With August Almost Gone...

So I guess I rushed to August and I was scooped up by the energy that colliding with time and intention creates- I tightroped on my dream string connecting me to balance on a narrow wall in Cartagena where my heart and mind stepped in time to the rhythm of his questions. My lips met something greater than a man there, my eyes were steadied on a face, and reckless though it may seem I lept there and drempt there wide awake. More awake and more asleep than a woman ever could be at once.

Maybe I was uneased by the power I feel by his side, I walked ahead or behind, even when hand in hand, just one step apart. Then to get swept in it again I let my foot fall naturally and once more the world is ours. The energy coming from his hand magnetizes mine and spins me and I am suddenly dancing. The world rizes up and presses up against our feet and the Earth is a great trampoline propelling us to the nearest rooftop, so we are compelled to learn to harness this energy, and there is no doubt we will be the first to really fly. He carries his dreams in every pocket, they paint the walls of my heart in the color of roadtrips and Vail and Thailand, my ears hear names sweetly spoken, and songs that don't exist yet, I feel smiles that must have started from inside because I look around and it's only him there and he's just sleeping.

There are other things I could never tell anyone simply for my lack of the ability to explain, because when he came to Buffalo on Tuesday, my life has been that way- beyond explaination. I could explain Colombia, but not Buffalo. With August almost gone I will tell you that I have lived the best two weeks, my life experience during this time has been in the top 5 best life experiences of all living creatures in existence. Your believing me is entirely unneccessary and bears no influence on the fact that this in fact true.

Things Grandmas say.

I wrote down a few things my Grandma told me over the weekend when I went to visit her and Grandpa. Best weekend stay of my life. We just stayed home and chatted, I played guitar and sang a bit for them, but other than that- just talking. My Grandma shared her whole life with me. She told me whatever she could and answered every question.

She showed me things- like, the button from her brother's naval jacket. He never returned from that submarine.

She gave me two necklaces. One had belonged to her mother, the other belonged to her grandmother. She showed me pictures of them and told me about them. She told me about the Faulks and... mmn I can't remember the other family name I'll have to call her about it, but she told me about their journey from Ireland to America. I need to see Ireland someday.

She gave me general wisdom about men and life. It's funny how simple things are, isn't it? I thought a lot about my time spent with her and I know I will continue to recycle what she said through my brain until every bit of it gets stored and categorized and committed to permanent memory. I can't wait to tell my Grandchildren about her. I hope they listen. I told my Grandma I often think that I will love to be a Grandma someday. :)

She cried quite a few times. About her loss of health, her friends lost to whatever's on the other side. She looked at me plainly and surely and said "I'm not afraid of death. I know where I'm going." then smiled.
Oh man thinking about it is spooky, you know why?
Because she's right. She's going to heaven, I hope to see her when I go eventually- not soon, but eventually. She told me things.... oh my gosh it's so spooky! Her eyes- so intensly telling me these things, she has so much to say to me and I'm only now able to really internalize what she's trying to impart. You know, she never had a daughter??
Grandma Simpson.
hmm. I'll be thinking.

Purple Planner

On July 27th, my life moves on to the purple planner. I've been preparing it for entry for the past 2 months. I've indexed all the months. I've filled in all the birthdays. I'm on the last page of my free CSN planner that helped me through so many crazy days, and moving on is bitter-sweet.

I keep such a detailed planner that it is my most accurate diary. I can tell by my writing whether it was a good or bad day. Most doodles are secret code. Notes in the corner say things like "<3 Can we please get focused, amiga? <3" And together with short poems here and there inspiried by something someone said, or a look I got... how can I throw this away?

At the same time I know what it means to move on to August 2009. Do you realize this blog is about moving on to August 2009? It's huge for me. And this purple planner is the physical representation of that.

The Beauty & Power of Dance / What is your escape?

What is your escape?

Lately I’ve been dancing. I put all my heart and soul and body into it, every night, every morning. Because everything on the surface of my life is practically perfect. But on a personal, private level there is major upheaval.

This is some kind of irony. No one reaches out to someone who seemingly has it all together. Why would they?

I’ve been given a new way to express myself. This job working for Fred Astaire Dance Co. couldn’t have come at a better time. Guitar, singing, painting, prayer… these things alone just weren’t cutting it anymore. Over the past two or three weeks, I noticed myself falling back into behaviors that strongly resembled those anxiety issues from my past… issues that I thought were gone for good. But this time I'm not going under. This time I'm going to dance straight through it.

When I dance, I take everything inside that is wrong-wrong-wrong, and force it up to the surface in the most beautiful, expressive way that I possibly can. Thank God for music. Thank God for our incredible bodies that were made for so much more than sitting and hunching, walking, talking, ingesting and digesting.

Now, instead of locking myself away from the world and becoming introverted and afraid, I am adding yet another way to be even more of a participant in the amazing world, and taking all my frustration, anxiety, strain, sadness, guilt, lonliness, fear, all of it- firing it down and hammering it into a gem and snapping it onto the charm bracelet of life!! :)

Life is hard. But we were built for this. We can handle it.

Now you know my escape. What’s yours? Because everyone needs one.