can practically guarantee I probably remember only a fraction of the names of the people depicted – and would I look at any of them, ever? Doubt it.

I don’t want that to happen with my memories. It behooves me to both cull and organize the photos I’ve taken and at least gives some context in case anyone ever looks at them in the future.

If nothing else, I hope to use more of them in this blog. Although you guys are probably going to get really tired of all the clouds, sunsets, creeks, rivers, oceans, trees, flowers and every animal that’s ever crossed my path. But there’ll be a couple cool shaman-shots mixed in.

(T-1033)