feeling.

i am opening up to the feeling
inside of me.
letting it come
like waves
if need be.
there is beauty
in every curve and crash.
in my heart, i crave
excitement & movement
and yet
i wait.
what am i really waiting for?
the perfect moment?
which is funny
because i know
i KNOW
in my heart of hearts
that each moment is perfection
and holds a space for me
if i am wanting it.
if i am aware.
and then i think
well if that is true
then where i am and what i'm doing
right now
is right
its perfect.
the wait, the calm before the storm
is what is supposed to be happening.
the not knowing what comes next
is trust.
surrender.
why is that so hard for us?
because this is what is so clear to me:
we are those things deep down.
we are little floating light orbs, burning brightly
knowing that the next moment holds miracles
magic
love
and we let it come
in whatever form it deems right.
we don't question or have fear or doubt
we just flow with it.
i want to delve deep
into everything that i am
and let this be okay.
whatever it is, it's okay.
beautiful.
♥

change.

to move or not to move? that is the question.

i am leaning more & more to moving. selling the house and being open to what is to come. this year marks 20 years here in December. that's a lifetime of my children, the only home they remember. our memories are in the walls & whisper in the evergreen branches outside my window. right now, it is US. filled with our family and our thoughts our feelings and our secrets. but it's just a place. it is not the people or the memories themselves. we can have that anywhere we all are, and it's okay to yearn for more. it's okay to move on to other things in other places. we just need to release & allow.

release & allow. my new mantra.

there are beautiful glorious exciting joyful things in the unknown. in the new. in the freedom. let's fly ... together.

***

watching MJ's memorial on tv this morning. i didn't realize it was today, but i woke up with his songs in my head. one of my usual premonitions of what the day ahead will hold. (i am seriously loving that more & more).

it's amazing how many people gather together for this one man: collective love is a beautiful thing.

***

my heart is open. my wings are drying. i'm ready.

dreamland.

dreamland. soft halcyon haze. soft kiss on my lips, my eyes are still closed. he brings his face into my pillow.
wanna make love? he whispers.
i breathe in his scent and start to stretch my arms around him.
*ping* {the cell phone, getting a text}: i love you wife, hope you have a wonderful day

i love how connected we are, even when we are far apart.

***

laying there, i close my eyes. i feel my day ahead. i always get messages then. they easily pop thru the veil & i love connecting with my inner self like that. it's very synchronous and flowy and open. i got: my day = love. and truth comes thru mystery. i felt myself floating in a lake of warm pink water looking up at cotton candy clouds in a beautiful pink sky. soothing comforting love.

things are really chill right now. i am enjoying it. looking forward to our lake trip. family togetherness and fun. my favorite thing. i am really loving me lately. i like the way i look & feel. i like the sunshine and warmth and my tan skin. i like my intuition and creativity. floating thru summertime like a dream. i like it here in dreamland. i think i'll stay for a while...

♥

create a life...

happy creating, happy weekend!

cracking open.

reading old journals...

this is strange for me because i love staying in the now, appreciating this moment. everything is beautiful here. and as i read my old angst-filled words, i wonder: is it because things are so different, or because i am now seeing with new eyes and feeling with a new heart?

Bub was two, Pea was a baby, just 6 months old. Rosie, Mimi & Muffy were all going through some stage of teen and tween hormonal chaos. Andy was changing jobs again. my mother and i were going through big mother/daughter changes, life was busy. i try to feel it, to find myself then and hold her hand. to tell her that this is just a little blip in time, that it is a stepping stone to where you are going to be. where you want to be.

Isabel was the first step. the first star to light up and wake up the stirring inside of my soul. she cracked open my heart and with that, things had to pour out in order for the things that are there now to blossom. she showed me the canvas, the night sky with all of the sparkling lights lighting up, connecting in perfection...

i remember being so scared to let her go, to let the grief fade. i held on to that feeling, thinking that it was our connection. how silly of me. because the first feeling i had with her when she was born was so amazing. so beautiful. so pure. i felt such peace and knowing and almost elation. of course i cried deep from the heart, but once i held her, all i could possibly feel was radiating love. in that flash, i knew. she came for a reason, she gave the biggest thing she could have given-her life, for us all. for the sisters already here and the brother and sister she was still playing with in heaven. for her daddy and i. she came to show us love and embed it inside of us. she planted the seed.

can you see the garden you planted, sweet girl?

we are so connected now. in this glow i feel in my heartspace most of the time now. i am so grateful for everything; every tear, every heartache, every dance, every laugh, every fight. looking back doesn't bring me there anymore, it merely makes me smile.

thank you thank you thank you. love.

long weekend.

my man is gone again. we had a really nice 4 day weekend together tho...

Fridays are love & bliss being back in each others arms, mixed with those little knowing sparky looks when we catch eyes. We drove together to the Island & i did some shopping while he did some work after sharing a slice of pizza at a little outdoor table.
Saturday was chill, nothing planned which is just how i like it and he & Bub shot their bows at their target in the backyard, father and son bonding time. Harry Potter number 3 and popcorn as a family later.
Father's Day started out with eggs benedict and gifts, and really, how can you go wrong after that? There was a little tension over the flippin-flappin ipod updating, but that always happens. itunes & the ipod always drives us a little bonkers. what is honestly the coolest thing is that we can get pissed at stuff like that and even at each other, but it doesn't affect US. seriously, this makes me so damn happy, i could spit.
Yesterday, we headed over to Seattle to see daughter #2 Mimi to give haircuts to Bub&Pea. Then to dinner afterward at Ivar's where Rosie was working--so much fun. the kids were dying to feed the seagulls all of their french fries. when we got home, i situated the 2 dinners i made for him to take to the cabin today to feed him & his partner because they are too tired to even think about cooking after working a 12 hour day, and he got all the rest of his stuff together. i guess this will be our routine now for a few months. i know there will be times when we will join him at the jobsite too, but for now, this is our life. he kisses me goodbye on Tuesday mornings and holds me. he tells me he loves me, and i tell him i love him too. then he says i know, if we weren't this strong in our love, i would never be able to leave. i understand exactly what he means. we are in such a good place right now, and this being apart thing is obviously something we are supposed to be doing right now. it's all about letting go and allowing what is. there's magic there, when you don't expect anything or force anything or think it to death. when you feel the love in the moment and let that moment float until you hold each other again.

life.

Pea has an earache. It makes me so sad when she is sick. It used to freak me out to no end when Bub would get sick--being a subsequent child, and getting so sick when he was a newborn, it all hit me like crazy. Okay, I was a little crazy. Just as our pediatrician. Ha. But now, Pea is the one who catches everything. And I know it is just her body telling her things, so we had a talk this morning about what scares her, and when she told me that so many things scare her, we started going over what and why. Little by little we peeled it all away, and it all came down to dying. It always comes down to fear, and the biggest fear is death. It's funny too, because how do you explain to a child that it is not them that needs to fear their own death; it would be me (and her daddy, and those she left behind on this human plane) who would be affected by it. She looks up at me with those big green eyes, they are rimming with tears and are tired from being sick, and they are the most beautiful things I have ever seen. I flood love into her little body through them. And then we scrunchie bear hug.

My husband comes home tonight. The stairs need to be vacuumed. Can I just state here and now that of all the jobs in the Universe, I hate vacuuming the stairs. Cleaning bathrooms is even below that on the list. But, of course, it is The One Thing that I know he would like to see when he gets home: clean stairs. But I digress. I miss that man when he's not here, I go through an entire emotional spectrum. But, I am not pushing against it like I know I would have in the past. I am flowing with it and in doing that, I know I am getting out of it everything I need to, all the nuggets of gold that I would never have seen before. I am learning that I can be on my own and do things myself, I am learning that I love him and just want to mesh with him when he's here, I am learning what a gift it is to have my soulmate and lover and partner with me, I am learning that my kids are amazing little beings and I feel so lucky they chose me as their mama. I am learning and growing and expanding, and damn. It feels great. It feels like that's exactly what life is all about. And good garlic, I can not wait to lay beside my man tonight.

Lost.

stand still.
the trees ahead and bushes beside you
are not lost.
wherever you are is called Here
and you must treat it as a powerful stranger
must ask permission to know it and be known.
the forest breathes.

listen.
it answers
i have made this place around you.
if you leave it
you may come back again
saying Here.
no two trees are the same to Raven.
no two branches are the same to Wren.
if what a tree or a bush does
is lost on you
you are surely lost.

stand still.
the forest knows
where you are.
you must let it find you.

~David Wagoner

us.

I look over at him and touch his muscled arm. He is perfection in his thin grey cotton sweater and faded jeans.

Are you tired? I ask him. I don't even know why I'm asking this, but his eyes meet mine, and I just feel it.

No. He answers. And then he yawns and smiles at me. Maybe.

He's leaving tomorrow again for a few nights. I hate sleeping alone. Twenty-some years of side-by-side with this one man, and it feels unnatural without him there. I wake up after turning and turning and reaching for him. When he's here, he drives me nuts snoring and wiggling and waking up to pee. But when he's not here, all I think about is his warmth and his comfort, even if we aren't touching. I miss it all, I miss him.

I look over at him and flood with feeling. And I wonder when it was that I became so attached.

***

I look back and try to recall when it was that we made the switch. The Big Change. How we got to this place of Bliss we live in now. It wasn't always like this. Yes, we have always loved each other fiercely. We have always had a very passionate relationship. And he did come to me like a dream. Just when I had stated to myself that I didn't need a man in my life *bam* he was there and not only was he there, but it was magic and he was this crazy impossible compilation of everyone I had ever loved up to that point. Only the most perfect parts. Only the parts that I had mentally, emotionally, somewhere within my soul taken note of. And the way he was, everything about him, shocked and amazed me. But the most amazing part of it all was that he felt exactly the same way. It was like our love never really had a beginning, it just was. Huge and blooming and so much more than the two of us. Our love never had a beginning because I honestly feel that our love has never had an ending.

But this lifetime together, this love, has always had challenges since those first halcyon days in college. We are raw and open and messy and fiery. We pull within, and when we close up we fight, we ebb and flow with each others moods. It's just lately that we have learned to flow together. To be completely open the way we were when we first met. To trust and allow and be and let be. It is bliss. I am so in love with life, and with him. I am so lucky.

the guest house.

this being human is a guest house.
every morning a new arrival.

a joy, a depression, a meanness,
some momentary awareness comes
as an unexpected visitor.

welcome and entertain them all!
even if they are a crow of sorrows,
who violently sweep your house
empty of its furniture,
still, treat each guest honorably.
he may be clearing you out
for some new delight.

the dark thought, the shame, the malice,
meet them at the door laughing
and invite them in.

be grateful for whatever comes
because each has been sent
as a guide from beyond.

~rumi