<Continued from “Nana is Dying and You Are Not Invited” post.> I walk through the familiar wide golden oak front door and set two bags just inside the door, stashing them behind her chair. “Hi darlin’, how are you feeling today?” Coming around her chair, hands free, I bend down to kiss her pale sunken cheek. She has been shrinking for years. Now she looks like a strong wind might […]
<This is a portion of a chapter set when I was in my 30’s.> I have been officially out of the Organization for 3 years. I am being shunned by my Faithful Witness family. When I first heard, really heard, how bad things are for Nana, she said, “Don’t you think the scariest thing would be to die in the bathtub?” The first time I heard her say it I […]
As the Ashes of California Ablaze float and settle around me …thoughts of Armageddon sift and flare in my mind like the last remnants of a forest fire’s dying gasps. Images of Fire raining from God on High to consume the running screaming mothers carrying babies in their arms filled my childhood. ARMAGEDDON IS COMING or They Have to Die…Really? “Armageddon is coming any minute and we need to be […]
9-9-17 I notice my journey into the wild is not very far from civilization. I drive ten minutes up the road from the (Madame’s) boyfriend’s house. I find a campground just off the highway. The ocean is a couple of sand dunes away. Cracked concrete forms a small firepit and next to it a pile of driftwood I dragged a long way down the beach. I wrap rough sticks and […]
9-2-18 Where the wave’s water sparkles with floating sun beams. Beams which glitter so fiercely I almost can’t look at them until they shatter in foam and sand. The day is a blue haze with drifts of sunlight playing with fog’s tendrils twining and climbing up the beach far into the afternoon. Lying in the warm sand, listening to the muted rush of the ocean’s breath, stills my mind’s darting […]
9-1-18 Went walking with my one of my ‘Sisters of Choice’, and the two little dogs Anya, and Styx into the woods. Into the Dark, no moon yet, the stars most often obscured by tall evergreen treetops. It is night, like 9pm and full dark at this time of year. We walk deeper into the forest following a trail only the dogs can really see. Periodically, I am blinded by […]
I heard you passed from this life noon yesterday. One week to the day from the last time I saw you. I drove more than 700 miles to have that last visit. I took a day after hearing about your transition from, a month of ICU hospitalizations and rehab center attempts, to comfort care…hospice care in the hospital…to set my life up so I could leave. Getting away for a […]
I read a book called Dating Jesus: A Story of Fundamentalism, Feminism, and the American Girl” by Susan Campbell published 2-11-2010. (Available on Amazon) ‘Bride of Christ’ is a term the ‘Witnesses’ use. This was a hell of a book for me. Her story is of course different than mine. Her attitude as a child and her journey are quite different. I never wanted to ‘date Jesus’. As a matter of fact, […]
EQUALIZING AS A BELIEF SYSTEM Places where facets of myself find like minded community… Alternative Sexuality, Gender Queer, BDSM/Leather/Kink/Poly Alternative Spiritual Path Walkers Animal People Artists, Musicians, Writers, and Story-Tellers Back to the Land: Self-Sufficient and Sustainable Community Living Ecologically Passionate Feminist and Women’s Communities Free Thinkers and Structural System Questioners Healers, Alternative and Otherwise Hospice and Doulas for the Dying Learner Led Education or Unschoolers (Self-Educators) Liberal Political Activists […]
I lit a candle for my father’s sister A. today in a huge Russian Orthodox Church. Not exactly the spiritual home of our Greek Orthodox ancestors but close. I bathed in the light of the gleaming garnet stained glass cross painting the floor. I knelt on the eastern side of the smooth golden wood beside the strip of carpet which bisected the expansive room and led up the steps to […]