Being with Mystery

The Mystery within...

My daughter’s cat; my daughter’s Facebook words:

“Rest in peace Sophie.  Sweetest cat I've ever known.  Very sad day.  She will be dearly missed.”

We never expected to lose Sophie this past week.  Her death brought us closer to Mystery and reminded us control is an illusion and change is inevitable.  She was thirteen years old and was treated a couple of months ago for a lame front leg that got better overnight.  The lameness suddenly returned, much worse, now in her opposite leg.  Treatment was ineffective and the next day she was still in major distress.  The vet suggested it might be best to put her down.  So we took her in and mercifully she was put out of her misery while we stood by her.

I had suggested to my daughter that we could bring her back home with us for burial but she was reluctant until the vet mentioned home burial was one of our options.  I thought Sophie would also have wanted to come back with us. 

Clearing a spot for her burial, digging a deep enough hole, sawing away large underground roots from nearby bushes was hard work.  But when I watched my daughter gently wrap Sophie in the cream colored sheet, carry her to the grave, and nestle her in, I knew it was the right thing to do.  She put colorful flowers upon the sheet, and sprinkled some of Sophie’s late buddy Ben’s ashes around her and then lit some sage.  That little ceremony reclaimed our connection to Sophie and Ben and all things beyond.  Life and death are so inextricably linked.

What if we could always reclaim the life and death link to everyone and everything? 

Hope and Sadness

The Mystery within...

I can’t remember the last time I felt so hopeful as I did this past week with Pope Francis’ encyclical on climate change.  His admonishment of developed nations' carbon emissions, the link to climate change, and its effect on undeveloped nations and the poor, lightened my heart and filled me with hope for the future.  I felt anew, the connection we have with our earth and everyone on it.  I listened to the conservatives respond to the Pope’s plea with fascination as their words so blatantly exposed their agendas.  I know there is still a long road ahead, but I have hope that this renewed struggle shows how deeply connected we all are, and will eventually lead us to revere and respect one another and our precious earth.

Real sadness touched me as well with the mass murders in a South Carolina black church by a young white man.  My heart ached for the young man, full of hate, who wrought so much death and grief for the affected families and our nation.  This Sunday’s “Meet the Press” discussion of this tragedy revealed a startling fact regarding South Carolina’s flying the confederate flag from its state capitol.  The fact was that it first started this practice in the early 1960’s in defiance for the passage of Civil Rights legislation. 

I either read or heard it once said that when evil is exposed to the light, it dies.  That gives me hope that we are on our way to creating a society where it is easier to be good to one another and our earth.

What if we all felt hope that eventually good will prevail for one another and our earth?

Spirit Animals

The Mystery within...

My August 5, 2013 blog titled “My Spider” told of how I came to know, and be grateful for my totem spider that appeared to me while on a “Women Gathering” retreat.  I wasn’t at all sure I wanted this spider spirit until I began to understand what it was asking me to suspend:  judgment of others and myself; anxiety for things undone; and the need to be perfect or right.  And after I learned that my spider is the keeper of the primordial alphabet, and teaches one how to write with power and creativity, I was in love with it.

Two more spirit animals have now recently showed up very unexpectedly in my life in the forms of a golden Palomino and a black horse.  They appeared on the first thawing day of this winter’s frigid grip while I walked in a wood not far from my house with my yellow Lab, Oliver.  Oliver stopped and stood transfixed with something among the bare trees deep in the snow-covered woods.  I followed his gaze and there stood a yellow horse!  My disbelief doubled when a black horse soon joined it.  We all just stood watching one another until finally the horses snorted, and then Oliver gave one bark, at which the pair turned and ran north into a grove of pines. 

This little 17-acre wood, bounded by private residences, a bike trail, and the Milwaukee River is home to squirrels, birds, chipmunks and deer.  Not horses.  I figured they probably escaped from their paddock somewhere and were enjoying a little spring fling.  I thought somebody should know where they were so when I got to the bike trail I asked a couple walking there if they had a cell phone so I could alert authorities of the horses whereabouts.  Later that night I called the Ozaukee County Sheriff’s dispatch to see if anyone reported a missing black and Palomino horse.  The dispatcher said no and they sent two deputies there and found nothing. 

I looked on-line for the spiritual attributes of horses and found Horse Journeys.  I learned horses are symbols of freedom and will awaken and discover my own freedom and power.  They teach fear kills creativity and can lead me to trust my own inner wealth of knowledge making me aware all things are possible.  Horses can reconnect me with the natural world, encourage me to be in the moment, and inspire a heightened sense of awareness.  Some of the goodness horses possess leads to a balanced social order because of their heightened sensory awareness, self-responsibility, and support of the greater good for the whole community.  These spirit guides can help me claim my authentic heart so what I say, do, think and feel comes from love.  I also found a golden horse signifies the coming of a spiritual manifestation and action; and a black horse is symbolic of death and rebirth.  I am thrilled to accept these new spirit animals in my life and welcome their mentoring.

What if we all became aware of our spirit animals with messages for our life?  

Ressurection

God is...

What if there was no mystery surrounding death? What if the real mystery to be solved is in learning how to live through the many physical and metaphorical deaths we encounter in this life?  After completing a workshop on the “Nature of Mortality,” I was reminded of what is so easy to forget—that we are each unique, with problems stemming from things that no one can assume to understand or fix; and that we can each view the same things differently—including physical death. So then, who’s the teacher?  Through workshop participants’ reflection and sharing, I was reminded the teacher is within!

Our facilitator, Cathy Gawlik, skillfully drew us within through handouts of poems to which we attendees underlined words that stood out for each of us.  Then we reacted to our selected words with pen in hand.  I was surprised how the ink flowed onto my paper from underlining these closing words in a poem by Rumi, “…I cannot say the flavor of my being apart.”  Paradoxically, what I wrote does capture the flavor of how it now feels being apart from my husband who died in 1975. 

"The void between us is so vast and yet is non-existent.
 Pain, so intense, somehow bridged the gap.

Slow healing drew a veil on the one life we shared." 

Maybe death is the Ultimate Facilitator.  It encourages me to make meaning out of life.  It reveals my heart--both its grace and need.  There I can converse with mystery, with God, in whom I place my trust.  And there I can rejoice with those who have already melted into the sun and are dancing.

What if we all took time to reflect on the many deaths we experienced and therein find new life?         

Indigenous Self

God is . . . 

In my memoir “God Never Hurries” I wrote:  ...I awoke in the middle of the night.  My room was bright with moonlight.  It called me outside to write.  Downstairs I put on a warm jacket and went out to soak in the heavenly light.  The evergreens were casting deep shadows.  The apple tree and grape vine glowed holy.  I bet I looked pretty good too in that Godly light. 

The air was super still in the cool quiet night.  In the neighbor’s yard a lone cricket found enough warmth to manage a slow chirp.  The barn a couple of blocks away released the smell of cows and hay.  And it seemed I faintly heard traffic on the freeway though it is well over two miles away.

I looked up at my bedroom window and saw Mr. Edison’s incandescent light.  It didn’t look like progress against this holy night.  Early ancestors, and even not so long ago, Native Americans must have had better nourished souls living closer to this Godliness.  I prayed, “Dear God, I know we can’t go back.  So please show us how to nourish our souls in this ever changing world.

Answers to my request on that glorious September night in the late 1990s started coming gradually after I sensed caring for myself was imperative as I struggled with my aging parents care needs.  l began to feel a part of something bigger than myself when on ritual walks in nature where I would find solace in reflection and found answers to some of my troubles.  Those walks helped me sort out what being human means, and to better understand how inextricably life is linked to the many small and big deaths we encounter on our journey.  Our ancestors had hands on experience with so much in nature which must have brought them closer to the living and dying experiences from which our modern, compartmentalized lives, seems to separate us from. 

I made the prayer feathers pictured above at a Women Gathering retreat given through Way of the Willow last August.  (See August 5, 2013 blog post titled “My Spider” and what my totem animal came to teach me.)  On the mornings I remember to hold my feathers and face each of the four directions and pray my day goes so much better.  Facing east, the place of Illumination, I thank the Great Spirit for what has been shown me, and ask for more.  Facing south, the place of Trust, I give gratitude for what trust has taught me and pray for more.  Facing west, the place of Introspection, I am thankful for what reflecting has brought me, and ask to go deeper.  Facing north, the place of Wisdom, I am thankful for what wisdom has come to me over the years, pray for more, and ask that it always be balanced with heart.  I close my prayer at each direction with a request, “Help me know what to let go of today, help me know what to embrace.”  Way of the Willow also just held a day of reflection on the Meaning of Mortality (see link to the program’s opening video, The Meaning of Death).  There I was able to share the annual Pre-funeral Luncheon I wrote about in my January 6, 2014 blog about old friends getting together to share what is important to them and to wink at death.  And then I had a rare opportunity this past weekend when my children, grandchildren and I were all in the van together to tell them about the green burial workshop I attend recently and learned about options for in-home care of the dying and the dead, and a new, even more environmentally sensitive option to cremation, the resomation process.  And I am thinking now, maybe I am becoming a budding indigenous grandma.

What if we all found ways to touch our indigenous selves?                   

Death and Taxes

God is...

This first month of the New Year has passed in a flash.  Little did I know when I lightheartedly wrote my January 6 blog titled Pre-funeral Luncheon, that I would come face to face with the death of my sweet boy, Yellow Lab Ben, less than two weeks later.  How quickly death can show us what is truly important in life.  They are inextricably linked.  I closed the month of January with taxes on my mind and Benjamin Franklin’s quote:  “…in this world, nothing can be said to be certain, except death and taxes.”

I’ve gone through a lot of Kleenex with Ben’s passing, and now as I start the dreaded task of getting my tax information together, I have opened a bottle of Tums for the first time in a long time.  Every year I tell myself I need to better organized the information I will need at tax time.  I do have a bunch of manila envelopes in which I attempt to keep the many pieces of information I will need at year’s end, but it still looms as an overwhelming task.  What if I kept a monthly ledger of all the  information?  Balancing my checkbook each month is something I do faithfully; for besides promoting good money sense, it clearly shows me how many different ways I can be wrong.  I don’t think I’d need Tums to summarize year-end tax information if I kept a monthly account of all those numbers.  What if I could make that happen for next year’s tax time?

Just as life and death are joined, so too are death and taxes.  When going over last year’s paper trail I saw a mini life review in my work, doctor and volunteer miles driven, household expenses, charitable contributions, purchases made, presentations I attended or gave, books sold (by county) and current inventory, postage, supplies, and the training I needed.  People nearing the death experience often do a life review.  What’s important becomes clear, the ego diminishes, and the goal becomes unity as we prepare to return to our Original Nature from which we came.  So too there is grace in taxes.  The goal is unity for the common good.  (Benjamin Franklin knew the importance of unity among the thirteen colonies.)  To support the common good gracefully we willingly need to let go of some ego. 

What if we could all come to embrace the grace in taxes? 

Ben

God is...

He’s been sick, my Yellow Lab Ben.  Diagnosis had been laryngeal paralysis and now this past Friday widespread cancer was added to the list of our ache.  The vet’s recommendation was not to wait too long.  She’s coming to the house early Tuesday morning.  In the meantime she suggested I indulge him with whatever he wants to eat.  There was a bit of relief in knowing the futility, making the decision, and getting final preparations in place.   

When we got home we went in the back yard.  He sat and watched as I took a small shovel and scraped little frozen patches of phlegm and blood off the snow.  Then for just a moment I felt a dark yet unbounded and paradoxically luminous space where life and death come together and join with the Infinite.  I was reminded that suffering has been the door to higher consciousness for me in the past and accepting my pain is the only way to soften it.  The inevitability of change and the illusion of control also loomed  large.  And later that day I was presented with a Meister Eckhart quote:  “Be willing to be a beginner every single morning.” 

I’m not sure I will know how to organize my time going forward since everyday for over ten years had been planned around our daily, mostly off leash walks, in a wood, on a lakeshore or in a dog park.  And I am definitely not sure I want to give my heart to another dog to tear.  Rudyard Kipling knew The Power of the Dog.

What if there were other ways to higher consciousness?            

Pre-funeral Luncheon

God is...

The New Year got off to a good start with a telephone invitation to the third annual pre-funeral luncheon.  It looks like it will be an annual affair from now until nobody knows when.  I am grateful to the couple who host this unique gathering of old friends.  Criteria for attendance had been you had to be 65 years or older to attend.  I hear this year an under age couple is coming.  I saw the wife of this couple in the grocery store after last year’s second annual pre-funeral luncheon and told her what a unique and fun time it was and now she thinks they should be included because her husband has graying hair. 

Just like death it’s a little uncertain when the pre-funeral luncheon will take place for it is either on the Green Bay Packers’ first playoff game or the Super Bowl.  I’m really glad the packers made the playoffs so we don’t have to wait until the Super Bowl to gather.  And thank God the threatened TV blackout for the playoff game was averted.

The format for our gathering is the host couple provides multiple main entrees (way too much food) and drinks, with attendees bringing side dishes.  We eat before the game and during dessert we each share an assigned message with the group.  I think last year we were asked to share what we think is the most important thing in life.  I don’t remember what I said last year; I’ll have to check with the host for he keeps a file (for later).  If I was asked the same question this year I’d say forgiveness is the most important thing in life.  But this year we are to bring our favorite quotation, which made me anxious (there are so many) and I even fretted about what kind of salad the group would enjoy.  Then less than an hour after the phone invitation both my favorite quote and the perfect salad just came to me when I was calm and not thinking of either.  Which goes to show I still have anxiety and trust issues to work on along with the need for less perfection.

The quote I will take this year is from my late crone friend, Rosemary, to whom I dedicated my memoir “God Never Hurries,” and in which I wrote:  The freedom to be wrong was a priceless gift that came from my dear friend Rosemary.  Through a mistake of her own she learned to say, “This is what I know and believe today, but ask me tomorrow and I may know it a different way.”  Humility graced her.  And I just finished making a tangy beet salad with olive oil, balsamic vinegar, summer savory, salt, pepper, feta cheese and walnuts to be served on a colorful bed of organic baby greens.

Life and death are so inextricably intertwined and yet we keep death at arms length and in the shadows.  The pre-funeral luncheon is an opportunity to let us flirt with death, ponder and share what’s important to us in this life, and eventually be part of our own eulogy.  All this and enjoying one another’s company and a Packer game too.

What if we all had the opportunity to wink at death while still warm and ponder what’s important in the company of friends?