marina, they called her. marina, marina, from the sea, the most beautiful child. “marina, where is your home?” “the sea, the sea.” when they baptized her, they said her spirit will find water. marina is an ugly cousin: hair too straight, skin too pale, eyes more like the reedy, muddy creek behind grandmother’s house than the roaring great ocean.
Read More1. The day we packed all of my things into boxes I felt something leave my body. Like the longer I occupied that space, the longer it occupied me. A friend came by to help me pile the odds and ends I reluctantly scattered around the place we called home, in to the brand new SUV, I decisively named Miracle. God placed me at the wrong place at the right time, so that when the day came for the exorcism, we would be ready.
Read MoreMother.
Maiden.
Crone.
His birth was unsettling in a primal way.
The archetypes came unmoored,
tectonic plate shifts.
I was floating, untethered.
At once a maiden
*rediscovered in the notes of my iPhone...
Coachella 420
We rode in through the mountains.
We dropped a pin at our car.
We met a pirate and he gave us swords. We hopped on board and drove us in through gates, around fences, past campsites, through squads and couples heading in for the day.
We hopped off and paid the tender and headed in toward the Ferris wheel.
It was another hot day.
Thousands of people moving, posing, laughing, feeling, looking, searching.
“Come play with me.”
“Not right now, sweet thing, I have too much to do.”
“Okay, for just a half hour then. I promise to leave you alone for a while if you spend a half hour with me now.”
Last Saturday I went to a writers day in
The park. I made myself a small lunch
And filled my water bottle with ice and
Lastly, grabbed a folding chair from my
Deck. I packed everything in the trunk of
My car and headed off to a park I had
Never been to. The GPS did the trick and
Got me there in fifteen minutes.
I have breast cancer that has metastasized in my lungs. At her recent visit, my hospice nurse said that my lungs sounded like two dry sponges rubbing together. I am on oxygen all day every day. With the effort it takes me to walk a few feet, I feel as if I’ve run a marathon. I’m tired. Some days I just sleep.
Read MoreWhen my friend, David, was a wee lad, a quest of his mother’s inquired of him, “What do you want to be when you grow up?”
Without hesitation, he replied, “a woman.”
I wish I could but I know I can’t. If I could, I would. I always hear those statement together. So... I GPS'd it. ! look down at my phone, because to hold it straight up in front of me, and stand as if I'm looking into someones face would look crazy.
Read MoreI wept for 10 seconds today. I normally don't cry. I can't. Who has the time? The thick, unbreakable layers of my sadness lie at the opposite end of the earth. I'm convinced I can't reach them unless I spend twelve days in an Ayahuasca retreat held deep in the jungles of Peru. Only an old, wise Peruvian shaman could serve me a potion to awaken the dormant part of my brain that harbors the demons within me.
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