Category: Compositions

Am I likeable? It’s a question this morning.

They say this is a product of naivete – or of youth – because supposedly, once you reach a certain age of “maturity,” such questions ought not to plague you.

I know I am likeable – and even more so, a genuine benefactor of humanity by the kind words I’ll say, or the lift I’ll give to another’s spirit in just passing.

I develop great rapport, genuine affection for, and caring with individual clients. I nourish trust between us, and they put a chance for their well beings’ progress in my hands.

It’s when I attempt to join forces with another team that I get bad messaging: I show up, play fair and squarely – then get rejected because the staff are doing other things.

I don’t go up to them in their face, and confront them.

I don’t walk around the office with a chip on my shoulder, or imposing judgements.

I just draw my sense of self more around me, holding my own position and not joining in the debauchery.

Meanwhile, the rest of the office flocks like birds chirping and following each others’ lead, swooping and winding through gossip trees.

Or, they gather together like a pack of hyenas, ready to figuratively attack and strip others, as soon as they see them.

I just take a step back and watch them, politely declining to add weight to their “cause.”

Before long, they excise me – and when I turn to go, they swipe at me with claws.

We used to have a cattery where we could time-out the cats, but with our place being smaller and youngest wanting the cats to be more happy, we did not bring it.

They used to yowl and misbehave with it, anyway. But, at least, we were where neighbors could not hear them.

The cats have been in youngling’s room while the rest of the house is put together, for they get into everything and could get hurt if unstable boxes fell on them.

They were content for a week and not causing mischief, but now when he is gone to work, the male begins digging at the bottom of the bedroom door, and I have had to spray him with water to get him to stop.

This evening, right after having to spray him, our silver girl decided to begin yowling loud for my attention. I had to go after her, too.

The thing is, there is no real solution.

Once these two get it in their minds (after having been given everything) that they want something different, they will misbehave until disciplined.

Their antics could get us kicked out with them being so loud and obnoxious in the middle of the night with neighbors stacked in around us.

I feel I have no choice but to stuff them into the back of the car in cat carriers when I leave to go get youngling, because if they do this behavior while I am gone, they are going to get us complaints from our neighbors.

We’ve only been here a week, and their anarchy could derail us!

(Two dogs and two cats in the car as passengers.)

I shouldn’t have these bruises – especially the deeper impact ones with a pink eye in the center, surrounded by a thick ring of purple.

And yet, I’m proud of them: they humanize me, and prove I’m capable of enduring.

It’s important The People respect me, and see me as akin to them.

Even if I’m an Elite.

“No. I won’t do it. I can’t watch you with another woman,” she resisted. “You’ll just have to give me a different project to oversee.”

“But, my Dear Girl,” he crooned in dulcet tones, persuading, “You know that only the deepest game will satisfy your craving.”

It is a challenge for me to recognize snd acknowledge my dualities.

I am stuck in the world of data and restrictions – this supposed “materialism” – and yet, I am more than a product of “The Machine.”

What I display to my own eyes from creativity is just the surface tip of more within and what can come through me.

I am a woman, yet a shapeshifter.

I am human, yet made of pure magic.

I am solid, yet ethereal.

I am calm and peaceful – yet a terrible, raging storm.

I’m an alchemist of emotions, is what it all comes down to.

Great power resides within me, waiting to be born.

Downsizing from not much allows remaining gems to be seen more clearly.

A few wooden bookshelves for storage, with an upright desk and lifted chairs, are surrounded by gray-blueish office privacy panels that create a bedroom out of a portion of our large living room.

Within this is placed a raised bed with box springs, mattress, foam pad, sheets, pillows, and many layers of pleasantly comfortable blankets.

A soft, dark blue patterned throw blanket drapes the entrance, and deep cream-red-orange Middle Eastern-type rugs cover the floor, elegantly.

Do not tell me it’s the way I’m thinking.

I’m saying this as a positivist, dealing with what others leave as wreckage.

You look at me and say I’m too much work because I’m honest, ask questions, and address issues of concern.

You look at her and think she’s easy because she doesn’t ask anything.

There’s a kind of magic that flows between you – effortlessly.

Well, maybe that’s because you haven’t hurt her.

Yet.

You did all your bs practicing on others like me to win your bet.

There’s trust between you two now that you stole from someone like me, giving the fire taken – not yours – to another.

“A good bone bake in a stable summer’s sun is what you need,” cackled the woman attending her.

“Child, think of the type of environment where you grew up – what your growing body got used to.

You just need a little reset, is all. Especially after all the cold dreary you’ve been put through!”

Corruption has been a thematic.

Wherever I go, it soon follows.

It’s gotten so that I want to look over my shoulder.

I flinch now when things happen around me – as if I’ve caused them to go sour.

But it isn’t me – it’s my timing.

I arrive where there is light, or I bring it.

And darkness hates the light, so seeks to dim it.

Humans are ever gullible and believe things at face value.

Therefore, they are easy for the dark to manipulate.

An example of this is when I was a child.

I used to go down the street to the place with the chain link fence and roses.

All the kids and parents said to stay away from there because the man was weird and the woman hated you if you touched her roses.

But, I couldn’t stay away because I love flowers, and nowhere were there any so beautiful.

I used to walk or ride my bike by and wave to the lady tending them.

She’d give me the evil eye in a kind of “hiss” for giving her attention.

I never touched her roses, but would lean across to smell them.

Maybe this is when I learned how to properly appreciate them.

i used to chide the other children not to hurt them.

She’d catch me doing this, but the rule was that I couldn’t touch them.

She saw I couldn’t help myself, and that I was persistent.

I asked her questions, and despite gruff replies, was always respectful.

We began having brief conversations about the roses and her love for them.

One day, she let me into her garden.

It was starkly bare on the lawn, but with the roses all along the perimeter as a guardian barrier.

They kept the bad outside their home.

They kept the neighbors’ judgement from infiltrating.

Over time, she invited me into her home and one day proudly shared that she enjoyed making chocolate pudding pies, and gave me some.

They were the best pies on the planet! and I was rarely allowed any treats at home.

Nothing compared to how good her pies tasted.

Her brother, the one everyone suspected of pedophilia, would allow me into his side den and share all the best, cheesy sci-fi movies.

We watched Godzilla and the giant ants attack the planet, while discussing philosophies of whether the humans should be saved.

We watched the giant praying mantis attack cities, and I cried when the military destroyed it – misunderstanding its needs to just survive.

He never laid a hand on me, and we were buddies.

Then one day, I shared my happy secret with my mother about these wonderful people and how good they treated me.

She had not realized I was spending most of my time with them – instead of with the block’s mean, ignorant children.

She then went and spoke with the lady and her brother.

Then, my friends no longer greeted me with trust and welcome.

I could still come over – but no pie, and no movies – because my mother had stated these rules.

The lady became more stressed and worn with every visit.

She had opened her home now to more children, and could give pie to them – but not to me.

She knew I wanted and needed this love, more than anybody.

We had been the first to share her pie’s secret.

She couldn’t handle the distress of both our heartbreak – so pushed me away and let other children take my place.

I was now a complication with rules to follow – which she feared and resented.

Her brother also distanced, angry I had shared our adventures.

I tried to explain it was because they were so lovely, that I appreciated him, and thst he was beautiful.

He shouldn’t hide away from people.

Later, be became active and brave in the church-going community, supporting and being there for children.

But then, he felt I’d betrayed him and holed away, turning against his own identity in shame.

He became as if slimy because he wouldn’t bathe as much.

I began to feel that vibe people had spoken of exuding from him, and no longer sought his company.

It was as if he transformed into what others expected of him.

And the pure beauty of kinship’s inclusiveness faded away.

(An ode to Esther and Ernest, my first genuine friends.)

This idea that my life can become financially stable when dependent upon others for employment is fecking hilarious!

And then, that this dependence could give me solid ground on which to pursue my creativy?

Hogwash!

The negative reinforcement of dealing with unstable employers keeps making me feel as if I am incredibly naive for trusting others.

These crash-and-burn experiences insinuate that I am avoiding my own responsibility by expecting others to follow through on their obligations and to “support me” in exchange for the work I give them.

I am made to feel as though I am a “worthless” worm, fit for little more than crawling in the dirt and eating others’ waste products.

I’ll have you know that worms create the foundation for everything.

Without earth worms, we would not have the oh-so-thin microlayer of biomaterial that supports the feeding and productivity of almost every life form on this planet.

Get your “shit” in perspective, people – and treat each other humanely!

The little girl sobs as the dark energies
Squeeze her heart and distort thinking:

They riddle like worms into everything –
Causing her body pain and discomfort.

She tries spells of warding, yet weakened,
Can only lay down, suffering as twitching.

When they first met, she thought, “Ah, if only I could have one such as this,” lamenting her age, and thus missed opportunity.

Why now, when she knew much more and could see more clearly, was she societally not allowed to seek congruity with a man sharing similar interests, ready to start a family?

She told him that because of their age difference, they could only be friends, and that she thought it would be great for him to visit.

But, over the next several months, she realized how precious his heart was, and that she didn’t want it to get hurt by another’s rough using, so she committed to him.

Looking back now, after years invested, only to be turned away at the alter’s door by him, she reflected how she’d initially assessed they should only be friends.

Yes, the adventure-turned-into-long-journey had yielded her own personal growth benefits, but she’d also sacrificed and endured much hardship – which in the end, again left her empty handed.

So what was the lesson here? Should she not have tried like in the band Heart’s song, “Dog and Butterfly?”

Or was there no fault at all on her part, and it was the boy who’d been afraid to rise?

I do not like conflict.

A popular phrase says that conflict is key to growth.

Some people greet conflict with alacrity – and even crave it to “get another’s goat.”

Conflict to me is a symptom that something is not working right, or has become broken.

It is not to be lauded as an ideal, but an indicator we must address an issue to a better solution – beyond mere token.

My youngest captured our playcul frippery and texted to me what we said:

Me: “What is stuck on this power strip that’s making it all weirdly sparkly?”
Mom: “The blood of children?”
Me: “??????”
Mom: “I was going to say ‘blood of elves’ but I didn’t wanna piss the elves off.”
Me: “As opposed to the children??”
Mom: “Well, they’re not around anymore!”

(I am still laughing, and my youngest comments my laugh is like I know this is f-ed up, but it’s the funniest thing ever that I said it. We have a lot of fun being silly and saying things to catch each other off guard.)

A thought often enters my mind as to whether or not I should make this site be anonymous.

For I am out in the world, promoting myself as a professional, and anyone at any time could happen upon these writings.

People who do not know themselves well enough to have reached the point of being able to accept others’ flaws mixed with capabilities can have too much reactivity and desire to destroy others’ reputations if they feel uncomfortable about something.

Additionally, some people put their whole life’s efforts into creating an impenetrable persona presentation that they can hide behind, which they think is then infallible.

But, all of us are squishy on the inside.

And we are always just still learning and adjusting.

It matters to me that I be allowed to be seen because I am not just another zombie, shuffling.

Consensus is a dicey word.

It’s elusive if people involved in a decision allow their fears and insecurities to overtake them.

It’s dangerous if a person depends on such people’s perspectives.

Today, I have been fired from an amazing job that I put every effort toward to move here and secure.

Why, you ask?

Because the people involved could not follow through on the offer they initially promised me – and then decided without consulting me that my position there was no longer a good fit.

Back to reenrolling in unemployment for me?

Back to walking the streets, looking for worthy humanity to believe in and collaborate with?

No.

I fought back. I fought to regain my position.

It is a great clinic – and I belong there.

No one – I mean NO ONE – is just going to be allowed to disolve my investments without at least my stating my case to them, loud and clear.

Grow up, people – and get over your fears!

We have a world to save here!

She didn’t blame the illness – in fact, she knew that it was due.

Her body having been disrupted from rest recovery and needed sleep cycles as she was pushed beyond levels of endurance time and again – then exposed to a sick client – rendered her vulnerable .

However, she also realized that she had to bring forward what she’d left back behind her: she couldn’t be in that space and time anymore, and who she was must rise up to next levels.

She needed to stop and let the rest of herself catch up to her.

For my generation, we’ve been under spell that you must stay unconsciousness if you wish to have intimate relationship.

I walk between then and now – into a new paradigm becoming.

My children will not fall into the sway as was attempted to be programmed into me.

Marrying whom I did, combined with my efforts to not pass forward the bullshit, will go a long way for them toward this freedom to choose their own life paths.

But, where does this leave me?

Perched in a tree, watching the world go by and cameo contributing when necessary.

I must get it into my head that I am an anomaly.

I must realize there is likely no one here for me.

I am the first of my kind, maybe – or maybe I initially was not supposed to be here, seeing.

My breaking the trap carefully crafted has me triapsing through unknown territories.

She reaches shakily for the smooth blue ceramic tea kettle, just large enough for a couple of cups’ portability.

Lifting the lid gently clinking and then stirring the tea, she reflects upon her own personal trageies.

How can one full of so much caring for others be seemingly denied basic human needs – why be programmed to love if there is no matching?

Though I appeared to you in a dream, thinking it was mine, I wore the face and form of another woman.

This is whom you loved – then were surprised to find me there, in her.

Too often I find that the male mind must be allowed its illusions.

And if I linger, thinking I’ve found a home, my heart receives more bruises.

The tally today was 10×6, 6×6, and 4×6 heavy chain link panels falling over onto my left posterior shoulder as I leaned forward.

I shouted out for youngest to come help me as I held my own in bent over posture where everything had shoved and pinned me.

What is it with my left shoulder always getting beaten on, lately? It is certainly acting as the shield that catches, deflects, and protects.

I then joked with youngest, like Arnold Schwarzenegger in Kindergarten Cop’s tumor reference, “It’s not a hump,” and acted out staggering forward like Quasimodo.

I could feel the pain begin to throb and swell under my shoulder blade, yet knew I had to keep moving

Then, something landed hard on the top arch of my left foot. Ow. Ow. Ow. completed the lurching effect.

Later, I “hauled bootie,” walking along the freeway at night, hoping to not get sideswiped as I kept flashing my camera light at traffic coming up behind me.

My upper left thigh kept spasming, making me limp to not engage the catch of the psoas and quadraceps intersections fighting.

I passed an older woman sitting close to the zooming cars outside a midway convenience store and gave her what would have been my taxi fare.

She liked my name and wanted to be spoiled as my baby, citing I must know her since I belonged with Zeus and the other gods.

I told her I couldn’t join her because I had my own kid to take care of, and besides, the gods were just a part of human imagination.

She released me back to my duty of getting home upon seeing I had my own purpose set.

Now that I am very tired and sick, I hope to spend the next four days merely unpacking boxes and resting.

Ok – maybe just resting!

The younger woman led me through halls of her part of the compound mansion.

Workmen were adding new aspects, which seemed like technology advancement.

Descending levels by smoothly-designed trap doors into brightly lit catacombs, I could see how the child version of her would have thrived in such a functional paradise.

When she brought me to the corridor where she could paint on, then erase the walls, she left me for a few moments to create my own presentation.

I felt this whole tour and introduction to how she had grown up was some kind of a test of my attentiveness and ingenuity.

She wanted to see how I’d respond, and if I would be worth more than being just some puppet they could use.

So, I got into the spirit of the moment, as if we were trusting, “thick-as-thieves” friends, and my brain clicked into the thematic of playing and one-uping each other.

I knew she’d grow impatient and that this could count against me if I took too long, so after only a few minutes, I called her back out to observe my artistic rendition.

She came out and observed the walls. They were still blank. She walked up and down the hall, looking at each one, seeking for some hidden coding or clue to what she wasn’t easily seeing.

“Do you get it?” I asked, in a jibing, gleeful tone.

She looked at me, unwilling to be miffed for not seeing the punchline.

“It’s impressionary art!” I crowed.

She looked at me, nonplussed.

“It’s art that you think in your mind I would draw – it’s whatever your impressions are of my artistic capabilities!”

I chortled a bit, like a kid quite happy with my inspired cleverness.

I didn’t even know I had in me, and she quietly fumed to herself at getting caught off guard by her own prebiased expectations.

When you can’t compete with perfection, you’ve got to be unique!

But, then the dream got the better of me, for suddenly I had no shirt on.

I apologized to her for this apparent loss of modesty revealing my amplitude, and asked if she had a spare one.

What does this type of occurrence mean again in dreamscape psychology?

I guess I felt revealed in sharing my playfulness with her.

(Title from Jurasdic Park movie quote)

“I could please you now, if you’d let me,” he extended the offer enticingly.

Her body responded with hope and longing, but she sadly turned away from its assenting.

“Thank you – but I can’t. I had to close myself off from you to survive.”

Shoulders clench, quivering, as I huddle in the now cold room, bent on capturing the images and feelings that began flooding into me during my giving a therapy session, as mind processed the dream.

The rain swooshes against cars and street as the vehicles pause, then slosh through puddles at the stop lights outside the office windows.

Up until today, the rain did not stop my loading or unloading the trucks.

And yet today, I am realizing how fatigued I am in my muscles – and even fingers – from all of the gripping and fine motor navigation coordination required in dislodging and transporting so many items from one treacherous landscape to unknown others.

The truck’s slippery ramp last night, which almost sideways completely “split” my legs, was one such terrain.

The shushing rain is telling me I’m to rest – that I’m not to rush out in the time gap between clients to address the near-countless plants and misc. items piled and crammed into the truck, still awaiting unloading.

It tells me it doesn’t matter that extra money had to be spent for toiletries and too-expensive cat food from the late night convenience store to feed felines and canines this morning at 4am and keep us all functioning

It tells me it does not matter that I will have to pay for yet another truck rental day.

It tells me that I must rest more and just get through working, to gain any recovery I can first, and that tomorrow, both my youngling and I will have a day off where we can then together tackle the whole thing.

If only I weren’t worried about funding with rent at work and home due in just a few days.

If only I could believe I’m truly in the hands of Divine guidance, and that everything will work out – no matter the pile of bills gathering and looming, like a giant tidal wave.

They targeted my father, and so went after my mother and their son and daughter.

I, being the oldest, understood too well suddenly what was happening as we discarded everything, climbed into a rickety Volkswagon van, and donned tattered clothing.

Luckily, the woven, striped blankets and makeshift bedding in the back did not smell musty, and our hastily grabbed snack groceries and water were tossed in without caring if the bags ripped.

I don’t know how far we’d traveled to reach the stone sanctuary, but when we arrived, it must have been long enough to confuse the hunters in their search, allowing their orders to switch from “kill” to “detain and bring.”

As we and mother were ushered into the chamber, dread filling my solar plexis, father was brought forward to meet the master planner.

He was told that he could choose to serve, or watch his family be slaughtered.

Luckily, the master gave my father further incentive on how he could serve with honor – or I fear he may have opted for us all to perish, simply to free us from this monster.

+++++

I watched as my fafher climbed the steps of the ladder to stand on the makeshift balcony and address the assembly.

It did not phase me that he now looked like The Witcher from the Netflix series, and it made sense that the people rallied to greet and follow him.

Bound to this new destiny, my family had become as royalty, and I was now maturing into a viable young woman.

I watched from a distance when the hunters would pass by in the halls, never coming directly down the corridors of the nobility, but crossing the transections leading to different meeting rooms on errands that only secrets and lies would keep.

The two that had come for us – I noticed them the most, for the impression they’d left upon me had been terrifying.

Like an arrow tip snapped off and left in my gut, the wound gnawed at me, and I ever pushed my will against it to understand and dislodge it.

+++++

Being as our family members were allowed to cross between classes, we could partake in both nobility and commoner gatherings.

I went into the dark-lit hall one evening to pass time observing the mixture of revelry where hunters and clansmen mingled freely.

As I observed the scene where everyone was welcome no matter rank or reputation of duties, I saw the two there, and the one with the thinner, sharp angles on his face leveled his gaze at me.

I can’t explain well the way he looked and walked, only that there was something of a mix of elvin, hawk, and lean wolf about him.

I felt drawn to know him more to understand what made him tick.

Was the berry plum wine I did not remember consuming leading, or was it the heart of a girl becoming a woman that caused me to beckon him to join me in the dark enclave where we might have some brief privacy?

He approached me warily with a “Good evening, Milady…” – a knowing glance between us quickly assessing and conveying that we both knew where we stood.

He had not forgotten the role he had played of neutral clemency or death upon members of my family – self included – and he could see and feel he owed some kind of debt to me in order to even our score.

“I would like you to kiss me,” I said – and his eyes widened slightly in surprise, before resuming their neutrality.

But, I’d caught the glint of fear before he’d hidden it.

I now understood that he was like a wild predator inside, and that he knew – like any wolf – that if you get close to a fire’s source of heat, it can burn you.

“What’s in it for me?” he asked, nonchalantly, recomposed and assessing me man to woman.

I was flattered that he gave me my new status by this scoffing, and liked the fact I’d caught a glimpse of his vulnerability.

“It’s not for you, it’s for me,” I asserted

“I want you teach me how to kiss properly, as I have no experience in these things – and I am ready.”

“I want you to teach me what is good and how to coax passion. Mayhap, I will teach you a few things…”

The corner of his mouth twitched as he struggled to keep aloof. Then he broke out in heartfelt laughter, dropping his guard and opening his arms wide to me

“Then come with me, Milady, and we shall see what delights we discover!”

+++++

I came upon them early one evening soon after, the two hunters having just strung up a young man built tall and strong who was gripping at the loop around his neck, struggling to not let it kill him.

My wolf – The Rake – was holding the rope hoisting the young man up. There was no mistaking the situation: they’d been ordered the kill the lad.

I rushed forward, ” STOP! STOP THIS NOW!” Whereupon the rope was actually dropped to my surprise, although Rake’s face remained impassive.

The young man dropped to his hands and knees, then struggled to loosen and get the rope off of his neck while coughing and gasping

Rake watched me as his hands still loosely gripped the rope, and it seemed as if he could read my thoughts and take in what I was feeling.

Panic’s confusion flooded my brain as I struggled to reconcile the versions of this man whose inner fire appealed to and quickened me.

Somehow, subconsciously, I had expected my “goodness” to transfer to him by our interacting.

I was flustered at my own naivety, and it dawned on me that I was going to have to teach him why he must modify his path in life and how he must own and use his power over life and death more carefully.

His high intelligence required soft handling and his spirit needed the warmth of my heart’s passion – I could see.

But, the reality of the world we lived in had dictated a role for him that was hard to abandon.

As he gazed at me, fully willing and capable of immediately resuming what I considered to be an outright atrocity, suddenly I was yanked back into my life’s previous “reality.”

+++++

My mind struggled through the haze of realizing the light in my bedroom was brighter than it should be, were the alarm to be going off soon at 7am.

“No, No, No – don’t let it be!” as I groped for my phone in the darkness, feeling impending doom and resurging panic as, indeed, both alarms had gone off – but were somehow kept silent.

“NO – I TRUSTED YOU!”

Adrenaline bursting through my body, causing instant shaking as I scrambled to find black smock pants, shirt, bra, socks (forget underwear – GO!), I crammed my feet into soft, velvet black tennis shoes and dashed to the bathroom – telling my youngest I was leaving immediately, so please take over Everything.

20 minutes was all I had to dress and drive to the office. I could still see Rake watching me from the other side, absorbing impressions of my thoughts’ cascade-patterning unfolding.

“I TRUSTED YOU! This is IMPORTANT to me!”

The dream had sucked me down into realms of deeper healing and alternative visceral experiencing long needed, and the alarm clock had conspired against time to keep me sleeping.

He had distracted me. His heart had lured me.

Because his darkness made it safe to accept the darkness inside of me that has felt like I’ve somehow become corrupted.

Because the darkness in that situation had allowed me to see how bright my white light is still shining.

Because my soul is seeking and needs another of it’s fire’s kind of heat to inspire and ignite the true me.

Because, as a healer, I’m drawn to the complexity of human spirit – especially if its kind appeals to me and feeds my own questing.

Because I desired him, and he needed me.

My brain in its turmoiled vex – unsure of what to think or believe – could only quip, “Never trust a murderer!”

And yet, perhaps it was he who had awakened me, knowing I was fully capable of using the time remaining to somehow still succeed.

This is something I’ve aspired to become, yet is a way of being that frequently eludes me.

I don’t understand why it does, yet sometimes find myself “waking up” after a period of continuity has made me fall into a mode of creative stagnation.

I will say, however, that I very much (I mean so much it alters my sense of internal safety) dislike missing work at my new job due to the difficulties of getting us moved out of my parents’ place and into independence.

It messes with my sense of purpose that I lost work and income, and this brings insecurity which capitalizes upon exhaustion from energy over-expension to begin tearing apart the fragile self trust that I’ve nurtured.

It becomes like being under constant assault by one’s inner critic, an embodiment of impressions received from any bad messaging imposed by others along life’s past journeys.

Feelings are important.

They help us identify aspects about ourselves at any given time, relating to any given situation.

However, one thing many people do not know is that when you attempt to transition from a bad situation to better, emotions are a bit laggy.

In homeostasis of mind, body, or soul, for example, there is a bit of squeeze – resistance to change or what’s called “snap back.”

It is not that these aspects of the self are trying to sabotage – although their antics can have that effect by giving us cross-signals that make us doubt ourselves, rather than clear, “Hey, yeah, let’s do this, you’ve got this!” signals.

In other words, leaving a bad situation and entering into a better one can have a bumpy, non-smooth transition which can give a person tons of self doubt, confusion, and anxiety as to their internal orientation and relation to the world.

It makes a kind of sense, though, that what one had come to “recognize” as “normal” was what “the norm” was to our system.

We are creatures of comfort – and let’s face it – sedentary, if we can get away with it.

Our beings naturally resist change for their own sense of self preservation.

Something’s changed out there.

The land feels taken over by a watching presence that is slowly claiming it.

Gone is the harsh cheer of summer and the promise of plenty.

Fruit trees and hay grass crops produced at a fraction of their usual yield – maybe because of the smoke from last year’s fires and the drought.

It’s likely the normal abundance of fall game is also diminished as a result.

Last night’s skunk seemed unnaturally ravenous, when for the last two years we’ve smelled it, but it never needed to dig.

I told my youngest we would not go outside tonight, after having left the truck running with lights on while bringing in groceries

The sheep and roosters will have to wait for food until the morning, and I hope the boys will be alright.

They say large predators won’t attack if you have lights on and are with your dogs, but this sense feels menacing.

It doesn’t care what we are. It just knows that it’s hungry.

I realized once we returned to the relative safety of the shelter that we had to go back out and remove the blood-soaked body.

Another problem was, we didn’t have the coop keys because our pet sitter had accidentkally taken them home with her.

So, with gloves, garbage bags, a wrench, bolt cutters, and hammers, we set about attempting to pop open the lock.

I finally secured the lock in one hammer’s hook and beat on it with the other until the lock’s outer casing popped off, and I could wail on where the latch nestled.

It soon yielded and I could slip the chain off that had merely smirked at our earlier efforts to snip it.

Meanwhile, things were going bump in the dark that normally didn’t, and we could smell the skunk returning. Then, we heard the shrill cry of a not-so-far off cougar.

I wasn’t happy that we were out there so late at night – basically luring any predator by the smell of fresh blood – and hastily cleaned up the mess.

To cover any remaining scent,I smeared stagnating wet hay over the blood spatters on the cage bars and cleaned up the bulk of what had poured onto the ground.

The neighbors across the road had an outside fire going and were probably wondering at our commotion and occasional vexed cussing as we troubleshot the entire situation and tramped all over the property, looking for tools and implements.

Then, I had to climb on top of the already packed large garbage can’s contents to tamp it down further and make an indent for the bagged remains so the lid would close properly.

The varied materials within it shifted dangerously and I yelled out something like, “Stop – No, not this time!” as I felt anarchy’s chaos taking note of my vulnerable position.

I swear, sometimes it’s only beligerant attitude that makes the forces of destruction grant latitude!

We came home to the predator having gotten into the rooster pen again.

It was a skunk, chewing on the neck of one of the white silkies that has no self preservation instincts

My youngest cried out to me in alarm and I tramped up the hill with a metal garbage can lid, which I bashed aggressively against the coop to cause the critter to retreat..

Blood drenched the end edge of the inside cage which was supposed to have been a second layer – but the four boys in it always slept clustered against the edge.

We’d had to tarp that area because they wouldn’t move out of the rain, and I had commented days ago to my youngest they had Darwinianism stamped all over them.

I hate being proven correct in such a matter, and I’m upset that we’ve lost two more roosters to the opportunist.

Because I saw you, back then, before anybody knew you.

I saw your potential, and I saw you poised to grow true.

I didn’t know what to expect from you, but I recognized.

My soul was jangled into awareness and instinct marked.

Then, I ignored you – for I hate and did not want obsession.

I did not want to fixate upon outcomes, nor rail vexations.

Until the day you arrived in front of me – and I remembered.

The way I felt for you back then remained, heat tempered.

I’ve reviewed your life’s accomplishments and see you rising.

You’ve become like me, after all – without compromising.

A thought – fleeting – taking me to another land.

An island, to be precise, where a man grew from childhood to one day take command.

I am there, for a few moments, wandering the perimeter until I find a bench overlooking the ocean.

Then I sit, leaning forward with my elbows propped on thighs and chin resting in my hands.

Is it sunny or overcast? Wind or no? Light drizzle or balmy?

I can smell and taste the salt, heavy on the air from waves crashing below as spray particles reach me.

What greatness has been born on this isle, to travel over the channel and cause nations to rise or fall?

What genius has ignited from the once tender heart of a complex soul?

My parents never felt the desperation of poverty, nor the vexation of being trapped in a town where one’s skills were barely applicable and rarely appreciated.

They never felt the hardship of continuous labor against elements and uneven, angled terrain bound to trip you at any minute – or make you slip and possibly break a leg if leveraging anything heavy.

They never felt the insecurity of power failing – how close to the edge we were living, without backup resources or communication in a drafty, canted dwelling.

Oh, they warned us it could be challenging, and chastised me for not being able to do enough like they wanted – while blaming not enough rent collected to warrant their fixing the decaying shower.

And when they visited, they stayed in their nice, well built, insulated house perched above us, “snug as bugs in a rug’s” “lap of luxury,” claiming they were homesteading.

Learning to let go and relax when the funds are low and more are hidden from view with impending rent and many other bills due (including another moving truck, trailer, and car that needs repair to be towed in order to completely vacate the property properly) is like having a broken bone underneath muscles that keeps misalligning.

It’s a bit alarming to have people so close that they are above and to both sides of us, after being isolated for three years on a mountainside.

Our cave of a slanted, cobbled-together 1950’s mobile home once-trailer is being replaced by a level-on-solid-ground one bedroom apartment without delayed maintenance issues.

(I get half of the large living room for my space -thus the needed privacy panels. And luckily I have ear plugs on, so the neighbors’ infiltrating sounds are slightly distanced.

This has got to be better than having lived in the motel room weekly for the last several months – and the caliber of people here have healthier lifestyles.

I don’t think we’ll be exposed to extreme drug and alcohol use, nor other people’s desperation and homeless disrepair.

I am grateful for this – though the the sudden banging noises they make as they prepare to go and then leave jolt me!

How do people do it?

Do they hire movers, have lots of friends, have extra time to spend, or just have flexibility?

The truck is half unpacked – all I could do late last night without help in the occasional lite rain.

The floors where furniture will go are washed, and alcohol wipes made the toiletries approachable.

(The shower afterwards was hot, the water soft and full, and the tub and walls are repaired without massave rot, mold, and crumbling apart!)

But, I had to call in to keep the truck yet another day because, like it or not, I needed to rest before moving the heavier things with my youngest.

We both worked all night until 6am this morning.

How is it that I thought two hours of sleep following could possibly rejuvenate, as I stretch my sleeping muscles warning me to be careful?

I must try to sleep some more, and chase away the work-I’ve-missed worries.

I’m in the eye of the storm, now – there’s no escape until the tasks are accomplished and the winds of change transfer us completely over.

Extending wings to carefully test the air, allowing currents to lift her gently.
Instincts oriented on sweet destination trust the breeze to carry her home.

I saw it coming, could feel it ahead.

The timing of dwindling money with the inability to not overspend.

Setting out on the road, when all you have it a plan – and a huge leap of faith where you let the universe take command.

Whenever I move, there is a physical cost.

One time, a heavy book shelf fell on the front side of my left knee.

It could have shattered it, but instead, the blow spread through the knee to bruising out the back side in diffusion.

The next move, bulky office privacy panels (which seem to be evil when no longer connected to each other) almost took out my right leg at the upper thigh as they fell onto me.

I couldn’t stop their weight, but fought it all the way down to my last seconf while backing up.

By Grace, Itself, something was there to stop the force from crushing or snapoing my femur.

I still have an indention in my quadraceps muscle from the impact.

This move, as I’ve twitchily moved around these items (knowing at any pivot’s second they could turn on me), I did not calculate for the trailer adjustment metal pole sticking straight up behind the truck once it was attached.

It hid under the ramp I’d opened over it.

In the dark, in the rain, in an empty parking lot where the truck was parked as I returned to retrieve some bedding, I exerted extreme force and forward momentum pressure on the ramp to close it.

The fore top of my middle finger collided with crushing force against the unmovable metal appendage – and let’s just say many loud f***’s were emitted into the air around me as the pain exploded and I hazedly calculated how bad the damage could be.

My other middel finger just split yesterday, causing constant pain’s agony.

This move’s price so far has got me “flipping” the toll collector elements both of my middle fingers!

Five days of packing items with three days getting them into the truck.

Truck Day 1 lent two moving hands for two hours. They got it started with the heavy stuff.

Truck Day 2 was all the miscellaneous, trying to pack in as tightly and space-saving as possible.

Truck Day 3 was washing all of the dishes and separating final items of what to take this trip vs. what to leave for the next.

When the truck was ready, it was time for the farm overhaul, making sure the hay arroving tomorrow would be secured behind tarps and all the animals would have adequate food, water, bedding, and shelter.

Afterward, we hosed down mud demons and found our hounds had been hiding underneath the grime.

Then, I had just enough time to drive into town to attach the trailer.

However, as soon as I began driving down the road in the rain, the passenger side windshield wiper flew kiltered-off of its mount, causing the mechanism to jam.

Thus semed a clear enough message to me that we wouldn’t be driving this evening. It’s better to manage the move when daylight aids visuals and emergency backup resources are more readily available.

I was born for something – only, I can’t remember.

When I was born, I was yanked from my mother too harshly.

In a way, this crippled me.

Not so the average person can see – but so that I couldn’t perform naturally, and other kids could label me as a freak.

They could ostracize me.

I mean, I couldn’t even jump more than a foot in those PE tests they gave us when I was a fledgling – I couldn’t get my legs to work properly under me until I was in my teens!

I wanted to scream at adults and children, alike, “Can’t you see that something has happened to me?!”

As I grew from infancy through childhood, I kept having head trauma from other people’s rough handling of me and my own tripping falls.

Impact against concrete conglomerate became pain’s chastizing message of obligatory duty to submit.

“Thou shalt not remember. Though shalt live a meaningless life and perish in obscurity like the rest of these cattle.”

It’s not that my ego minds so much that the world doesn’t know me, but that this severe migraine in my neck tells me something is off from what it should be..

The drive in my spirit ever pushing to keep moving, keep achieving – keep transcending beyond whatever I’ve recently learned – is blocked in its channeling, pounding at the door to my awareness.

Impulse is a part of my design – something that few others posses in their natural, daily functioning.

Therefore, I AM Unique – I was meant to be Something MORE.

If only I could repair the damage, I wouldn’t be stumbling forward – blindly.

I am not a prophet, though I understand their undertakings.

In similar fashion, my predilection guides me.

God has been ever silent, watching.

But, occasionally, an angel has visited by extrasensory.

Yeah – try to get anyone to believe me!

Luckily, I have no interest in preaching.

It isn’t something I can prove, just relate as things which happened to me.

Can I call one? I don’t know…

Would I want to? Are you kidding?!!

I’m smart enough to know they have their own agendas!

And I refuse to be a plaything

I won’t do just anything to gain love, but if I believe that I have it, I’ll do nearly anything to keep, nourish, and grow it.

You see, love is not a commodity – though now on the world market, too many buy and sell it.

It’s a fragile, near intangible state of being that extends its protection as shelter.

It gives hearts strength where weak before, and improves lives beyond any troubles.

It banishes darkness and carries us to better horizons, where we guard it like fierce tigers.

How many times did I lift my chin against the wind, believing you’d come home to me?

How many times did I push aside the doubt and fear to believe we’d have our new beginning?

How many times did I hold our children in my mind’s eyes – loving them, and laughing happily at how they were so much like you?

How many times did I come through against all odds – long after the darkness consumed you?

An alcohol swipe – just there, cool and gentle, carressing.

Setting up for the bite allowed to inject venom, promising black desire’s indulgence.

Ah, heroine – my dealer, sweet healer.

I’m your junkie.

Soaking up media transmission waves, claiming I’m innocent.

He sought me out in the canned cranberry and yam aisle.

A more boring aisle is hard to find – maybe the miscellaneous tool aisle.

Extras, on the side – but nothing main dish or savory…

I was stuck there, contemplating.

I didn’t want to buy any, but the association of Thanksgiving and Christmas with the Matriarch’s family cheer called me back to those many years.

Like a vestigial limb, I still received the seasonal impulses that my help was needed for ensuring everything was prepared.

That he would seek me out there seemed odd to me, and I would say in preference that it wasn’t my best timing.

I looked at him blankly, lost in reverie, not seeing him clearly and feeling just hollow: empty.

I had no facade to offer, no cheerful smile – and yet still, he wanted me.

Mithral trails extending across the atmosphere guide the mind into realms which stretch conscious fabrication.

As others stay grounded in knowns and numbers, one is drawn to expanding their possibilites.

Where once lay border of madness, now reside sparks of imagination causing plausible emanations.

It is important to me that people understand concepts of deeper psychology because I believe we are held back from truly healing as a species, and I am interested in finding out what we truly need in order to do so.

The letdown nearly crushed me as I braced and took the hit. We would not find acceptance, nor inclusive prosperity, here.

Our course had brought us far outside normal trajectories, and the inhabitants of this land were ignorant and hostile.

I’d already been in charge of forging income and housing, but now I’d have to keep us alive against nature’s elements and racism.

Why couldn’t I let it go – just give up, like he had?

Because if I’d done that, I would’ve stayed stuck on this mountain – turned to granite.

Last night, we let the cats stay out with us instead of in their own cattery, and surprisingly, my female and male stayed on the bed with me.

He was at my feet or in-between my legs, sleeping outside my covers, and she nestled in some curled positition gainst my head, neck, or shoulders, kneading into my neck and purring.

He is my rough-and-tumble, brown tabby guy: the harder I pet, massage, and gently pull on his tail for spinal tension release, the better.

She is my queen: silver and soft furred – and seems to adore me, though I don’t know why since I’m always moving in a blur past her.

You’d think that after an evening of such love given to me, I’d wake up refreshed and in a good mood.

But my hound had been jealous in her crate all night and kept waking me up, trying to get attention.

In the morning, I had a sudden panic attack when I thought about driving with the trailer and getting our stuff and pets out of here.

Luckily, my ex -husband picked up the phone and was a sounding board for me to break-it-down a bit, and relieve some fear.

After we hung up, I spent the next two hours going over details of the moving pieces, working the problems I could see and searching for solutions.

Then, I pushed outside, fiesty and to the point – moving things around, caring for the animals, and making sure the dogs got exercised before I left them with youngest to run errands in town.

I wasn’t calm or relaxed while driving and listening to “The In-Between” on replay while getting into its best passionate moments. And when I arrived at a stoplight, my angst diverted to a man and woman directly across the street from me in front of an office.

They seemed to be discussing the plants in huge pots outside, as if he was her contractor.

I noticed he had a strong beer belly and red face, denoting possible frequent beer consumption, and I thought, “how like this region where we’ve lived around others living unhealthy lifestyles.”

Then, I saw something as the light turned green and my path curved me left in passing them.

They were laughing as if teasing.

He leaned down as she looked up chuckling – and then she looked shyly away.

She looked up again and paused, realizing he’d tried to kiss her.

Then she reached for him as he leaned down again – and they kissed!

Right there, in front of traffic, unaware that all could see.

My heart melted.

I had just witnessed two people falling in love.