Surreality

As a group of us - friends and family - were sitting in a classroom we'd overtaken near the neuro-ICU a woman came in.  She was with another family that has been in the area for two weeks.  She was visibly disturbed but had a message for us, it went like this:


"We're getting moved, after two weeks, to a regular room.  So if you want to come and have the little waiting room we'd taken over, you can stay there.  This is just so tragic what we're dealing with."

My friend, Kate said "Oh, are you with the young man who had the ATV accident?  I met his mom."

"Yes.  Its just the worst tragedy...he's only 24 and paralyzed from the waist down.  We just don't know how his life is ever going to recover."


We all sort of stared at her and nodded. 


We would take the twitch of a pinky.  We would take an eye flutter.  We would take anything.

Ann's condition is stable.  But the wound in her head is too big to close.  The surgery would take more than 8 hours.  Right now, she can breathe on her own for two or three hours at a time.  It is brain stem function, we know.  But still ... it feels/ sounds like something we like to hear.

Absolutely Dreadful News

Our dear friends - Kate & Andy Grosmaire - found out yesterday that their 19 year old daughter Ann had been shot by her boyfriend.

She is in critical condition in the hospital here.  Her injuries were sustained in the head, by a shotgun.

He has been arraigned on attempted murder charges.

I just have no words.

http://www.tallahassee.com/article/20100329/BREAKINGNEWS/100328057/Update--Gunshot-victim-still-in-critical-condition-at-TMH

Inside Out

I left off with a picture of the first buds of Wisteria - and that was a hopeful and positive note on which to focus as differing energies asserted themselves into the Labyrinth.

Well, let me say that mostly it was people who care about me and wanted to help me.  Yes, that's actually more akin to the actual truth.

Now the Wisteria are blooming in their lush and fragrant way - filling the air with sweetness and a gorgeousness that is not captured by my camera.


I worked on one of the outside lanes of the Labyrinth and found the only really useful and satisfying way to spread the sand the way I wanted was to get down on my hands and knees and work it into the ground.  This doesn't hurt my back, and it's connecting me to the earth and the process in a way I couldn't have imagined.

So while this may not look (in the picture) much different from the other side, it is wholly different to me.  And the inner energy of focus and containing has found its way back into the project.  I like the look, the feel and the grounded nature of the path.  It's not finished, but I can see I'm on the right track.

The small circles to the right are two of the three special gardens that I want to plant with fragrant, fragile annuals... for my children.  Of course the number three works its way into so many aspects of my life - I'm not surprised when it shows up.

Then I decided to move to the middle and work on the center circle.  I don't know if you can see, but I'm laying small stones in the sand and making a kind of floor.

Not solid, but smooth and loose and natural.

I got only so far and then my body went through a kind of upheaval.  (Men - you can avert your eyes if you need to...) I'm beginning the phase of menopause and yesterday I was simply laid low with aches, pains, throbbing head and general malaise.  Like I had been hit by a truck.

No surprise how womb-like this center looks - is it?

So I wasn't really surprised that my body was turning itself inside out ... or outside in.  The upheaval was painful, but as with other pains associated with birth of any kind it doesn't last forever and today I am able to go back out and continue.

Shoveling smaller loads of sand, working it into the path.  Seeing shoots of grass still pop through.  Feeling the soundness of the ground beneath my hands.

I can see it coming to life.




And I like the way it looks.




And feels.

And I hung up my two stained glass windows again.  

It makes me happy to see them hanging in the pergola!

Not So Fast There, Missy.

>: /   <-- is that a growling frowning face emoticon?  Because that's what I mean it to be.

"Nearly Done" - ha!  Might as well hang a "Mission Accomplished" banner with that last blog post.

Remember this?  It's a Pergola that had kind of gone to seed and I decided to use it as the entrance to the labyrinth.  I liked the feeling of "ruin" that it had, and I imagined fixing it up (loose terminology there) and having a kind of open, organic room to meditate or journal in ... and then proceeding out into (or coming back from) walking the labyrinth.

 Well. Not so fast there, missy.  Hubby-the-engineer would have none of the "fixing it up stuff" and called in a crew of his friends to straighten the boards and make it sound.

And while I'm sure I can eventually appreciate the "soundness" of it, at this moment I can't stand the industrial strength galvanized cabling and pressure treated wood beams.  Blech.  Next they are coming in to flatten the floor and make it level.  Really?  WTF do I need a level floor in there?  I'm not going to be living in it.

Okay.  So we're having a little intensity around mixing the feminine and masculine elements here.

And, I'm not so wild about the sand that came. 

It's too white!  It feels like some kind of fake beach or something.

After umpteen wheelbarrow loads I am thinking to myself -
"THIS LOOKS LIKE CRAP!"

Not exactly the meditative energy I began with, or want to continue with.  So I've hit a metaphorical brick wall - and that is what it looks like. (Not to mention - shoveling hurts my back!)
Harumph.

If I step back I can still see the vision I had.  So I'm going to do that ... and hopefully the "crew" will finish and I can reclaim the whole space.  And figure out what to do about the sand.  I'm thinking topsoil.  

Maybe I need to focus on some plants?  

As an aside, and probably not all that accidental in the grander scheme of the Universe, my husband and I will celebrate 25 years of marriage on April 13.  It's funny how even after all that time we can still hit these spots where I think to myself - who the heck are you and don't you even know me??  

He definitely does.  It's not about him.  It's not about the sand.  

When things shift inside of me - heart and mind - 

it's always tempting to imagine someone else is the culprit.

I think I'll focus on the Wisteria.

Nearly Complete!!

All the rocks are laid!  The full pattern is down, and the pine straw is strewn.

This is the entrance and the first turn.  Up in the right corner is the center circle.

These areas will be planted - herbs, flowers, medicinals.

There's the center circle - can't wait to get my bench in!

Rocks!

I've got this marvelous pile of sandstone rocks.  With some granite thrown in.  And a few limestone as well. The pile looked much larger at the rockyard.  Next to my flags and tape it looks rather paltry.

I got to work anyway - it's overcast and cool, but I was able to work up a sweat placing them along the pattern laid out.  There are hundreds of Redwing Blackbirds singing in the trees as I work, and every now and then a whistle from a Mockingbird tries to be heard as well.  Cardinals flit around, they seem curious about what I'm doing.  I suppose they wonder where the feeders are going to go.

This is the beginning up to the first left turn.

 Here the first and third turns are emerging.

And I'm coming along nicely.  The stones feel a lot like mosaic pieces, almost like they have a place they want to rest.  There is a peace that accompanies me in the work, that I hadn't realized would be there.  And oddly enough, there doesn't seem to be any space in my head for a worry.
(oh, the pine straw is for the visual, it will be covered in dirt and mulch)

There are some small wild violets popping up for Spring, and they seem to fit right between the rocks!

(I'm really not surprised - but I am delighted)

Making My Marks

I went out into the yard today with a can of paint, and a copy of the labyrinth pattern I want to create.  What an optimist!!  I used that entire can of paint making incredible mistakes in the yard.  It was rather hilarious. 

For those of you who are engineers: bite your tongues.  I know there are mathematical ways to do this.  I'm choosing a different way.

A quick trip to Home Depot and I had flags and two rolls of pink tape and the whole wonderful path began to take shape!! 

I decided to take pictures that reveal my mistakes, because why not?  Nothing about me, my life or this labyrinth is going to be precise, measured or perfect.

I have a pattern for the rocks, and also places for plantings and bird feeders.  I'm SO excited!!