Full Circle #1 ~ Burt's 54th Beeday

We returned to camp outside of Mama Jamie's home in Buena Creek, Vista with days to prepare for Burt's 54th birthday celebration. Even though the pandemic was still in full swing, twenty of our community members were willing to gather outside, at Shelter Cove in Solana Beach, for releasing Burt's ashes to Mama Ocean. Half of us paddled out to do so, while the other half stayed on shore and created an altar to Burt. I had felt energetically high after our first full circle, Mama Caravan tour and as though I had learned a lot in the process However, returning home usually has a way of triggering our core wounds. After the success of Burt's beeday, my emotional body began spiraling downwards into the unprocessed guilt that I have spent a lifetime carrying. For the first time ever in my life however, I turned towards my emotional pain and had a conversation with it. "Hello, Pain," I greeted. "Why are you here?" I asked out of curiousity. "To hurt you," it snarled back. "Well, you're doing a great job!" I stated out of fact and not snark. Unbeknownst to me, it was the first time that I was meeting 'Badness' the stone child that takes up residence in my heart and feels really bad, all the time. Still, I gave myself the emotional releases I needed - especially after seeing a Sexological Body Worker who works out of his home near Beverly Hills in Los Angeles. Cee prefers to celebrate his beeday in San Diego County as well, so we did this with the people we love. He even caught a fish during a fishing excursion with Quinnie. Turning six, he had started losing his baby teeth just months before when we were sheltering in place at Steve and Fiona's home. For my 44th birthday the following month, I decided to head out on our second caravan tour through the southwest into the east and up towards Jersey to celebrate Thanksgiving with my mother-in-law. We hadn't seen her since Burt's cancer had shown up, in June 2018, and I knew this was an essential part of her and our healing as well.