Tales From The Labyrinth

A Friend's Passing...

Holding on...
Life so fragile...
Yet so tenacious and strong...
How could it be
that you were just here,
feasting and sharing friendship,
celebrating your heart's love,
as we gathered
with laughter,
cherishing each other
and the stories we share...
Seventy years of footsteps,
last night
you crossed a threshold
that we can not yet follow...
Your smile
and sweet hug
still wrap around my shoulders
leaving an ache in my heart,
in the space where I grew to love you...

My dear friend Dr. J, lost her sweetheart and partner last night. Some of you know Dr. J personally, and some of you have come to know her through our de-cluttering enterprises that we've been helping each other with. Please hold her and Joe's family in your thoughts, sending them your love. Joe and Dr. J found each other later in life... and shared a very deep and loving relationship. My life has been so enriched in getting to know Joe and his amazing outlook on seeing the positive in life, and making every breath of life, have meaning...

Photo: Newly planted pea vines growing in our garden...

Another Spiral of De-Cluttering...

Two Tuesdays ago
it was my turn for my good friend Dr. J
to come and help me spiral into
decluttering some of my tangled spaces...

There were lots of places in our house to choose from that needed attention, but what I wanted the most was to turn my upstairs office and writing space into a more functional area...

This meant finally getting to THE BOX 
of labyrinth papers and articles
that has been haunting me for eight years...

So we lit a candle of intention and clearing...

And began by rearranging what was in my file drawers...

We wrote out the names of the content of each
of the seven drawers...

This simple act of first rearranging the cards for each drawer, helped me to see how best to rearrange the actual contents of the drawers... I went from seven drawers to six. And now have an empty drawer to grow into... the flow of these drawers, even though they are in three separate groups and areas in my office, make more sense and give better functionality, and makes filing a simple task, instead of being tossed into an ever growing box...

While cleaning out my supply closet...
I rediscovered the full size body drawing that I did in my first year of graduate studies in my expressive arts class... I am going to try and find the original slides that I gave to my professor of my process of making this art piece. The piece I turned in, in 1993, was of my bones, I believe inspired by Frida Kahlo and her portrait of Luther Burbank...

Over the four years of my graduate studies,
I worked on this piece, filling in the flesh,
sometimes with paint, sometimes with wet clay,
and finally draped my body with a scarf in 2002
before rolling it up and putting it away...

This art piece was made ready to let go of, as well as with some other pieces of paper that were ready for a ritual fire of transformation...

But first, Dr. J had no idea that part of her assisting me in decluttering entailed shoveling 91 wheelbarrows of mulch that was delivered in the middle of our sorting out my office!

Thank you Dr. J!!!!!

Michelle, Lynnette, and I were most grateful for this extra help!

And so was the meadow!!!

At last, after we let go of so many containers and drawers on wheels that will now find new homes, Dr. J and I lit the ritual fire and let pieces of the past go... (Tesa, do you recognize that candle????)

Dr. J was momentarily distracted by the sounds of birds and the scent of flowers wafting over us from the meadow and the blossoming garden...

But the flames brought our attention back,
and what had been,
transformed...
rising in a spiral prayer to the heavens...

and our task for this time was complete...

Coincidently... this post today, coinsides synchronistically with my dear Kimberly of Ariadne's Thread and her spiral post, Spiralling Onward...

I'll be away until next week and wish you all well, I will be by soon to see what you've been up to and as always, love to receive your comments when you stop by...

The Art of Decluttering...

Over the holidays, I met with one of my dear friends from graduate school for an outing in San Francisco. It had been awhile since we'd been together and one of the agendas of the day was to celebrate her finishing her dissertation in 2007 and officially receiving her doctorate. Yeah Dr. J!!!!!!

While at breakfast, over the most delicious of mochas, we caught up on our lives. We discussed how pleased we were to have made it through the quicksand mazes of our doctorate programs... and our dismay at the chaos left behind in the wake of our lives being so focused for so long... One of the complaints we share is the clutter that accumulated while our noses were held to the grindstone (I still have a box of "Important Stuff" that is eight years old that I can not part with, not to mention other boxes and cluttered corners of our home that could make for a DSM diagnosis!!!).

Overwhelm at what needs to be attended to can be the biggest deterrent from starting... So... Dr. J and I made an agreement to go to each other's homes and to lend support and help the other with our decluttering projects... She was first, as it had been too long since I'd last visited...

One of the things we found is that it can be hard to let go of some things because of what they represent to us. We want to hold on to the feeling or the memory that the object reminds us of... I still have a t-shirt in my closet that I got in Hawaii when I was sixteen...

J had made a banner our last year of graduate school classes. This ten-foot scroll holds the name of every classmate, every place we met for classes, and every teacher we had and it is precious to her... Now torn and faded, this strip of paper has hung in her office these past eleven years and it was time to let it go... To do this, J has found that taking a picture, helps her to let the object go...

(See??? I was there!!!)

We decided to create a ritual for letting some of these precious things go... Rather than tossing them in the trash, we made a pile to burn, an offering of prayers, to be transformed and carried away in the flames and smoke...

We then tackled some of the big stuff,
like her office...

We moved everything out of the room and brought back in only what was necessary and desired...

Dr. J was glad to get her office back... And I discovered just how much I love doing this... for I can feel the change of energy in the the areas that we worked on. There were three main areas of her home that we tackled ... the office, the main hallway, and the family room. I love hearing how it has changed her enjoyment of her home... and we made plans for the other areas that need attention. What was once overwhelming... is now doable, step by step...

At the end of our time together, we lit the fire...

and watched these objects transform...
leaving space for more life and energy in Dr. J's life...

So if there are areas in your home and work space that you know are in need of clearing... here are several suggestions to help you in the art of decluttering...

• Take a picture of things that hold memories, making it easier to let them go.

• Have a friend help and give witness to what is changing and being let go of.

• Tackle small areas first, so you have the experience of instant success, giving you the fortitude to go on to other places that need your attention.

• Move everything out of the space to be decluttered. Place objects in bags or boxes clearly marked, denoting if they are to go to a thrift store, a particular person, or to the garbage/recycle. (Note: I no longer hold things for that garage sale that I think I'll hold someday. I find that garage sales take more time and energy than I have to give. I believe that moving objects allows for their worth to flow towards you in easier ways than spending all day in the sun selling items for small amounts. However, some people love to hold garage sales, and then I say go for it! But if the someday garage sale begins to create more clutter, it's time to move those objects on in the easiest way possible!)

• Once a space is cleared, make a commitment to keep those places clear and to not allow them to get cluttered again.

• Create a ritual for things you are letting go of, that have been precious, giving meaning to the what they have meant to you and their transformation.

• Reward yourself each time you clear an area. Dr. J and I went on outings and she treated me to the most delicious of meals.

Thank you Dr. J for allowing me to spend this special time with you... you are an amazing friend who I deeply cherish...

Got Elves?

We've been Elf'd!!!!!

It all happened because of my Aunt Rosina!!!
(I didn't know there were Sicilian Elves...)

Here is the link to the Main Site
where you can go directly to Elf Yourself!!!

You can get there also after watching how we have all been transformed in the first link...

I have a high powered computer (Mac) and it took a while to load. I also tried to Elf Ourselves about 10 times, trying to send us capering around to family and friends, before discovering that when the option comes to just copy, that was the ticket for me. When I hit the e-mail to friends option, it bombed. By using the copy option, I could then just paste the link here and into e-mails.

A very scary thought that there are at least ten clones x four of us running around in cyberspace...

Oh well, I bet Santa can always use the extra help!!!

Enjoy!!!

"The Moment" ~ Writers Island

There are so many moments I could write about...

The moment I saw my baby sister for the first time...

The moment of my first kiss...

The moment I took my first of many breaths under water...

The moment before I leaped over the chasm with the waves crashing below me on jagged, jagged rock...

The moment I decided to step into the labyrinth...

The moment we decided to get married... and did...

The moment I stood in the 800 year-old air-hanger-sized cathedral attic of the Chartres Cathedral in Chartres, France and looked down through the boss hole to the labyrinth, hundreds of feet below...

The moment when the Santa Rosa Labyrinth design came through me... I will never forget that feeling of curiosity... of wonder... and excitement of discovery that led me to that very moment of opening to something so much bigger than my conscious self...

The moment I discovered that my whole world could change with just a thought...

And one of my most favorite moments of the entire year is almost here...  when I awake on December 25th and the freeway and city and my whole world is quiet for a few precious moments...

© 2007 "The Moment" ~ For Writers Island

Photo: Fossilized Nautilus shell from the Seaton Labyrinth, East Devon, England.

#86 ~ "Misspent Youth"

You can find
her in the falling leaves
in the vineyard…
the girl who
rode endless hours,
pages and pages
of books to escape
anger,
dancing the only way she knew
how…

You can find
her in the falling tree
shattering the family into splinters,
into bits that flew away
landing only once
or twice a year,
stepping over lines,
into new lines
exploring passions
long buried…

You can find
her in the voice
of spirit waking,
igniting through
the cracks of youth
broken,
of innocence set free
on wings of longing
stepping into time far, far
from where the journey began
only to circle back to the beginning…

You cannot find
her in one moment
of youth misspent,
only in the echo of not knowing
that everything she is today
sings from those shadow years
of believing in black
and white,
not yet ready to see
the blaze of color
that comes with falling...

© For Sunday Scribbles #86 - "Misspent Youth"

Meme~ing

Everything we see, touch, or taste is... stardust. All
of the carbon in our bodies, all of the oxygen in the air,
all of the silicon in the rocks and sand came into
existence inside ancient stars. At the end of their lives,
in explosions of unimaginable ferocity, their debris was
thrown into space. It took billions of years for this
stardust to form new stars and planets under the
influence of gravity.

This excerpt came from an exhibition at the CERN nuclear accelerator in Switzerland where my step-son is now living and doing his doctoral research (more on that later!)

I've been tagged by my new friend Rambler as to five reasons I write. And he already knows me well enough that he guessed correctly that I don't do tags!!!! But I am touched that he would think of me and  honor me in this way and I will answer his tag, but I will not be tagging it on. So if this post does spark you to do the same, let me know and I will gladly add a link here to you!

I had to look up what a meme is. My interpretation is that like a gene that passes on genetic material, blueprints, and all the characteristics that make us human, memes do this in the cultural sense. Ideas, concepts, cultural ideals, are passed on and kept alive by memes.

    1.  I have to write. If I don't, something will explode within me. The feelings, passions, and desires in me have to find expression, a place to be, like a curtain in a window...

    2. Blogging has pushed me over an edge. I am seen. People come and visit and sometimes comment and I have no control over how they perceive, or how they interpret, what I share. This makes me stay honest with what I post. It also makes me feel raw, vulnerable, and humble. I have to know that I am 100 percent behind what I put into cyberspace. And I do not do this annonymously, so the mask I wear here, is very thin...

    3.  If it were not for the computer, I could not write at all. I had sever trauma in my early years  around grammar, sentence structure, etc., as well as dyslexia. The first time I sat down at a computer, it was as if a light came on in a dark room. Because of years of graduate school, thousands of papers and a dissertation, I can now write from a very left brain place. I can proof dry medical reports, but run as far away as I can from that type of structure when I blog. My poetry and images have their own agenda, and it is wonderful and a bit scary at times, to let them take control.

    4.  I love reading and being inspired by other writers. I have found conversations and connections that have become very important to me and dear to my heart. I am sparked by others here in Bloglandia in a way that I never thought possible.

    5.  Over the years I have filled my life with a lot of structure. Blogging has challenged me to let go of some of the many have to's and must do's that roll around in my head. I have found so many unspoken rules that I impose upon myself and my writing that I've had to let them go, one by one, or I would not be able to write or nor have a blog. And as I said in statement "1", I have to write... 

I have to find expression for this stardust that resides in me... and to look in awe at the pinpoints of light that exist around me... and feel this pull of gravity that brings this all into form....

Thank you Rambler...

More Calabash ~ Another View

Our dear friend,
Glen...
sent these pictures from yesterday
at the Food For Thought
"Calabash: A Celebration of Gourds, Art, and the Garden" auction...

Reflections in the garden...
Glen and Milt...

Amaranth forest of fingers...

roof of the gourd house...

another great hat
in the great pavilion of gourd art...

one of my favorites...
peas in a pod...

how is this for a woven basket,
of gourds...

or seals romping and convening on a beach...

Glen loved Hesperia...

and I am sure she loves him too...

just look at the way she looked at him...

sharing the beauty of imagination...

and new beginnings...

 

Thank you Glen...

Calabash ~ 2007

Today
was Calabash ~
The Forrestville, CA
Food For Thought
"Calabash: A Celebration of Gourds, Art, and the Garden" auction.

You must forgive me...
for I did not take many pictures...

I was having so much fun
visiting with friends
old and new...

(Annie & Don Jeffries ~ Milt & Me) 

meeting new people...
like this handsome gentleman...

in one of the many fine
Calabash fashionable hats...

Walking the magnificent gardens...

sitting in secret spots,
like my sweet husband here
in the house of gourds...

and looking at all the amazing art,
like my piece Hesperia,
who won an award,
but alas, did not sell
as her price was a bit high
for the occasion...

She was greatly admired,
which did make my heart swell with gratitude...

(photo by AnnieElf Jefferies)

It was such a wonderful day and event,
done with such class,
delicious food, wine, music
and for such a good cause,
feeding and nourishing those so in need...

And a wonderful stepping stone for me...

as I already have ideas
for what I will create for next year!

Old Friends...

She walked
into our kitchen,
and into our hearts,
and began helping me
to make lunch,
as if she had done so,
hundreds of times before...

husbands and wives
only meeting for the first time...
sharing stories,
and loves, and children,
and the turns in the path
of life
that are sometimes difficult,
sometime joyful,
but real,
like holding hands at dinner,
or sharing good food at lunch...

or surprises...

from someone who only knows
your blogging face,
yet picks one of your favorite colors,

knowing the way to the mandala

of your heart...

Thank you AnnieElf and Don for stepping off from your Slow Moving Train to spend the weekend looking at the scenery with us, and for the delight of your company!!! May this time bring deeper connections with all you hold dear as you step back on that train and travel the road ahead.