Fun in the Grey Gardens - Ah-Ha!

This is how I knew that Belle was a Grey Garden Girl.  This morning it was snowing - well, random flurries actually and we were chatting about having to work in the blizzard.  "Don't forget your panty hose!" I said.  And without skipping a beat she replied "I shan't, and I'll be wearing them on my head!"  This exchange in our best eccentric, nantucket drawl dahling!

May we all in the end, feed the racoons, break into random dances of joy and surround ourselves with lush, comforting, gardens of our own creation.....la, la, la!


But oh yeah, minus the garbage.....

Triste est Belle

This is the view from a certain rental house in Ocracoke. A vacation rental like all the others, but this one rented on a certain September weekend, with dear friends, during the waning days of summer, a summer like many that came before though none after. From my bedroom I noticed them. The egrets that came to rest en masse on the fading green marshes. As still as ghosts they peppered my view and I remembered them as beautiful, simply. Looking backwards, as memories overwhelmed, so fragile, those that had come and were yet to come, still, yet restless to live, still.
We were on our way out to the beach, getting ready and busy. Barely giving time to catch their watching. I glanced out and saw them and quickly took this picture. These thoughts of ephemeral joy far from my mind that day. There were no words for passing souls and goodbyes, I had no reason to gasp, though the breath was there already caught deep inside my heart - ready to burst out just a few days after this photo was taken. And then again just a few weeks later.....
Yes, I recall that life can change in one instant. A desolation can descend and make shreddings of the foliage of our lives, we've only to turn our heads to glimpse what was before, just there, on a cloudy, changling day. The feathers of an egret, moving slightly in the breeze, sharp eyes looking here then there. Making a terrifying memory restful if we let it. A bird of summer perched near us for a moment, bringing hope with their beauty. Should we pause to watch them finally fly away, we feel peace in their leaving.


C'était un weekend innocent, plein de joie, avec ma copine chérie. Peut âpres avoir pris cette photo - ca maman c'est endormit un soir, mais ne s'est plus réveillé.....

Dance!

Had an evening out with some friends and we went to the ballet in Raleigh!  The performance was Cinderella and was just perfect.  The Carolina Ballet http://www.carolinaballet.com/  is a great company that has grown in the last dozen years or so.  The performance could have been cutesy and done, but instead was a fresh and beautiful version of this classic.  We had great seats - almost front and center.  It amazed me most of all how quiet these dancers were.  How all we heard was occasionally their feet coming back to land on the ground again.  They seemed to float on the air they were so graceful and free.  I can't even get through one yoga class without grunting so loud the instructor calls attention to it.  They perform these amazing feats of flexibility and pose without so much as a whisper.  In addition, the music was live and performed by the resident Pianist Tetyana Ryabchikova - he played for over an hour and it was flawless!

After the performance we got an extra.  A dark interpretation of one of my favorites - Barbers' Adagio for Strings.  Each note of this piece is so sharp in its sadness, so heavy with hopelessness that it was a struggle for me not to allow the tears to run down my cheeks.  Every time I hear this music I am moved by its beauty and melacholy.  The performance was the struggle of one woman among five men, as she moved from the arms of one to the other.  But the music, for me, filled the room with a thick swelling of suffering and blanketed me with such melancholy - it eclipsed what I was seeing. 

I think Adagio for Strings is the sound of a soul dying - it is so pure in its release of each note, it is not of this world.

Falls of New Hope

Lately I've been thinking a lot about a handful childhood memories. I find a lot of comfort in these as they not only recall good family times, but also help me look forward to the coming summer. My favorite season. In light of this dreary coldness we've been having, the anticipation sustains me.


When I was growing up we lived in a rural residential community, there were only a few homes on this farm land and the homesites were large. The roads were not paved but dusty and wide. The surroundings were oftentimes corn field rows....Oftentimes at dusk during the hottest months we would go out for walks, being European we would not have dinner until late - 9 or so....so as the sun waned we would set out to take advantage of the cooling temperatures. My sister, brother, mother and I. I loved those walks, at five, six, seven, my universe seemed so wonderous. Right off of the road we could reach the prickly blackberry trees, we loved to eat those "mure" as we called them.....I remember that the air was thick and heavy and eating that sweetness made us all the more sluggish but excited too. It was always so disappointing to have to return home for dinner.

At the center of the neighborhood was a park, there was an old large gate there that was tall and rounded. I can't remember that gate ever being closed. Inside was a creek and small waterfall, huge boulders and meandering paths. Fino and I would spend hours and hours of those hot summer days looking for crayfish under the rocks. We would walk alone on those huge dirt roads, miles it seemed, during the day, perfectly safe and without a care. Our mixed breed dog "Dixie" pushing us away from any snakes that might be sunning themselves ahead of us. Dixie was the smartest dog, named after the Dixie Land my mom was so grateful to be living in. Dixie only answered to French and was completely, utterly and wholeheartedly in love with my mother. During those beautiful sunny days, it was hard to imagine that that sweet creature would die four years later , at my mother's side, eyes in love still until the light went out in them, struggling to overcome some poison she had consumed along the way somewhere.

Our home had large upper and lower wooden porches. On those summer evenings, after our bathes, my brother and I would run up and down those porches naked, with just a towel around our shoulders. Humid and droopy capes that we believed would take the next step into the sky. Our favorite play things were the grass and rocks and creek and trees that surrounded us. We loved being outside and though isolated, we had each other and our imagination had no limits.

Once a few years ago I returned to this neighborhood. There were more homes, the roads were paved, the cornfields and old farm buildings in the distance were gone. Many years of living and life were etched into my soul by then. My experience shrank the universe of that neighborhood, and though I looked around every corner, the wonder was gone......but just as it should be, Fino and Nani are in the past there still somewhere, cool water running over our small feet, turning over rocks, eating the berries,laughing at the crickets we chased, a vibrant and kind dog by our side, ghosts of a beautiful life beginning. I see them still, alive behind my eyes whenever I care to look and turn inward to watch the children still dancing there.....

Never Alone

I wanted to talk about friendship and sisterhood.  According to Webster online dictionary, friendship is explained as: "affection arising from mutual esteem and good will".  From the same source, a sister is someone:  "closely allied to, or associated with, another person".

We all need a factual, dry definition of things, but I am going to try here to write about the human truth of what friendship and sisterhood means to me.  And how both are in my heart together.

At times we have losses or personal tragedies that bring us to our knees.  We've all had these devastating moments.  Sometimes life does not make sense and seems to drain from us all the best  without giving anything back.  So these times have happened to me.  But there were blessings in these times.  The friends in my life, those in the guise of my sister girls, or my sweet sister cousins or my dear blood sister - like an extension of myself,  take in with arms extended some of the pain, so that I can breathe easier and live lighter and more free.

These dear friends to me are all sisters ( et ma soeur aussi ).  I know that at any time I can call on them.  Should I want them to just listen to my words, or my sobs, I have nothing to do but to seek them out.  In turn I would listen out for them always, should they call out to me.

They are the ever present, when the moments are the most difficult and when they are the most joyful.  Sometimes darting in out and out of my life, but always near me in spirit.

Life is good when at the end of the day you know you are loved. 

These wonderful, strong women will be along side me without judgement during the pursuit of my craziest dreams.......

Stoop to clean up the most shattered of heartbreaks for me. 

Twirl to happily dance to my most frenzied melodies. 

Patient in their stillness during my most sorrow filled harmonies.

Thank you sisters - you know who you are! 

Yoga Night

I really am a novice at this, but the few times that I've done, it was incredibly relaxing for me and this is another important component of my happiness year.....so off I went tonight to get my calm on.  Twice a week I go to a retirement community's wellness center for this basic yoga class.  Last week I was stuck under the one ceiling light they keep on in the room, so this week I was determined to get a better spot.   I rushed in first and found a place in the middle of the room, perfect.  I grabbed my mat, my pad, my two blocks, my blanket and my belt - whew, threw off my tattered unc sweatshirt and sat facing the mirror.  Cross legged, shoulders back, I thought that was a yoga-ish pose while I waited for class to begin.  On either side of me were women approx. in their 70s.  So hard not to be self conscious.   Instructor likes to start off with belly breathing, we lie down, pillow up, and breathe with focus on our bellies enlarging and pushing in.  Picture a puppy in deep sleep......with his paw palms up of course.  The lady to my right was the sweetest thing, with the worst coordination.  She laughed at herself though, made the strangest jokes and he often had to tell her to sssshhhhh!  At some point during downward dog I realized I had terrible gas.  Fart in sanskrit is yoga.  Anyway, I thought I should try to silently allow myself to pass it but then thought better of THAT idea....needless to say I created a few of my own contortions in order to avoid anything unpleasant happening.  Next to me I notice the old lady shaking her head, I get nervous but then realize that she is only perplexed because she cannot hold her left leg bent while turning to her right with her hands behind her back and her diaphram lifted as her hips remain square.  Don't forget to breathe! Then during warrior pose my iphone begins to vibrate across the floor, I am throwing the javelin intently, my arms are poised, I will not look down or acknowledge the evil technology that has put us all in this mess.  All of our stress comes from our core, the more tightly we hold our ribs together, the higher our blood pressure, the more our muscles become tense and unhappy.  It's a fact.  I must allow a river of peace to run through me and exhale the toxins out.  I bring my head down towards my knees.  Smell my feet.  Namaste.

the long and winding road

I decided at about 4:45pm to walk home. The sun was shining and the snow was melting. I remembered that Belle had a beautiful pair of blue, rubber boots in her office. Since she loves me, I knew they were mine to take. The fit was perfect.

I set off, me and my grey satin trench coat and my bright blue boots. I cut across a stark pasture, my steps creating the first marks on the shiny white sheet that spread out before me.

I came across this tree, the sun was shining off of its branches so wildly that it looked like each limb was crazily reaching out to the heavens, screaming, it seemed, "it's cold!" .

Around the bend as I kept on, I met a lady walking her two dogs. One of which was a little old thing, head lowered, munching on chunks of ice. The other was a pure, muscled and huge pit bull - Jaxon. "Does he ever intimidate" I asked her, thinking I knew the answer. She did not disappoint. Jaxon had the most massive head I had ever seen on an animal. His jaws so huge that it looked as if he had packed his cheeks with oranges. His legs were thick and defined with big knobbly joints. And all he wanted to do in his life at that moment was jump on me and give me kisses.

It reminded me of how truly you can never know a thing by simply looking at it, not one thing. Jaxon was as sweet as he could be, just as he was pulling the lady every which way, his leash barely containing him, looking like he could devour you.....I said my goodbyes and started on my way, turning back for a moment, Jaxon was watching me go, smiling, cheek to cheek.