(Tuesday, August 21, 2018) waxing gibbous moon Capricorn/ tarot King of Cups
It is evening. I am at a craft store, talking to the famous art critic Lucy Lippard. She has so much to say, yet I can keep up. She speaks rapidly, energetically and deeply about art. Theories, techniques, philosophies, politics. She is warm and friendly. I have the intellect to follow her complex threads, but I bring up the difficulty of being born a creative into a family of farmers. Peasants. She as a native New Yorker may not grasp that, although Lucy has lived “off the grid” in Gallisteo, New Mexico for many decades.
Finally I tell dear Lucy that I need to leave and get to work on my art project.
I walk through the golden dusk, arriving at a moat that surrounds a round, single-story temple. A mandala. A labyrinth. I cross a stone bridge over the water and insert a skeleton key into the wooden front door.
A man in his early forties greets me. He says he is my soulmate, but I don’t feel that kind of connection. Even so, he has my back. He wraps one arm around me as we walk towards the center of the temple, which is a circular chamber of glass. No other physical presence is in the chamber or in the rest of the building. I sense invisible spirits. I think this temple may belong to a religious cult. Why do I feel that way about a building with such an obviously sacred design?
Day notes:
A lovely man in our Paradise Valley morning group belonged to Eckankar, and other IASD Canadian members belong as well. They have always seemed kind to me, but organized religion is not what I can do. That is how I felt at my aunt’s Catholic funeral. Four men at the altar, not a single woman. Not for me.
My friend Anne and I did not get accepted into the MCBA show. Rejection made us sad, but it is a national show with only 9 contributors. It would have been a miracle if we had been juried in.
My friend Jana just moved back to Montana from California, next to the Red Sun Labyrinth. “To enter a labyrinth is to choose to walk a spiritual path.”
(Thursday, August 16, 2018, Deloris Sheehan funeral)
Strength is the tarot card I pull in the morning.
Dream 1: Dogs
Traveling on Highway 61, along the bluff edge between Lake City and Wabasha, I spy two large, spindly-legged creatures crossing the road ahead of my car. At first I think they are deer. One is brown, but the other is black. They are Great Danes! The Fastenal truck that has been behind me since Hastings pulls to the shoulder, and I do too. When I get out of my car I see a third dog struggling to keep up with the Danes. It’s a Bassett Hound! Now I am terrified. No driver will see that ground-hugging canine.
All of the vehicles stop when the truck driver and I run out onto the highway, in spite of the blind curve along Lake Pepin. The young man grabs the two dogs that have collars, the Bassett and the brown Great Dane. I coax the uncollared black dog: “Come here honey, c’mon sweetie.” And he does. A woman creeps past us on the other side of the road, yelling out the window about where the dogs live. Then she drives off. I ask the trucker if we can put the dogs inside his van. He agrees and tells me to open the rear door. The friendly, freaked-out dogs jump inside.
Both of us humans are so panicked we don’t register clearly the instructions about where to take the dogs. All I remember is “second driveway.” Trucker wants to trust my instincts, though, so I hop in my Ford and he follows me.
My distorted memory says that the driveway we are looking for is on the left, but all of the driveways are on my right. Now I realize they were to the snappy woman’s left.
I turn into the second driveway, up the steep dirt road. I see a house to my left. There is a dog inside of a gate on the deck, which makes me think that place cannot be where the escapees come from. I drive to the top of the hill, to a second property. It is obvious no one is home.
The two of us get out of our vehicles. The young man says he was surprised his truck made it up the bluff. I feel bad about that. We decide to to go back to the first house to find out if the residents know where the three amigos dwell.
When we pull up, the old dog behind the gate barks. We stand looking at him, and notice that his collar matches the other two collars. Aha! Then we see a flimsy second gate that is trampled, cracked open wide enough for doggies to slip through. Our eyes meet in relief.
We schmooze with the grey-haired pooch for a bit and he lets us in the gate. I knock on the door. Ring the bell. Eventually a man answers. He is indeed the negligent papa of the roaming pups: thank god! The young man and I smile at each other. I honor him with namaste prayer hands then climb into my car, heading back to Highway 61.
Dream 2: Eagles
I leave work Wednesday afternoon, focusing on my time to come with family at my aunt’s funeral in Kellogg on Thursday. Deloris worked for many years at Wabasha-Kellogg High School. The National Eagle Center is in Wabasha. As I cross the 494 bridge over the Minnesota River, I see a huge bald eagle perched on a lone dead tree, high over the valley. Truly an omen, a blessing from the spirit realm. I recognize it as such immediately.
The closing funeral hymn on Thursday at the St. Agnes Catholic Church in Kellogg is about eagles “soaring high.” As my father, mother, sister and I step out of the church, an eagle circles overhead. No one but me sees it. Why?
On the drive home, as I pass by the town of Wabasha, I reminisce on the post-ceremony conversation with my girl cousins at my aunt’s farmhouse on a bluff above Snake Creek. We want to get together and begin recording family stories. I don’t know why, but I muse on confessing to them about my mystic side. I feel Charlene would enjoy that disclosure, and possibly share that aspect of herself. Another eagle sails across the sky, above my windshield. Confirmation!
Dream 3: Cat
Most of Deloris’ great grandkids are under the age of four. At the farmhouse they keep scooping up a huge tom named Jerry. They drag him around the yard, his long body hanging from their arms, sometimes upside down. He never hisses, yells, scratches or bites any of the babies. Surrealistically serene.
Dream 4: Horses
I park by a barn at my aunt’s and pat the nose of a gorgeous tan horse who is standing at the open door.
Day notes:
The Strength tarot card often has an image of a lion and a woman coexisting peacefully.
A memorable time at Glastonbury was when I worked on my “Love For The Animals” theme. A graceful brown dog walked into the ceremony as I shared my wish, my passion, with our mandala. The second dog at Earth Spirit Centre was black. Interesting that the uncollared Great Dane is black, like Black Wolf Romeo, whom I first dreamt of in England. After Deloris’ interment, we visited the graves of my godmother and my uncle, Marguerite and Richard Wolfe, at St. Mary’s Cemetary in Minneiska.
I opened my Wisdom Ways fall catalog to find there is a presentation on October 11 called “Celtic Saints and Animal Stories: a Spirituality of Holiness.”
”But ask the beasts, and they will teach you; the birds of the air, and they will tell you; or the bushes of the earth, and they will teach you; and the fish of the sea will declare to you.” — Job 12
(Saturday, August 11, 2018) new moon Leo partial solar eclipse / Carmen Sorrenti tarot: trail (knight) of coral (cups).
Waking dream: the number 11 shows up all day. When I step into the car, 111 miles are left till the gas tank is empty. Jeanne and I eat at Gigi’s at table 11. I arrive home from Jeanne’s at 1:11. I did not realize it was August 11 till I started this post. I told Bonnie in Sedona that 11 is my fave number.
Last night was full of dreams. I remember many fragments. The most distinctive is of a new home for me and for Chris. It is in a northern region that reminds me of Bonnie and Paul’s neighborhood. It feels like a small, intimate village on the edge of a giant wood, a state or national forest.
I look out our large picture window at the deciduous trees. All the trees are the same age and size, formed in a slender, vertical shape, like aspens or birch. The leaves have turned deeply golden. Many have fallen, so the earth and sky are the same rich color. I am mesmerized by the sensuous, vivid view. That feeling of lucidity.
I turn to Chris to tell him how happy I am about the surrealistic environment that surrounds us. He is focused on something else, not fully present.
The house is barely furnished yet, so the clean, wooden floor attracts my attention as I turn away from Chris. I see a small baby bunny near my feet. Our eyes meet and remain connected. There is a teacup on the boards and I fill it with spiral-cut vegetables. Bunny hops into the mug to munch.
I turn again to the window. Farther out into the forest is a collection of framed artwork, placed in a circle on the ground. My curiosity is peeked, but there is now a gentle mist falling. I wonder if the artwork will be affected. Who leaves pictures in the woods?
The light starts to shift as the sun begins to set. I palpably sense the presence of bears ambling through the wilderness, very nearby. But invisible. They circle our home, communicating with me telepathically. Will they come in, like bunny? I think so.
Day notes:
From muskrats to lions to wolves to bears. The transition of spirit animals in my dreams. My next clay piece will be a bear and a doe based on a dream I had 11 months after Trump’s election, “Bodhisattva Combats The Dark Force.” Bodhi is the bear, I am the doe, and our mission is to create light for other beings. The bodhi tree is where the Buddha attained enlightenment.
When Jeanne and I entered her yard after lunch, I noticed plants eaten by her wild bunny. This week on one of my walks at Big Rivers, a baby bunny stared at me on the edge of the poath. It was not frightened by me at all. We connected. A very pleasant experience.
Last week two mugs I ordered from CB2 called “Luna Black and White” arrived on my doorstep. Today they delivered two more that I did not order! Eclipse teacups.
Rabbit spirit animal, Sarah Seidelmann: “Womb/sacral chakra. Absolutely legendary in their powers of creation, rabbits produce roughly ten to thirty masterpieces per season … Can you imagine a world in which Alice had not followed the White Rabbit into Wonderland?”
Bear spirit animal, Sarah S: “Womb/sacral chakra. In Hindu mythology, Jambavan, the king of bears, an immortal being and the son of the creator of the universe, reincarnated as a bear in order to serve Lord Rama. Like this mythological bear, you are being empowered to serve the greater good and help others realize their own power and unique skills. Reflect people’s light back to them.”
Bear spirit animal, Jamie Sams: “It is in the Dream Lodge that our ancestors sit in Council and advise us regarding alternative pathways that lead to our goals. This is the power of bear … The female energy that for centuries has allowed visionaries, mystics and shamans to prophecy is contained in this very special bear energy. In India, the cave symbolizes the cave of Brahma. Brahma’s cave is considered to be the pineal gland … Bear seeks answers when she is in the cave dreaming or hibernating.”
