30/31

I retreat, to lick my wounds and recover from all of the rejection and judgment, once more.
"I am so tired of this 'not good enough' story," I tell S, as we spend her daughter's tenth-birthday reveling in food.  Although they're celebrating, I'm emotionally eating.  S understands my need to wallow and allows me the space to bee exactly where I am.  I surround myself with dozens of books found on the shelves and tabletops within her home.  Sprawled out on her king-sized bed, it is her business partner and spiritual teacher, Arjuna Ardagh, whose words resonate deep in my aching belly.

His short novel, The Last Laugh, is filled with animal medicine (ladybugs!), laughter and LOVE as it moves its reader through the quick tale of one man's awakening - from failure, despair and a near-suicide to discovery, redemption and reclamation.  Of course, it's always the human mind that gets in One's way - creating attachment, suffering and misery by not bee-ing in the present moment. 

In Ardagh's book, the guru also offers a 10-step recipe for awakening:
1.) FEEL WHAT YOU MOST RESIST (i.e. S. once shared with me how she laid in bed for three hours as her entire body was wracked with jealousy.  She allowed herself to feel her feelings as deeply as she could so that she could then transmute her pain.) 
2.) Become the Other
3.) "Just Like Me" (i.e. "She's ugly - just like me."  "He's hot - just like me.")  
4.)  The real teacher is the present moment.  Respond within and from it by allowing your listening to guide you.
5.) Drop the past.
6.) Act without thought.
7.) Practice Gratitude.
8.) Give just to give.  Add color where it is missing.  Be generous with yourself.  Make love to life in all her forms.
9.) Become friends with the darkness.  The Zen poet Bunan once said, 'Die while still alive, be absolutely dead.  Then do whatever you want, it's all good.'
10.) Step into and own your own freedom.  You are free.  You are free of even the need to be free.  You are free of me; free of any work; free of any teaching.  It is done.

And a few pertinent quotes that just felt so damn ripe for this now:
"See, the way you are with a woman is just like you are with all of life.  One mirrors the other.  If you hold back, if you are half-assed, she will turn from you, and close to you.  If you give everything of yourself to her, she reveals her deeper beauty to you.  All of life is just one huge beautiful woman.  You have to make love to her all the time.  Seduce her, find her ticklish spots, open her, in all her countless forms and appearances.  And then penetrate her completely, till of her writhes in surrender.
Lick her, bite the inside of her thighs, drive your tongue deep between the wet lips of her juicy mango.  Suck her, give her everything you have.  Whisper sweet nothings in her ear.  She is craving your penetration.  Thrust deeply into her in every moment, like there has never been any other moment, and there will never be.  That's the whole key, you see, to bring all of you to her.  Penetrate her so deeply that she writhes and screams and begs you for more.  Slay her with the sword of you absolute presence." 

"What more can I hope for than what I'm made of, this legacy of embarrassed compromise, of failure to stick to one's course?  But its so much bigger than that.  I'm not only shackled to a family of mediocrity but to a species that's bent on consuming its way to destruction.  This is the legacy I pass on to my children, this legacy and this example.  I come from a long line of weak-willed men, generation after generation, whose ideals are so faintly conceived and asserted they are washed away in the current of the status quo.  
I conceived my children like Nero did, when the culture was already beyond the point of no return.  Just last week, I read somewhere that global temperatures are averaging three degrees above normal.  The signs are everywhere, but like lemmings we rush, following power-crazed self-righteous leaders over the cliff.  Give me a bigger house, an upgrade to my airline seat and my RAM, and I'll turn a blind eye to the madness.
It's all dying.  Not dying in a natural way; dust to dust, ashes to ashes.  The very system that supports a healthy life and death is itself dying.  Every year more species wiped from the globe by this collective trance of greed.  A huge machine smashing everything in its path, chomping everything down its greedy gullet....
I once read a story in the paper about a man, quite well-to-do, good job, worked for one of the long-distance companies, with a wife and three children all doing well.  One day he shot them all and then committed suicide.  The question we all ask ourselves is 'why?'  When all is going well, why?  In my attic at dawn, cold, alone, I knew why.  Perhaps that poor crazy man was saner than the rest of us, perhaps he saw through the futility of trying to make something right that is plunging, out of control, into something wrong.  Perhaps he saw the future he was raising his children for; one with polluted water, polluted hearts.  One in which love and nobility are insidiously turned into products to sell." 

"The music goes on and on.
We're dancing still, we're laughing still.
Put that computer screen down now, my beautiful friend.
COME JOIN THE DANCE."

snake medicine, too ~ on failure & success

I awoke fresh from another snake dream.
This time, however, I was once again bitten.

In the dream, I was at an outdoor location, camping with my sister and her friend.
They alerted me to the snake on the ground, and I danced around its slithering presence
until it began hopping, using its singular coil like a spring.  It hopped right onto my neck,
and bit me several times.  I think it may have bitten me in my hand as well when I brushed it off my body.  My father also played a role in this scenario, consoling me when I became emotionally devastated.  "Why am I being bitten again?" was the old refrain playing its sad, lilting tune out. 

On Monday, M. was talking quite a bit about snake medicine.  "We are taking a lot of information in at once and, then, we are having to sit and be with it in order for it to digest," she said.  With the Chinese New Year of the Snake upon us it's a fitting metaphor.

It's been a powerful first month of 2013 with lessons learned that have been both elementary and huge.  Friendship is a theme that I love to ruminate upon.  What does it look like, truly?

Friendship is generous, giving, loyal and yielding.  R. surrendered his entire physical life to me - no holds barred, without shame or guilt and in total trust.  I have witnessed him do this with another, too.
And, I observe how I have similarly offered the exact same to others.  In return, I heard about how R's friend blatantly disrespected his family.  Meanwhile, I have been on the receiving end of a complete and total lack of reciprocation, as well.  Instead, in contrast, I try to bee regenerative in my exchange - so I breathe and stretch with his mom, translate homilies and go to church where his dad sings and is a deacon, talk privately with his sister when drama happens, do acroyoga with his brother, and then dedicate a book to him because its the least I can do to give back just a bit of all that is freely being shared with me.  These small acts of engagement are goodwill embodied.  

Unfortunately, I am finally admitting to myself that I feel surrounded by the exact opposite - here in San Diego, it feels like the "me me me-mentality" is the status quo.  It's rife - the stinky way that we, the supposedly "conscious" crowd, are perpetuating popular paradigm.  We're trying to crawl over one another's heads in some forced effort to get to some perceived, other location.  "HELLO!!!!!!!!" I am screaming into our collective faces.  "THIS IS IT."  (These moments, now.)
Duh.  

Not too long ago, I called a soul sister who was on a much needed vacation.  She cried when she heard my voice, because nobody called her.  Meanwhile, I worked for that same "sisterhood" and it also couldn't show up for me - not for my birthday, or my events.  How sad.  I've married a musician and provided food and shelter for another, and though they say, "I am so grateful," they're actions rarely demonstrate this.  Unless, of course, I remind them, then reciprocation comes.  Like a scolding mother, I have to ask for a return kiss.

In December, R. made up a song and sang it on the spot after I had simply made cups of tea and then served us them in the living room.  In that moment, R. demonstrated what LOVE can look like.  And, the best thing about this LOVE is that it doesn't "mean" anything - it just means that we are grateful for this now and that we're giving it all we got so that we can move on to whatever is to come next.
Whatever is to come next.

Embodiment is not something that you stand up on a stage and speak about - down to a crowd of clueless faces.  And, it isn't found facing downward dog on a yoga mat in a warm studio.    

What felt safest to me about R. was that he was willing to call the stink out for what it is - BULLSHIT.   

This weekend, R's sister talked about the old masculine way of pride, of being unforgiving and how tribal culture slights one another by not showing up to each others' parties.  "I wanted to practice unconditional love," she shared, "but our showing up only created more anger, passive aggressive behavior and violence."  And all I can feel is how I am so ready to thrive in a world where the feminine way of regenerative exchange, true friendship and unconditional LOVE is embodied.

2-9

“In Africa I was a member of a family—of a sort of family that the people of your culture haven't known for thousands of years. If gorillas were capable of such an expression, they would tell you that their family is like a hand, of which they are the fingers. They are fully aware of being a family but are very little aware of being individuals. Here in the zoo there were other gorillas—but there was no family. Five severed fingers do not make a hand.” 

-- Daniel Quinn, Ishmael: An Adventure of the Mind and Spirit

I just wanted to leave.  I was so angry at him.

I didn't want to see him.  I didn't want to talk to him.

So, I took my stuff and left.  

I had the car, though.

Which meant that I had to come back.

 

During my twelve-hour exodus, I contemplated returning to an old lover.

But, when I saw him from a distance, I knew that the past was over.

Then, I stopped in to see another and, again, I was happy to discover that the

electric pulse that once throbbed in my loins was gone.  Still, what remains is always LOVE - 

only now, it's a sweet, generous and forgiving LOVE.

 

With soft surrender, I returned to experience a warm vibration emanating from my heart when I walked back into his room.  It is time alone that affords us the opportunity for deepening into our relationships.  And, it has been his family whom I have deepened with.  This has been the most beautiful of all.  He alone is just one part - if it weren't for the whole, I would have turned on my flat-footed heel and walked out weeks ago.  Tribe nourishes us in this way.  Although my relating with and to him will fluctuate - with ups and downs and all arounds - it is my relationship with his family that will keep our friendship afloat for a long time to come.  After all, it is family that sustains us.

twenty-eight

"Magick"

M. says that last Thursday night's, "We Have Risen," was a magical evening.
Tell tale proof could bee how one of the evening's performers, a Sengalese man who teachers West African dancing and drumming locally, fainted.  Long-limbed, his over 6'-tall body went from vertical to horizontal in a few seconds flat right in front of a small, round "bar" that doled out red wine and beer during our event.  He fell right on top of a small, white child - a baby girl under two-years-old.  Her "improbable" placement in that moment kept his head from hitting the floor.  In other words, the baby broke the man's fall.  He was lifted up off of her writhing body and they both were moved outside the gallery's front doors where each was tended to.  Fortunately, a doctor was on-hand and "miraculously" found each person to be unhurt.  What could have caused such a ruckus?  One wonders.... 

One woman beelieved it was the spoken word piece that was taking place in the center of our heart-shaped performance space when another local singer and artist was telling an Earthly tale about both the dark and the light.  With grand fanfare and resonant theatrics, Zoe beat the anecdotal drum of story - reminding us of its medicine.  L. fell right at the exact moment when Zoe illuminated such an experience - "and the princess fell to the Earth."  And, BAM!, next thing I know, L. is laid out cold on the floor below the bar with a baby crying underneath him.

Outside, while tending to the drama, T. berated me.  "You're not paying attention," she said.  "The energy is dark in there.  We must smudge it."  Given the space to do what she felt called to do, the woman who shared that her intention for our evening was to "transcend duality" then took to the microphone and intoned as well as sang in our "shift."  "Shift the light," T. spit into the loudspeakers, as she encouraged us to open up our mouths and sing the same refrain.  Our collective commitment for our shared evening was that our One, unified heart was open.  

Later, L. went on to lead us through numerous West African dance steps as we moved together in time and unison across the gallery floor.  Meanwhile, baby girl S. was carried home on her grandmother's hip, ready for bed after a full-night spent running around a dance floor after another two-year-old guest.  I didn't see when M. rolled his self and his wheelchair out of our event.  The seniors and the babies retired, the occupiers occupied a corner of the gallery, the "biggest art dealer in San Diego" joined in our tribe photo, while people from India, Pakistan, Columbia, Mexico, the United States, and more broke bread, communicated and shared, dance and enjoyed together.  An embodiment of the King's vision?
INDEED. 
And, all by the LOVE of a QUEEN.

27 ~ LOVE Flies

So, I've been reflecting - maybee, I was booted out of two separate locations in one year because I am supposed to FLY.  Perhaps, this 2013 marks the year of my LOVE World Tour....  I've began where one, ideally, always begins - right here in my own backyard in San Diego at a local Lebanese family's lovely home in Spring Valley.  It's been a bee~autiful experience of sinking deeper into village when I've also been confronted with reflections of a self that I had forgotten about - a quiet, reserved, insecure me who is afraid to take initiative and bee proactive.  This little girl, I will always carry her with me.  It's the natural paradox of bee~ing human.  And, I accept the journey.  Nonetheless, who always remains is a resilient woman who is willing to sit with her discomfort while relentlessly building towards her heart's song.

In the process, I have become an adopted daughter to an amazing family that embodies the values that I hold nearest and dearest.  Time spent together communicating and sharing over Arabic coffee; a family room filled with the raucous laughter of an inter-generational tribe playing together, from volley-soccer to wrestling; and resources abundantly shared as though there is always room for one more, because there is.  Eager to reciprocate, I've led the matriarch of the family through daily stretching and breathing yoga exercises, dyed her hair and made her breakfast, while I've also helped to translate an Arabic homily with the patriarch who is a Catholic deacon and whose mass services I have attended.  Through it all, I've been embraced open armed as family.

Last Thursday night's, "We Have Risen," (click here for the online photo gallery) was an event that I had been building toward.  Now, with the first copies of my first "LOVEBOOK" officially produced it is about time I fly this nest.  And, I am thinking that it is time to fly my bee-loved San Diego nest for a bit, as well.  If you'd love to host this soaring dreamer, let me know.  I am headed to where ever the Universe beckons...

26 ~ feeding a free heart

How do you feed your heart?
Is your heart free?
How do you free your heart?
Is your art free?
How do you feed your art?
Is your heart free?

 Is Mine?
ONLY WHEN I GET MY MIND OUT OF MY WAY.

24/25 ~ Introducing My First "LOVEBOOK"

YES!
It is here.
And available for YOU.

"MORE LOVE:
Connection, Sensuality & Intimacy 
In Your Life Now, A LOVEBOOK"

www.royaljellypublishing.com

twenty-three (23) - Sex As Medicine

t

It's a great conversation and it came up today, as I sat with a group of four men, in a bedroom in Spring Valley.  In the video we shot on the spot together, I am holding space for what is and for what is wanting to come through; I am allowing the present to unfold, without trying to force my will, a way or, even, what I think is 'right' (by telling my hard-core feminist to take a backseat when the conversation of the objectification of the female form comes up, for example.  Because, one truth is that sex sells.)

There's also an element in here about the King's dream.  I see 'color' in how it is our unique hues and tones that make us each marvelously different.  And, I have always simply refused to let fear rule my connecting with and to anyone.  Plus, what is there to bee afraid of when it comes to us humans?  After all, we all want the same thing - Sex, Love & Connection.

twenty one & twenty two

I missed posting yesterday as I was enjoying celebrating the King's dream at the World Beat Center so please accept this post for yesterday and today.  
I am continuing to ruminate upon the word FORGIVENESS as the topic feels crucial to this now, to myself and my day-to-day life as well as to the King's words.
The most important question it seems, is "Can I forgive myself?"
For being imperfect, "not good enough," (HA!) and for my own in-authenticity and in-congruency?

Because, I believe, that it is only from this space that I can then offer the same generosity of Spirit to others.    

May my life and this work be testament -
"Si, se puede."

Celebrating our Royalty

"Your kiss
like giant space rock
bursting into flame
overhead
shot through
this wandering soul/star
puncturing its atmosphere
leaving it to burn
in orange anticipation
and in the heat of red's passion
awaiting
your lips return." 
I call it,
MAGIC.
---chc 2005

HAPPY BIRTHDAY  TO A KING ~
KEEPING HIS DREAM ALIVE
in 2013 & Beeyond.

nineteen

This is it.
Nada mas.
Nada menos.
Eso ~
LOVE.
Amor.
Esta todo.

Daily Dose of LOVE for Today 01/18/2013 ~ On Listening

Today, I missed the Chai lattes you briefly made for me as I once stood firmly in front of a counter.
I never told you that, weeks after our run-in, I was going through my things and came across my Meyers-Briggs reading - a print-out I've held onto since I was in college in the late 90s that details how my eNFp personality type is the "portrait of a champion" which only shows up in 2% of the population.  I knew then that the Universe sent you to me because it was screaming for me to remember my true destiny.

Our relationships aren't personal - they are merely lessons showing us what we need to learn, so long as we allow ourselves to receive their bittersweet teachings.  Yet, my ego was holding on to its addiction to love as pain up right until the very last moments of 2012.  It's funny, how life works.  Thank God for R.  He showed up just in the nick of time - after 26,000 years, maybee - so that I could experience and taste a generous, unconditonal LOVE that doesn't hurt.  (A LOVE I like to believe that I am quite adept at giving out.)  One that comes without guarantees and expectations.  Just LOVE because there's nothing more.

Intuitive and a bit psychic, I am continually bombarded by messages and markers from the Universe, pointing me in certain directions.  The task is to simply follow the signs without thinking I know "why" or, even, the meaning of them.  Because, I never do - I only know that it is important that I listen and pay attention. 

I have always been fond of my initials, "CC," because I share them with all four of my most primal tribe members, from my mother and father to my brother and sister.  It did not go unnoticed by me that these letters are important in your world, as well.  They also now play a part in R's ongoing intimacies, too.  And, again, I don't have to know "why," I can simply allow that it just is. 

IT JUST IS.
LOVE.
There's nothing more.

seventeen ~ a new video! (guess the topic!?)

Earlier a peer recommended that I make a call that I haven't made in years.  To an old mentor, someone whom, at one time, I worked side-by-side, and whose number was once filed away in the immediate rolodex of my memory.  Today, I had to look his number up in my paper telephone book. 
We chatted as though the years that have passed in between our past moments of intimacy to this now of little to no contact have been but a drop in the bucket.  And, that's the beautiful thing about relationships, connection and life - we can always pick up where we left off because life always goes on.  It always goes on.  Thus, I appreciated the opportunity to once more practice FORGIVENESS and to embody the LOVE that I so enjoy espousing upon.
In JOY.

sixteen (candles)

An iconic hit from childhood,
and teenaged passion blows out like a breeze,

Anonymous random postings to a blog is like
a needle in a haystack.
What's the point?

I like to write and speak in code.
Not because I mean to confuse
but because it's fun.
Besides, what else is there to do
but to enjoy the ride?

And, today's video says it all.

May you create comfort for yourself
however these words find you.

On Forgiveness

Here's the thing about bee-ing an Embodiment Artist, it means that I can see and smell my own $hit quite well.  So, when I started talking about the above event, "We Have Risen," which is slated for next Thursday night, January 24th in downtown San Diego, the fact that I was harboring resentment in regards to the actions of another hit me like a ton of bricks.  

The only way I can have the audacity to produce an evening celebrating the work of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. - and, more specifically, his vision of "Beloved Community" - is if I am willing to stand up and embody his ideas.  FORGIVENESS is an essential part of the process of this being human.  My willingness to forgive not just the actions of others but my own inaction is tantamount. 

So, forgive I did and I do.  I raise my palms up to the sky in an act of both surrender and humility.  "I don't know the answers here," I say.  "I am merely willing to ask questions, listen for guidance and TRUST that all is unfolding exactly as it is meant to."  

In'shala.

a LOVE poem

This love poem is for you
for teaching me the sweet purity
of the form,
for being a master to my student,
for loving me the way you do.
This love poem is for you
for your bushy eyebrows, and jet black locks,
for mirroring me the way you do.
This love poem is for you
for your grand expression,
your divine timing and the way the song
bursts forth from your chest, filling the morning hours
with your RICH harmony.
This love song is for you
for eight shooting stars, beautiful nights
and all the time you generously shared
your bed, family and home.
This love song is for you.
For holding me gently and rubbing away my scars.
This love song is for you.
For receiving me without all of the hurting,
without all of the bites and the bruises, the poison and the pain,
this love song is for you.
Perhaps someday, this ballad will become a great love story,
recorded in the annals of history, murals painted across crumbling stone as architectural effigies are built.  Maybe one day, we will be that space rock bursting into flame overhead, shooting stars plummeting back towards Earth after another twenty-six thousand year journey to the center
of the Milky Way Galaxy and back.  What is now, however, is what shall always remain, 
MY LOVE FOR YOU.

fifteen ~ purring like a cat

FIFTEEN SIMPLE TIPS FOR LOVE IN YOUR LIFE NOW
fifteen: Purr like a cat
fourteen: Peel away your defenses
thirteen: Give/show GRATITUDE!
twelve: Remember your dreams!
eleven: Story IS Medicine
ten: Create humor, bee silly & laugh at yourself.
nine: The triumvirate of human connection - connect to your Self, others & the Earth
eight: Perfection is bee-ing imperfect!
seven: Share what is in your heart!
six: Listen!
five: Commit to our collective healing.
four: Give & receive healing touch (to yourself and others).
three: LAUGH A LOT!!!
two: Dance!
One: Set Your Intention(s)

& GO!!!!!!

14 ~ stripping away the armor

"I dreamed of you this morning," he said.  "You were standing in a calm, clear pool of water when a pod of sting rays swam up and began circling around your feet.  Helping you in through the open window I was standing safely behind, a snake with its fangs bared then rose up behind you.  Thankfully, someone else closed the window on the striking serpent as I led you away from the slithering creatures," he shared.

He asked mama for interpretation.  She said that it was a good sign that the pool was calm and clear. 

Usually, he flippantly responds that he doesn't like it when others communicate in code.  Later, however, we "randomly" flip through Coleman Barks' Essential Rumi; his choice and I sweetly chuckle at his blatant contradictions.  He opens the book and it falls unto chapter 21 - Beginning and End.  "The King and the Handmaiden and the Doctor" begins like this: 
"Do you know why your soul-mirror does not reflect as clearly as it might?  
Because rust has begun to cover it.  
It needs to be cleaned. 
Here's a story about the state that's meant by soul-mirror." 
And it ends with the Three Brothers and the Chinese Princess: 
"It was the third brother who had been ill up until now, who received the hand of the princess.
He lived the marriage of form and spirit, and did absolutely nothing to deserve it." 

"Hmmm," he responds, after we finish reading aloud to each other each of the two stories, sipping, like fine wine, the metaphors while tasting how they apply to each of our lives.  "I love a good story," he says, his belly full with imagery and poetry.  Again, all I can do is laugh.  "Yes, STORY IS MEDICINE."


Stingray Medicine
from Ted Andrews/Animal-Wise:
Keynote: Gracefulness in maneuverings and moves. Staying on course.

Stingrays are relatives of the sharks. They have flattened, flounder-like shapes with long whiplike tails that have a stinger or poisonous spine attached. Stingrays have electro-receptors on their snout by which they accurately detect buried food. Some generate and emit low level electrical pulses that help them to guide and recognize food and danger. Often, when stingrays are totems or messengers, people get tingling sensations to alert them to the presence of danger, and treasures, etc.

A network of nerves informs the stingray of the position of each part of its body wherever it is swimming. For those to whom the stingray is a totem, there is a natural gracefulness, a sense of never being lost. This individual is usually confident in maneuvering and operating in whatever environment in which he or she is found. For those to whom stingray is just appearing, the ability to maneuver gracefully in new environments will need to be developed.

When the stingray appears, trust in your own inner guidance. Trust in your own ability to find what is beneath the surface. Do not be afraid to whip that tail around to protect your own dance in life. It will be much smoother and more graceful than you imagine.
  

White Rabbit

"A sign of good fortune," father says,
after he is told that a fluffy, white bunny has showed up in his backyard, foraging for green grass under towering trees of avocados, lemons, oranges and more.
Later that day, a long-standing business deal of one of his sons finally goes through - promising a rainfall of fortuitous prosperity.  Soon, the other son receives word through the mail that he has been invited to address this year's graduating class of his college alma mater.  Thoughts of receiving an honorary doctorate degree are shared.  
Today, mother says to the visiting friend (me) who has found comfort and shelter in this Lebanese tribe, "Maybe, you can help to alleviate the pain in my back," as we stretch and breathe together in the front room.  "Perhaps, you are my angel."  "Perhaps."
Only time will tell.

thirteen ~ On Beauty, Peeling Away the Layers & Letting It Bee

LOVE 
Is.....

(you fill in the blanks.)

twelve & THE IMPORTANCE OF DREAMTIME

What do you dream?

Pay attention to your dreams.

Your subconscious knows - it always knows.

ELEVEN ~ doses of LOVE

Surprise!  It's Rihanna, not me.  ; )
I do enjoy my pop music.  I was raised in so Cal after all, yo!
Ain't nothin' like a little sugar pop when I'm opening up the engine on the 5.
Ha!

Here's the thing about LIFE and living one day at a time.  How can one plan months in advance when each moment affects one another and is interdependent like water?
This past Tuesday, I was planning on some conceptual, performance art dance piece, called "Quetzalcoatl" for the Bar Basic gig.  Yet, it wasn't flyin' - Steve couldn't make it, Marlon never called me back and I had no clue what music to use.

So, I breathed and simply remained present to what is.
AND, what is is my experiment in living in village with an already established tribe.
A family that already has its rules and its roles and I'm stepping in as a guest, sleeping in the son's bedroom, and Whew!  It's got me pressed up against the glass of my own face - my insecurities are rife and I don't know how to just bee myself here.  I'm trying...

And, I'm getting bombarded, still, by the illness of another.  At first, you reprimanded me for my harshness, as well as my unwillingness to immediately forgive.  Then, after a week of late-night texts and suicide threats, you understand why I have been feeling the need to protect myself by keeping my distance.  My sisters and brother, however, show up and choose to stand firm in community, rather than allowing sickness to fester.  At first, I say, "No, thank you," but then I recognize that these moments now are BEELOVED COMMUNITY, that there is no ideal moment some time, some place else.  Here, Now.  THIS IS IT.    Nothing more.  Nothing less. 
(LOVE)

Earlier in the week, while working side-by-side, gathering avocados from the tree and beginning to build a pvc-pipe greenhouse, you feel stuck by my questioning you about our becoming lovers.  I kiss you and a truck ambles by, Rihanna's "Diamonds" pouring out through its open window.  The connection clicks and I realize that I want to perform for the Bar basic audience, which is simply me dancing as well as being flown by Lou to Rihanna's top 10 hit.

And, here's the thing about CONNECTION:
8 SHOOTING STARS (as seen on the evening of the last new moon)
8 for BALANCE and the HOURGLASS OF TIME (ideas I've talked about in a recent vlog post).
8 MINUTES (a blog post I recently wrote).
STARS = DIAMONDS In the SKY  (RiRi's song).

LIFE IS MAGICAL,
and

STORY IS MEDICINE.
All we have to do is listen for it.
And allow it to unfold.

"We're beautiful like diamonds in the sky
eye to eye so alive we're beautiful like diamonds in the sky
shine bright like a dimond shine brought like a diamond
you're a shooting star I see a vision of ecstasy..."

Gratitude

Last year, when the Hive was booted out of the Art Center, I moved the play toys to what later became Las Raices and then spent two and a half weeks recuperating at a friend's sweet Carlsbad pad.  While there, I read Vladimir Megre's book, Anastasia, which I had seen amongst SA's things when she first moved in to the Hive.  "You should read this, Cara," SA had said.  So, upon seeing the book again - on N's shelf - I decided then was the time.

I wept my eyes out upon reading Megre's non-fictional tale of magical realism because I felt vindicated.  "See, I am not crazy," was what I told myself.  Nonetheless, I am not an Anastasia making do while living wild and free in the Siberian Tiaga.  Rather, I am an Anastasia born and raised to live in a western city center, where the harsh reality of the material world must be contended with.

In early-December, when our plans to rent a half-acre in Golden Hill fell through, I challenged myself to not jump into erecting plans.  I especially did not want to act from a place of 'scarcity mentality' or fear.  "Trust," is what I kept telling myself.  Yes, it's true - I always have my parent's home to fall back upon.  However, I am not looking to fall back.  I want to keep moving forward. 

So, on New Year's Day, after I had spent an amazing late night and early morning up in the high desert with my girlfriends, I ended up at the same place and event where I met N. last year.  This time though, I ended up on the lap of someone whom I had been getting to know more as a friend and a brother over the course of the past month.  "Come stay with me," he offered, as I sweetly nuzzled into him.  "Okay," I quickly chirped, from a place of abundance and safety. 

Yes, I am grateful to trust the Universe and that it has my back - by meeting my needs as they arise.  There is no need to live in another moment - to plan ahead into a fictional future where reality doesn't exist.  Beeing here now, however, obviously goes against the grain of everything we've been taught as westerners.  "Slave now and bee rewarded in the future," is how the mantra goes.  Even worse are the ideas of finding your pie in the sky when you die.  "No thanks!  I just want to bee exactly where I am, because heaven on Earth is here, now," is always my response.

So, in my gratitude for our planet and the cosmos, I also want to type my gratitude for my friends.  It's so easy to judge others, as well as ourselves, and to think that because we don't speak the exact same language - like music, or Landmark, or English, or whatever! - that we are somehow incompatible.  Yet, what the last few days have taught me is that it's all simply about the water that flows under the bridge between us - CONNECTION IS LOVE.

On Tuesday night, I invited a friend to perform Acro-Yoga with me at a bar downtown.  I asked Lou last minute and he drove down from Orange County, trusting that a less-than-an-hour rehearsal ahead of time would be sufficient.  While at Bar Basic, I felt enveloped by the support of friends whom I have spent the past two years cultivating connections with. From Johnny carrying the heavy sound system in just so I could share a spoken word piece to Ben downloading a pop tune on his computer for me to move to to DJ offering me material support. I am grateful beeyond words for their friendship. Nervous about putting my solo dancing self out into space, I immediately dropped in to the performer in me who relishes commanding an audience. The next day, however, I felt like I had been hit by a ton of bricks - the beers on top of the hard-core Acro workout was too much for this "old lady." It took me a whole day to recover during which Richie tended to me like a Queen. Wow! Thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you. I bow down in deep gratitude.

TEN ~ Because life is too short....

to not be Silly.

Create Humor.
Bee Joy.
No one will do it for you.

Who cares how you look.
Who cares how you are perceived.
Light radiates from the inside out.

LAUGH AT YOURSELF and
BEE HAPPY.

It's this simple.
JUST SAY "YES!"

Daily Dose of LOVE: On the Triumvirate of Human Connection & Sexual Union

If I am going to speak about it, then it is important that I know every facet of it (LOVE) -
each face and angle, every side and shape.
Because
there's nothing more.
LOVE.

8 (is for the Birds) - Daily Dose of LOVE for 01/08/2013

This video says it all.
Enjoy!
And, if you're in San Diego,
come down to Bar Basic in East Village TONIGHT 7pm-12am
for the "Birds of a Feather" Art Show
presented by Thumbprint Gallery.

BEE Medicine

I know I am on the right path when....
stopping in to the occupied house, around the corner from where Las Raices
once sat, a small, hand-painted Owl shaker tumbles off of the table and onto the floor where I have
temporarily placed my things.
"Hoot, hoot," the Universe silently calls, nudging me along my journey.

Then, my feet carry me over to the Ant Hill Collective where, with power tools - a saw
and a drill - I help to build bee boxes.   Side-by-side with a few of my local activist brothers, one of San Diego's best urban agriculturalists directs our motion.  Feeling adept and at ease with the work, my warrior goddess is given space to play.  "See you later, Queen Bee," one of the beautiful men says, as he departs, giving me a friendly kiss on the lips.  

Then, you arrive to pick me up and carry me to your home, where you have been keeping me like royalty.  There is no singular totem between us.  There is no driving Eros that, usually, only leads to a quick snuffing out of the flames of passion.  Rather, what is here is the triumvirate of sexual union - a sturdy foundation based on Philos and our friendship as well as the unconditional love between a brother and a sister.  In our exploration, we are teaching each other about romantic sustainability.

What is also present here is the reflection of a powerful healer and shaman.  "I see myself in you," you said.  "And, I don't want to lose you in my life," you said, when we discussed the possibility of sex between us.  "There is no guaranty - for anything," is always my embodied response.  The magic that dances between us was written in the annals, long ago.  I counted - it was eight shooting stars.  The symbol for balance and infinity.

seven

 

"Swan Dive" by Ani DiFranco

cradling the softest, warmest part of you in my hand
feels like a little baby bird fallen from the nest
i think that your body is something i understand
i think that i'm happy, i think that i'm blessed

i've got a lack of inhibition
i've got a loss of perspective
i've had a little bit to drink
and it's making me think
that i can jump ship and swim
that the ocean will hold me
that there's got to be more
than this boat i'm in

'cuz they can call me crazy if i fail
all the chance that i need
is one-in-a-million
and they can call me brilliant
if i succeed
gravity is nothing to me, moving at the speed of sound
i'm just going to get my feet wet
until i drown

and i teeter between tired
and really, really tired
im wiped and im wired but i guess its just as well
because i built my own empire
out of car tires and chicken wire
and i'm queen of my own compost heap
and i'm getting used to the smell

and i've got a lack of information
but i got a little revelation
and i'm climbing up on the railing
trying not to look down
i'm going to do my best swan dive
into shark-infested waters
i'm gonna pull out my tampon
and start splashing around

'cuz i don't care if they eat me alive
i've got better things to do than survive
i've got a memory of your warm skin in my hand
and i've got a vision of blue sky and dry land

i'm cradling the hardest, heaviest part of me in my hand
the ship is pitching and heaving, my limbs are bobbing and weaving
and i think this is something i understand
i just need a couple vaccinations for my far-away vacation
i'm going to go ahead and go boldly because a little bird told me
that jumping is easy, that falling is fun
up until you hit the sidewalk, shivering and stunned

and they can call me crazy if i fail
all the chance that i need
is one-in-a-million
and they can call me brilliant
if i succeed
gravity is nothing to me
moving at the speed of sound
i'm just gonna get my feet wet
until i drown..."

UNLEASHED

Dear God,

THANK YOU!!!!!!

dia #6

breathy/spaciousness
singing an arabic line, he sings to the chickens
they come running for their daily feed
being/spacious
holding space for all of it
including my own discomfort,
my own desire to control and force a way,
my own sense of entitlement to what doesn't belong to me
held & contained
and allowing it all to just be
because it is
and sometimes it just isn't.

liberate me

Warrior goddess, wrapped in blue,
she kneels on the mirror pond, frozen after a great snow storm.
The crone's mask of wisdom, age and ferocity sits stoic,
wilting in a winter sun, on top of her chiseled facade.
She is tired from so much running, eluding and chasing.
The violence of the hunt has worn her down,
to her knees, where with talon-sharp fingers she
gazes.  Reaching in, she seeks to free the
beautiful maiden, whose flowing locks of golden strands now float below the icy visage.
It is time - she desperately seeks freedom.
The full alignment of her whole Self.

(For you, RK...)


(go here for TIGER MEDICINE reading)

Daily Dose of LOVE for 01/05/2013

Still don't know what I am doing and I'm allowing the adventure to unfold...
Too much driving in circles this weekend, got me feeling that it's an old refrain to a lilting song.
Changing up the tired tune sometimes means sitting in one's frustration with their own pattern.
And, PERFECT.  C'est la vie.
It all makes perfect sense.
And, still., I don't know "why" for any of it.
I am simply allowing it to move through,
with intention and sacred ceremony
and with a lot of just beeing human in between
REMEBERING CONNECTION is key
as I trust that it is all unfolding exactly as it is meant to.
May you as well. 

p.s. yes, this video was pre-recorded. and, so was yesterday's...  back up plans are good.  ; )

FROG Medicine

  

"SING FROG SING! CALL THE RAINS, QUENCH THE DRYNESS, CLEANSE THE EARTH. THEN FILL ME UP AGAIN. FROG SINGS THE SONGS THAT BRING THE RAIN, AND MAKE THE ROAD DIRT MORE BEARABLE. FROG MEDICINE IS AKIN TO WATER ENERGY, AND THE EAST ON THE MEDICINE WHEEL. FROG TEACHES US TO HONOR OUR TEARS, FOR THEY CLEANSE THE SOUL. ALL WATER RITES BELONG TO FROG, INCLUDING ALL INITIATIONS BY WATER. WATER PREPARES AND CLEANSES THE BODY FOR SACRED CEREMONY. IT IS THE ELEMENT WE UNDERSTAND BEST IN THE WOMB. FROG, LIKE OURSELVES, IS A POLYWOG IN THE FETAL WATERS, AND ONLY LEARNS TO HOP AFTER IT EXPERIENCES THE WORLD OF FLUIDITY. THE TRANSFORMATION INTO ADULTHOOD PREPARES FROG FOR ITS POWER TO CALL IN THE WATERS OF THE SKIES; THE RAIN. IN KNOWING THE ELEMENT OF WATER, FROG CAN SING THE SONG THAT CALLS THE RAIN TO EARTH. WHEN THE PONDS ARE DRY, FROG CALLS UPON THE THUNDERBEINGS TO CLEANSE AND REPLINISH THE EARTH WITH WATER. LIKE FROG, WE ARE ASKED TO KNOW WHEN IT IS TIME TO REFRESH, PURIFY, AND REFILL THE COFFERS OF THE SOUL." from ThunderDreamer's Blog

 It's strange how Animal Medicine has come to me. In a lot of ways, I interpret the potency of the medicine based on not just the object itself, but in the ways that it shows up in my life. Both as the subject itself, or as symbols, signs, omens, etc. AND what I've been noticing is how important a role men have played in this unfolding. So, FROG Medicine brings me to you - yet another powerful man who was willing to stick with me for four years in order to do some real dirty work. Ha! Or, maybee not so willing. LOVE is a strange, funny thing. bell hooks says in her "All About Love: New Visions" that some things, like co-dependency, meeting the physical needs of another, and more, aren't love when abuse and neglect are involved. Yet, how can we not call time flowing under the bridge, no matter how it has been spent, LOVE? So, that night, as we strolled along Clairemont Avenue, form our shared house in a suburban neighborhood to the boxy, earth-color painted strip mall down the street, we stopped to gaze upon the facade of a neighbor's house. A frog lover, this person had hundreds of plastic and plaster frogs decorating their front yard. Frogs lounging, frogs kissing, frogs dancing, frogs hopping, frogs, frogs, frogs. We just stood there, laughing as we did (and do) together ~ a lot. Then, with magic dancing in your eyes, you turned to me and said, "And, I bet there's a frog at our feet right now." Standing on the sidewalk at the space where a wooden fence met the earth, wet from a winter season, we shuffled our feet in our shoes. "Ribbit!" went the little green froggy, hopping out from under our human stance and back towards the hodgepodge of fake, American finery. And, that MAGIC defined US for me - choosing to believe in the unseen, in humor and lightness, even when we ourselves felt too bogged down by the emotional baggage that can come with a lifetime to really allow ourselves to flow and unfold in the power of LOVE.

Daily Dose of LOVE numero cuatro

My feet have carried me across thousands of planet Earth miles.
Each journey has a destination in mind, certainly - a peak to summit, a goal to complete.  Every adventure it's own unique flavor - lessons learned and experiences accrued.  Many travails are tiring.  Some have even been difficult (9-days spent in the New Zealand bush, amongst diverse terrain, on a backpacking trek listed as "Hard" in the manual), yet if I simply kept my feet in motion below me (even with a 3rd degree burn on my thigh!), I would always end up where I/we set out for.
Unlike the hundreds of teenagers and kids (sometimes, even adults!) that I've guided up dirt slopes and undulating switchbacks, I don't bother with complaining about the path.  "Just keep walking," has always been my motto.
JUST KEEP WALKING.

Your Daily Dose of LOVE for 01/03/2013

 
The battle that you're fighting is within you.
Your misogyny and hate,
your anger and rage,
your resistances and fear,
they are all inside of you.

Once, I was interviewed, along with an International Socialist,
about why I had attended an economic forum in San Diego.
I shared my peace - that I tend to my home, my heart and my community
because it is where I can affect the most change.
He wanted to argue my offering.  With his fists raised, he spoke to the nefarious
evil that exists "out there" and the systems of oppression that must be brought down.
"I didn't know this was a debate," I compassionately communicated.

I recently lived with a man considered to be a darling of our activist community.
He brought all of his groceries home in plastic bags, after which he'd write his name on all of his perishable goods and place them in our "communal" refrigerator.  He thinks he is fighting a system with all of his talk about bringing down the borders that exist in the world.  Yet, he neglects to realize that unless he knocks down the borders in his own home, in his kitchen and around his heart, all of his words will fall on empty ears.

So....you can argue semantics until you're blue in the face; you can take down my work; you can pretend that I don't exist, as you go on shoving your phallis in holes, thinking that you can fill up your sad sense of self by take take taking from another.  I've already been burned and rejected, baby.
This time around, I LAUGH.

Your Daily Dose of LOVE, vlog day #2, 2013

How was your first day of 2013?
Did you keep the gratitude I spoke into on the tip of your tongue?
I sure hope so.  If not, then you have plenty more opportunities to practice (364 days to be exact).

As for me, "Phew!"  Well, my 01/01/2013 kinda looked like this:

Wake early in the high desert to bathe naked in an outdoor hot tub, surrounded by patches of snow.  (YES!)   Drive west with two of my dearest soul sisters, as I rest my eyes in the backseat.
Continue cleaning and saying "goodbye" to Las Raices.
I intentionally waited until the later afternoon to hang fliers for "Connection Therapy" classes in local cafes.  It didn't matter though because, still, I heard Snake Medicine man's voice boasting about his up and coming tour.  Damn you, LOVE - you are so bittersweet.
Drop in on the New Year's Day party at Bee Medicine man's house.  Eager to show me the rough draft copy of a book he is working on, I was pleasantly surprised by his work as well as how healthy and robust he is looking and feeling.
Damn you, LOVE - you are so bittersweet.
Then, you offer me your lap, I sit and its pure sweetness.  The hand of time keeps marching on and all I can do is surrender to the Universe's commands.  "I bow down before you, oh great mystery - whatever you command, I shall do," I have literally prayed in the past.  And, c'est la vie.

I keep moving - driving north to Carlsbad, I arrive onto the doorstep of another soul sister.  I know I am exactly where I am meant to bee as the visages of three hooting owls greet my eyes from the doormat.

Sitting together in merry excitement, we share our adventures since we last saw each other.  She holds such deep space for me, and my stories.  "Damn, woman," she says, after I recount only some of the recent memories imprinted in my BodyMind.  "You are writing all of this, right?"

OF COURSE.

But, first, We DANCE.
So, we head toward our beeloved Encinitas Dance community for a first day of the year twirl around that proverbial dance floor of LIFE.

Shall we dance?  

HAPPY 2013 ~ Your Daily Dose of LOVE (Medicine) now distributed via video!

Another new year and opportunity to wipe the slate clean,
to (re)create a new YOU, a new US, a new Now -
a renewed way of bee~ing in the world.
YES!  I'll take it.

I am enthusiastically exhausted after days spent cleaning up the past,
preparing for what is to come and then running off to the high desert to ring
in 2013 under a star-studded sky where patches of snow dotted the terrain
and rock-outcroppings cut a dramatic swath.

Liberty Advance was chock-full of people for its annual new year's eve party
but, still, I remained desiring quiet, so I took what I needed
and gave very little away.  I am enjoying this shift.

That eastern land is a magical space very near and dear to my heart.
The animal medicine I experience there has been profound.
Years ago, I moved with a mountain lion - keeping myself at a safe distance from its creeping prowl,
I stalked it as it danced and played in the knee-high grass under both a setting, full moon as well as a rising sun on an autumn equinox morning.  Then, just this past August, I brought "the Anchor" up with me for an overnight getaway and, upon our departure, we witnessed a Hawk lifting up from the dirt road with a snake firmly held in its talons.  We both gasped upon seeing it.  "QUETZALCOATL!" I sang.

Last night, as Bee and I strolled along the ambling path, the still night was punctured by the howls of Coyotes.  Wild dogs, one of them had an iconic bark that ended with what sounded like a horse nay.  "They make themselves sound like they are a larger pack than they actually are," Bee shared.  "Smart," I thought.  This morning, as I wandered in solitude, I reveled in the abundance of cougar paw prints, pockmarking the trails they had hardened in the mud.  Feeling the indentations with my own fingertips, I imagined the power of the Puma flowing through me. 

NOW is the TIME.
2013.
Welcome.