I can still feel it… chills chasing up and down the back of my neck as Jean blew Taps on her bugle. The two of us walking the paths through one Florida state park or another, depending on the year, and making lights-out rounds of all the cabins.
The sound of giggling ‘tweens mixed with hooting owls, the occasional grumbling bobcat, and, one summer, the scream of a Florida panther on the shore of the lake.
It was a space somehow out of time. No physics or SAT tests. No TV sit-coms. And, with the exception of a lifeguard/bus driver or two, no men.
It was my very rustic, poison ivy covered, gnawed on by fire ants introduction to the Divine Feminine. Of course, I didn’t know that, consciously! I didn’t even know the words.
Six summers. Summers which included my first Moon time, swimming with Manatees, learning Macrame’, passing Red Thread, sitting with the homesick ones, and telling stories. Stories of how we were all related. Even the fire ants!
Fifty years, more or less, before I encountered the notion of Medicine Basket, I was filling my own.
Then came decades of learning several versions of the way we’ve always done it.
I started to be conscious of that dynamic in nursing school when I realized that my instructors, who were 30 or 40 years older than the students, were teaching us what they’d learned from their teachers, who did much of their learning during the Korean War.
While I was finishing my BA at Eckerd college, I learned one of my all-time favorite quotes… wisdom from the Quaker tradition:
In order to learn, we must be willing to be changed.
I knew, with every cell in my body, the huge truth of those words.
Then, when I was in Seminary, I encountered more than a few folks who seemed to wish those particular words weren’t true! Fortunately, those weren’t the only voices!
There were also folks trying to find new ways of telling old stories in a world never imagined by the first people to speak them… likely filled with fears of both silence and speaking. (Though that could be projection on my part!)
Somehow, though, I am here, today… sharing these words with you, in a time when silence feels far more terrifying than speaking.
And I have a new language now! Images!!!
What fascinates me the most is that, when I allow myself to learn new things about the process of putting paint on canvas, I am also learning new things about me. About my fears and my dreams. About being seen. About showing up… all of me!
It’s not all this world needs, but it is choosing to put one foot in front of the other, on the way.
The Way of Love. Which just might have been what Jean was hoping we’d learn, all those years ago!
For this moment, a bowl of my very own bone broth. With lots of veggies. And gratitude!
And, an offer… 30 minutes. My gift. You show up willing to claim the place you long to be. We’ll start making the map! Just click here and the calendar elves will gladly hook you up!
ps… no explaining the art, this day. You tell me what you see and hear! Really!!! Leave me a comment, if you like. Or email me. suesvoice@gmail.com
pps… I’m waving my magic brush-hammer again, and declaring that all original art and archival prints at FierceArtWithHeart – including those in the guest artist collection – are 20% off the current listed price, ONLY through July 22nd, at 11:59pm EDT. Just enter the code The Tower when you check out… (And, if you have your heart set on something major, there’s an option to spread out the payments!)
ppps… if Jean were here now, she’d say what I’m saying… never tRump!