Evaporating Into The Ether

12"x12" Continental Drift of the Mind

Friends, I really have evaporated into the ether and have no explanation to offer. Perhaps it is the intense smell of honeysuckle wafting from the large tangle of blooms on my back deck that keeps me outside until dark and render me invisible . Maybe it is the miraculous tang of garlic scape pesto on new potatoes that has kidnapped my tastebuds.

It might be the ridiculous conversations I have with Siri on the new ipad that has found its way into my house.  Or it could be the many talks I listened to on Hay House that makes me more and more convinced that the world we live in is swimming in information and connections, that all I have to do is "think it" and you will receive it immediately??  You have been getting those messages, haven't you??

But I could just be lazy and distracted.  That is a good human possibility too.  These days of late Spring, the ones tipping precariously over into summer, have been filled with satisfying activity.  If you live in or around Salt Spring, I will draw your attention to ArtCraft where both my art and that of over 100 talented art and crafts people appear. I did spend some time getting ready for that, that counts in my defense, yes??

16"x20" The Colour of Silence

There is the garden to tend and if it is to be done at all well, it requires time and attention. We are eating radishes and greens, garlic scapes, broad bean, kale and perennial arugula and green onions from our own little patch right now.  There is nothing quite like washing off and popping a white icicle radish straight from the ground and into the ol' cake hole,  except maybe  a kale flower plucked off as you walk by.  And if you want to watch an inspiring TED talk about guerilla gardening, check out Ron Finley here.

I visited the city where I grew up and can report I did originate from somewhere on this planet but it was somewhat foreign to me.  Revisiting old places gave me the feeling that we are slightly homeless in this world.  Those old places that I imagined were home, don't match the film track of memory and the current landscape lacks the depth of memory so it feels as if we are afloat in this vast, groundless  universe (not in a bad way, but in a way that asks us to give up our search for security).

Just for fun here are  links to  Joe Dispenza's TED talk and David Hamilton's website.  I thoroughly enjoyed their talks on Hay House. It's always about how you use that grey stuff between your ears. And on that note I will dive back into the greenness of deep space, very unapologetically. I will continue to send you messages.  You can return them unopened if you like or respond in kind. Happy solstice.

Groundlessness Hog Day

You've heard of ground hog's day? Well it's ground lessness hog day out here on the prairie. That's me out there in the wide expanses of dry brown grass, quivering nervously. Today I awoke to a deep sense of discomfort. Eek I am burrowless. No where to pop my head back into when I do or don't see my shadow.

My first inclination was to look for a cause. Sort of like looking for the shadow? How much longer is wintery discomfort going to last? And then instead of going shadow hunting I decided I would just be the furry little creature without the burrow. I stood up on my hind legs and sniffed the air, in a prairie dog sort of way. What's up out here?

And what was on the wind was a sense of vulnerability, of openness to the energy of anything that might come my way. No burrow to dive into for respite, no home to retreat to, no living room, no bedroom of safety and sanctuary. Terror, fear struck my quivering little nose.

I remembered my homeless friend and sniffed the sense of what it must be like to always be available to others in this way. I could see that we weren't that different, me hugging the walls of my home, her clinging to her camper van.

And so that was the experience of the day, of wanting to hide and not being able to, of simply staying with the discomfort and not trying to rationalize, explain it, or make it better. Today is groundlessness hog day for me I will just burrow a little deeper into my practice. And there is always tomorrow.

Walking On Ice With the Dalai Lama & A Pee Wee Hockey Team

I don't live here anymore. In fact I don't live anywhere right now. I have read about "ground-lessness" but I had the first hand, slightly uncomfortable experience of it on moving day. As I drove to deliver my belongings to the garage where they will be stored for the month of March I realized, I don't live where I used to. I don't live where I will in the future. I have no idea whether I will like my future home and my previous home is no longer an option. There is no turning back. Openness stretches in front of me.

I have spent a lot of time getting ready for this move, thinking about it, planning it, working for it but now it is right here, right now. But there is a different quality to it when you are in the middle of it. You are no longer playing at it, imagining, hoping for it, or grumbling about why it isn't happening as you'd planned. You are it. It came as a tangy taste of having no ground beneath me, the bitter sweetness of true unknowing. An interesting sensation that required just breathing and not backing away from it. It is our state all the time, anyway, we just don't realize it. Mostly we trick ourselves into our feelings of control and security. We prefer them to the quivering state of groundlessness.

And it was all fine. I sensed the slight feeling of chaos and being unsettled as I went about the following weeks activities. I don't usually live in people's basements. I don't usually have no address, no phone. I don't usually have an abbreviated set of belongings stored in wicker baskets and a small travel bag. Who am I, anyway?

As I completed each errand and loose ends got tightened up I felt a little lighter, a sense of closure was moving toward me. I was ready to leave the lovely home we'd lived in for the last 12 years. I was ready to declutter and move on to a new part of my life. And each task, each appointment moved me further away from the past and launched me into my future. I am ready to be the agent of my own impermanence, to move into the shifting landscape of change.

Our daughter has been getting alot of mileage out of telling her friends that her parents are gypsies, and sending me text messages asking me when the caravan pulls out of town? And so today, all the campfires extinguished, the laundry lines taken down, the wine bottles drained, the garbage bagged and disposed of, the caravan folded its awning and wound its way across the Strait of Georgia and over a snowy mountain summit or two. Dinner this evening, came out of a crock pot in a little motel room in Clearwater, BC. The late night is producing a cool rain that may turn to snow overnight but the room is warm and cozy. We are thinking about an ice walk in Maligne Canyon tommorrow and Larry King is talking to a re-run of the Dalai Lama on the TV. The Pee Wee Hockey team sharing the motel with us is strangely quiet right now. Hopefully they will wake up early, make a lot of noise so we can curse them and get on the road early. Who knows what will happen, really.