WHITE CARPET : RED STAIN.

                    

Saturday. I woke up this morning with an image in my mind that won’t go away.  So I thought if I gave it a voice it may have more to teach me. It has to do with my personal journey through domestic violence. It was certainly not a journey that I planned for myself, but once the engine pulled out of the station, picking up speed ~ it was hard to jump off the train.

I have spent the past few months working on a piece of “unfinished business” that bubbled to the surface through a series of seemingly unrelated events. Actually it was brought to my attention by my life coach who listened to me ramble on about the random chaos of my life;  a disappointing experience with my male housemate, patchy communication with my son, and yet .. forever optimistic …. my desire for a new relationship. Yes, I believe I am finally ready.

It was she who finally named the elephant in the room. With her help I have been looking at my relationships with the men in my life ~~ from the very beginning to the present. It has been interesting and sometimes painful; sorting through what is important, what needs to be transformed, and what needs to be let go. 

This morning’s vision was a red stain on white carpet.  It was curious and when I stepped back I saw a scene unfold before me.  I was in a living room ~ and I knew it was my living room although I have never lived in a house with white carpet. Someone had spilled dark red wine. They apologized profusely and even as I quickly found things to mop up the mess I was assuring them that it was alright, that everything would be all right.  But I was lying.  I knew the carpet was ruined and would never be the same again. I had the carpet professionally cleaned and the spot looked like it really had disappeared. But by that evening, after the workmen had left, the carpet began to dry and stain popped out again. And every time the carpet was cleaned the spot faded away a little more, until it was so slight that only I knew it was there. Maybe it isn’t really there anymore! Can you see it?  Maybe I only see it because I remember where it happened.

That is what domestic violence feels like. There were many stains …. but it was such a long, long time ago.  I cleaned and cleaned that damn carpet. I even sat a coffee table over the top and could walk right by without even thinking about it.  I thought the stain had finally disappeared … but here it is again. This is what unfinished business looks like.  

Of course there are elements of forgiveness ~ for myself and others.

But what about wiping the slate clean and forgetting all about it. Is that the answer? Is it even realistic? Does time heal all wounds? For me, the answer is “Yes, but” … which quietly dissolves into “No, not really.” 

And so here is where I am today. I realize that stain happened a long time ago to a young girl who had few skills and very little protection. But today I am a very different person. My forgiveness, offered many years ago, is still sincere. What to do next? I booked an energy session with a friend to clear and remove blocked and harmful energy patterns that no longer serve me. I have studied hard, learned many things, yet often stopped to smell the roses. I know honest lovely men, most of them married to dear friends of mine, but I enjoy their company and know there are more men out there like them. Today I walk with my head up, laugh easily, and am surrounded by friends I can trust to be there for me.

I believe the white carpet is my own young innocence. The "red" stain is the anger I felt deeply and never fully acknowledged. Stains happen, so do miracles.  Talking with a qualified coach and receiving energy work allowed me to move through the process with much more understanding; deeper and quicker and with more direction. 

And I know now that I can choose to pull the cord, stop the train and step off, thusly … moving forward with grace.                                    Blessed be.                                            

I’m Back !!!

WOW ~ is time flying by for you as well?

I intended to offer my paper, Expressions of Horses as Healers, one piece at a time; breaking it down into small segments.  I scheduled Parts 1 through 6, and my goal was to present the entire paper without interruption.

And then life happened.
 
And life has been "interesting."  I use that word a lot these days in place of difficult, overwhelming, hard or scary.  "Interesting" carries a different energy ~ and that appears to be the main lesson. As my friend BB said recently, "The energies of these times are proving to be intense, chaotic and uprooting as we move more fully into the Age of Aquarius."  I am learning how to handle the not so subtle energy fluctuations that are being beamed to earth at this time.  My teachers said they were coming and science now says that it is happening.  Some days are better than others.
 
So, now I wish to finish the series offering Parts 7 - 10 in, hopefully, short easy-to-read segments. This will allow me to move on, free of my self-imposed decision to offer the whole paper in its entirety before scurrying off in new and exciting directions.

I hope you find it interesting! 

Check out my new adventure and website,
www.healinghorseregistryinternational.com

UNRAVELLING MYSTERIES

UNRAVELLING MYSTERIES; An Anthology of Women and Aging.  

Last Monday night a small group gathered to listen to authors' reading their own pieces of work in the recently published anthology edited by Jyoti Wind. As a contributing author, I secretly had my own reservations about driving to Golden to a used book store, Read, Write & Brew. It was brutally cold, dark, and did I mention cold?  But we did. And it was good.  The readings were well received; I listened to women reading their own words and they were even more profound than when I had read them myself. And Jefferson, the store owner, donated homemade chocolate chip cookies!!!  The night was a complete success.

A friend, sister author and listener, wrote to me about the evening,

“...i ventured so much through other people's heads in that hour and a half....my heart filled up so much in that hour and a half...and, to top it all off, i learned what a MILF is..........”   *csm

This would make an excellent gift for the woman on your list who has everything. If you are interested, please go to Jyoti Wind's Facebook page for information on buying this new book.

And if this piques your interest in writing, we are having our monthly writing drop-in group at the Barbed Wire Books in Longmont, this Thursday night, Dec 8^th, 6 to 7:30 pm.

In-joy!!

My Place of Worship

I wrote this as I drove away from Abiquiu, New Mexico.  It was inspired by a conversation sitting in a beautiful sun room with new friends.

My Place of Worship

The landscape is my cathedral,
this rock shall be my pew

and a dandelion leaf my communion.
The bird and the cricket form my choir
and their tracks in the dirt are my hymnal.
The clouds across the azure sky, my stained glass windows,
even as the night-time sky is an open portal welcoming me in.
The trees are my elders,
this pungent sage, my incense.
My love for you shall be an unending tithe.
I kneel beside my horse, in awe of all that I witness.
Dear God, Goddess, Creator of all that is,
thank you for this sanctuary.
No walls to hold me in, nor others "out".
Bless you for this day.
Amen.
    

MY DEAR TILDE

 

I have always known that I was a tilde ( ~ ) kind of gal.  I just had not put the word, the symbol, and my persona, all together in the same conscious thought stream. But now that I have, I can see that it could never have been any other way.  

I grew up with the hyphen a.k.a. the dash (-); dashes were ordinary.  I flitted in and out of a fascination for ordinary. Elementary school is kind of a blur; all I can remember is my love for reading and recess – rather ordinary.

By junior high I dreamed of looking like most of the other girls = normal = ordinary. I was haunted by my parent’s out-dated sense of a proprietary dress code ~ they were stuck in the middle ages and I was walking the halls with thigh-high skirts and tight sweaters over padded bras. Well, mine was padded.  I lusted after well-shaped bangs and the wonders of caked on mascara. I wanted so badly to be ordinary and look like everyone else.

In high school I read the poetry of e.e.cummings and adored the fact that he had thrown away punctuation entirely.  The rules of punctuation seemed trite … vulgar even. I could a diagram a sentence till the cows came home, but “who cared”. Punctuation after all, was devised to assist a reader in following the thought process of the writer. For me, the use of ellipsis ( …. ) and my dear tilde (~) were much more expressive, and please pardon my fascination for multiple exclamation points ~ I am a highly excitable gal !!!

It was in my junior year of college that I found a book about Edgar Casey in the closet of my new apartment. I dove deep into the ideas of a planet of free will. The unrequited romantic in me continued to write poetry; it allowed me to mess with the rules, follow my true spirit, and meander with the meaning of my muse. Lost my virginity, but not my heart, to a husky Phi Sig junior who wrote me love poems ~ it seemed only fitting.

So imagine my surprise last week when I sat in a real estate appraisal class to prepare us for yet another over-haul of our regulated-to-the-max-no-room-for-free-thinking way of doing business with yet another round of federally-mandated-standards-of-professional-practice. It makes a sane person want to scream and believe me I have ranted till I am sick of hearing it myself. It is the reason so many of my peers, all very good appraisers, have thrown in the towel and ran away from this drowning profession. But I digress.

In the new UAD, Uniform Appraisal Dataset, effective September 1, 2011, the ( ~ ) tilde has now become the symbol of approximation.  As in, "if the year built of the subject property cannot be determined or is unavailable, “a tilde (~) must precede the estimated year built”.

There it was ~ on Page 30 of 58 pages of strict rules and definitions guaranteed to constrict the normal blood flow to arteries and cause inadvertent spasm-ing of various sphincter muscles in older, decrepit appraisers ~  I was actually liberated. My beloved tilde ( ~ ) had come to my rescue.

I will use my guidebook until I have memorized the definitions of C-1 through C-5 and Q-1 through Q-6. I can play their ridiculous game until they tire of this one and some moron gets paid a million dollars to come up with another set of rules that will allow the readers of these reports to become even more brain dead than they obviously already are. Poor dears. I will set in front of my computer, naked if I want, and continue to do my job in the restricted format now dictated, and pray the UPS delivery man doesn’t notice my tilde state of undress.

Barbed Wire Writers

Well, we have the first writing adventure under our belt and a good time was had by all.  Were some of the writers slightly challenged?  Yes, I think I heard a couple of big gulps ….. but did they all rise to the occasion? Absolutely!!  If you are remotely interested, give me buzz and we will get you the information about this NEW writing group. 

We have the room at Barbed Wire Bookstore reserved for the second Thursday of every month and would love to have you join us.  An RSVP would be appreciated so I can have the room set up and now we know, you can bring in your own coffee!!!

Here is what one of the participants had to say the next day. 

 “I wanted to give a shout out to Annette for offering and leading an awesome drop-in Writers Meet-Up at The Barbed Wire Book Store in Longmont last night! I had a great time and discovered that I am a pretty good writer outside my journal entries!!! We really had a great time and I can't wait for the next one! If anyone is interested in being more creative in your writing or to clear the cobwebs please come to the next one! They will be held on the 2nd Tuesday of each month from 6-7:30.  Don't forget that this is a great way to network!”

Next writing adventure:  November 10^th 2012,  6pm to 7:30 pm, Longmont, Colorado!

In-joy and have a great October.

A Guest Review ~ from our Innisfree Reading

Sixpenz Reading

It was raining so hard last night, an umbrella was needed, something unusual in
Colorado, as we walked around the corner and into the Innesfree Bookstore, on the
“Hill”. There was a reading by Sixpenz. The “z” for the dog always under one womanʼs
foot.

Words began flowing in and around the gray headed and students, some sitting around
tiny tables, some standing in the tight space. One woman after another read until the
entire room was awash in a movie of thoughts, images and ambience.
Sometimes the words, so deftly knitted together, that what remained after the voice
ended, resembled a finely woven tweed cloth draped, fluttering in the wind. Other times
vivid images of a womanʼs body curves caressed by a sheet still imprint on my eyes as
bright as her blue-green shirt. A wild turkey trotting alongside a biker pecking the bare
leg of his owner kicking back from his bike, was not only comic, every annoying peck on
the struggling biker trudging up the mountain, it was felt on my skin as well. I was taken
to foreign street scenes, red nail polish, a hand on a glass, was reminded we donʼt need
“saving”, that saintly mothers guide us, and we donʼt know who we think we know, after
all. Lastly, that the weak lay down until the strong rise up again.

The focused, hushed atmosphere accentuated the experience of the spoken word. Last
night every reading was articulately presented. I left refreshed, swept along by voices of
lives living their feminine journey. Christy, seated next to me and a newly transplanted
Boulder woman, so excited by the group, she wanted to join on the spot.

Ann Griffin
9/22/11

Taking In.

 

It feels like I have been in a receiving mode …. a place of “taking in” …  but I understand … it is also an inability to “put out”.  I am content to read, so many good books, and have read morning, noon and night.  Taking in the words, other people’s lives, even the made-up ones, tranquilized by their life situations. I listen to inspirational CD’s on those nights when I cannot sleep or those dark mornings when I desire a few more hours of respite ... and then wake up later with headphones pressed into my cheek.  I have sat with rented movies and dissolved into their premise letting them flavor my own life.   I have accomplished the “have to’s” and even a few of the “should’s”, but even as I think about writing some little incident, I cannot muster the strength. 

And amazingly enough, I have allowed myself to indulge in this place for weeks with very little recrimination.

But I am growing now uncomfortable.  I have flyers to create, I have workshops to fill, I have new people to meet and the ideas that have been percolating are ready for more.  And I have so many ideas!! It is time … to gather up all the little pieces of paper that have accumulated on my table tops … to review my moments of inspiration penned so quickly.   

I am heading home for my mother’s birthday and these ideas need to be birthed so that I will fit better, comfortably, in the seat of my transport.

It was not a cocoon and I don’t feel like a butterfly. I lay in bed this morning as the warm glow promises a pretty day and drank a cup of lovely coffee. I read my story and the many other stories printed in a new book, Red Silk, a Red Tent Anthology. I am thrilled to hold it in my hand, to see the printed words, some of them are mine!  I am inspired.  I am ready. And I do have so many ideas!!

ZEN & New Computer Set-up

I am re-reading Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance by Robert M Pirzig, while I wait for my new computer to arrive.  I am surprised by the byline, “An Inquiry Into Values.”  I don’t remember that. In fact, I don’t remember much about this book.  It is totally new to me. The paper back I recently purchased for $2.50 at the used book store looks exactly like the one I moved from house to house for the last twenty-five years or so. I am, at this point, not sure that I ever read the book even though I professed many times to having done so. It was first published in 1974, one year after I left Missouri and travelled to Colorado in my personal search for freedom.

This morning I am curled up on the couch with my little purple book as I wait for Bonnie to come and take away the frightful, strange, ‘too new’ yucky feelings I get when I look at my new computer. I read these words in Part II, Chapter 14, which speak to my anxiety – my fear of the unknown.

“Assembly of Japanese bicycle require great peace of mind.” ...

…"Peace of mind isn’t at all superficial, really,” I expound. “It’s the whole thing.  That which produces it is good maintenance; that which disturbs it is poor maintenance. What we call workability of the machine is just an objectification of this peace of mind. The ultimate test’s always your own serenity. If you don’t have this when you start and maintain it while you’re working you’re likely to build your personal problems right into the machine itself.” 

WOW!!!!  There it is.

Before Bonnie gets here I want to adjust/transform my fearfulness of computers into something more productive.

A willingness to allow this computer to be as great as it can be ~ allowing me to keep my real estate business going even as I move into my new career as an equine gestalt coach, writing and producing fliers as I go!!!!!
I intend that my quickening heartbeat is all about excitement for the future, not the dread from long time limiting beliefs of the past.
Together we ARE powerful. 
I sense a different way of being moving in. I make way for it.  

And I hope that when I finally get around to unpacking the boxes in my shed I will find my original copy of this marvelous book.  Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance. It is timeless.

Thank you, Bonnie, for your time, patience, and your far reaching knowledge of the computer. 

Thank You, Thank You, Thank You!!!!!!

PS.  She told me her name is Melanie. Yes, my computer told me this. Could be my imagination, but no matter, I will call her Melanie.

Gracious Miracle

This was one of my journeys during a shamanic writing workshop that I took a few years ago.

As a group we had been instructed in the afternoon’s process.  Each of the participants began by gently grooming the horse in front of them. As the drumming started we were instructed to step back and begin our journey.  I have never tried journey work standing up before, but, why not ??

Accepting the rhythm of the drum, I moved back away from the horse and closed my eyes. I quickly found myself in total darkness.  I was quiet with the blackness and then it began to take shape.  It somehow felt like I was in a very large tube, the darkness felt soft, like velvet.  It was not something that I could touch because I was somehow suspended in the middle of the tube, easily and gently being supported there. No worries.

I begin to notice a procession. It started way below me, the shapes were small. It looked as if they were slowly walking up black velvet steps that I could not really see, just imagine. The shapes were not close to me, but they further defined the feeling that I was in a large black cylinder. The procession arched around me and as they grew closer I could tell that they were horses, of every color; colors that “real” horses don’t normally come in ~ there were bright yellow horses and pink ones, and green ones.  Some of them looked like carousal horses, but it was also very apparent that they were living, breathing, and moving animals. They were beautiful.  As they grew close, I saw their wings. Some were folded back along their backs but most were standing up, connected at the upper shoulder and moving gently with each step.  It was so awesome I may have stopped breathing.

I have been told for years in different readings that I could work with the horses if I so chose, and help them get their wings.  But I could not visualize it and was totally unsure what to do next ….. and here they were, and they all had their wings.  Sensing my question they said, “Yes, we already have our wings. We have always had our etheric wings. They are a sign of our divinity. Only you humans have never acknowledged them. Some of you are only now beginning to acknowledge our divinity.  It is good and we are thankful.” 

“So what am I supposed to do?” silently formulating another question in my mind.

“There are horses who have forgotten their own wings. You will find them in your healing work. You can help them remember and restore to them their divinity if they so choose. Share this vision with them and they will instantly remember ~ they will re-awaken their own cellular memory”. 

I nodded my head in agreement and continued to watch the procession of amazing creatures, silently climbing, creating now a wondrous spiral around me. I had tears in my eyes as rapid drumming drew me back into the arena and an outside voice instructed each of us to return to our bodies. I quietly whispered my prayers of gratitude for their willingness to be present with me this day. Another gracious miracle received.