Just Thoughts

Fantastic arbor with pale pink roses. Carmel By The Sea.

Mornings have gone quiet. The birds are busy now raising their young. Sometimes, mid-day, I hear the babies, and as much as I miss the early morning melodies, my heart does swell at the rambunctious energetic chirping of the fledglings.

The only thing certain is change; or so they say.

Years ago gardening taught me about the seasons of life. Both literal and figurative; how to work with the earth's and life's turnings, how to not only honor, but trust each new season. It especially taught me to trust the dark, the time of cold and barrenness, the time to go inside, and rest. Let go and let life work, let her do what she does, down there in the deep fertile earth. Down here deep inside me.

It's hard to know how to breathe, let alone trust, without my garden; without the day to day reminder, without the sanctuary of my hands in the soil, the sun on my back, the delicate colors, the heady scent of that cherished piece of earth.

I used to write poems in my garden. Bad, ridiculous poems. Over the top maudlin poems. Love poems to the One I Never Got Over. Much to my joy and shame. (The not getting over part and the poems part.) About his eyes, and his lips, and his hands. The flat-out miracle of him. The way he would scoop me to his chest, his taut waist warm against my forearms. How one day over his kitchen table, Christmas lights blazing against the gray bowl of a sky outside, not even a half a day from his rumpled sheets, he ended it. Just like that. Sometimes I would lay naked in my garden. Not a soul knows about that. Even I had forgotten. Talk about shame. (I had a friend once who had a framed photo of herself in her bedroom, lying naked in the forest by a stream ~ right there on the white wall next to the door.)

It's painful to live when you can't find yourself. When you've vacated the premises and are somewhere, god only knows where, else. Dissociation is the clinical term. It's what happens when your world isn't safe. It was a good thing because it helped you to survive, helped you when you were so overwhelmed and so alone you thought you would die; though later it just steals your life.

Some things never change. Some things you never get over losing. Not so far anyway.

Walking under the redwoods, the hot wind whips their perfume right into my body, and suddenly, for a split second, it remembers everything.

That night I would dream I was coming home.