I had a major revelation about a perception I have had about some events that happened in my life over a year ago that hurt me deeply. My ego was deeply wounded and I was protecting that wound in a way that it was keeping me from enjoying life. It was keeping me from dancing both symbolically and literally. At one point last year I was dangerously depressed and suicidal. Then I had a conversation that woke something up in me. I spent a couple of days just trying to unwrap this in my brain and when I finally saw the situation for what it truly was I began to understand something I was missing in my perception of what had happened. There was a part of the situation I had not been able to see through my pain and the revelation of that has freed me in such a huge way. I spent way too much time focused on trying to convince people who had hurt me why they had hurt me when I needed to turn that around and convince myself. What good was it doing me to try to convince people of something they are well aware of ….or maybe they are not aware of…but even if they are aware what at this point could they do? I think there was a part of me that was begging to just have it fixed so I would not hurt anymore. But the truth is it was done and over with and I was wasting my time trying to fix something that was not fixable. Furthermore my instant reaction to the tower moment and what I thought was the truth was just not true. In the moment the lightning hit and I was thrown from the tower I was blinded. I became so guarded that I become bitter and jaded.

What matters at this moment is that I have learned some amazing lessons. I have learned to set boundaries and keep them. I have learned to say enough is enough. I have learned to take care of myself when I need to. I have learned that sometimes I need to withdraw and reevaluate and that is OK. I have learned that sometimes people are going to hate you no matter what you do. I have learned that I do not have to react to that hatred. I have learned that in some instances people do not want to see the damage they have done. I have learned that sometimes all those things are things that I have done myself.

My life has changed for the better. I will never be the same and for that I am grateful. There was also a piece of this puzzle that when I finally clicked it into place I was just shocked at the realization. Why did I not see this before? But I see it now and today…right this moment I am forgiving and am letting go completely. It was never about me not being valuable. It was never even about me not being wanted. I was always wanted and valued. The bottom line is that it is also not my problem anymore and for that I will always be grateful. I don’t have to live my life questioning my worth anymore because I know my worth and no one can take that from me.

Today I am releasing from my mind and my heart those things I spent over a year feeling tortured about. Thank you for the lessons.
Now…. It is time to Dance.

When you have had a deep valley of soul crushing depression and mourning it changes your life. That happened to me. I was in a deep dark place. I did not want to leave my room and I felt numb most of the time when I was not crying or thinking about how I wanted this life to be over. I tried to pull myself out of it and when I could not I went for help. I spent months in therapy and then I went into a 10 day program to help me to learn ways to cope with this depression and move on with my life. I struggled with medication issues and found that those medications I was on were making me worse. After some nasty withdrawals I finally starting coming out of it this past Fall. I started feeling better about my life and doing things again. I felt like myself or at least that is what I thought. But I have come to realize the past few days that I have been in a state of low grade depression for months…and probably for most of my life. I have a cycle of trying to pull out of it and doing lots of things but I always want to retreat for days after I do things and when I do plan things I spend all the time up until that thing dreading it. I am anxious in groups and I am always thinking that people secretly hate me. I have a fear of those I love leaving me without a look back. It has happened a few times and that is hard to deal with when it does. Last year at this time it did happen. Someone I had invested much emotional energy into and had been a close friend to for over 6 years just said “Don’t contact me anymore” and that was it. I was not a part of their new life and they did not want anything to do with anyone who had been a part of their old life. I honored their request and never emailed or contacted them again. I still hurt over that. I thought we would be friends forever. I want them to be happy and if never hearing from me is part of that I understand…but it still hurts.

So I am depressed. I have no motivation. I don’t sleep well. I worry about everyone around me abandoning me but at the same time I do not want to drag anyone down. So this is my plea to those close to me. Get out if you need to. Just be honest with me. The dishonesty is the worst part. If I am dragging you down just say so and go. I feel like giving up sometimes but those people who have truly stood by me…those people have helped me not to. I am grateful for you.

My adult daughter has been calling me on a daily basis to ask me about tarot card meanings. She is learning to read tarot. I always hoped my children would want to be a part of my spiritual path. I never forced it. I never made them go to ritual. I did however make things available to them and I encouraged them to seek out the path that was right for them. I wanted to one day pass the flame to my daughter or son. I am pleased that my daughter at 33 is taking up the study of tarot.

I was cruel. I admit it. I said things that in the moment were my truth. I had carried that pain for months and months. It was stinking and awful and I finally said it out loud. I don’t know what I expected. That I would feel better? That this person would tell me what a mistake they made and how sorry they were? Did I wish for those things? Yes, I did. It was not what happened. Instead I saw the pain in their eyes and when we hugged goodbye I felt that pain. It was awful. I wanted to get back out of my car and beg them to forgive me for what I said. I did something I had swore I would never do. I wounded someone else. I forgot all the terrible things I had done in my past I had been forgiven for. I forgot a basic truth…what happened was not done to me…it was not even about me. I felt so hollow at that moment. Yes, I was wounded deeply by what happened but my perspective has changed over these months that have passed by so quickly. I now see a person who is just as broken as I am, not a monster, just another human being trying to do their best. I have made a vow to do better. I will not open my mouth in cruelty again. It is better to forgive and move on.

Another bit of writing from about 15 years ago that I added to today.

New Lebanon, Ohio is a small town.  Small enough that you know everyone and everyone knows you.  To walk from one side of the town to the other only took an hour or two depending on how fast you walked.  At least that is how I remember it.  There are more churches than bars and at one time we only had one grocery store.  In the 60’s the high school basketball team, the Dixie Greyhounds, won the state championship and there is still a sign at the city limits to let you know that.  The local hang out when I was in high school was the dairy queen because the Toot which used to be the hang out was gone.  The only interesting thing to do when you became old enough to drive was to drive the loop.  We would start at the edge of town at the Dairy Queen after we hung out long enough to be told “You kids need to find something to do besides taking up all this space”.  Then we would decide who was going to ride with who and we began the nightly ritual of driving up and down Main Street.  Loop around the Dairy Queen, past the High School and the water tower, into the downtown where the library and the bank were, past the only bar in town (nicknamed the crack) and down to the dentist’s office to loop the parking lot and start again.  New Lebanon was known as Magic City when I was in high school because the only thing to do was drive the loop and get high.  Off from the main street all the streets led to the housing developments which we called tracts.  Houses upon houses that all look alike: rectangular, brick with two car garages and two trees in the front yard.  Each one looked slightly different depending of the personality of the people who lived there.  Our neighbor had a bird bath in the front yard and used white rocks to fill up the spaces around the bushes.  Our house had black bark around the bushes and black shutters.  Some houses had fences and others didn’t.  For the most part they all looked alike from the outside. 

Our house inside never seemed to change.  I always wondered what other houses were like inside.  We had the same furniture until I was 17 and moving out.  Our living room had green curtains with plastic backing.  There was a huge dark wood bookshelf with the Encyclopedia Britannia from 1965 and books my dad collected from book clubs by mail.  There was a gold couch that was worn from years of my dad sleeping on it all the time.  Two end tables with nothing on them but a lamp and a coffee table with a giant family bible on it that had nothing written in it.   There were two things on the white walls of the living room, a huge mirror that was framed with gold grapes and a picture of a seashore that was distorted and dark.  The pictures were on opposite walls so when you looked in the mirror you saw the distorted seashore behind you.  The carpet was green and sculpted.  I hated green.

The den was bare also.  We had one picture on the wall above the leather couch; it was a picture of musical instruments which were distorted and black with lots of red in the picture.  The picture just looked mad and confused.  The couch was this horrid black thing that you would sweat and stick to in the summer.  In front of the couch there was a coffee table my sister carved a picture of big bird into, it had a small drawer in it that contained nothing.  At the end of the couch was a cabinet stereo that had sliding drawers and was full of records by the Irish Rovers, Janis Joplin, Glen Campbell, Percy Sledge and other artists that I became familiar with over the years.  At the end of the room in the corner facing the couch and the kitchen was a black and white console TV with a knob for channeling.  The only remote in the house at that time was my sister and I.  Off to one side was my father’s black lazy chair, no one dared to sit in it except him.  He used to scrape his feet with a paring knife while he sat in it so there was always this fear that I was going to touch that dead skin if I went near it.  The carpet from the living room also spilled into this room and was the same boring green, the curtains? Green.  We did have a fish tank for a short time but I accidently killed the fish.  I had seen my dad putting ice cubes in the tank when we got it and so I thought that was something you were supposed to do.  The next time the babysitter was with us I told her we had to put ice in the tank and all the fish died that night.  My dad called me the fish killer for weeks. 

In the kitchen we had a big oval table by the glass sliding patio doors.  It had big soft wheels and the material on the chairs was almost the color of my skin and was some kind of fake leather.  There was never a centerpiece on the table.  It was always bare.  We did not have placemats or napkins.  The kitchen had nothing on the walls and the counter only had canisters for sugar and flour.  They were silver with black lids.  Our stove and refrigerator were avocado and the fridge had a drawer on the bottom.  The Washer and dryer was also avocado.  It seemed so bare in there, so bare that if you talked too loud it would echo. 

Now I decorate every inch of my life.  I cover up the tables with flowers and Knick knacks and cover the walls with pictures and the trappings of my life.  I string lights from the ceilings and around the windows.  I am afraid of the bareness.  Today I live far away from that place of emptiness but on days when I miss my family I get in my car and I drive from my house to the grocery store down the road and make the loop through the parking lot and then come back down my street and make the loop over and over until my heart calms down again. 

This is something I wrote years ago about the color Red

Red….

Red is the color of my daughter who is a new mother

Red like the color of blood, the color we wash into this world with

Her lips as red as roses, red seems to radiate from her every pore

Caliente splashed across the chest of her shirt

She is hot, vibrant alive with the energy of motherhood

Red bleeds and burns within the chest of the young and the young at heart

When I think of red I think of the dark red of lust and swollen bruised lips of passion, the red raised stripes of my lovers back

I fantasize of red heels, red lipstick smeared on flushed red skin

I think of red painted on the stomach of a very pregnant woman

The red of a swollen vulva ready to give birth, ready to receive passion, red womb, red heart, red earth

I hear the goddesses of fire, Pele and Bridget calling for the pulsing blood and the passion of their followers, dancing around the blazing fire on the night of the red moon. 

I smell cinnamon, red hots and red wax lips

I remember blood ties, blood relations, blood thicker than water, menstruation and Phoenix rising 

Red nails, red hair, red light

In eighth grade whispered from girl to girl “you can’t wear red nail polish it’s for whores”

Eyes red from crying, hands red from clapping, red lines from sleeping with your hand to your face.

Skin pulsing with angry red blisters

I see signs in my mind, stop, danger, death, go no further.

Anger is blazing from my eyes

Red streams of hot lava flow from my mouth….

Red