I've written three books, each a part of my journey to elderhood. Now with this blog my intention is to give a moment to moment accounting of my life as it is now, and now, and now. I'm a leader and student of Sensory Awareness, and a practitioner of Rosen Method. I believe in the connective and collective power of Love.
Steve and I were married 50 years ago tomorrow. Because of the pandemic we chose not to travel so we celebrated at Nick’s Cove and now tonight and tomorrow night we’ll be in Sausalito. 50 years seems unimaginable but it was 1971 and this is 2021. Gold.
And now our anniversary will always be a federal holiday. How gratifying it is to honor two momentous events.
50 years allows one to experience highs and lows and inbetween. May we all be well and happy, celebratory and appreciative of what comes our way, the seasons and tides our guides.
Great Blue Heron feeding at low tideHigh tide looking down from the pierEgret feeding!Sunrise with high tide on approach – the rock covered and uncovered with two highs and two lows each day
We’re home now to heat, 92 degrees, after two glorious nights at Nick’s Cove on Tomales Bay. We left here early on the 15th, the day CA reopened. Stopping at The Parkside in Stinson Beach for breakfast, we were greeted with smiles. Because we were the first people inside in all this time, they took our picture and fed us for free. What a treat!
We headed up the coast and out to Abbott’s Lagoon where patience allowed us to see a mother otter with two pups swimming and then climbing up onto the sand dune, and then back into the water.
We checked into our abode, pure heaven, and as though on a boat lived enchanted as the tide moved in and out.
Nothing to do and nowhere to go. Rhythm slowed as we watched the sun, moon, and stars, and even saw the Milky Way, a glow in the sky.
Heading towards Abbott’s Lagoon Look closely to see Mama Otter and her two babiesLook in the waterCrossing over Otters on the dunes Evening comes SunsetMorningAnother sunsetMorning again as the earth turns and we do too!
I was awake in the night and rising, felt called to move and massage my spine and sacrum with the air and the floor. Gravity was a cloak pulled back and forth.
Then, sitting in a chair next to a bookcase, one book called to me. Awakening the Spine by Vanda Scaravelli.
“The pull of gravity under our feet makes it possible for us to extend the upper part of the spine, and this extension allows us also to release between the vertebrae. Gravity is like a magnet attracting us to the earth, but this attraction is not limited to pulling us down, it also allows us to stretch in the opposite direction towards the sky.”
We see it in nature, plants rising up.
I watched the movie “The Courier” with Benedict Cumberbatch. I recommend it as an example of courage, and what one or two people can do to change our world.
We rise early these days. Today I realized I had the idea it would keep getting lighter and lighter, earlier and earlier, but as with life, there’s change, so we have these lengthening days until the 21st and then a shift backward again, a slide back to dark. I light a candle this morning in honor of all the ways to light.
Because we’re on water rationing, I’m out early to give the plants a drink, rare now as twice a week is their gift. Roses are blooming.
Driving down to Menlo Park this week, I was listening to “Oldies but Goodies” when the song “Eve of Destruction” by Barry McGuire came on. Released in 1965, it’s sadly appropriate today.
For some unknown reason, WordPress is not working correctly for me these last few days.
This African saying calls: The times are urgent; let us slow down.
I’ve been working/not-working with presence, cultivating and allowing its flow and movement, its ease.
Today I read these words of the poet Nikki Giovanni – “Writers don’t write from experience, although many are hesitant to admit that they don’t. … If you wrote from experience, you’d get maybe one book, maybe three poems. Writers write from empathy.”
Empathy.
Reflecting on it, I feel the connection between presence and empathy, the way to widen presence in this whirled world.
When I was young we loved to pile into the car for a drive or road trip. Drive-in movies with homemade popcorn were a special treat. We’d play in our summer pajamas on the swings and playground equipment until the light dimmed, and then we’d run to the car to snuggle in. I remember the magic and delight of watching Cinderella on the big screen with the sound popped right into our station wagon.
I used to love to drive but traffic has become such an issue that sitting stopped has taken away the appeal, but my nineteen month old grandson loves cars.
Watching him, I’m entranced with all the levers and gears, the technology that moves us from place to place. He holds the car keys, and puts them in the slot, or in a more modern car, touches the screen.
I think what a marvel a car is, realizing it contributes both to our autonomy and a sense of isolation. We are pilots of our destiny, well, until we hit another red light, or a traffic jam. For now though, it’s fun to travel the roads of imagination.
I spent yesterday with my grandson who is now 19 months old. He loves wind chimes so I’ve created a forest of them here at my home. He has one at his house that celebrates children. If you want a wind chime, this is one place to go.There are many. People love wind chimes.
I’ve given this little being our children’s giant tinker toys. They’re huge. He or his dad had put four sticks together with two wheels to look to me like fancy barbells but to Keo they were drums. He drummed away , each drum separate or one placed on the other, and then, he lifted them one by one and pointed, “Up!”
Naturally I obey his every suggestion, and since we were outside, I saw some hooks and nails along the covering for the deck, so I maneuvered this way and that until I figured out how to hang the drums. They looked slightly strange hanging there all a-kilter, so I didn’t take a picture but this morning it hit me. If the wind can play chimes, why not drums?
The news these days is sobering as our President works to keep our country a democracy with freedom for all. I nourish on a child in the park, on children everywhere.
I’m reading “We Came, We Saw, We Left: A Family Gap Year” where a family of five travels together for a year. I’m paused now where they are in Stone Town, the capital city of Zanzibar and a World Heritage site. When they visit the small museum, they learn that slavery created this cross-cultural outpost.
“Slaves were captured in the interior of Africa, brought to Zanzibar, and then exported to the rest of the world.”
“At the height of the slave trade, sixty thousand humans were trafficked through Zanzibar every year.”
“The exhibit that packed the most emotional punch was on the lawn outside: a full-scale sculpture of several women with chains around their necks looking up from a pit in the ground.”
I had to stop reading to absorb unimaginable numbers and pain.
I always find this an odd weekend to navigate. It began as a way to commemorate the sacrifices of Civil War soldiers.
On May 30, 1868, at Arlington National Cemetery James A. Garfield said:
“We do not know one promise these men made, one pledge they gave, one word they spoke; but we do know they summed up and perfected, by one supreme act, the highest virtues of men and citizens. For love of country they accepted death, and thus resolved all doubts, and made immortal their patriotism and their virtue.”
After he spoke,5,000 participants helped to decorate the graves of the more than 20,000 Union and Confederate soldiers who are buried there.After World War I, Memorial Day was established as a national holiday to honor all those who’ve died in American wars. It’s a weekend to remember as we move forward to change.
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