Shhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh

That's the Library of Congress in the background, a building FULL of overthinkers. Yeah!

I've been overthinking lately, a condition I'm prone to. Now don't shake your fingers at me - there are a bunch of you out there who have the same inclination. You know who you are!

Of course I love to think, I take pleasure in it. But too much cerebral activity tends to turn in on itself; my thoughts can get so distorted from overworking them that I don't know what is what anymore. The echoes inside my skull, after awhile, become deafening and impossible to decipher. You know what I'm talking about - right? Whew!!

It's a beautiful day in Washington DC, and as it turns out my work schedule is very light. My plan for the day includes looking at plants (since I've become severely addicted to gardening), hanging out at Eastern Market, cooking something good for dinner tonight. I'm going to do a lot of breathing and Ohmmmming today in an effort to keep my brain from overheating.

Wish me well, please? Thank you!

What was I thinking?

I was thinking (while allegedly meditating this morning) that I would write about love. Love: you know, that thing that no one can define, the big ole mystery that makes the world go round. I was going to write about brotherly love, divine love, I was even thinking I would write about romantic love.

What could I say about love that hasn't been said, sung, written, danced at least a million times? Well? My idea was to skip the task of trying to define different kinds of love (the Greeks did that already, so did C.S. Lewis, and many others), I thought I would address Love shamanically, as a force of nature that "comes over" (as Eric Clapton explained it). It is kind of amazing in that way, after all, how it arrives and then sometimes departs, just like that. (Sound of fingers snapping.) I was going to mention Cupid's arrow, the random quality of romantic love, the way it feels like a state of being that has been imposed, rather than something one might choose. Just as I began to think about unrequited love, I burst out laughing. I literally laughed out loud. I laughed hard. Oh man.

Ha ha ha ha ha ha ha!!! Oh I am so funny sometimes. I should have been focused on my breath. Instead, I was thinking about love, and that thought, that idea, that image of me sitting down at the computer, letting the words flow, was such a beautiful, innocent, audacious concept.

For heaven's sake. I can be so ambitious sometimes. Forget that. Happy Friday, y'all.

Dancing with the Green Dust

Growing older is an adventure, it really is. Most of it I like. I am an old soul with a long memory, so being in an older body makes more sense. I'm extremely healthy, so even though I have aches and pains, even though I can't stay up all night anymore, or drink too much unless I'm willing to be completely out of it for days afterwards, mostly I'm so good with aging.

There are aspects of youth I miss very much. Approaching age 60 as I am, I hesitate to name specifically some of the things I miss. Ah what the hell. I miss the "zipless fuck" as we called it in the '70s. Honestly I wouldn't mention this except after thinking long and hard about liberty yesterday, I remembered the exhilaration of the era of sex, drugs and rock 'n roll. The social revolutions of the late '60s and '70s made me believe that true, honest Liberty, if not yet real, was certainly right around the corner. It was so exciting. The current moment feels somewhat like that time, with middle eastern revolutions, the execution of Osama Bin Laden, the monster tornadoes, tsunamis, earthquakes and extreme weather. Things are shaking, oh yeah.

It makes sense that I've been contemplating the ways in which I navigated through that period of tumult, yes? C'mon.

I don't miss the drugs at all, especially the serious psychedelics or anything speedy. I don't miss the music because I have plenty of music at hand. But "free love" ? That, I miss. Well, ok, maybe I only miss it now at the height of spring when the natural world is in a frenzy of free love. Most likely that's why I'm waxing rhapsodic about no-strings-attached sex. It's my way of dancing in shamanic alignment with the season. For heaven's sake!

The great social upheavals that unfolded just as I was coming of age convinced me to try all kinds of things, to experiment. That period of time made me believe anything is possible and love is the answer. I still believe it. Do you?

People got to be free

Freedom's just another word for nothing left to lose. --from Bobby McGee, by Kris Kristofferson and Fred Foster

Not only is Justice a she, but so is Liberty. It's interesting that there is no tarot trump that conveys the idea of liberty, perhaps because the design of the tarot was pretty much set during the age of European monarchy. All the images of Liberty I attached to the sidebar this morning are related to the revolutions that followed the age of monarchy.

One thing I'm wondering this morning is whether, in all the middle eastern countries where revolutions are taking place, there is an image, a symbol or icon associated with that struggle. If there is such an image, I haven't seen it. Do you know? Also wondering if there is a symbol of freedom, liberty, democracy or whatever it is the people are hoping to create. If there is such a symbol, does it look like a woman wearing a long loose dress, carrying a torch of some kind?

I think of Liberty as an idea rather than something "real." Justice is a palpable force, a pure energy, but Liberty seems, to me, to be something we can't quite touch, no matter how we try. Perhaps the Liberty we seek has something to do with a half-lost memory of how great it is, between manifest lives, to fly free in the realm of spirit, unencumbered by these bodies that want food and drink, sex and other pleasures, that need so much to move around, also to rest. The limitations that are part of living inside a body are pretty intense. One of my great teachers used to say, "Infinite souls inhabiting finite bodies. It's a crazy idea!" It sure is. It has its up sides, too, should say.

As a double Aquarius, I know all about the yearning for freedom. One of my great friends nailed it when he said, "Reya, to you even happiness feels like a jail you have to break out of."

Oh yeah.

In the tarot there are many images that portray the situation of being bound. I think of the 8 of swords, 4 of pentacles, 4 of cups, for instance. Within the trumps, the Devil card certainly portrays a state of imprisonment. But there is no Liberty card, not in any deck I've ever seen. Hmmmm ...

L'chaim

Want to hear a secret? I don't give a rat's ass about Osama Bin Laden's final moments. I don't need to see a schematic of his hideout, or learn, blow by blow, how they brought him down. I read the New York Times obituary yesterday - it's really interesting. I learned a lot about him.

Now he's gone. Must we drag ourselves through every little detail of his passing, over and over again? Why?? I'm ready to move on. Is that a bad thing?

My plan for today includes avoiding all sources of "news." For the next few days I will focus very specifically on spending time with people I love, cleaning the chateau, doing some fun cooking. All the rest of y'all can tune in to every grueling, horrible detail about the end of Osama Bin Laden. Or ... drop by the chateau for a cup of coffee, a beer, a glass of wine. We can speak of other things, yes? I say yes.


I can't resist taking pics of the pollen residue on cars at this time of year. It's rather perverse.

The Dark King is Dead

My idea this morning was to write about royalty. I've been thinking about it since the royal wedding, thinking about how, as an American, I could never quite understand the way my British friends feel about their monarch and her family. Most of my British friends are either slightly anti-royal or fiercely anti-royal. They find my fascination with the crown vulgar, or at least misguided, since we have no royal family here.

If my beloved George Washington had accepted the crown, who knows what the U.S. would look like now? Washington was offered the job of King of America, oh yeah. The amazing this is: he said no thank you. What a guy.

I try to remember that all the monarchies in Europe, once upon a time, did not exist. Somewhere along the way, warrior-chiefs decided to make themselves kings. It was a trend that swept through Europe way back when. The royal families were not ordained by God or anything. Nevertheless, over time and after a few generations, the royals generate a different energy than the rest of us. It's palpable. So interesting to think about.

I was going to write about idealized monarchs, King Arthur for instance. I was going to write about Ghenghis Khan and his great, harrowing life as Emperor of a huge swath of Asia and Europe.

But then this morning I heard that Osama Bin Laden has been killed. That news took the air out of my lungs for a minute or two. As I said the other day when I posted a tarot image of the World Trade Center tower, on fire and falling, even though 9/11 was ten years ago, it still has traumatic resonance when I think about that terrible day.

But I do NOT cheer or celebrate this assassination. I'm surprised by the news, and it does feel like closure in a certain way, but partying all night because someone has been killed? I don't get it.

In his own way, Bin Laden was a dark king, royalty of the wrong kind. May he find peace and healing beyond the veil and may the orgy of celebrative revenge so many people are now experiencing fade sooner rather than later. May it be so.

One of my Facebook friends posted this Ghandi quote this morning: "An eye for an eye makes the whole world blind."

I agree completely. Oh yeah.

The Birthday of Summer

Sex, as they harshly call it
I fell into this morning
at ten o'clock, a drizzling hour
of traffic and wet newspapers.
I thought of him who yesterday
clearly didn't
turn me to a hot field
ready for plowing,
and longing for that young man
pierced me to the roots
bathing every vein, etc.
All day he appears to me
touchingly desireable,
a prize one could wreck one's peace for.
I'd call it love if love
Didn't take so many years
but lust too is a jewel
a sweet flower and what
pure happiness to know
all our high-toned questions
breed in a lively animal.

--Adrienne Rich

Yeah. I love that last bit about lust as a jewel, and how happy it is that our high-toned questions breed in a lively animal. Fabulous.

It's Beltaine, y'all. Engage with earthy pleasures today. I'll be at work but all the rest of you? Dance around a maypole, make love, eat something delicious, yes? I say yes.