Sea Witch

Today I’m a right proper sea witch. Down to the water go I, wild of hair, entangled in kelp, and dripping with salt. I’m searching for moonstones cast up by the incoming tide, and instead find jaspers and shells, and no moonstones until I stop looking for them and then they come rolling in. Isn’t that just the way of life?

The pelicans fly overhead in great flocks. They proceed both north and south so I know they are not in migration, but scope for schools of fish to eat. I spread my arms wide as they fly over. I am not the only human doing this. It is a good beach, this one. No tourists. Just lone walkers and the flirts of surfers.

So, I marvel at the moonstones rolling in at the last few moments of my walk and I laugh. For the moonstones are like life. You don’t know where they are going to be or when they are going to roll in, but you know that it’s your job to go down to the beach and look. And they’ll find you. The right ones. The ones meant for you. I pause at the base of the cliffs and near a spray of ice plant flowers to pen these words.

Gulls stand on rocks as the water comes in providing them with their supper. As with the moonstones, they don’t know exactly what is coming to them, but they know that it will, and they wait on the rocks.

So what is the use of worry?

Sparrow

Yesterday a sparrow flew into a window inside one of the places I work. I didn’t see this accident; this confusion of egress. A colleague did, and said she just flew into the window frantically and fell to the floor.




Against all the protests of No! Don’t Touch Her! I picked her up. There is nothing to fear in nature such as her. What was she going to do? Peck me? That would be a minor injury. She was motionless, and made no effort to escape my intrusion. Her eyes were bright. She was warm, and a soft thrill met the finger I placed on her chest. She was paralyzed and alive. My heart bled.

I took her back to my office and regarded her closely. Her eyes remained bright and her body remained warm. At first I thought there was nothing I could do. And then I realized that I could be with her while she passed. No one should be alone in either birth or death. That was what I could do for her. I could send her love.

Fortunately I had set aside a few hours to work at my desk on some projects, so I could easily accommodate this small creature in her dying hours. If I held my hands in a slightly convex Namaste/Prayer position, she completely fit. I offered her Reiki twice over the next hour and a half and twice she took it. I prayed for her safe journey, whether it be to recovery or to leave. She remained warm and motionless. Her eyes continued bright. The chest thrill began to fade ever so slightly. Any thought I had that she was merely stunned and would make a theatrical recovery to suddenly rouse and fly away left me.

I held her in the crook of my arm, and checked on her between drafting pages on the computer. Another hour went by. Finally I held her in my hands and felt her pass. The energy left her and the light in her eyes extinguished. Slowly she cooled, and then her nits and fleas left her. It was at that exodus of parasites that I knew it was time to wrap her body; she had gone and flown to the light.

At the end of my workday I regarded this slight corpse that was next to my purse. I took her on my evening walk and adjusted my route to take me to a very happy park that is out of the way and known to only a few people. I left the path and made my way to an out of the way copse of trees. I unwrapped her and laid her to rest nestled in some sweet grass under a pile of dry leaves. It would have been wrong to bury her; that is not the way of birds. There she can gently return to the earth undisturbed.

At home later I felt a gentle release in my heart, and I let the tears flow. I cried for the honor of having been with her at her passing; at being permitted to share such elegant tragedy. I wept for my own past traumas, and maybe resolved them just a little further. I cried for reasons I couldn’t even articulate. I had experienced something profound. This little sparrow had taught me so much.

Tonight I went out of my way to drive by the park and stopped. I did not get out; she did not need me poking at her resting place. I looked in her general direction, about half a mile in from where I was. It felt peaceful. I knew she was free.

Valentine's Day Trees

Love is a temporary madness. It erupts like an earthquake and then subsides. And when it subsides you have to make a decision. You have to work out whether your roots have become so entwined together that it is inconceivable that you should ever part. Because this is what love is. Love is not breathlessness, it is not excitement, it is not the promulgation of promises of eternal passion. That is just being "in love" which any of us can convince ourselves we are. Love itself is what is left over when being in love has burned away, and this is both an art and a fortunate accident. Your mother and I had it, we had roots that grew towards each other underground, and when all the pretty blossoms had fallen from our branches we found that we were one tree and not two.- St Augustine

High Tide

If you go to the beach at high tide, you are going to get wet. Know that.

At high tide you aren’t going to find crystals. Those are for low tide. But you are going to get wet. You are going to get slammed by incoming waves and you are going to learn things you wouldn’t have learned otherwise and see things you wouldn’t have seen otherwise. You’ll learn where to step and when the waves are coming for you. It’s a great metaphor for Life.

Today I went to the beach at high tide. A narrow strip of sand called me, and the sea chased me into the rocks and pushed me in to quicksand and uncertain footing. I am like a mountain goat in the shore rocks.

I met many ladybugs who landed on me without hesitation. They stretched their wings and had a sniff of me and took off once more.

I met flocks of shorebirds who paid me little mind as they chased the water line back and forth seeking their Sunday brunch.

I saw where others had come before me and left their mark.

And of course my flirt of surfers.

I was surprised by a wave, and called it Thigh Tide, as I was unintentionally soaked to the waist. Silly ocean. Yes, it has the last word on these matters.

I found a rock as speckled as an egg, and full of magic. The cats have it now, and won’t relinquish it back to me yet. They can keep it. The ocean took my cares, and replaced them with calm.

Crystals in the tide

Went to the beach today to gather crystals left by the tide and to restore my mind. I accomplished both.

The sky was streaked with clouds which looked like two angels in flight. Or maybe a giant gerbil. I'm not sure.

One of the angels cast off a feather.

The birds studied their reflections in the sand.

And Ginger Cat enjoyed the day's haul of moonstones, prehnite, quartz, and agates.

Looking Forward

Wow the holidays are here and have really taken up my time. I’ve been totally preoccupied with work, with year-end business, with the business of the holidays, and parties, and people, and obligations, and…. Oh wait, aren’t we supposed to be having fun?

I got a great lesson the other day. I ran out at lunch to purchase some last minute New Year’s supplies and found myself in the local drugstore. Ahead of me in line was an older lady.

She was immaculately dressed: well done wig, sparkly scarf, boiled wool coat, dark stockings, and low heels. She was pushing a cart with three huge mechanical Santa Clauses on post Christmas sale – these fellows were about three feet tall each, with zombie like movements, flashing lights, and sang with a definite Asian accent. These Santas were great. You don’t get better kitsch that this.

As it turns out, the lady was 89 years old. She was buying the Santas for NEXT Christmas. And in addition, her birthday party was that night – she was having friends in and planning a great time.

That, my friends, is the secret to longevity. To be 89 and planning (and taking action toward) next Christmas.

I raise my New Year’s toast to her. And to her zombie men in red.

Treasure

Today I was helping a young man organize his legal research. He initially seemed an unlikely candidate: heavily inked, nervous affect, blunt and taciturn. He displayed all the classic signs of a tweaker who had been up for several days. He was, however, polite and appropriate with me, and as his story slowly unfolded he found his way into increasingly heavy legal materials.

He sat at a large table in the reading room and spent several hours in the material, and occasionally would ask me for another reference. Finally he asked for a dictionary. And then came up to me, confounded because he could not find a particular word. A really basic, non-legal word. The word was one ending in –ed. I found the primary word for him, which he had identified and explained that the word he was studying was the past tense of the primary word. He looked puzzled. I pointed at the word in the dictionary. ‘This is the present tense word’ I explained. ‘The word in the book you are studying is written in the past tense’. He looked up at me, still puzzled. ‘Present tense? Is that, like, the now?’ he asked. Yes, I assured him, and explained how the definition showed the various tense forms for the word.

I went back to my work marveling at how a young man, presumably educated in our society, could not know what the present tense and past tense of a pretty basic word was. And then it struck me how this was a metaphor for how many of us live. We don’t know how to distinguish the present from the past.

We dwell in past anguish; in memories, guilt, delusion, or pain. We dwell in denial, or we hold on to attitudes or thought patterns that no longer serve us, or have any use for us. In other words, we don’t let go.

And this is so silly and unproductive. Because all we have is the present. The past is beyond us, and the future not yet in grasp. All we have is this moment; this very second of our existence. And in this present moment we have the ability to create our reality and affect not only the future, but also the past.

The quantum physicists assure us that thoughts become things, and can alter the very DNA of our being. These concepts, well-known millennia ago and then forgotten, are now being proven in laboratories all over the world. What we do in the present matters. It’s our workbench. It’s the place from which we design our life, and our very world.

The past is history; the future is mystery. This moment is a gift. That is why it is called The Present.

So take this moment; this gift, and look at it. See the beauty you have within you. See the beauty in every moment and regard the treasures in the every day things. Don’t confuse the present with the past. The past is gone. Right now is the treasure. Don’t let it slip away from you. Use it well.