Digging in the Dirt

Sometimes life throws you a few different strands all at one time and because they come close together they can touch and recombine and form a new piece of thread within the weave.

Thread One
I had an overwhelming urge to listen to a particular song on the way home, Peter Gabriel's Digging in the Dirt. It had been an interesting day, lots of stress flying around and I wanted a high energy song to shout out the lyrics to on the way home. I find dark, emotional, loud music cathartic. They make me happy. All that energy and release. Not sad, not dark, not to me.

and I got to wondering about the lyrics. It has two distinct emotional overtones. One angry, raging and the other softer, melancolic.

Something in me, dark and sticky
All the time it's getting strong
No way of dealing with this feeling
Can't go on like this too long

This time you've gone too far
This time you've gone too far
This time you've gone too far
I told you
I told you
I told you
I told you
This time you've gone too far
This time you've gone too far
This time you've gone too far
I told you
I told you
I told you
I told you

Don't talk back,
Just drive the car
Shut your mouth
I know what you are
Don't say nothing
Keep your hands on the wheel
Don't turn around
This is for real
Digging in the dirt
Stay with me, I need support
I'm digging in the dirt
To find the places i got hurt
To open up the places i got hurt

The more I look, the more I find
As I close on in, I get so blind
I feel it in my head, i feel it in my toes
I feel it in my sex, that's the place it goes

Digging in the dirt
Stay with me, I need support
I'm digging in the dirt
To find the places i got hurt
To open up the places i got hurt

Digging in the dirt
To find the places we got hurt
Digging in the dirt
To find the places we got hurt
Digging in the dirt
To find the places we got hurt
Digging in the dirt
To find the places we got hurt

And I started to get bits of meaning and so I read other people's interpretations online and I have a slightly different view on it.... (not veyr different but just a little). Cycles of abuse. Abused become abuser. The angry bits are him as abuser and abused both at once. The sadder parts are him as himself, dealing with and looking at himself.

Then I watched the video.



and it makes me think further on this. There are sequences with him as an adult, swatting flies around a woman, which looks very like domestic violence. There are sequences of him as a child, a victim of an adult, just like him. The child becomes buried in the dirt. There are also sequences of him as an adult buried in the dirt. At one point, mushrooms grow above him and spell out help. It all speaks so loud to me.

The chains of karma. But the thing about this song is that it is a cry for help, for change, for the breaking of the chain. It is a release. A breaking of the chain. In the video, the man ends up on top of the dirt, wearing a bright white suit. Clean. Free. I know many people find this song dark but I never have, there is a joy in that breaking of the chain, a less than shining joy, but a joy all the same.

Thread 2
And then i read the lovely Suzi's post of today. Ah karma...... breaking those chains. it helped me understand the song, put the pieces together. It made me think about my own life too and some of the things I have read about karma.

Thread 3
The Deverry books by Katherine Kerr are a fantasy series, a long one. They tell the story of a group of souls that reincarnate and slowly work through the karma of a situation that was mishandled in one of their lives together. The thing is, that original situation and it's effects has a ripple effect outwards, so there are a whole host of situations that develop as a result throughout their lives and those ripples impact others and further than that, countries and..... The stories are a celtic knot, the lives flowing through and around, back and forth.

So where does this leave me? What am I thinking about right now? I am wondering if the chain of my own abuse is alive and well or if it has been broken. I wonder at that chain, I think the link had already been weakened by the actions of us both in previous lives or maybe as a result of the ay we chose to live in this life. It could have been worse.

it's effect on me though was pretty catastrophic. I turned to drugs to disguise the fact my world had fallen apart, nothing in it really made sense any more. I eventually had a nervous breakdown and my glandular fever / Chronic Fatigue Syndrome flared up again. I got help and I read and I rebuilt my world, block by painful block. Being a logical sort, I had to reconstruct my understanding of how the world works. That narrow Christian ethic I grew up with had made my world too black and white to cope with grey.

I have reached a point where the memory no longer hurts. Where the changes in my life wrought by the consequences of it have ceased to be negative and i can see they have bought me to be a person I am happy with, living in a way I am happy with, and my life is pretty good. and I would not be here without that one singular event. Is this enough to break the chain? Is this forgiveness?

but the dirt, it clings. It is hard to let go and where does the dirt end and me begin? Am I raggedy tree climbing urchin with dirt on my chins as I climb the tree of life? Or do I need a damn good bath still, to make me clean? the effects linger on, maybe they always will. F and I feel their echoes in our relationship, the difference is love and care. Those ripples are something we face together as best we can.

I am not sure I will ever be able to listen to Digging in the Dirt in the same way again. i won't enjoy it any less. I may even enjoy it any more, as i belt out those words. release. clean. free.

The Lion and the Mouse

The Mouse is irritating me a little. Most days, not at all. the Mouse has improved my life at work but their manner is not easy. They barely talk. They ignore us all, pretty much. They are precise in their work, anal. And if things are not exactly as they like, you know, sighs or a hurt look. Go too fast and you get a reproving hurt comment but go to slow and they are there trying be one step to be one step ahead, doing your job as well.

So I came home and that irritation was niggling. i picked two cards and got the owl and the deer and then I wrote to see what came out. Writing seems to be a way my other side can talk to me, without a purpose, my logic is quiet.

And you know what came out? Confirmation that what bugs me the most is this feeling of duplicity. I know others find it rude and that is what annoys them but.... it is not what gets to me. There are things that do not ring true. This person is smart and if you step on them even a little, them even a little, they speak up real quick. They have taken steps to make sure they speak to as few people as possible and see as few people as possible. every so often though, you will be talking about something that they have a little one up manship on and there they are.... and it just does not quite fit. It niggles....

A while back I joked and formed the theory they might be an ex-victim or in witness protection or something. Something happened to them. They are not the mouse they pretend to be, they are a lion hiding in mouse clothing. They are hiding but not scared. Don't talk, people will learn very little about you and not expect their idle queries to be answered, how best to not give away any background at all? Talk softly, so you can try and pretend that your Scottish accent is Cornish. Hide and lie with belief. But the eyes give you away, they are nt they eyes of a mouse.

So the owl.... the owl helps us see through deception. And because the owl came flying through and my stream of conscious writing lead me back to this potential deception, now I wonder whether it might be more than idle thought.

There are many reasons for a family to run and hide. Many women flee dodgy relationships via refuges, Christian communities help harbour such women and their families and give them a fresh start. Cornwall is a good place to hide. Isolated country with tight knit communities. but the Cornish will welcome good folk in and then you can hide in plain sight. There was a high profile case a few years back with a renowned witness who was moved here and was recognised by some, even after surgery, too many to ignore. People move here to hide abusive relationships and keep their partners controled to.

The deer stands for gentleness and maybe, just maybe I am right, it changes nothing except makes her more deserving of gentle handling. Not all masks are bad. Some are there for very good reasons. Who am I to say that the lion wearing the mouse mask should come clean. but it doesn't make them a mouse, even if they act like one.

Something Different

Three great songs - rather different from what I normally listen to but just soooo great....

Soul Food

I feel tired and drained right now. I have since the clocks changed. I am not the only one at work that is feeling the effects of the change. Some years it seems to have little affect but this year it has.

And now F is on a shift week which means he will be working the next three evenings. So no comfort there.

I was sat in work wondering what I would eat tonight when out of the blue, the desire for chicken and sweetcorn soup hit. I can't remember the last time I ate it and I have never made it. A 30 second internet hunt saw two versions of the recipe printed off. And a trip to the shop saw the ingredients home.

It turned out pretty good and was definitely soul food. Shame the cornflour went a little lumpy in places.... But it tasted good. With prawn crackers.

I needed that, I really did

Of Mice and Men

Not a day that has gone to plan.

It was supposed to be an S day. Normally F would pick him up from the FMIL but this weekend S was off to a sleep over and we had to go pick him up. After a text or two and a call to Grandpa we discovered he had not gotten home yet so we decided to get on with our day.

S called us while we were out. Where are you. Are you still coming over. Yes, if you want us to. Off we go. S is no sooner in the car pretty much than he asleep. He sleeps through F going into a shop. He stays a sleep when we get to the market but wakes enough, under pressure, to nod his head about staying in the car.

Half the market has been packed up. Waiting around for his call and then trekking over to get him has made us too late. We don't stay long. We return and inform S we are taking him back home and he barely wakes up.

We get back to his house and he wake, why are we here? *sigh* Turns out his Grampa had to wake him when we got there. He also admitted to watching horror films with his mates till 6 in the morning. We eventually went and got some food with him and then dropped him.

Hours driving backwards and forwards on a Sunday afternoon because a teen can't turn round and say, not this weekend Dad. Or even, maybe leave it till this evening Dad? And then he is grumpy with us *giggles*.

Was I this self absorbed when I was a teen? Was I this stubborn? *laughs* Best laid plans....

Back to slicing up old clothes. I figure there is no point buying the hessian or rag rug making tool until I have all the clothes chopped and given I want a random coloured rug in blues with a little grey and white. I need some of every single item of clothing pretty much chopped before I start.... Lots and lots more chopping to go....

Another Day...

My funny mood of the day never went away. Indecisive and not very easy. Uncomfortable. Depressive. My horoscope warned me of this and also advised me not to allow the mood to let me miss opportunities. I think I did.

We could have gone out but I avoided it like the plague. I felt low and tired and icky.

In my continuing discomfort of the day I finally pulled a couple of cards and I got the Heron and the Rabbit. The Fear Caller, one of my totems, is all about dwelling on the negative and calling it to you. The Heron is a mirror and helps us find our truth by looking at our feelings, getting stuck is a sign of being over-critical, blaming life or others is a sign of lack of courage.

Today I didn't have the strength to live life. Am I being hard on myself over it? No idea. Somedays it feels hard. Are these days caused by my own fear? Or are they caused by my lack of energy? The last few days have been so full and last weekend was a full one to, maybe today was a kick back from that growth? Maybe I am just tired, maybe it was just too much.

The only thing that is certain is that tomorrow is another day and I have learnt from experience that sleep is what clears these moods when they come. Tomorrow I will feel differently.

I suffered from depression, sometimes related to my Chronic Fatigue, sometimes related to a bad relationship and it's after effects. I became pretty agrophobic at one point and eventually had a nervous breakdown at 21. One thing I learnt from all that is that everything changes, things can not stay the same, and this was a great comfort. If you hit rock bottom, and believe me I was there, any lower and I would not be here today, knowing that things will change, really understanding that, becomes a comfort. Time takes things and distance helps, time gives distance.

So I know that tomorrow, is really, another day.

Something to Look Forward to

I woke this morning feeling low and grumpy. I gave F a bit of a time about going out somewhere and doing something today. He eventually agreed and then I realised. I don't want to go out today. I am tired and drained after a busy and fun packed week. A lot of fun.

So what do I want? I want to know that it isn't over. We had fun and did stuff, it just happened that we did two things close together. We have other stuff booked, three concerts that form part of the Eden Sessions. For those I have to wait till the end of June and then again, all three come together.

And I have to wait till then to do anything at all and it seems a long way off. I liked having something just round the corner to look forward to. And now it seems a long way off. We need to do more, make sure we go out and arrange stuff to look forward to.

I want to go to the circus they are having at Eden this year and I also want to go and see the Miracle Theatre Companies Summer production but both these things are later in the year as well.

And it doesn't need to be anything so major (or expensive). F and I agreed to go visit one of the many local gardens on his next weekend off. Nothing so very expensive. Something nice and fun and chilled. Something to look forward to.

It also reminded me that towards the end of last year I had planned an excursion for myself. A day touring places. A day that would only cost time and petrol.... And maybe some parking money in a couple of places. Maybe I should put that back on the cards and have me a little pilgrammage next week when F is working.

Fifteen

Another day another piece of fabulousness....

Today F got an early birthday pressie - I took him out for his birthday meal. several weeks early. I was making the most of a special, off season, lunchtime deal to go to Fifteen, one of Jamie Oliver's restaurant. It was lovely (and really quite reasonable). The restaurant is placed in a lovely position on Watergate Bay. We sat in the window and looked out at the blue, blue sky and the flat sea with the hazy headlands in the distance.....

Idyllic.

Then we walked along the beach and it was so warm. If it got no warmer than this in the sun all year I would be happy. Balmy and beautiful. It is still cold in the shade though and without the sun, that breeze can feel like a biting harpy of a wind. Winter has not let hold of her grip entirely yet. The daffodils are blooming everywhere now, swathes of them along the roads and in the fields.

I like Fifteen, the restaurant of today. They have a nice ethos. They buy local, seasonal produce. They support ethical suppliers who produce top notch ingredients. They take on young people as apprentices who need to learn to put their past lives behind them. they don't shy away from police records, but give those who truly want it a chance to turn their lives around. They have to work for it of course, and work hard..... So Fifteen is a charity. I know they do a lot of local work as well. A school I worked in had a class go there to learn about healthy eating.... i bet they do more than that....

So a couple of years back we visited Rick Stein's restaurant in Padstow. Which did I like best? Rick Stein's was old fashioned, discrete, impeccable service. Fifteen was funky and fun, the service was good but more chatty than fun. Fifteen had an aura of fun upmarket surf. Rick Stein's was just plain upmarket and sleek. I have no idea what Rick Stein does with all the earnings but I don't think he runs an ethical charity, I think he is a businesss.

Jamie's influence on Watergate Bay is understated, the restaurant entrance is tucked away. The building is an old beach cafe that has been restructured with a restaurant on top and a cafe and hole in the wall below. From the beach you would not know that the restaurant above was Fifteen. I am guessing the hole in the wall and cafe are also Jamie Oliver's but they makeno advertisement as such. The choice of drinks and produce showed the mark though. There was also a surf academy and surf clothing shop and whether he is a landlord or they form part of the charity, I have no idea. But there is no taking over and empire building here. Jamie sits softly and easily within Watergate Bay....

Rick Stein however.... Padstow is nicknamed Padstein. He has a restaurant, a chip shop, a bistro, a cafe, accomodation, a foodie gift shop, a bakers and a deli.... All branded. He has revitalized Padstow and given it's fishing industry a boost, but at a cost. His is an empire, a brand.

I can't fault the food of either. I adored both and would eat at both again if I was rich or they had another special offer.... but Jamie inspires....

Swan Lake

F and I have been out gallivanting. I decided we needed some culture and took us to see Swan lake.... on ice..... in our regional theatre which is not huge and not somewhere you would expect to find an ice rink.

The ice rink was tiny but when you get a team of skaters who have over 200 medals between them, they know exactly how to make it work. They really are world class and the skating was incredible, really incredible. And coupled with Tychaichovsky's beautiful music....

From the first few moments I knew F was as hooked as I. The audience clapped many times throughout at astounding moves as well as at every single break in the music. At the end we clapped until our hands were sore and the theatre was on it's feet.

The guy in the photo above is pictured as the Prince but he now plays the evil Rothman but I loved this photo. What it does not show is that he is whizzing about the tiny rink while lifting the black and the white swan.

If ever you see this show near you, don't hesitate. And don't buy tickets too close to the stage - a little perspective is better!

There isn't much else I can say about the show. It is stored in my head as beautiful music and images and the words I have would take some of the magic away....

The Wall

The other day I picked a card and was surprised to get Armadillo who represents boundaries. Most of the time when I pick a card it makes pretty immediate sense but this one did not. So I shrugged and moved on...

But there was a lesson for me here, a huge one, several years in the developing, triggered by events I could not predict, involving others. Boundaries have to be regularly walked. They have to be maintained. If you don't maintain them, they start to slide and they keep on sliding. In any sort of relationship, this can be a dangerous thing. Sure sometimes they need to be flexible, but some boundaries are essential otherwise we lose ourselves and there are so many ways of doing that.

I had been letting some boundaries slide and over the course of a long time, they had moved too far, so far that the things that triggered all this made all those involved realise they had moved too much. This boundary has to be put back and I will hav to work hard on it, maintain it and be strong. It is a weakness, a boundary previously trampled that has never grown back fully, but now, now I am going to water it.

Hiatus

I have much I should be thinking about. Why does my work colleague get to me so much? Particularly as I had much the same issue with the Little Princess. there is a real issue here that I am still digging away at the edges of.

But I just can't be bothered tonight. I did a lot this weekend. Packed it all in. Yesterday I went to the market and found a coffee table, one with cubbies underneath for all my books and craft bits. It involved some tidying but I love it. I also found a cute glass bottle that has been cute and painted a translucent blue. At £2 it really is nothing special. The glass is wonky and the cuts are not straight but it is just pretty...

I cooked up a pork joint and watched a film with F and then I chopped some fabric for my rag rug on my nice new (to me) table.

And tonight I do not want to think. Not even one tiny little bit. I want to go to bed on time having had a nice hug and I want to sleep well and deeply and wake refreshed tomorrow.

Bubbles

As i sat in the bath, I noticed the bubbles and how the bubbles all fit together, all different sizes and i felt inspired. I was reading about the rainbow dream and suddenly my bubbles were rainbow coloured.

By the time I got out of the bath, the process of a piece of art was in my head. A wash of rainbow colours. Circles of all sizes fitting together, with white acrylic between the circles. A black border. A booklet with this the first in a series. Words on the left hand page.... They appeared later.


I had to laugh though. All this to get me to produce an artwork, which while I like very much, it's message is a.... mild rebuke? a joke at my expense? I laughed. It fits my current problems at work. This would, as Jamie sans would suggest, Coyote in action....

Someone is a pain in the ****. Very capable but not into the job, no sense of responsibility, team play, pride in their work or anything that would help them to do a good job. They just don't care. They are lazy and untruthful. They hide, do non-work things, anything to avoid work. This results in others having to do the job for them and they only help others if backed in to it and then grudgingly and slowly with lots of questions so it is often easier to just do it yourself....

This person had a good career and chose to leave it. They have a good standard of living and a family income in excess of anybody else in the team. But yet they talk of money troubles while also boasting about the cost of the extra-curricula activities of their offspring. They are often patronising and make the less academic members of the team uncomfortable, hell I probably have better qualifications, but I feel uncomfortable to!

Conversation is rarely fun. It is boastful and competitive. No I don't want to hear about the awards you and yours win. I don't want to hear about what you have bought. I don't want to hear how good you are. Do you feel so bad about yourself that you have to make everyone else feel bad?nnDo you have to be a snob?

I get cross. Then I bitch. I have been trying to work out how to express negative emotions without allowing my feelings to damage others. I have some way to go on this.

But this art..... all about leaving them be. Letting them fit and being one of many bubbles around them..... I would not want to burst or be burst. Static... friction.....

But then how do you express your feelings? I guess part of the problem here is my Boss, not dealing with a situation effectively, a difficult situation involving confrontation. Until they deal with it, the rest of the team is impotent, powerless, with no way to resolve or deal with their feelings about it.

Books

So I came home and got in the bath. I had a good read today.

I read the introduction of my magpie book and it looks good. I can't wait to finish the book lent to me that I am reading at lunch times. Then I can read about my magpies as I watch them. I like this idea very much.

I then read some more of Jamie Sans and her seven paths of initiation. I read the fifth path. This book has things to say about my illness as well. I suspect I will need to read this book more than once. I may need to dip in and out a lot to. I am finding it heavy and challenging, in more than one way for sure....

Then I read the first two chapters of Art is a Spiritual Path and I like this book very much. Much in here speaks to me.

I then finished my National Geographic and started on my Cornwall Today. I only started Cornwall Today last month but I am liking it a lot. It is a regional magazine and contains so much variety.... All of it well written and interesting with lovely photos. It is a good read and worth the money.

This whiled away a lot of the day.... The window was open and I could hear the birds sing

Then it was dreamboards and then it was art....

Today's Dreamboard

I have been reading Art is a Spiritual Path so i thought I might have a go at witnessing this dreamboard.....

The words have been speaking to me all week....

We are the stones. We stay, we last, we are the bones. We can help you rise up and give you somewhere to stand. We are all that remains of ancient tombs to your reverred ones. We last and we will be here after you. Do you deserve a tombstone such as this? You walk on us and you build with us and our high points are sacred. Climb. We can take you above the clouds and show you the light.

Nature always climbs, plants will grow on us and hide but we are always there underneath. Grow and climb, we will support you. Be beautiful, be wild, be free. And listen to the stones.


The wolf causes me disquiet. This is one of my totem animals, but this wolf is not free. It is a tamed wild animal. And that mind the step sign.... What would the wolf say?

I will always be myself, no matter where I am and what they do to me. Loving the people that keep me here does not compromise my wild self. I know who I am. Sometimes I get to run free and it is enough. Mind the step, it can trip you on your way to freedom. You are yourself.

The red and green is lizard skin. This speaks to me of some things going on in my life and art right now. It reminds me that we are not the same but we all fit.

Last Full Moons Dreamboard

This one struck me as being all about hibernating. About being deep under the surface of things where there is beauty and quiet and much hidden. Things go on down here but not so the world can see.

Under.

For sure.....

And it suited this last moon very well for me. I have been quietly plugging away at the things hidden beneath inbetween working. I guess I didn't have the energy for a complicated dreamboard.

A Walk on the Wild Side

I have so much to post today. I had one of those days. One where I made up for the lack of time and energy and did all the things I wanted to do. All day.

F was working and I had more energy after catching up a bit on the lethargy from all that overtime, so it was time to take care of my spirit as I had coddled my body....

I went for a walk shortly after F left. I couldn't take Little Dog because this nature reserve does not allow dogs. The sun was rising but still fairly low in the blue sky. The day was going to be a lovely spring day, one of the warmest so far.

I love Pendarves Wood and nature was sure shining this morning. The human element of the walk was a little disquieting though. I shan't talk about that here though. People should not leave those sorts of things behind them....

So let's have some pictures.....

The Blue bell wood is preparing itself in earnest now and the daffodil field in the background is in full flower. I wonder if the bluebells will flower before all those daffs go...


An old boat house on the ornamental lake...

A hole in the roots of a tree. I wonder what lives down there, except for the spider....

Free my Body

Sometimes when you are looking for one thing, you find another. This happened to me last night. i was curious about Jamie Sams, author of Medicine Cards and Dancing the Dream. I have questions, lots of questions. So I thought I would hunt and see what I could find.

I didn't expect to find an explanation that matches my own viewpoint on my illnesses and takes it on further.

Stealth Viruses

This view believes that many illnesses such as Cancer, Multiple Sclerosis, Fibromyalgia, Chronic Fatigue and more have a viral component and that these viruses can lie dormant in the body and are very difficult to spot. They also recur.

I had glandular fever twice in my teens. It dragged on and was very much Chronic Fatigue. Over time I have gotten better and I am almost normal now. I get tired. I sleep for 9 hours a night generally.

When I first met F I was napping every weekend and sometimes after work. 6 years before that, my day began when my boyfriend got home and ended when he went to bed - it was that short. I am improving. This year I have managed to avoid catching the cold that have lain everyone I work with low. I survived the last stock check pretty well.....

Twenty years.

I was told it was caused by Epstein barr virus by doctors then I met a homeopathist who used electro acupuncture and she confirmed the Epstein barr virus diagnosis. She gave me doses of the virus as a antidote or vaccine to show my body how to deal with it, how to look for the virus. It worked and my improvement was marked. But long term, the recovery of my body has been slow. But at least my body has been able to recover.

And here I am reading of Stealth Viruses. I didn't expect to find that she is a sufferer or that vaccines manufactured using animal proteins is one way these viruses have been spread. The recent MMR vaccine Autism scare / case is an example of stealth virus infections caused in this way.

Reading about how things have come along since my last bout and all the surrounding symptoms makes me sad. Even things like my feeling cold and my dry eyes are symptoms. It also makes me wonder if I will ever fully recover. It seems full recovery tends to occur within five years if it is going to. Some people gradually recover but never completely get better. Others never get better or get worse. i think I have gradually gotten better....

So if I never get fully better? I guess I know this. I can deal with my life as it is now. I dealt with it when it was worse. I will deal with whatever else comes my way.

There is also a link with depression. It seems if you are depressed before you get it, they won't diagnose CFS but I became depressed shortly after. I have suffered from depression on and off ever since. Whatever cahnged in me, seemingly rather suddenly this Winter, has resulted in me feeling that that cloud has lifted. Maybe it is the virus lessening it's hold a little more.

The virus has had huge effects on my life. It has affected my abilities, the way I cope with life, every decision I have ever made really, since I became ill. I live with it and I count myself lucky that I have gotten better. Maybe one day science will have an answer and my body will be free.

I am tired..... I am eating badly again. I await the weekend and next week I will get back on track. Honest.

I am finally gathering together the box of goodies for my family. OK so they were due a little while ago.... maybe around Christmas.... but they are getting there. Soon.

I finally finished my craft bits and felt happy with all the selections. It took a while.....

Sleep.....

The Rules

I am having a rollercoaster ride reading Dancing the Dream...

The introductions just resonated soooo strongly so I was looking forward to the rest immensely. So now I am reading about each of the seven paths in turn. I didn't get the first and second path.... couldn't feel them really at all. The third.... oh I have been working on that one, I think I probably still am and I can see no end in sight to that.... but bits of the fourth, they resonant a little as well, but not so strongly....

It seems we work on the lessons of the different paths without finishing the ones before. We walk several parts of the spiral at any one time. We get tested on lessons in previous paths to.

This is all fine. I just want to learn to be happy. i don't necessarily want to get all the way to the end and be a perfect spiritual being. That's a lot of work....

But one thing I am finding at the moment reading away, is that there is a strong emphasis on not gossiping, not being unpleasant, staying away from the negative.... I find this hard. What about balance? Is it better to repress these emotions? How do you stop feeling them? Do you need to stop feeling them or stop expressing them? Do we feel them and then let them go? Is it holding on to negativity that is wrong? Should we let others do things that are wrong to us without commenting? Where is this line exactly?

So many questions.... Theory is all very well, but knowing how to put it in to practice is another thing entirely. You have to believe the advice you are reading.... I need some explanations here and hope they come later in the book......

Chains and Riches

Strange dreams last night.

But I guess I asked for them. Before I went to sleep some words drifted in to my head, and I spoke them inside my head in that way that has intention, half spell, half prayer. Words I can't remember now, about walking with the Goddess in my dreams.

So I guess I got what I asked for.

I dreamt I was a little girl, washed out to see, all alone in the ocean, floating on a mattress, clinging to a case full of money. I was rescued by a fishing vessel but refused to let go of that case....

I dreamt of a group of people, flitting from character to character. A man left a nightclub and discovered a girl chained underneath, sold into slavery. He tried to rescue her, to talk to her. Another of the group was with another woman and was confronted by the club owner. The other woman, who was not me, started chanting and so the group of two began chanting together. I don't remember the words but there was something about being free, freeing the woman. A spell cast in my sleep..... While the Goddess walked with me....

I woke with the Tears for Fears song, Woman in Chains in my head. Later came the thought that my inner child is a hoarder. I was a hoarder. I didn't want to ruin things so I often didn't use them, kept them pristine and unsullied.... Pretty pads unused so as not to ruin them. The things that lived under the bed - there was a household myth that if you lost something, then you should look under my bed....

I hoard. I collect. I want more. I want to keep. letting go of books..... wanting more music than I can ever listen to on my ipod. Throwing things away..... but at the same time I know I can live without things - I did for some time when all my posessions went in to storage, including the ones that were not supposed to, I had a couple of days clothes for a month....

I need to think on this more. I am not sure what it is I am hoarding exactly. What is it my inner child considers to be riches exactly? What could tempt her to let go? What can unlock that woman's chains, make her let go of her slavery?

Journeying with Myself

Since the other day I have done another two card reading and it was a gentler thing than the last. Elk and Deer, stamina and gentleness. Again they go well, keep going but make sure you give yourself breaks.....

I had a dream yesterday afternoon (afternoon naps have ruled his weekend in helping myself catch up). In it I was in my parents back garden. There back garden is large and basically encloses the house on three sides. On one of these the back garden encloses the front garden and parking area too. The garden is much longer than it is wide, with the house perpendicular to the long side, sort of dividing the garden in two. One end is much more open than the other.

On one side the house is over shadowed by three huge lime or linden trees. In my dream there was a tree growing in the shadow of the giant trees, in Summer there leaf canopy is beautiful and creates huge amounts of shade... I was told to move the tree in the sun so I dug it up roots and all and huge amounts of earth and plonked it in the open in the other side of the garden. The tree was happy. Then I saw an amazing, huge yellow beautiful butterfly.

So, moving my tree will unleash my transformation....hmmmm..... what does moving my tree mean and how do I do it?

Anyway... my ninth totem animal is the otter. I was sort of denying it, invalidating the experience when i was gifted it and here is the story....

Once upon a time I was a gap year student on a placement and I couldn't drive and had had to move away from home. I was young and alone but there were other people around on the same scheme as me. One chap was a good friend (and that was very much all) and one. Friday night he called me straight after work and said come along lets go... so we did...

He had a van with a mattress in the back decked out with curtains and all. So sleeping bags in the back we set off for Avebury. We parked on the road and climbed up the mound in the dark before returning to the van and playing crib. In the morning we woke early and visited the barrow shortly after dawn. It was lovely.

We were a little surprised however to find a man there, who had slept in the barrow overnight. We chatted and gave him a lift into the village. Before he left, he took out a rag tag deck of cards. Blank white cards with the names of animals written on them, they were moth eaten and dirty. My card was the Otter. We left him and visited the stones while the village slept on.

The man himself was rough around the edges. Older than us, I doubt our parents would have been pleased to see us with him. The meeting was brief and no information given and none pursued but it was a gift none the less. Otters are not so very common sights in the UK, they are shy and hard too catch....

Every time I glimpsed the Otter page in my new book, my heart would jump. there are only so many times you can ignore that.....

So I have my nine animals and a varied bunch they are too! (well apart from my collection of canids).

Otters are all about balanced female energy. Otters are playful and don't start fights but will fight if attacked. they care for their young. They are welcoming and non-judgemental, they have joy for others. Envy has no place. Stop worrying and let the playful inner child out.... Play...

A good message for me. Something I am and something I am working on being. The way all my totems seem to be. It is odd that they are both things I am but things I struggle to be. Almost contradictory, but it works for me.

Between the Lines

I didn't want to write last night. Well actually that isn't true. Everything I did write just sounded... wrong.

How can I write small personal things in the light of world events?

I watched the news last night and I have been watching it this morning.

News is not free, not exactly. Information flows and diplomatic ties affect the news. Eye witness accounts flooded youtube and twitter but the junk information makes these hard to find. I tried as i watched the news. For every relevant tweet it seemed there was 5 irrelevant ones, mostly repeated pledges to give money (not that I have a problem with that, but that is a separate information flow).

Watching the news on the 24 hour news channel, it became obvious that the news organisations suffer from the same issues. The same pictures over and over again. From things the news reporters were saying it was clear that many of these came from agencies.

I also began to see that what was being said was just as important as what wasn't. Little has been said about the effects of the tsunami on the rest of the pacific rim. Digging reveals that the waves were not too big. They have caused damage, a lot of damage but because of advance warnings, people were not generally stood around close enough to the sea to be in danger. People have died elsewhere - no idea how many but not very many, not in comparison....

Most of the pictures and recent information seems to be flowing out of Tokyo which appears to have not suffered as badly. Further north the story is different. The images are from the air, with little information attached to each one. Few images are from the ground and the reports almost have an anecdotal feel to them, they are just one liners.....

Japan is a proud and honourable country. A technologically advanced country. I fear for the North, I really do. This lack of true information is not a good thing. I understand the respect for Japan and the responsible attitude of the news organisationd for not inciting panic, but things are very, very bad.

There was also the developing story of the nuclear plant at Fukushima. As I went to bed last night, I told F that I thought it was very, very bad. The News people obviously did too, otherwise they would not have been reporting it. But it was a little story last night, fueled by their understanding of Japan and what wasn't being said but what was quietly being done, for example as the area of evacuation kept slowly being increased. And that beyond the area of evacuation, way beyond, there are roadblocks not letting people in. The rumours that the US was flying in additional coolant, a country that would only ask for help if it desperately needed it....

In a way I was not surprised to wake up and see the pictures of the explosion this morning. Sad. terrified for the poor people there. Absolutely terrified.


What other things, other stories of horror, are not spoken? The news organisation works much much better than it used to. The web is full of information but weeding through the static is nearly impossible it seems. Reading between the lines..... You have to read between the lines to understand significance. I am not sure how good I am at this. I bet the news reporters could tell us a story or two..... if they were prepared to mix semi-fiction and hearsay with fact and their gut feelings.....

Trans-

The feelings of last night are still running through me. I slept funny last night and had odd dreams. I don't feel rested or joyful this morning but I do feel calmer. The storm has abated a little but is still there brewing away.

Just before bed I did a quick reading, just two cards, one for the masculine and one for the feminine. The masculine pulled the snake and the feminine the frog. A really interesting pairing, transmutation and cleansing. i don't feel these two cards are at odds with each other.

The snake is an interesting card and different to how I imagined. The snake is a rare and powerful totem and I am glad it is not mine. Snakes have the power to transmute all poisons and that it seems is what I must do now, I must take this thing that is getting to me and turn it into something else, something better.

The frog is all about cleansing and also a bit about transformation as well. Letting go in a more gentle way than the snake. Taking time and space to breath.

I know things are flowing from me here. It occurs to me that the child inside me liked being alone to climb trees, catch grasshoppers amongst the tall grasses, read books, draw, build dens. The problem was my child was too much alone and didn't meet others like her.

Maybe if I had gone to a bigger school, maybe there would have been others. Maybe not. In fact really, it is only through this wonderful land of blog that I have met many like me (though of course all rather different). Before this online adventure began, I only knew of one and an acquaintance from years before and I reconnected via facebook and discovered we were kindred spirits as well... So two, sort of.

Not good odds for me to find one like me at school really. Although looking on facebooks uggests that one or two people were like me and I never knew.... One girl in the year below has definitely walked an alternative path. I used to play with her and sometimes went to her house and rode her horse. But she was the year below.

Age is a powerful separator for the young. It should not be. This is what caused most of my problems. I had friends, just not with me in my year group. Both older and younger.

Even now, with my old college friends, I walk with the group but I am separate, I always was..... I had other groups of friends as well and walked several paths at the same time. My magpie blood and probably a bit of coyote too.

Oh and I know my ninth animal too... i always did... but that will have to come after work....

Mardy Arse

I am tired and grumpy.

Nothing seems good tonight somehow. I am just desperate for the weekend. Desperate to start sorting this house out, to get things going. The cheque from the power co was un-usable because it had both our names on it. It is slowly sorting out but with work et al there has not been much chance to do it and F is distracted and not being quick about it.... It will probably be the end of the month now before that money is in my bank and spendable. And those wardrobes still seem a long way away.

I seem to have been spending a lot of money.... Tickets for this and that. Valentine's meal last month and a posh lunch booked for an early celebration of F's birthday. And this is before the presents, mother's day or Easter.

I am feeling grumpy with F and just generally grumpy with the world. I can feel my self glowering at it all. There is that tinge of tiredness and weepiness underlying it all. Too tired, and probably too hormonal.... I just want to get through tomorrow and then revel in my two days off.....

Flip the Coin

I woke with the words art is a spiritual path in my mind. This is the title of a book that has been on my wish list for several months along with all the others recommended during BIG. Then I read my horoscope....

Increased intuition, imagination, and spiritual insight could inspire you to either undertake a course of study or move ahead with related creative projects, Libra. You might be very pleasantly surprised at what you learn or produce, and so be motivated to continue with whatever you're doing. This could be an inspiring and productive time for you. Make the most of it!

So I ordered the book.... Things seem to be telling me to create more at the moment and now that spate of overtime is over, I should have the chance.

And so... here I am....

Tired and unhappy. The mail i sent to the boss of my WoW guild took it as me being burnout and stressed rather than a problem that exists separately to how much I have been working. This feels like defensive optimism to me. It made me sad but it also is a viewpoint that definitely leaves the door open. He is a very smart guy, very incisive and capable. makes me wonder if this leaving open of the door is deliberate.

It does bug me though that in order to be taken seriously I would need to forward chat logs and emails. In his position though, he needs to be fair to all of us. but I am still sad. sad for so many reasons.

but happy about so many other things and looking forward to the weekend when I can catch up on myself

Walk on the Outside

I feel very sad right now.

I made a decision to leave the Guild I belong to with in World of Warcraft. I have had much fun there and have friends, good ones. There is two reasons really....

I had a good friend within World of Warcraft but old arguments refuse to die with him and two much ill feeling has grown between us for us to remain friends. I had distanced myself but he does not seem to be able to leave F and I entirely alone as he picked a fight with F this last weekend.

I also have found that the guild I am, soon to be not in, requires too much commitment to playing and I am just not feeling up to that level of commitment.

But I am sad.... It brings up old things..... Am I doing the right thing? this is a pattern I recognise within myself.

When I split with a boyfriend, I would tend to ditch any mutual friends as well. I would leave them to him and walk alone in to the future, taking only the friends with me who were truly mine alone. I have walked through life, leaving places and people behind me. I didn't have the self confidence I guess to cling to them, or is that lack of self confidence? I have no idea. but those people didn't try and keep me either....

I have no idea if this is a good pattern or not...

I have not closed the door though and I have not left, yet. I have slung no mud at people, although I have summarised stuff to the guy in charge and tried to keep the mud to a minimum in the process, at least it is private mud.

I am hoping that at some time in the future I may feel able to go back and be welcome to do so. Is that progress?

If this is a good decision, why do i feel like crying?

Outside of Love

I feel as if I have opened a rich vein of things to dig at, but I have to dig past the things I have already looked at and examined to get to where the trouble lies. I have no idea what the little nugget of pain that will not leave my Inner Child alone is, so I will just keep writing about the episodes of my life that come to mind and keep going and going until I get there.... It is however nice to feel that I am writing about the things that made things better as well as the things that made it worse. This is not digging for the sake of oh woe is me, honest!

I have trouble remembering when exactly the glandular fever first began. Life got very fuzzy, fuzzier than normal. I remember I was 14, just started my GCSE's, so I guess sometime between my birthday in September and the following Easter. Right slap bang in the middle of this time is one of those little life stories...

I had had boyfriends before and I had had minor crushes before, but this is the story of my first love I guess. Let's call him A as that comes first.

My sister had her birthday in January and for the first and last time, my parents decided to open the house to a group of drinking teenagers. The lounge carpet was being cleaned and all the furniture was moved out. My parents barricaded themselves in the end room with the TV and the dogs and we had the run of the rest of the downstairs.

My sister has similar music tastes etc to me so her group of friends was exactly the sort of people I liked, goths, rockers and other alternative sorts. Although my sister was never particularly wild, she floated on the edge of that scene and some of the people who came were a little wilder than her.

I met a man. (Obviously) I don't remember too much of the evening (how frustrating is it to try digging away to get to the hurt when you just can't remember it all clearly?). I remember he gave me a key ring with a rude but complimentary message that I shall not repeat here. I remember kissing him outside and it being so cold we went in to the outside toilet (*laugh*) but my Mum decided to come out with the dogs and to use the facilities (*double laugh*). She was a little surprised to find me in there with a young man......

He was an arty type and oh so different to me. i think he was perhaps on the side of art that is a little dark and that I don't always get. He tole me some story about some art project involving syringes and bits of animal or some such. He was cool. He was good looking. He was slightly wild. He liked me.

At least I think he did. I remember there being some issue. I didn't hear from him I don't think. Someone else had sent me a story to read and I sent a letter back with it via my Sister. Neither my Sister or my Mum were overly keen, hence the need for sneakery.

We spoke on the phone a few times and he made me a mix tape. The tape introduced me to some great music, definitely alternative and to be honest, it helped shape my musical taste. I can't remember too much of what we talked about. I think his home life was very different to mine.

He told me about a party in town and eventually my Sister and her boyfriend agreed to take me. We arranged to meet at a pub in town. We got there and he was off his trolley and my Sister and her bloke were not convinced it was just alcohol. He went a bit odd and didn't say a lot and gave my sister some odd directions that no one was over keen to follow... and that was that....

My Sister and my Mum won that round.

A few years later I was at college and let loose on town myself. That same pub became my stomping ground. One of the same group of friends remained at college while I was there. And A was occasionally in the same place when he was home from Uni. It was my turn to go funny and I never spoke to him, even though his friend said he would have liked it if I had spoken to him.

Thing is. I am never sure how much all this affected me. How much it tied in to my glandular fever. I remember seeing the Doctor and he started asking me questions about depression. I did tell him about A I remember. He prescribed me Amitriptyline. I was 14......

I later discovered that amitriptyline and glandular fever do not mix.

This was all around the time that my health went down hill. I may have been ill before hand but I don't really remember.

I think I lost something important in all this. I wish I had been free to meet him as I wished but we lived in the country and I had no means of getting anywhere near him without help. I know it was all timing and I know my Mum and my Sister wanted the best for me, but I wanted him and there has always been wild child lurking inside me. It just had to wait till I left home to get out....

I also see all the hallmarks of how much my relationships with my Mother and Sister were dishonest and damaged me and my confidence. But it was mostly their caring that did it. I can also see how my teenage years were troubled because of my age. My age meant I couldn't hang around with the people I wanted to or do the things I wanted to. In some ways I had a lot of freedom but it was carefully controlled.

Guardian Dog Angel

When I was about twelve, we had one dog, an old Welsh Border Collie who lived in the garden, got too hot if you brought him in and was not a people dog. We had lost another dog a while back. She was a sweetie....

So one day we were driving from school to my Gran's and we were going down a tiny country lane. We saw the car in front slow and then drive on and as we reached where it had sloed, we saw why. There was a dog. A fawn and white skeleton of a greyhound. She was sniffing cars as they passed.

She sniffed our car as we slowed and then stopped. She was so ... gentle. She was cut and bleeding in places and really needed a good meal, well a lot of good meals. She quietly got in the back of the car and sat next to me.

We visited a friend with a kennels on the way home and she knew of no missing dogs in the area. We took her home and fed her and later on took her to the police kennels. I remember leaving her there. She howled as we left her.

She had impressed us all with her gentleness. She was a beautiful spirit and it was clear to see.

No one came forward to claim her, so after her week, she was going to be put down. My parents stepped in and arranged to pick her up and mys sister and I were delighted.

Except my mum got lost on the way to the kennels and was unable to pick her up. I remember being terrified that she would be put down as we had not got there in time. She was kept alive as they knew she was wanted and the day after she came home.

I have a really, really bad memory so i don't remember all the details of how it all came about but she became my friend. She was mine. If I called her, she always came, no matter what was going on, unless it involved food.

If she knew I was awake she would whine and howl at the bottom of the stairs till the door opened and she could get to me. She always knew when I was unhappy, even before I got home. She loved me unconditionally.

When I became ill with glandular fever, she was my companion. I was not up to a lot at that time, I saw few people. I slept. And she slept with me. I would walk up the nearby hill and she would accompany me. Those walks and her company kept me sane.

When she eventually died, i felt her spirit visit me later that same day. She was not a simple dog,s he was something much more and I still believe that. I think she was a guardian sent to help me through tough times. How much worse would my loneliness and all that fed the growth of the Outsider have been without her?

Little Dog and Big Dog, for all their love and everything else and all that I love(d) them and adore(d) them, that something that she had is missing. She was more than a dog. I thank spirit or whatever you wish to call it for sending her to me when I needed her.

I could tell you more stories about her, how she used to raid bins, could jump the highest of fences, grinned, and turned out to be pregnant when we got her....

I am not sure how far and where exactly to dig to release the hold of the Outsider on my Inner Child, so i will keep writing till I feel it.... And it does not hurt to share a little gratitude for the good things on the way.

Learning to be Outside

I am pretty tired after my weekends work. By the end of Friday i will have worked 19 days with only one day off during that time. 144 and a half hours. But anyway. It will be next weekend before I am back on form I suspect but I am still thinking about the Outsider. I need to delve in to my past and see if I can free my Inner Child a little as this feeling of being the Outsider has sometimes drowned her.

I am the youngest of two and we grew up in the country. There were not many children living near by. My Sister and I had an odd relationship I guess, I was laid back and let her take control but really, I liked adult company more. I liked talking to adults and always did. I had no fear and I had a disturbing desire to wander off and find nice adults to talk to, much to the chagrin of my parents.

I went to playgroup in a nearby village and my Mum also worked there some days. Our hamlet was linked to the village I went to playschool in but was the opposite side of the main road so when school came, my sister and I went to school in a different village. At playschool I found myself deserted by my playmates as the school they were going to, took them some months earlier. So I was suddenly the oldest.

And then I went to school to. I knew none of the children there and had none of the history of playschool with anyone and none of the established friendships. I never really settled in my primary school. I never really had many friends. I only remember playing with two girls. I remember being bad at skipping, but also that the playground attendants used to lead group games and that although I was well liked, this meant I was not alone. One of the lunch time people really liked me and even gave me a present one time.

I was a tomboy. I was one of the oldest and tallest in my class. I remember towards the end of my time that I started playing with two boys. I suspect that if I had stayed, I would have ended up playing with the boys more than the girls.

My Sister meanwhile had finished her time at primary school and been sent to a local private school. This was a good move for her. She was shy and less academic and the school gave her a sheltered place to grow and learn. She had a long term best friend there and a group of friends, mostly day girls like us rather than boarders. (Her best friend eventually betrayed her and they fell out and I can barely remember why. My Sister then felt betrayed because I remained friends with her)

I was so unhappy at my school that my parents decided to take me out early and send me to the same school as my sister as soon as they could. Unfortunately I was put up a year and the school had no idea. I went from being one of the oldest to being the youngest. I was behind and tested for dyslexia etc because of this and given extra lessons. I grew up thinking I was less than intelligent.

I was bad at sport and I still did not gel with people at my school. I did not have a best friend until many years later. She was a special young lady, several years older, older than my sister and lacking friends herself. We probably had about the same mental age, but she was a good and true soul (and probably still is).

In the years before that I didn't have a friend and I was desperate for one. I would always volunteer to show new pupils around, hoping desperately that one of them would like me enough to be my friend. I wasn't disliked, I just wasn't a part of things. I didn't have much in common with these girls I found myself with.

The biggest difference was that most of them boarded. I didn't really understand that my apartness was not my fault I don't think. The boarders were there together at night and the weekends so of course they formed strong bonds with each other. In my year, the handful of day girls did not form a strong group like they had in my sisters year. I think the girls I got on best with were the small group of Chinese girls but I was never one of them either.

My best friend left. I decided to join Young Farmers or YFC, a countryside youth movement. Once I had made friends there my Sister came and joined as well and then her group of friends from school started to go out with us as well. This was one of the best things I ever did in my childhood I think. At that time the YFC was a much more diverse organisation than it is now because there were more older members than young, so I had plenty of adult company and I loved it all.

I think my class mates were probably jealous that I was going ou drinking and kissing boys while they were locked away in school. I am sure that some of the most popular girls would have loved to have been asked to my house for the weekend. But I have a mile wide stubborn streak and I refused to ask any of them, they had left it a little late to try and form friendships and their attempts were obvious in their purpose.

Things would have continued getting better I guess, as my reliance on school lessened and my life outside of school bloomed. At fourteen I became ill with glandular fever and my social life went away over night. I couldn't even cope with school a lot of the time. The next year were pretty lonely I guess, I don't remember much except sleeping.

I got better and started work at a local restaurant. I was doing a job I legally should not have been, serving alcohol. I didn't look or act my age and so the customers sometimes behaved a little inappropriately towards me *laugh*. Then my school started to shut.

My parents offered to send me as a boarder to the new school they were all going to but I refused and went to a local college instead. I was fed up with snobbishness for my school had been firmly divided in terms of money. My Mum worked at the school and some of the children came from rich families.

I loved college and it came as a shock to discover that there were people like me and that people liked me. Suddenly I was very popular and I had plenty of boys interested. Although i had had boyfriends before it was always tricky because I was younger than everyone else, but here were hundreds of boys my age. These were two great years.

This is a very superficial story of my life up until I turned 18. Some of the issues. I think some memories need to be looked at in a lot more detail. This doesn't get too far really as it is well turfed ground. I need to dig deeper into these years and ones that came after. I expect it might be quite dull! You may wish to avoid these posts....

Inside(r)

I want to writer about the outsider but I am sooooo tired. Last nights dream disrupted an already disturbed night. My sleeping pattern is still out of order from last weekend's overtime. And I have to be up so early tomorrow.

At work I am not an outsider and i understand now that this is why I didn't want to leave this job, even when things got so very bad. Now things are better for me, it is clear how i belong there. I consider a couple of the guys to be the brothers I never had. I get on with all of them. I am relaxed and in my element, having a laugh and a joke with them all. In my element indeed.

Some would consider that I have sunk to the bottom of the heap, but they are people who perhaps hold a career success oritentated view on life, rather than a people focused one. truth is the people I work with are unique individuals and each and every one of them is prepared to accept me in the same vein.

Down here, we don't pretend to be the be all and end all. i am not saying all is perfect and we are perfect people, but there is an honesty in our relationships that is often lacking further up the career ladder where professionalism is a by word for not being yourself and squishing your emotions somewhat ( a very personal view, no offence intended).

We can be cruder and ruder. Our jokes can have more bite. Our disagreements don't simmer beneath the surface, they flair out, not as far as fists, but often voices get a little raised. We can be individual and are accepted as such, as long as we do not think we are any better than anyone else.

I may be one of the more academic on the team, but I know this does not make me a better person, or more able to do the job. It means I do different aspects to some. I have weaknesses and everyone knows what they are. My poor memory is the butt of many a joke, but they are never jokes against me but jokes with me. My colleagues, through their love and care have earnt their right to rib me, they know where the line is and it is done with much humour...

And what of my Boss? Things have been calmer of late. The Little Princess and her really were a bad mix. When she becomes stressed, she turns to me now. i am the peacekeeper, the facilitator, the bouncing board, the stress relief. i hear every single whine and whinge.

And suddenly I know how to deal with it all. I calm, I reason, i listen and sometimes I just nod my head, sometimes I shrug my shoulders. i do my best to be balanced and non-judgemental. i keep her happy so things stay calmer. And strangely I am calm and fine with this.

Don't go thinking I trust her and like her after all that has happened. I know her faults. I learnt some painful lessons last year, but once I truly learnt them, the situation resolved. Things have changed inside of me. She seems little different.

So if I am so far from being the outsider, how is it that i am still haunted?

It haunts my inner child and it is back to childhood I need to go.

Rabbit Dreams

OK

So getting the rabbit totem is not exactly what everyone wishes for.... How much help can the fear-caller be? Who wants to call fear to themselves anyway?

Writing last night I was trying desperately hard to understand, to not let my skin crawl at the thought of calling fear to me. I was being positive.

I guess Rabbit appreciated my efforts because last night I received a little demonstration.

***

I am on holiday with my family. No F. My parents, my sister and her two kids. We all arrive in our separate groups and immediately everyone is off doing things. My parents together, my sister and her two together. Each time they all go off and forget about me. I am left waiting at the car while they have a lovely picnic somewhere and every so often one of the kids appears to collect some juicy food item to add to their picnic, not noticing that I had lain a picnic out for all of us.....

They all eventually return to the cars and I let loose all my anger and frustration at being alone. The reaction is one of horror and why didn't you say? We thought you wanted to be alone.....

***

And then I wake up.

F is on his side of the bed and Little Dog is asleep between us. I am very awake and alone and the residual feelings linger from the dream.

I know if I let myself stay in this moment, I won't get back to sleep and the dream feelings will linger (another aspect of Rabbit). So I get up and go to the bathroom and then return to bed.

Little Dog gets up to let me settle back in. F sleeps on, but he has the ability to understand and respond to simple concepts in his sleep WITHOUT waking. So with no guilt, I said cuddle. And he happily moves into position and I scoot up next to him. Little Dog, not entirely happy that she is no longer the sandwich filling, snuggles up on my other side.

I feel happy and warm and loved and sleep comes to visit again.

I don't think Rabbit could have given a better demonstration of it's power. Not a comfortable totem, not an easy totem but one that is surprisingly useful and powerful. Rabbit also has a very different voice from my other totems and I suspect will always stand clear. I have more than enough predators and animals that are able to take care of themselves after all.

I think if you listen to Rabbit, and work with Rabbit, then you can receive valuable insights in where to start digging. Rabbit knows where all the bones are buried.

Thank you Rabbit. I might leave a peace of carrot by where I park my car as I leave work, and I apologise if it is not dark enough to discourage the Magpies.

Pop!

I have spent too much time with my new books to do anything else tonight except the one little thing I wanted to share. i did something brand new to me, I popped corn!

Now I have eaten it before but never made it and it was fun! A tiny amount of corn.... then it starts to pop! Yay! And before I know it my pan is soooo crammed with it that no more can pop... or move.... or anything.....

And it tasted nice too!

But seriously! How much fun is that? *grin*

My Aminals and I

Sooooo.....

My medicine cards came with a lovely book and the first thing in there is to find your 9 power animals. The first seven of these are each for a direction and the last two are personal power allies, which are not necessarily found by using the deck. I obviously know one of mine already, magpie, but the other is a mystery to me.....

So I did the layout and cringed.... because it was obvious I had not shuffled enough.

But.

It is a layout you are only supposed to once. ever.

So I thought about it and this was how I was moved and this is what I have.

Each totem animal helps with the lessons related to that direction, but also stands for talents or attributes we have or need to develop. It is a key and we can call on them to help us in our life. They are here to help and we should accept their blessings.....

Ant - guardian of my path and an aid in my greatest spiritual challenges. The ant is many things, aggressive, a builder, stamina, scrutiny and generousity but it is most strongly patient and trusting the Universe to provide. I know I am patient. I am able to complete painstaking beadwork, spend hours, weeks, years doing the same mundane tasks over and over again. I have patience for sure and I do slowly chip away at things but in terms of my spiritual path? Maybe not so sure..... I am always imploring the Universe to help move things on for me..... yes I am waiting, but perhaps not very gracefully..... I am laidback about things (wardrobes still not been ordered) but other times I despair about the state of my house and the long list of things that need doing to it. I can see this as a strength but also something I need more of....... oh yes.... I have always respected the ant, I sat on ant nests twice within a week as a kid and I have never ever forgotten.....

Turkey - The Turkey is the animal that guards my inner child and helps maintain my balance of innocence. The turkey represents the give-away, this is all very North American for me, not part of my heritage and the closest i can get easily is the theme of generousity. Apparently, having this medicine means I have many virtues and have transcended self.... I think this may be a goal, but I do not feel like i am there yet. I often feel I have to guard my energetic giving as I get very tired.... When I smoked, I was always the one giving away my cigarettes. At work, I am the one who always has sweets for others. I give heavily of my time in making gifts for my family. I sometimes get too ambitious in the things I want to give - packages have so many things I want to include they never gert sent. I have found myself becoming less generous, worrying about money. i recently decided that my teaching books would never make it on to Amazon to sell and that I should give them to the local library specialising in teaching, but they have not got there yet. I need to work on this. I need to work on not trying to give too much, because then sometimes I end up giving nothing at all or not leaving enough for myself.


Rabbit - This animal is my personal truth, my inner answers, the path to my goals. And I get the rabbit! The rabbit stands for fear. It is prey to everything. Apparently it became this way because it was scared of what might be and this ended up writing it's future. All the things I am most afraid of, I will call to me. What I resist will persist. I will become what I fear most. I have to learn not to constantly do the what if thing.... i do this. I do this a lot. I am a worrier. I think about possibilities, I run them through my head over and over again. I have had a tendancy to be very negative because of this. In my job my head has time to spin all over the place and this has been good for me. I have gotten a lot, lot better at making sure my head spins in happy circles and that i do not start on that nasty negative downward spiral. I have learnt to manage my mind better, in order to help myself be happier. Am I still scared of stuff happening? oh hell yes, there are still things that scare the beejesus out of me, that i pick at like a spot, for instance, it terrifies me that F might die and leave me alone. Apparently I need to release my fear..... To give it away. So I can see progress here, i can see where I have come from, but I have a long way to go.

Wolf - This one is all about when to speak and when to listen and to count my blessings. The wolf is the teacher, the knowledge within, psychic energy via it's ally the moon. It is it's own being but is fiercely devoted in relationships, it manages to retain it's identity within relationships. Not something I have always found easy but F is great and with him, I am myself, as I learn how to be me. I guess it is appropriate... i love to learn. I love learning more than anything else. I howl at that moon for sure. i even tried to train as a teacher but.... i did not suceed for I was unable to fit within the current school framework very well. It seems I should look for the lessons, no matter where I am. That walking in lonely places may help me hear the lessons within. Stuff to think about here for sure.....

Dog - and my second canid (I like dogs and am very closely bonded with mine, my family, always have been). This is all about honouring the powers that be, my guardian of the dreamtime. The dog is all about loyalty and we all know how true and loyal they can be, even when they are abused. They will destroy themselves before they lose their faith. Best friend and protector. It is all about service, but the trick of dog is to learn to be your own best friend, to face my fears, to look at y loyalty andhow it interacts with my need for approval. To be loyal to myself and my own purpose in life. Stop cowering in fear. I have had guardian dogs throughout my life and they have even featured in dreams.

Coyote - and my third canid, all about inner earth and how to stay grounded. Coyote often features in Charles de Lint's books so I am familiar with his character.... The great trickster, the fool. Always meddling and setting things in motion, that never work as they should, but he always survives, always gets by, even if he is beat up and hurting, he has to laugh at it all, because so often there is nothing else he can do. Cosmic humour, the great joke. All about doing things just because they are crazy and fun as well as the knots we tie ourselves in that ae just daft beyond reason. Oh so I need to lightne up, to let loose more, to play jokes and celebrate the whimsical.... Oh this is a hard one for me to get, which is exactly why I need it! I am a logical science type, I don't always get humour and I take a while to relax with people and let it go. Coyote is sacred though and I guess, having coyote in your life means it will never be dull. I need coyote badly. I can see instances where coyote has walked my path with me. I need to play pranks, to be more foolish, to meddle a little maybe? ouch ouch ouch! And yes, I can see some areas of my life where the joke is on me.

Porcupine - This is all about my inner self, my joy and personal truths, the protector of my sacred space and it stands for innocence. Trust and faith and becoming child like. Playfulness of spirit. As a scientist, I play. As an artist I play. I could perhaps do with a little more trust and faith but well... Although I am not innocent, i do have a innocent quality. I often take things as they appear, even though some other part of my head knows things may be otherwise, i go along with how they appear whole heartedly. I am not sure i can explain this very well, but I can see my innocence and I can also see it as something to work on.

Finally my two power allies, one for the right, one for left; one masculine, one feminine. The book suggests letting them come to you, but when they do, buying a book on them and learning more about them. My book on magpies arrived at the same time as my cards (do I believe in coincidences?). I do not yet know if they are left or right and I do not yet know what my ninth animal is, but I am very, very certain of my magpies.

I have enjoyed this immensely and writing has helped me take it deeper. i have a lot further to go with my animals, we shall walk together along aways. and i have much deeper to slow with them to. Any insights gratefully appreciated!

And I know I have things I am thinking on to write about, they are still coming....

Outside(r)

There is some meat here. An old niggle. Something that causes discomfort. Something I must dig out and examine. Old issues that need to be set in letters to make their outlines clear so they can catch the breeze and fly.

I guess anyone who has been through any sort of counselling episode / deep loking at the self or anything of that type in any way knows, where there is discomfort or pain is where you need to go.

So I am going to go here and follow it back, all the way back. I am going to look at why htereis always something of the outsider lurking about me. In my head. I know I am not an outsider. I have many places I belong. I know this. But the child inside me, she feels alone and outside and different.

And just thinking on this for a few minutes, there are a lot of threads here to pull. It might take some time to write and examine and mull over. But I think it long overdue.

Strange how a blog can become therapy. Airing the intensely private in public, swathed in anonyminity.

But for now, work calls.

Shine Little Sister

Sometimes you meet a soul you feel very strongly drawn to. Some times you find a soul mate, a soul sister, a soul brother. You make a connection and it is a very real and special thing.

But change is the only inevitable thing.

Any relationship can only operate at such a high for a length of time, not forever.

I had love at first sight with F but our relationship has been through several different stages. We are just as in love, just as close but our bond is different to how it began.

And so it is with friendships of other sorts too.

I have a good friend whose star is shining brighter and brighter, so bright now, she blinds me. She has stepped on, upped her game. I havenot been left behind, I am still there, but no longer such a part of their life.

It would be easy to be resentful. Easy to be jealous. I want to be a star as well. Sometimes I could feel hurt. And honestly, sometimes I feel all of these things.

But you know what I feel most? I want my sister to succeed! Sine little sister, shine, shine as bright as you can!

Because as she learns to be a star, she shows me the way, or a way. She shows me that it can be. That it is possible. That I too, maybe, one day might learn to shine as bright myself.