This old photo popped up online recently. Always liked it. (Thank you, Bob, for taking it probably 18 years ago.) And always loved that horse. Quatro. I used to call him my Marlon Brando. My bad boy. In a good way. He could step out like no one’s business. And flip around faster than a flapjack if I got the pack line under his tail.
He is long gone. It happens. We grow. We age. We die. Our horses even faster than us. Our dogs even faster than horses. We hold them all dear in that box found beside our heart, maybe a part of our heart. A secret place no one knows but you. Mine is full. So full. Too full it feels at times as I cram more pain, more heart ache, more loss and regrets, and always more love, compressed with time and tears and a tinge of bliss.
I imagine mine to be a small metal box, with lock and key, perchance like an old diary I had as a young girl back in the 70s into which I poured out my pre-teen grief. That diary turned out to be no more than cardboard and was easily torn open one day in fifth grade by Paul Procnoun whose desk was right behind mine. I still remember his name. A wanna-be boyfriend. It didn’t charm me. What do we know about love at age ten beyond if you are loved, or loved not enough? This was his way of expressing a crush on me.
I was crushed.
It ripped open a part of me.
Sharing is still hard to do.
I’m sitting here trying to write A Long Quiet Ride. This morning started my third re-write. Is turned out to be harder than I planned (most things are), and taking far longer (most things do).
Sharing.
How do I share what I saw out there? What I did? Who I met? How I felt? Stories of the kindness of strangers. And the blindness. And the often unorthodox way we made our way through.
Stories.
That is all I have to share. And yet it frightens me at times to do so. Like ripping open your head, your heart, the past. It hurts in a place I cannot see but from which I cannot tear myself free.
As Ernest Hemingway may or may not have said: “There is nothing to writing. All you do is sit down at a typewriter and bleed.”
I am bleeding.
And for those of you who are writers, you’ll understand this: My darlings are bleeding too.* I am killing them. One by one. They disappear from pages, screaming with a light bright blue highlight on their way out. Vanishing into a sky of white screen.
So begins re-write number three, in a pool of blue blood as mine pours forth forever fiery red.
Above the glow of the candle and illuminated table upon which my pen scratches passionately at the invitation of open space on empty journal pages.
Shifting focus. Softening my gaze. Opening up. Looking around.
Seeing beyond safe and assumed. Seeing not what I expect to see but rather what is really there. So much more than quick glances and linear judgments reveal.
I am rewarded with this gift.
Three geese lurking silently through shallow silver water by the rocky shore in the dark of early light before color awakens.
Soften your gaze.
That was something I once read when learning about riding, and an expression I shared often when eventually teaching riding. It was the reminder to stop looking at one point (usually down and directly in front of you). Instead, look around. Try to take in the whole picture. Where are you going? What obstacles lie ahead? What’s lurking in the woods? Who is behind you (or not)?
Soften your gaze.
It’s also the reminder I often need, riding, walking, or just being, to stop clinging tightly to what I expect to see, and open instead to what is really around me.
One of the greatest draws of courage (and thus hardest things to do) is to open. The act of opening wide exposes the soft underbelly of your being. We are hardwired to protect that. We are also hardwired to let down the armor we hammered in place which separates me from you.
Vulnerability.
I’ll show you mine. Not the naughty game we used to play. But the big wide worldly expansive and uncontained game of the wild soul.
This is a courageous act. The act of opening. Of seeing. Really seeing. Understanding what we see.
Peering from behind the lens of a camera safely teaches me to open. I then can take that vulnerability onto the pages via my words.
When we first moved here, I was not able to take photos. I couldn’t find beauty. The land was dry and ragged, burn scarred and overgrown by brambles, broken branches and scattered dreams.
Now I wish I had my camera with me all the time, like sitting in the garden yesterday afternoon, sipping mate and soaking in the sun, as a hummingbird comes and pokes its needle beak deep into one of the first open vibrant pink blossoms of a peach tree. A peach tree that had yet to be planted in a garden yet to be created less than seven years ago.
Most of my peach trees were started from pits, and many of those pits were saved for ten years by my dear friend John after eating what he said was the best peach ever. As usual, I believed him, for the most part. One of those peach pits turned out to be a nectarine. Okay by me.
This one beginning to blossom at which the hummingbird dances in the air grew from a pit as most of my peach trees did, but not in a place that I wanted it to. It volunteered. I let it go the first year. By the second, I saw it could be a problem. It was growing under my solar panels. So I wrapped my hands around the little trunk and pulled and pulled and pulled but that tree refused to come out. Now it’s a bonsai peach tree. Big fat trunk and the top gets chopped off twice a year which doesn’t stop it from blooming profusely and producing, you know it, the best peaches ever.
On a walk up river with the dogs yesterday, camera strap tugging on my neck, I thought about beauty. Beauty, magic, wonder, awe, call it what you will. That which rewards the effort of opening the heart and soul. That which makes vulnerability worthwhile. The more we dare to look for it, the more of it we will find.
How many times have I been out walking, in the city or in the mountains, and I look up and say, “OMG, how did I get here already?”
It was one of those times. I was lost in rumination. Thinking about what I could have, should have, would have done or said that would have been oh so much better than what I actually did do or say. That sort of thing. Completely useless and closing me off to this magic that’s all around. Ruminating is like a default state. I have to work to drop it. Work to be present. Work to see what is really around me, where I really am. And when I do, I am rewarded. It is a beautiful world.
Wake up, Ginny…
I remind myself to slow down, let things soak, look around. If I’m going too fast I’m missing the view, too busy looking at the rocks I’m trying to avoid stumbling over, not looking ahead or around. If I’m lost in rumination I’m missing all of it in this myopia of tunnel vision. I’m not seeing the rocks or the view.
I stop. Stop worrying about rocks for a moment. And the stupid things I said or did. And for a moment, I lift my head, soften my gaze, and soak in the bigger picture.
Sun splashing on oddly aqua waters. Soft wind through tall dark timber. The shrill whistle of the redwing blackbird.
Beauty. Magic. Wonder. Awe.
There’s also a scattering of tiny bones and orange feathers from a recently killed flicker. A big blow down of an ancient oak tree I sat under only a week ago. Bear scat in the middle of the trail full of fur, and fox dropping left precariously on top of a protruding rock. It’s not all peaches and cream. It’s a package deal. The real deal.
The vulnerability of receiving it all, unfiltered, unadorned. Real and raw and rich and wild.
Alright, this one got long. Grab a cup of coffee and sit back when you have some time, if you’re willing to read it through.
At my age, you start to hear it more often:
You should teach that! With all your years and experience, you have so much to share! Is this a compliment, or another way to tell me I’m getting old?
In my case, it’s stuff like herbs, wild crafting, writing, cooking and baking, off grid living, and horses, which I spent a lot of years already doing.
There are plenty of experts out there. I have no interest in being one.
See, I’ve never believed I would be a good teacher because I still feel the best way to learn is by figuring it out yourself. Not being told by someone else how to do things their way. Find your own damn way.
At least, that’s how it works for me. Always thought it would be easier if someone could give me the answers. But then is that really learning, or is it remembering what someone once told you? For wisdom to sink into your bones and your belly, you have to live it. Yourself. Your own unique path. All the damned mistakes, misunderstandings, misjudgments, mess-ups and all.
Funny thing is, all the same, I’ve always secretly longed for a teacher, a guide, a guru. Sometimes just for reassurance. Because more often than not, likely I won’t agree with what he or she is telling me. But it’s a good prompt. It’s comforting. And people love to give advice so they can feel they have all the answers. But is it always in your best interest? That’s for you to figure out.
Sometimes help is a great thing. The encouragement of courage. The direction for taking the next step when sometimes you can’t see where your feet are meant to go. And it reminds you, you are not alone. Which with writing, can be a thing.
Other times, you need to figure it out yourself. After all, it is your path, and your feet ultimately that will walk it.
I think it comes down to this: Do you believe in yourself? And do you believe in others?
Believing in yourself in so far as you can stop counting on others for wisdom you already have or will figure out. Everyone is not wiser, better or more than you. You got what you need, got what it takes. You got your own trip around the sun. You have the ability to make it brighter every year. No one ever can do that for you.
Believing in others in so far as trusting that they too have the wisdom they seek inside them. They can figure it out for themselves. You are neither better nor less than them. They don’t need you to teach them your trip. You are not the expert. Everyone’s got their own trip. Let them take it.
Okay but… truth is, I have worked with coaches, and I love that. They’re different. Coaches help you find your own answers. They don’t give you theirs. That’s fun. That helps. They are more like cheerleaders. Not teachers, guides or gurus. And who amongst us couldn’t use some cheering on?
Mentors are similar, with the added bonus of they might hold a little more weight. They might actually have something you are looking for. Maybe answers. Maybe a career or life path you’re trying to follow. Sometimes a specific skill or trade or way of thinking. Good stuff here too. And a good reminder that this is where age and accrued wisdom really pays off – when you are able to share it with others. Not just amass it for your self. What good is that?
Though do remember that wisdom does not necessarily come with age. It’s not a guarantee any more than expecting wisdom to come from books or school or teachers telling you. It comes from experiencing those truths, yourself, then contemplating what they mean. It comes from learning by living. Not just going through the motions, but understanding them. Wisdom is the beautiful balance between knowledge, experience and deep understanding. Age can be on your side there.
All this rambling is inspired by this.
This past week I’ve been spending a lot more time than usual at my desk staring at the screen. In part because of the rain. In part because it’s work. Not the fun, inspiring, creative writing of getting my latest book moving along. This week has been work to get the book proposal (for A Long Quiet Ride) ready to send out. This is big and scary stuff. Finally reaching out to the pros and saying, “Is this good enough? Am I good enough?”
Of course what I really want is someone to tell me, “Yes that is good” before I even send it out. But no one does. First of all because no one but Bob has seen it. Though of course he always says it’s good.
Where are the mentors when you need one? The elders who can lend an ear, or a hand? When we’re really feeling lost, that’s when we most want a guide or guru. This week I was feeling I needed one. Guidance. Answers. Direction. A pat on the back. Something.
And then I got the answer I needed.
It came in the form of an owl.
If you take things as signs (as I tend to do), you know Owl is a symbol for inner wisdom. She’s also a symbol of the Divine Feminine.
Last time Owl came to me was after my long quiet ride, on our ride back from Colorado to California. It’s dark early morning, Bob’s driving out of the place where we camped for a few hours for a quick rest, almost halfway home, somewhere in Nevada. Crow and Bayjura are rocking back in the trailer, calm and still despite the movement of the trailer after all they’d been through. We’re pushing it, rushing to get home because we heard Canela was missing. As we ease out of the parking lot onto Highway 50, an owl crashes into the windshield. Hard. I knew it had died. I cried and screamed because I knew what it meant. Canela was dead.
This time, this past week, this handsome little fellow crashed into the glass on my kitchen door. Chances are he was after the phoebe who lives in the eve over the door. I rushed out to check on him, so afraid of what I’d find. Lifted his limp body in my hands and held him close to my chest as I brought him inside.
A moment later, I felt his talons grip strong on the flesh of my palm and my heart alighted. Within minutes, he was able to fly free.
I shared that story this weekend with a couple of soul sister poets with whom I get to gather with online once a month.
“You already have the mentor you need,” one blurted out firmly.
You know sometimes when you hear the right answer (even sometimes when you don’t want to) it hits you in the gut strong like a punch? Bam. Yes. You know it’s true.
This was one such time.
“What more of a mentor do you need?” she continued.
“Draw on your connection with the Earth, with the Divine Feminine.
She knows where you need to be, what you need to do. Ask her. Within.”
Yup. Gotcha.
The choice is yours.
How do you choose to see?
With self empowering wisdom? Balancing understanding with a continual childlike open mind?
Or feeling you don’t know enough, don’t have enough, aren’t enough, and all the answers will come from someone else? Like where, what? The perfect parent, teacher or Prince Charming?
It’s not just for work, like getting this proposal together. It’s about life.
A friend wrote recently so sad that as a new mom not enough people where showing up, helping out. When I was a young single mom, likely I felt the same way. But that’s grumbling, whining, blaming, being the victim of our life rather than the creator.
I asked her who she reached out to in kind. She hadn’t. Ah ha!
If you need a friend, go be a friend.
Don’t wait.
Don’t be the victim of your own life.
Have the courage to reach out, create connection.
Have the courage to do something beautiful for someone else.
There’s healing in that.
There’s connection in that.
There’s love in that.
We all want the same stuff. We want to feel safe, to belong, to be loved.
If you want something, if you need something, nobody knows but you. Don’t wait for someone to carry it to you when chances are they have their own issues holding them down. Go get it. Chances are, they will receive you, beautifully.
Sounds like I’m giving advice. Really, I’m just talking to myself. Reminding myself. Or trying to drum the wisdom in.
So what’s the best advice I was probably given, didn’t listen to, and eventually had to just figure out?
(besides “give more than you take,” “listen without judgments or assumptions,” and maybe just “be good.”)
It’s this:
The answers you’re looking for, the advice you’re seeking… It’s already in you.
Listen.
Inside.
Not to something or someone out there. Not all the time at least. Not for the really big stuff, or the ultimate answers.
Be your own guru.
You have heard this too.
Others can point to the moon, but only you can find your way there.
Life will test us, allow us to learn, hopefully not always the hard way.
If you’re gonna leap, and I hope you do, get to weaving your own damn net.
Find your own answers. Your own truth. Your own goodness and beauty and truth.
(today i’m simply sharing some of the beauty from yesterdays warm wet storm, along side this sweet old song by Cris Willamson that I remembered while standing out under the soft rain)
Today I’m simply sharing some pictures from yesterday (yes, even the blooming flowers), and a little lilting piece (from something bigger) I was working on and thought you might enjoy.
Here.
Now.
Early morning.
A morning like so many in the six years I have called this place home.
Familiarity grows like the pear trees planted along the side of the creek, an amaryllis started on Solstice preparing to bloom on the window sill over the kitchen sink, blackberries and poison oak that promise to sprout and spread even in places you wish they would not.
In the quiet hours before the sun hints at awakening, with full moon low in the west veiled behind a lavish shroud of fog, I wake with arms and legs around my sleeping man. I am comfortable with his earthy scent and even breath and a little reluctant to rise. I slip on sweats, pull the covers back up around him, then quietly find my way around in the dark.
Stepping over snoozing dogs, lighting the wood stove, filling the coffee pot at that kitchen sink, all as I have done so many mornings before. I feel the ease in knowing where I am and what to expect. What time the sun clears the mountain to the east. When to hope for the last frost late spring and when the first frost of fall will arrive. What bird belongs to the flicker of wings that distracted me from my work or the song that rises each morning around the same time I wake. When to turn the soil, start the seeds, when to water, and when to drain or cover pipes. When to watch for leaves turning gold and brown blowing down, and when to look for new life at the tip of each naked branch, swollen and slowly unfurling in fertile subtleties.
Familiar. Is it the place or the pattern? For I have done this here. And I have done this other places I have been, and still will be.
This place, this pattern, has become familiar; intimate and expected as the view out that kitchen window which as the sun comes up and chores are done, awakens to an ever green pasture where horses graze, chickens free range, dogs play, and a brave cat or two may creep cautiously not too far from the house.
Familiar too is the sound, the ever present prevailing sound of the river, which ebbs from summer’s gentle roil over smooth rocks ever shaped by the ever movement of the ever changing flow – to winters rage and roar. A sound so familiar I often forget it is there.
In this semi-silence I am able to hold the world, embrace it like a big bear having found a honey hole, and my heart feels full.
Comfort in the familiar.
I do not take these things for granted. I have known what the unknown feels like. I think I’ll choose a balance of the two. The first keeps me grounded. The second, on my toes. Both can be magical or mundane.
The same worn boots left by the back door. Same old truck parked out front. Same cast iron pans curing on the wood cook stove. Same table, same chairs, same sofa, same rug. Same silly jokes that still make me laugh every time.
And comfort in accepting change, as the road map of my life unfurls on my face. Stories embedded within wrinkles that spread across my skin like dusty webs, and every graying hair that begins to outnumber the brown. I can laugh at my own fleeting vanity, because truth is, though I’m not thrilled with how I look now, I can’t say I ever was. Good looks are not what got me where I am. I’m more of a guts and grit sort of gal.
The inner landscape has changed, too. There is a calmer storm blowing within me now. Muddy waters have stilled and settled. Menopause, depression and drinking have been left behind. Hot flashes and explosive emotions have subsided. I sure don’t miss them. Neither does Bob.
Some days I look within and expect those frightening facets to surface again. But they do not. Can I claim to have slayed those evil beasts? Or rather, did they simply fade away, one more good thing that comes with age?
So it is into this calmer, quieter space that I feel myself finding a new familiar. Settling in. Not that I’m settled down; it’s more like the gradual un-letting of the belt cinched around my well worn levi jeans. You can only fight it for so long. Then you stop holding in, exhale, let it out a notch, and realize it’s not such a bad place to be.
I am getting there. Closer to that place deep inside that whispers, “Welcome home.”
This has nothing to do with writing or rain or riding through the wilds.
It’s political.
Because I choose not to be.
I don’t get what’s up with our world. But I can’t not see it. So what’s a gal to do? You see; you feel; you care. And then what? At some point, you’re gonna stand up and do something. Hopefully, something good. We all need that.
More and more of us can’t watch the news. Bad for mental health. It’s like watching a brutal boxing match, or ancient gladiators in a pit, or a really bad WWE show. Two sides in a barbaric fight, a fight to the death, while the spectators, show leaders and ringmasters egg the battle on, laughing at the foolish, bloody pawns they’re playing against each other.
No thanks.
If I was standing on the fence, which at times I feel I am, how could I choose sides when at their core, both sides are good? Good folks with good values wanting a good life for their children, but somehow pushed to this dark place of devaluing and dehumanizing the other side.
“We’re not the same,” some friends say about other friends.
Bullshit.
Y’all look the same to me.
Y’all want to be safe.
Y’all want to belong.
Y’all want to be loved.
So why are we ripping one another apart?
I don’t care what side of the fence you stand on.
Because it is not a fence between two sides or walls between us that will keep us safe when the danger is already within. Building bridges, not walls, is what will make us stronger.
Remember these bold words of Ronald Reagan, “Tear down this wall!”
Let’s do it. All of us. No matter what side you stand on.
There’s no room within this country for walls.
Me, I’m gonna kick the bricks when I see them stacking.
Not kick the builder, the contractor or even the client wanting them stacked.
I’m standing together. With all of you. With this country. With my home.
United we stand.
Divided we fall.
Remember?
I’m standing.
Please, stand strong, people. Together. Without a stinking wall between us.
One Nation. Under God. Indivisible. With Liberty. And Justice. For all.
I might be a sappy idealist and optimist, but I’d rather go down feeling like I’m doing the right thing, a good thing, and helping my neighbor rather throwing bricks at him.
I’d rather see the beauty that is all around and in everyone, because no matter what I’m told, shown or news I’m fed, it’s there. Beautiful stuff. Good stuff. And love.
Yes, there’s a lotta junk and bad stuff too. But you know the story: What wolf do you choose to feed?
Fear fuels hatred. Don’t be a weenie. Have courage. Choose love.
The garden roses finally called it quits for the season, right in time for wild Manzanita to begin their bloom while daffodils break through saturated ground.
It’s a beautiful world. Magical, if you will. I will! I will find magic.
This is a photo dump of magic from last month: roses blooming through to the New Year.
It’s also a sharing of some deep thoughts, because well you know, that’s where my mind goes.
I thought you might enjoy.
We all could use more beauty. And more sharing. Good stuff. Connection. Common ground.
These are things I have to tell myself.
What takes more courage?
Fighting?
Or getting along.
Because I will not be divided.
And I will stand strong for a country capable of holding its center together.
Don’t fall, I tell myself. Don’t allow yourself to be ripped apart at the seams. Like the baby before Solomon, two halves are not the same as one whole.
Silently witnessing as one year withers and a new one unfurls.
The annual undulation; time and space between thoughts, between plans and projects, between seasons, between years.
A reflective time, quiet and dark and moody. Open or closed, the eyes refrain from looking out there, and are instead drawn within. Somehow sightless, you soundlessly feel your way through heavy fog, sensing your place along your inner journey, as the cold dark river rages through your veins, intuitively and instinctually, as is the nature of things this time of year.
Yesterday the river rose to the occasion, busting beyond the confinement of her bank, roaring loud and heaving with brown waves, spreading to a rumble in the saturated ground beneath my feet as I stand there amazed at humbling might while even the dogs and horses watch in wonder.
Sacred water.
Sacred time.
Solstice is a natural celebration of the pause between the darkening and lightening, between states of wonder and beauty and awe, simple as watching the river rage and a candle flicker and rain fall into swollen puddles alive with shimmering reflections.
This morning I woke to stars spilled across the sky, sparkling behind black branches of the sprawling oak. And then from out of the earth, or is it more magic from the sky, fog formed, shrouding the stars with a silent embrace.
Yet I know the magic about the fog, the mystery beneath the earth, the wonder of planting a seed and knowing maybe, just maybe it could emerge into fruition.
Somewhere I’m certain the sun rose a moment earlier and the cycle of new light, new life, is celebrated anew.
As I await the sky to lighten, in this deep still silent space of new light I have yet to see or feel but somehow know, I stir with the wonder of a candle. Of planting seeds, which here happens on my kitchen counter on Solstice every year, and now sit over my propane fridge awaiting the moment of emergence. Of darkness out there, which shall be shorter each day. Of light within – not to protect and preserve, but to shine and share.
What are you waiting for?
What are you here for?
~
Our community has a beautiful gathering to celebrate Solstice. I had never had the guts to attend. Groups don’t tend to be my thing. Basically, social gatherings scare me shitless.
It’s easy to use the excuse of Solstice being a sacred time to turn within. Because, yes, it is. It is also the pause before the waxing of light and new life. It is that space in between. If one has the courage to open to it, there’s a time and place to be alone, to reflect on what you want to release from the last dance around the sun, and contemplate your intentions for the next cycle. And… a time and place to unfurl like seeds, be vulnerable, be brave, get out of your shell and connect.
Thanks to the honesty of and love for some dear friends who reminded me I’m not the only one… I went.
Thank you for encouraging the courage in me to step beyond my comfort zone, and get off my side of the mountain for just a little while. It was beautiful.
Now more than ever…
Come together.
Partake. Participate. Life is too short and sweet to miss out on this stuff.
Have the courage to care more.
The gusto to give more
The grit to do more.
The guts to be more.
It’s not that you are not enough.
It might just be that the world needs more of who you are and what you do.
Thinking of those who give and do and care so much, like hidden stars in that dazzling day sky.
Gin Getz 