September 7, 2019

Nature of the beast

A couple days ago I blew past my goal of walking two miles with a 2.4 mile mark and it felt great.

Today I could only muster 1.7 miles and didn’t feel so hot afterwards.

That’s the nature of the beast with Mr. Lyme.

Some days you can push, some you can’t.

I’ve learned to deal with that by being mindful it’s overall progress over time that counts.

I’m actually happy that I listened to my body and stopped at 1.7 miles. Normally I’d push further and would have likely paid the price for it.

In just over a two month span I’ve gone from barely able to do quarter miles to hitting a couple miles.

I’ll take that.

Slow and steady and ever so faithful continued healing with each step (and paddle!) I make.

I think I’m gonna reward myself anyway with a chocolate coated peanut butter popsicle. ; )

September 7, 2019

All your eyes look the same

Over my nomadic travels, I’ve looked into thousands and thousands of your eyes through different interactions of all kinds.

I’ve seen the most brilliant variety of colors in ’em all, ranging from black to brown, blue to green, and even from grey to white.

I’ve also witnessed all ranges of emotions within yours. Joy, anger, ambivalence, agony, sorrow, depression, sexual, curious, innocent, weariness and danger.

Sometimes the emotion in your eyes didn’t match your personaility in the moment. Despair pretending to be joy, anger pretending to be nice, (and vice versa) and so on.

(It’s true when they say you can’t hide behind your eyes, at least to empaths like myself.)

You more authentic folks didn’t have filters. What I saw was what I got. Sometimes it was startling, mostly it was refreshing because you were being real even if it wasn’t always a positive emotion.

Sometimes your eyes tell deep stories, such as the survivor from brain cancer behind the counter at her sandwich shoppe. I could tell she’d been through hell and back and she said so.

Some of your eyes had soul wisdom. It was often those of you living under tough circumstances, such as the extraordinary soul I befriended near my campsite who lost her mother and home at the same time.

Some of your eyes were flinty, unsure, and insecure. Those are the ones I’m wary about because when they’re uncertain like that, I’ve learned their ethics are also uncertain. Like some of the folks I hung out with in Mexico over Christmas who ended up breaking my heart.

And there are the angels like the intellectual nomad who pulled up in a rickety, barely functioning camper next to me and we ended up spending a starry night talking about all kinds of mind-stretching and heart-warming topics. I’m certain he was a fallen angel come to earth in disguise.

The one commonality I’ve noticed lurking behind all your eyes across all these lands?

They’re all the same.

All part of a vast, universal soul.

September 6, 2019

When walking two miles is a big deal

Walked over two miles (2.4 to be exact!) today…

It’s funny how two miles was nuttin’ in the past; it’s what I usually did each morning with a cup of coffee to wake up into the day.

Yet today it’s a big milestone out of the way and I’m happy. It’s also a mental hurdle fallen by the wayside post-lyme recovery. It took a long time to get there, but now that my body is starting to get back to the way it was, it’s getting easier to make progress.

I’m still stunned by how much Mr. Lyme can wipe a healthy body out so thoroughly. When I was told it took an average of a year minimum to recover (if that — some folks take years), I didn’t really believe it. I do now even though I’m well ahead of that curve.

Scary.

I don’t always have the best of days just yet, but I’m grateful I’m getting better and beginning to be able to do the things I love.

My biggest goal is to get back to nomad life in my camper. That’s where my bliss is and I have a feeling once I get there, healing will come even more rapidly because nature is where my heart is.

September 5, 2019

It's good to sweat again

Yesterday I hauled my kayak out to Newnans lake for a sojourn on the water. It’s the second time out paddling since recovering from a too-long dance with Mr. Lyme.

The gentle swells and swaying of the kayak is soothing, a perfect balm for a soul missing its tangles with nature.

It was nice to have enough strength to make my own wake in the water as in the past. I like seeing my wake, it’s visible confirmation I’m churning and burning up calories.

At the end, I noticed I was sweating. Although seemingly silly, it’s another first on my return to health journey and it felt so darn good to be a little drenched in it.

I love sweating, it’s a release and mark of a job well done towards getting back in good shape.

All these little milestones are slowly falling by the wayside one by one on a relentless march back to where I once was before Mr. Lyme.

Onwards and upwards!

September 4, 2019

View from today's meditation before hurricane Dorian

Hurricane Dorian is due to sideswipe us sometime tonight so I got out for a quick kayak to enjoy the calm before the storm on Newnans lake in Gainesville, Florida. You’d never know a violent storm was coming…

September 3, 2019

Beloved, I miss you.

I know you’re everywhere.

   But it’s out there…

   in vast oceans lapping your shores

   in soaring mountains laden with your sharp breath

   in dry deserts teaming with your wordless life

   in secret coves and hidden lakes where your beauty abounds

   in rain forests enveloping your musky sweat

   in seaside cliffs where your seals and whales play below

   in forests of tall trees where your bears chase me

   in silent sunsets that slowly explode of your essence

   in quiet stars and solitary moon that sing of you

…where I feel you the most.

Moon over the Bay of Fundy in New Brunswick, Canada

September 2, 2019

Two dreams ten years apart

The other night I had an unforgettable dream that rocked me out of my sleep:

I was traveling and it looked like I was in New Orleans or a place very similar. I was hungry and I went into a restaurant/pub, it was packed so folks were sharing tables. I ended up at a table with two women. We hit it off pretty well, small talked about the place, the food normally being better but figured since it was so packed the cooks were harried, etc. etc.

All the while we were talking, I kept feeling some kind of haunting familiarity with one of the ladies. I just knew there was some kind of connection with her, tantalizingly deep, but I couldn’t pin it down.

She *knew* though. And she knew exactly what to say. She looked into my eyes and said something about “helicopters flying around town” and POW!

I was hit with a tremendous surge of an old dream from ten years ago, flashing back to when I was in a helicopter with her, this very same lady.

She was my friend’s fiancé and was in a bad accident; her face was badly cut and we were on the way to the hospital. I don’t remember why, but her fiancé either wasn’t there or couldn’t make it so I accompanied her to the hospital so that she wouldn’t be alone.

The dream-memory jumped ahead to where I was visiting her in the hospital. Apparently her fiancé had wigged out on her because of the big scar on her face. Not wanting her to be alone, I hung around to lend moral and emotional support.

(I distinctly remember there was an underlying mutual attraction between us from the beginning when her fiancé first introduced us. It was a quiet, instantaneous bond.)

She was terrified because she had decided to undergo surgery to take care of her scar, she was still in pain from the accident and felt so alone with her fiancé bailing out on her.

As she was being taken to the operating room, she freaked out and changed her mind, deciding against the surgery. I calmly stayed by her side and the dream-memory ended.

Flashback over, I was back in the restaurant, staring at her, mouth agape.

*Now* I knew why she felt so intimately familiar! It was *her*, the one whom I felt some kind of bond with and stayed at her side in the hospital.

She must have had the surgery done some time after the initial dream-memory — I saw a faint outline of the scar on her face yet she was the same beautiful soul I felt such a deep kinship with.

I shouted with joy, “Oh my God, it’s YOU!” and leaped over to give her a hug. We held each other for a long time, a decade rapidly fading away.

As I started to wake up from such a powerful jolt of recognition, the dream sped forward and I saw how we ended up as we were meant to be, kindred souls, kindred lovers, melting into each other’s hearts as the future unfurled.

I woke up that day with my heart singing all day.

What a heck of a dream! It’s amazing a dream connected to another dream I had over ten years ago and it continued from it, like an epilogue in the same book.

Parallel universes, anyone?

September 1, 2019

Facing an angry El Morro

On my wanderings through New Mexico, I was thrilled to find free campsites (with water and bathrooms too!) could be had at the El Morro National Monument.

Even better, straight from camp you could hike up to the top of El Morro and view what was left of ancient Native American pueblos left by the Puebloans in the late 1200s.

El Morro is also known for its “Inscription Wall” (fancy wording for graffiti, in other words) where you can read over 2,000 signatures and notations carved into the wall, some over several thousand years old.

Very few of the “inscriptions” were art from ancient Puebloans, the rest of them were the common kind we still see today in the form of so and so was here with a name and date scratched out.

As soon as I settled in at camp, I made a beeline over to El Morro for a hike to the top. On the way, I stopped at the Inscription Wall to view some of the autographs scratched in.

You can definitely feel a sense of history there — it was mind boggling to stand in the very spot a fellow human from several thousand years ago stood to carve his immortality onto a rock wall.

As I walked along the wall, I started feeling bad inside, like a negative pressure that was making me queasy and weak.

Halfway through, I had to back out and leave.

As I made my way back to camp, the pressure eased and I felt a bit better. I still felt something within that didn’t sit right with me. Usually I can figure it out but not this time. It felt intangible and from an outside source.

I had this strong sensation to meditate to get answers. I sat under a tree facing El Morro, deepened my breathing and closed my eyes.

I found myself enveloped in anger.

Giant, overwhelming anger.

Bewildered, I dug into it and abruptly found myself face to face with the energy of El Morro itself.

As a natural intuitive and empath, I’m not surprised when I come across all sorts of energies and dead people, but I’ve never faced the energy of a… well, huge rock.

I’ve always thought huge rocks, canyons, etc. were ancient and passive giants, but not this one.

(El Morro itself is not that old compared to its brothers and sisters across the continent, so its energy did not feel ancient — it felt young and brash like a Greek God.)

After being startled by the source of the anger, I took a moment to collect my own wits. My first thought was can I really talk with a rock? It seemed absurd.

I swallowed my pride and reached out, asking where all the anger was coming from.

(Intuitive messages come through primarily via feelings, visions, and empathy which I “transliterate” into our language.)

El Morro silently roared back that his space has always been sacred and he’d been desecrated over thousands of years with scars on his surface. And “you humans” had the audacity to turn his defacings into a National Monument honoring them!

I was baffled this huge rock had an issue with little scratches on his surface. Aren’t they impervious to this sort of seemingly minor thing?

El Morro played on my empathy and showed how I’d feel if strangers carved their initials into my skin over the course of my life.

Point made.

I offered my deepest apologies.

His energy calmed down and I felt pressure of his anger recede a bit.

And that was it, we were done.

I strolled back over to El Morro and although I could still feel an imperceptible anger, I no longer felt nauseous and was able to explore further.

Later that night, I had an incredibly beautiful lucid dream with El Morro unlike any I’ve had. That’s another story for another day.

Today as I think back to it all, it still feels implausible and crazy.

Maybe I am off my rock-er (lame pun intended). All I know is nothing is truly out of the ordinary when it comes to the Beyond.

Who knew rocks had feelings, too?

August 31, 2019

How do you stop loving?

I can’t.

All my life and all these loves I’ve had, I can’t stop loving them.

Maybe I just don’t have an “off” switch when it comes to love.

I used to think I couldn’t let go.

But for me love is forever.

It doesn’t always work out. Change is constant, especially in people and relationships.

But love? The flavor of it may change yet it remains.

Flowers of a different color.

My high school loves? I love them even as memories fade; smiles and warmth still come.

My once wife? I love her even as we are unfortunately estranged. I’m forever grateful for wonderful memories and miraculous creation of a loving daughter.

My old flames? One tore my heart wide open, others widened it further, bringing forth more love of all different flowers.

The more I’ve loved, the more I’ve found there is to give.

Once I tried to stop loving to move on.

Instead I dried up, veins empty and heart barren.

Like blood, love gives life.

I can’t ever stop loving and I made peace with that.

Sunflowers. Roses. Daisies. Orchids. Chrysanthemums. Weeds.

I love ’em all.

Field of love near Micanopy, Florida

August 31, 2019

How do you stop loving?

I can’t.

All my life and all these loves I’ve had, I can’t stop loving them.

Maybe I just don’t have an “off” switch when it comes to love.

I used to think I couldn’t let go.

But for me love is forever.

It doesn’t always work out. Change is constant, especially in people and relationships.

But love? The flavor of it may change yet it remains.

Flowers of a different color.

My high school loves? I love them even as memories fade; smiles and warmth still come.

My once wife? I love her even as we are unfortunately estranged. I’m forever grateful for wonderful memories and miraculous creation of a loving daughter.

My old flames? One tore my heart wide open, others widened it further, bringing forth more love of all different flowers.

The more I’ve loved, the more I’ve found there is to give.

Once I tried to stop loving to move on.

Instead I dried up, veins empty and heart barren.

Like blood, love gives life.

I can’t ever stop loving and I made peace with that.

Sunflowers. Roses. Daisies. Orchids. Chrysanthemums. Weeds.

I love ’em all.

Field of love near Micanopy, Florida