Friday, December 16, 2011
Twenty minutes. Half the house in boxes, half my body in distress, half my mind in disarray. The movers come tomorrow. Yesterday I wrote the checks and opened the door and walked in to the empty apartment and it was bare and freshly painted and beautiful.
Relax and let it go. Move forward. Relax and move forward. Relax and let go and move forward.
So grateful for so many things right now. And I still (the manager in me sure loves this expression) have to do the work. Knuckle down and buckle under and do the work. When Lucy and Desi come today, I can go ahead and give them their Christmas presents, half-wrapped or almost wrapped. Everything doesn’t have to be perfect. Relax into the imperfection, keep moving forward, rest on the page, and do the work.
Work as a spiritual practice. Can I have fun while doing the work?
The Move (Introduction)
On a bright, cool day in December I packed up all my things and took the fool’s journey into a new cohabitation. The fool will say “it’s different this time,” but the wise fool knows when it’s actually true.
What follows are excerpts from my journal entries written before, during, and after the move.
Saturday 12/10/2011
The dream:
A tent full of women in folding chairs,
a table at the fronta buffet served over beds of ice
Me introducing,
talking about the interplay between dreams/words and reality,
the inner and the outer lifehow this very event starts as a dream,
started as words on paper,
and moved through them into realityhow reality and our experience of it
sparks our inner life —> poetrythe experience of a bite of food
or running into a friend by chance
or hearing someone else’s words read aloudinforms our own inner life
the idea of delicious food served over beds of ice
and wildflowers perched in mason jars
and a room full of women — all these beautiful women!
young, old, mothers, crones, fat and skinny, smooth and blemished —
listening and speakingit’s important that some of the
women have short hair
Dear NOW: This Is Why I’m Not Giving You Any Money
Dear NOW:
I wanted to explain to you why I am not sending a contribution in response to your recent U.S. mail solicitation to me. I have three primary reasons for not wishing to send you my dollars:
1) As a queer woman, I am uneasy about supporting an organization that has a history of marginalizing “the lavendar menace” from the feminist movement.
2) The overt fear-mongering tone of your letter (“Do you want animals and clowns teaching your children about sex?) bore a marked resemblance to the emails I get from the Family Research Council. I believe strongly that hope and compassion conquer fear and loathing. Nixon’s campaign back in the middle of the last century appears to have had far-reaching consequences in the realm of national and local politics. One of the reasons Obama was so refreshing as a candidate, and why people rejoiced in his election, was because he ran on a platform of positive change rather than the fear and paranoia that marked the Bush administration. I expect the organizations I support to deliver the same sort of message.
3) I find that other organizations seem to be doing a better job of working for goals that I care about.
That being said, I am glad to see that you have joined the Web 2.0 revolution (hahaha) and will be following your actions via Facebook, Twitter, and email. I’m open to persuasion. So persuade me that your organization is still relevant and working toward the type of change that is in line with my own values.
Garden of Words 