Last night the not yet half moon was a beacon in the sky spreading light.  It seems as though as the days shorten, the moon offers even more light. Plants respond to the change in how to receive as do we.

Yesterday coming back from Woodside, we and other cars were speeding along 280 when traffic came to a halt.  We creeped along for 30 minutes, or so, and then came upon the reason why. A horrific crash left crushed cars spread across two lanes of the four lane highway.  Lights flashed from trucks and ambulances.  Like that, lives changed.

As each of us looked, and drove past, there was a difference in the quality of the driving, a slow down from the previous 85 to 65, a visceral knowing of fragility and gratitude. It could have been one, or many of us.

I was grateful for the carriage in which I rode. My son who was in a different car on a different freeway, his slowed to 15 mph, pointed out that at the Folger Estate Museum, where we’d just been, we’d been looking at carriages from the past, carriages which would have required days to travel as we were, open carriages with no shock absorbers or air conditioners, and though we were in different cars on different freeways, we were communicating. How amazing is that!

This morning I wake and feel my body responding to seeing such a crunch of metal, a safety we take for granted, feel my spine extending, and again I think of the sea star with it’s five armed reach. I’m living; I move, moved.

Yesterday after brunch we went to the Folger Estate, a former estate now a beautifully preserved museum from the past, the CA past, which includes the Native people, but also those who came in 1840 and divided the land into grants.  Today the buildings are preserved, children are educated, and horses are housed.

We sat under oak and bay trees and savored soft talk.

Today I feel a call to turn my yard toward fall, to be in the preserve that is mine for a time to care for, an extension of my receptors and probes, like fingers and toes.

As I again contemplate this stable designed by Arthur Brown Jr. who later designed the City Hall, Coit Tower, and the Opera House in San Francisco, and the Hoover Tower on the Stanford University campus, I think of how we are told Jesus was born in a stable. I’ve never visualized it quite like this.

Enjoy your day as you expand on the meaning of words, and the mobility, flexibility, and airiness in your tissues, the blessings in this moment, this symphony we share that titled simply is Life.

You can learn more about the Folger Estate here: https://www.huddartwunderlichfriends.org/

I rise and watch the day come to light. My “baby” was born 42 years ago tomorrow. I sit with memories, a sky rising with light. Birth expands around words, like a womb, shared.

October is my birthday month.  I click into a lower gear, preparation for birth perhaps.

I notice, probably as I did in the womb, it’s getting a little crowded in here, time to emerge and trust more space.

Yesterday I went to Rodeo Beach, drawn to the waves, though there was no wind and all was calm.  The beach up close to the cliff is composed of small pebbles so lying there, bare feet and legs, I felt massaged, cells drawn out like periscopes to see and perceive. Oddly I felt like a mermaid even though I was aware of my legs, but my torso seemed predominately core, and I felt so clearly how like a Sea Star, I extend out in all directions, oriented to five, five fingers on each hand, five toes on each foot, two arms, two legs, and a head, all reaching to probe and receive.

I played with that while noticing detritus on the beach.  How can we differentiate between life and death when all is so present and involved?

This morning I woke feeling what I interpreted as the quantum field though it felt like bliss.  My heart sparked waves of connection.

Having savored days sitting by the ocean watching waves, I still seem to be floating in a rhythm of up and down, a flow of in and out, a living awareness that light is both particle and wave.  

I’m aware of ankles and wrists, desiring them to open with more fluidity to connect hands and feet, to more clearly meet and expand my ability to receive and touch the inner and outer world.

All of this seems to originate in the area of the heart, a vibrational frequency that comforts and lifts my head on its stem to survey what surrounds in a rise of curiosity.  

I peruse the savanna of my life, the trees, reach back wondering if I can remember living in trees, then climbing carefully down from that safety to explore and stand on two feet.

What unites and invites me now?  I shiver with anticipation as I both reach and wait to receive.

I’m not sure why this little fire hydrant has such meaning for me but it stood steadfastly outside our room in Spanish Bay, like a little sentry ready to protect the trees and me from fire.

I appreciate how it’s painted to blend in.  In certain light, it stands unseen, and I wonder what else I don’t notice or see, depending on the light, and my openness to insight.

I’m also impressed with a push-button fireplace.  I’ve used them before but somehow this time I can’t stop thinking of what’s involved in making a fire: cutting wood, carrying it in, arranging it just right, lighting it, and now we push a button, wait twenty seconds, and voila a fire with a timer, so fire for an hour or two and then it turns itself off. 

I’m reminded of Arthur C. Clarke’s third Law: 

Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic.

Profiles of the Future (revised edition, 1973)

That brings me to cookies.  I love cookies, all kinds of cookies, chocolate chip, oatmeal, lemon drops, but just like too many cookies in the stomach, too many cookies on a computer can be a problem.  I’ve calmly mentioned that I’ve been having problems posting on WordPress. It seems I needed to delete my cookies. 

At first, I was gingerly going through deleting them one by one, but my son said to delete all of them, and then, choose the ones I want to keep.  It seems we need cookies, but not all of them. I did this, hoping all my problems were solved but that’s not it and so now I’m switching from Safari to Chrome, and a different computer, and trusting technology as magic, I’ll see if this posts. If not, I’ll find a tree to dance around after gathering wood to make a “real” fire. Ah, and it seems this is not the day for that, as here you and I are, blissed in connection, trust shared.

May this day refresh each moment with awareness of changing light and in honor of William Blake, the cultivation and reception of Energy as eternal delight.

There are many versions of the “Is that so?” story but the gist is that whatever happens there’s a positive and negative to it, depending on interpretation and so the point is to ride balanced up and down in the middle of the waves.

Perhaps watching waves for days creases the breathing like an envelope allowing a container of shared connection and exchange.

I am home now, feeling rested, gentle, and peaceful.  We’ve gone from 95 degrees last Monday to wetness and the heater running today, from airy tops to sweaters, all in a week.

Driving down the coast this last week, we passed a multitude of pumpkin patches, and now the air is filled with the scent of fall, with that tingled lift to drop into a season rich with celebration, gathering, and reflection, a deeper knowing of the ocean and its waves.

The irony here is that I need to nest ever more clearly in “Is that so?” since I’m having major problems with WordPress and am struggling to post.  My computer locks up and I go through a bunch of steps and so I’ll see how the day unfolds.

On another note, when I was on the shuttle this weekend going along the coast from one place to another, I pointed out to the shuttle driver the cairns of stones, the piles so carefully constructed and balanced by tourists on the beach.  He responded that the stones hold the beach in place; they are homes for little creatures. At night, the locals place the stones back, as much as is possible, to where they belong.

I thought of how we want to create and influence our environment, but it’s important to note when it’s intrusive, not needed, destructive, or too much.  It’s why I study Sensory Awareness, to balance in place, this moment, now.

And now, in this moment, I post, considering how to balance the stones of my life in a cairn of coming together and falling apart, always with the awareness of balancing acceptance and surrender in a philosophy of: “Is that so?”