today is my daughter's birthday.  4o something years ago,  i was in labor.   She was face up.  Would not turn.  Took 21 hours.  Sometimes slow,  sometimes the total opposite.  They wanted to turn her with forceps.  I refused.   I was Into It….i LOVED it….i was deleriously happy with it and finally for unknown reasons,  She turned and slid out.   And this has been Our Way over all these years.  She does things for  ways known only to her.  She does things in her own time.  I am so Glad to have received her.  

Michelle sent me a link about a movie,  1 hour and some minutes about dying.  It's called Mortal.  she'll post the link.  but it's blog.mortalfilm.com.  It  can be viewed for free through the 25th.  So 3 more days.   It's Extraordinary.  Much of it is things we might be very familiar with but it is put together in a way that takes in all the ways of looking at dying.  There are two parts of it that for me were priceless…the young woman with ALS and the scenes of the disembodied Energy walking the Earth.   I watched it first thing this morning and then had to go to the bank to send money to Alyssia.  She is in Hawaii and she and her woman Kimberly had somehow not read the fine print and miscalculated their expenses.  So…eating peanut butter and jelly for a few days already,  so i sat there,  waiting to talk to one of the uhhh,  what would they be called,  the two women who deal with Issues,  Anna and Neata,  waiting and watching people come and go and seeing them as beings who ALL entertain thoughts about death.  It's unavoidable,  entertaining thoughts about death even if for only a moment at a time, but i saw all of us in the same boat,  knowing.   But going.   and it was very Beauty Full,  how this is.  Just a big US.  Knowing but going.

This evening,  just before this,  i needed to change the water in the Buck tubs.   and for whatever reason,  Nogal was completely into whole body touch.  Usually he will be ok with ear scratching,  chin,  but tonight….his whole self.  He stood so still and i went down his spine, crown to tail.  Sides.  Underbelly.  Legs.  Whole self.  ???????????  Never since he was just a newborn.  TenZen watched and thought about it.  Goats are mysterious beings.

 

 

so here they come.  Following Mo's suggestion,  the second from the right is done with some very wonderFULL thread that Jan had recently sent.  It worked except for it's very hard to do a split back stitch…well, really,  you can't.  but i like it, too.  The others with a single strand of the 6 floss and well,  they will take some imagination but that's really ok i think.  

 

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15 responses to “Thursdays are becoming interesting days”

  1. Michelle in NYC Avatar

    What a GREAT birth story! Not just goats, but everything is mysterious until you trust completely and then it just seems normal. I still wish for a procession of crows across the whole sky…and love the lizards. As requested:
    “I’m stunned and moved. This hour and a half film is FREE on line through April 25th, I urge you to register at the site and view it. We can talk about it after if you like. My two Zen teachers Sensei Chodo and Sensei Koshin, and the Buddhist teacher Robert Thurman are in it, as well as a dear ‘Moving Pen’ buddy Judith Kalina. “MORTAL” Celebrates the importance of end-of-life as much as the beginning-of-life, presenting stories that inspire. I should warn you that the burial portions of this film are a little freaky, sometimes funny-I personally find them so, and that this is not an easy film but it’s well worth your time. If you don’t choose to view, that’s fine. Do only what’s right for you.”
    ​Access here (you will be asked to register:
    http://blog.mortalfilm.com/

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  2. grace Avatar

    THANK YOU!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! mICHELLE
    and i need to say, that when i read this email this morning…” I should
    warn you”…i thought. oh, eeeee
    but there is nothing here at all that is difficult, even a little freaky,
    it’s very Grand and Gentle.
    I am so beyond grateful to you for sending me the link

    Like

  3. handstories Avatar

    I think there is a whole mysterious world through that crack & I like not knowing a thing about it. & just love birth stories- how each story is different & amazing. & that we come into the world as ourselves.

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  4. grace Avatar

    the births of both my kids
    STUNNING moments in my life
    i loved pregnancy, well, conception, then pregnancy. I loved
    being Pregnant, getting bigger and bigger, Filling with them
    I loved their births, my son, came too fast
    i wanted it to take longer
    knowing it would be my last time, i wanted to savor it, but he came very fast
    but her
    such work it was.

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  5. handstories Avatar

    Yes, to all you said. Blue millimetered out for hours, Moon ten minutes. Years before, seeing the first friend to give birth, right after- & she was SO beautiful & powerful. I knew that I wanted to be able to give birth, thinking that if I could do that, I could do ANYthing…it took another decade before I was willing to commit to the part that would come after birth- parenting.

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  6. grace Avatar

    i never gave it a glance, the parenting. I was such a one
    to just GO. Was so Sure of everything, never giving it a glance but just going and feeling so Sure.
    i think of that today, as i write this and am amazed, really,
    i just somehow felt like i Knew and Things knew and
    it was just all so ok

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  7. grace Avatar

    i knew for sure i could do it better than my mother did
    i knew it for sure
    and i did.

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  8. handstories Avatar

    I was waiting for a neon sign..”This Way”, but then, like you, realized I could probably do better than my folks, & maybe well enough. Was right on the first part, hopefully they’ll let me know if the 2nd part happened too someday. Admire your “going”.

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  9. grace Avatar

    it’s done. and you DID it. Don’t you know?
    you did.
    their lives now belong to them

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  10. handstories Avatar

    Almost. It was probably good enough. Right now we’re in the middle of teens- they spend a lot of time telling me how wrong I am, & yelling “I’m not yelling!” I spend a lot of time holding my breath.

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  11. Mo Crow Avatar

    love those little lizards in her hair!

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  12. Tina Avatar
    Tina

    Just satcand listened to mortal…it has filled me with such thoughtfulness…my mind is going in every direction. Reading your birth stoies….remembering my own. Being present at the birth of my first grand child and later the same daughter bringing twins into this world. Being present for the death of my mother in law last year and most recently the sudden death of my sister. This post could not have come at a better time…
    It has filled me with such a sense of peacefulness. Grace I tried calling earlier but you were out and about or maybe even just not wanting to be bothered…I do that sometimes. So again if you ever think that this posting that you and your friends do serves only a selfish purpose ….please please know that this lady here in Milwaukee is filled with love and gratitude. Extra thanks to Michelle….

    Like

  13. grace Avatar

    you need to let it ring 6 times and wait till the dumb answering machine comes on and keep talking or waiting silently and i will hightail it in from Out Side if i can in time and pick it up.
    i am SORRy i missed your call
    and i am GLAD so so GLAD that you found the video usefull…
    so much was so beauty FULL to me….i tried to watch it the
    second time to day but it wouldn’t let me. I wanted to see
    that part of the Energy Being moving through the LandScape…i loved seeing that and i don’t know how it is after we die, i would like to think of it this way, i would like to look Forward to that kind of Going…just so so Beauty Full to me
    and this lady in Milwaukee…yes….my sister….thank you and
    always to Michelle who finds Everything and brings it to me
    Such Love

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  14. patricia spangler Avatar

    love the exchange with “handstories.” i too felt so sure. of everything. and then “things” happened that rocked my boat and i sailed off, with two young one. still i was certain. never doubted just went. but at some point doubt crept into my being and i’ve just now purged it. have just now had the conversation about my lack-of-good-boundaries with my daughter. have just now realized that she’s got it right. and she is probably also the mother thinking “at least I know I’ll do it better than my parents.” that’s how it must be. because, after all, parents need that confidence. to just put one foot in front of the other.

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  15. grace Avatar

    but then, she too will look back one fine day and the same
    doubt will creep in for her. It’s like the granddaughter
    says over and over, it’s developmentally appropriate wondering.
    we do the best we can with what we have in any given time in
    our lives and as it goes, we have more, as in more wisdom.
    it’s never there in the beginning, really, just the seeds
    of it and we go by intuition and our own Contract or whatever
    Carolyn Myess (sp) calls it…and i think the thing that really
    matters to keep the conversations ALIVE, to keep talking
    through it all through the years on and on, to not stop
    looking and Wondering and telling the stories as they
    shape shift and morph and circle around. Nothing is ever
    Finished. Stuff stays Alive

    Like

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