Keep it together, keep it together, keep it together or.....trembling before you

Truth be told, I am an extremely emotional person. Years of having to be an altarboy for funerals and weddings helped curb me of my constant flow of tears. I could hold my little plate to catch the crumbs under the most grief ridden, mascara stained face without even a dampening around my eyes.

This trick, or gift, came in handy for me with all the years of abuse, physically and verbally. You will never see me crumble. No, not me. I am strong and I will save my tears for the privacy of my own room or beach thank you very much.

As I remove more of my protective gear, I find the surge of emotions rush over me more freely and I enjoy welcoming a nice waterfall from my eyes.

Some days, I just can't help myself. I will be sitting in a room with friends and just feel so blessed to be surrounded and supported by so many wonderful and loving people and my eyes swell.

Just today, while walking to work, rehearsing a few numbers as I strutted down the street, a particular song came on and I found myself within the moment of the number... I should pause here to say that while I walk rehearse, I use movement visualization, I picture myself in the moment of the performance so I can feel the depth of the movement. I usually place visual memories of all our bodies in the theater, the energy in the room just lifting us up and supporting us. That love!!!

So, I'm having that moment, working on this particular number, a number I'm really doing for my mom, and now she is actually going to see it live and it got my heart fluttering and I had to chant my,"keep it together keep it together keep it together" while I was working on the song so that I wouldn't cry. However, in this moment, I let the tears fall, because it felt so good. And, it's good practice to make it through the tears, especially in front of all of you.

So, if you see me crying, know they are tears of joy from us all being together ringing in the new year!!!!

It has been a tough year for all of us and we have made it through. We have weathered the storm, faced our demons, loss, change, so much change. And we are at the point where we can examine what we faced and bid it a farewell as we ready our hearts and minds for this amazing year ahead of us!! We are stronger together and the more open and loving we can be with one another the more peace and joy we will find along our paths! I will be looking for you.

All my love as we move forward,

Daylight

The visitor at the beach

 I find myself sitting at the beach, again, on my rock; the place I allow myself to stand unguarded and vulnerable to the world and the powers that be. It is the place I am able to see just how small I truly am in the scope of the world. Oftentimes, things seem so massive, life and problems too big to even face, fear pushing me down and causing my soul to shrink. Not here, at the jetty, the salt air filling my lungs, the wind caressing my skin and the sound of the waves finding their way into my heartbeat and within that moment of connection I see beyond myself and the world and recognize that we all roll with the tides. Some days we are on the high, other days the low but it is always shifting and changing and moving on.

As I sit there feeling the screams within subside and my shields drop as the warmth of the rocks seep into my core, grounding me, the crack of the waves trembling the very place I sit. The sun breaks through, glorious rays of light jumping free and making the ocean appear to be mercury so thick and silver and oddly gold. The sky takes my breath away and the bird soaring in the sky grabs my attention. It is so large and graceful and its wings carry the bird across the water towards shore, towards me.

I think nothing of it, birds soaring over head always fills me with excitement and awe. This bird was approaching me, however, as in flying right to me, descending to my very spot at the jetty. As it makes its final descent, I am able to see past the blinding brilliance in the sky and I notice that the bird is actually a man; it is you, the man I have been coming here to hold space for in your absence. 

You land before me, wings turning into arms and they wrap me in an embrace I have been craving these past many years. As you hold me, I allow myself to be held and to hold you; I breathe in, grabbing the rich aroma of you... Smells I've missed. I can feel your ancestors in a drum circle around us as our embrace lifts me from the earth as you whip me through the sky with your touch.

You let go of me, but still stay connected, taking me in with your eyes. Oh how I've missed your pools of blue. The depths they took me to, always thinking there would be a shore to rest upon, the reality is last time I gazed into your eyes way nearly 20 years ago. 

Do you recall our first meeting? We met before we ever met. In that space between worlds, me looking for my guide and you appearing from the forest guiding me along my way. You stepped forward, caught me with your eyes and I was pulled towards you, a pull which turned to flight and I landed on the middle of three branches facing north, I looked down at you, only you are me looking up at me and I was a hawk facing north.

Our first physical encounter was from across the street as you caught my eye at the corner of 11th and Marine Drive, you held me in your gaze as you walked right to the cafe door. I remember being in the back kitchen silently freaking out in the mirror trying to figure out why or how you were real??? I pull myself together and walk out front.

There you are, sitting at number 7, in your red and white checked Italian tablecloth shirt, couldn't mistake those eyes. I'm trembling as I place a menu down and ask you what brought you to the cafe. You smile and say, "I came here to find you." My heart. In my mind, I'm jumping over the counter and making love to you without holding back; I can feel your eyes on me sensing the same scenario as I continue my work.

We go on like that, pulled in to each other...

On our third date, I tell you of my vision, you tell me of your Indian heritage and that your name is Hawk Facing North. I'm so wet right then, I can feel you so deeply inside of me and I in you and we never even did it.

You opened my heart and my eyes in so many incredible ways and then, you vanished without a trace and my heart still searches for you.

As the years have passed, the memory of your smell has faded. I can still feel your skin beneath my hand if I dare to go that deep. I feel your breath on my neck, guiding me on still.

You have visited me in that in between place, twice. Each time, encouraging me to continue to let go and open my heart and trust that my feet and soul will take me to where I need to be.

I used to pray that they would lead me back to you. I kept my porch light on for you every night for 7 years. I held vigil for you until the day I realized I was also holding my breath. Actually, you whispered that in my ear.

You holding me, right here at the beach, brought all that into focus for me. I don't know what I was hoping for.. I guess a guide and a lover. I'll take the guide. You have helped me to understand so much in this life. 

As you look into me, I feel my fortress wash away with the rolling tide. You tell me I needn't be an army of one any longer. That I must trust my breath and my voice and my heart and step on with as much openness I can sustain.

You, here, now makes me realize that as much as I have brought to my breath and my present moment, I have found that I have been suspended and separated by the fortress of my being. I thought I was free and flowing but the reality is that I was still bound. Well, that is what my mind

lead me to believe. I can see that I am not bound, that I am free to move as I must, it was just a trick of the eye.

You remind me of the importance of community and how there should be no restraint, no ignorance, no blind eye. We are all one, we are all here finding our breath and our heart beats and paths and if we would just look up and out, we would discover that we are not alone in any one thing that we do because we are all connected, drawn to the places that bring us more deeply home.

And as I sit at my spot on the rocks, taking in the lessons I have been given, I am reminded of the guidance you have given me in all these years I felt you had abandoned me, to you, my sweet David, I allow my heart to open more fully and allow all the sweet salt air to refresh my soul for the next part of this journey.

As the storm rages

The other morning, while I was walking to work in the wind and rain, I was overwhelmed by the electricity and rage in the air; violence washed over me and tried to grab hold and the Doctor Seuss tree out front of the Daily Astorian, waved its long arms and encouraged me to just let it roll off of me like the rain and not hold onto the rage.

I have spent many many years curbing my rage. It is an aspect of my being that I have never been comfortable with. This past year, has taught me to surrender to the rage, and what I found as I gave into it, was that it dissolved and washed away with the tides.

It's a mystery, there is an emptiness within me, where I kept it locked down for so long, and within that emptiness, I have found a calm and peace that is so satisfying.

I think what brought the shift along was my need to find patience and kindness for myself; something that has never been easy for me. As a perfectionist and former human who lived for guilt, self doubt and bottled up rage, it was always easiest for me to let my quick witted tongue and attitude slash through the air and strike at will. I hated it and loved it at the same time. 

In conversation, I would always have my mind racing for what to respond with never really hearing what was being said. 

There is an art to listening; a skill we should all focus on. It's has gotten to a point where it seems like no one can listen because we are all too busy tuning in and freaking out. I feel like we all need to take time out and breathe together and find the rhythm of our breaths and then, take another moment to allow that stillness to sink into our souls and the, take a moment to look each other in the eye and recognize that we are all the same. We are all just trying to make the best of it, it being our journey through life.

Some of us are worse off than others, but the reality is that we all crave the same thing; we have just forgotten what it is we are really searching for because life has turned into a race and we don't even know what the prize is, all we know is we have to keep going and moving past those in front of us and not even acknowledge one another when we have that moment of being side by side.

Fear pushes us along, and we never look back at it because we have been trained to not look at our fears, keep running from them.

This year, I stopped running and I turned around and looked at my fears and I actually let them touch me and hold me and I found that they were not as frightening as I had been lead to believe.

Since I stopped, I find I am not winded any longer, my shoulders have begun to relax because I'm not using them as a shield from keeping my fear and things I don't want to deal with a way. And, as they have released, I have noticed my heart expand and my capacity for patience, breath, love and laughter has grown.

We all have our points in time we get locked into; maybe a moment when we felt most alive, a moment of total disaster, rage, confusion, infancy. For myself, it spans from 18-21. The years I truly learned to guard myself and put on my armor and try to walk brave even though every step caused my soul to quiver within out of fear of being beaten down one more time.

But through that guarding of myself, I allowed myself to continually play the game of master and servant, me being the servant, only it wasn't nearly as sexy as the song made me feel(wink). Too many years of abusive relationships because it was what I knew.

About 3 years ago, I learned to not react in fights but to listen and respond in kindness. It was so strange the first time I did it; I remember it so well, it was a New Year's Eve event we were doing at the cafe and Uriah and I could really get into it, and I stopped myself from it. I just told him that I wouldn't raise my voice with him like that anymore. Something shifted in me, in our relationship, and the hold was gone.

I decided to try it more often, I tried to lower my guard and allow my fragile being some air.

It feels so good, being free from that conflict within. I love that I can see people now and not duck and run or puff and strut to avoid actual interaction. 

So, as the storm blows and the waters rise and the vibrations get electric, I let my shoulders drop and I walk with the elements and let it shake the shackles from my being and let myself go breathless knowing that I have the skills to fill myself back up and trust in the journey.