Grace and the Bobcat

I am very proud of my daughter Grace. Today was a great day for her, and also for me. I witnessed the profound effect of her taking action for a cause she feels strongly about. It’s true what they say about being a parent: It only gets better

Today we visited two bobcats at The Living Desert, which is a very special Zoo and botanical sanctuary in Palm Desert, California. Grace raised $300 last spring to “adopt” a bobcat and that entitled her to a “behind the scenes” visit with the animals.

We arrived early for our 2:30 pm appointment, both of us a little nervous and very excited. First we met Shirley, who runs the adoption program, in the administration building where she gave us each a bottle of cold water and showed us out to her golf cart. Grace sat up front with Shirley and I rode in the back. The ride alone was enough to satisfy Grace, who remarked later, “and I’ve never even been on a golf cart before!”

Shirley drove us through the park and since we were a few minutes early we took a detour to see the giraffes. It was a gorgeous day, only about 90 degrees, and the giraffes were majestic against a blue sky streaked with cirrus clouds.

When we reached the bobcat area, Shirley drove around the back of the exhibit. It looked like the back end of a grocery store or a restaurant. Scattered behind the buildings there were sea containers, dumpsters and vehicles parked here and there. There was another golf cart and two young women stepped out to greet us. We were introduced to Katie and Amanda. Katie was in charge of the bobcats and our visit. Amanda, we learned, was new to the zoo and tagging along.

“Now, the only thing I need to ask you is please don’t get too close to the cages because the cats can stick their paws under the edge if they really want to.” Katie smiled when she said this and then asked, “are you ready Grace?” as she opened a big steel door. Inside there were cages and in the cages were the bobcats. We were so close to them it took my breath away. These were the enclosures they use to feed them or do any procedures with them or trainings and they were not deep. So we were only a few feet away from them. They looked like big house cats with wide moon faces. Their eyes stared right at us, not used to seeing anyone back there but their keepers. The tufts of hair around their faces made them look like old men with white whiskers. They were incredibly cute and obviously strong and sturdy. Their fur looked soft and fluffy like you could bury your face in it. Their paws were large with long fur and they moved silently, the way cats do, around their cage. It struck me how soft and silent those big paws were.

Katie explained that she had come up with three “enrichment items” for the cats so that we could observe them in action. She sounded excited about her plan, explaining that one of the items was a ball that they had played with before, but that the other two were new. One was a toy- a circular track with a ball that went around inside it- and the other was a bucket of what she called “wolf dirt.” Wolf dirt was collected from the wolves’ enclosure and smelled of their urine.

“Almost all of the other cats love it, but we haven’t tried it on the bobcats yet.” She walked us into the area where the bobcats live. The cats were safely in their cages inside the building while we walked around their outdoor habitat. Katie and Amanda put out the toys and spread the wolf dirt around. Katie warned, “You never know what they’ll respond to, but I’m guessing they’ll like the wolf dirt.”

We exited the enclosure and went out to where we could watch them. The zoo was very quiet so there were only two people, a pair of women, standing there when we emerged from behind a gate. Their eyes got wide as they saw the two zoo keepers and figured something was about to happen. We all stood there waiting for the bobcats. It took a minute for Amanda to walk back and let them into their space, but then we heard a sound and there they were, bounding toward us with anticipation. They immediately found the wolf dirt and rolled around in it just the way a house cat might roll in catnip.

“That’s just what the other cats do with it,” Katie said. We all watched the two cats joyfully roll and lounge. They looked relaxed and happy. Eventually they noticed the new toy and pawed it once or twice, but then they discovered more wolf dirt on top of a little swinging platform they have and rubbed up against that. They hung out around the swing for a while. Grace stood as close as she could taking picture after picture, trying to get good shots of them and record the whole experience.

The five of us stood there watching the bobcats for about an hour. It was that entertaining. Katie talked about them, sharing her extensive knowledge of wild cats with us, and veering off into other animals and experiences as well. We learned all about the bobcats, the story of how they came to the zoo and about a lot of the other animals there as well. The Living Desert is home to many animals that cannot be reintroduced into the wild, but they also work hard to set free the ones that can.

Grace often talks about how she would love to work with animals when she grows up so I asked Katie and Amanda about their backgrounds and how they ended up there. All three of them (including Shirley, in fundraising) said they loved working at The Living Desert. I asked Katie if she had a veterinary degree, and she said no. That they have one vet at the zoo but most of the keepers have degrees in biology, not necessarily zoology, and some have other specialties. “We have people with degrees in nutrition, psychology, and many other things which is what helps us come up with solutions for the animals. People come here with experience from all over the world and all over the animal kingdom. All that varied experience really helps us make things work. I came from marine biology and then I worked with birds for several years.”

Amanda, having just gotten herself hired there piped in with strong words of advice for Grace. She said, “The degree is important, but you need to start volunteering early. Because its your experience that will get you a job, not a degree. It’s a very competitive field because so many people want to work with animals. You can start volunteering quite young. You might not get to work directly with animals until your older, but when the time comes, they’ll want someone who knows how the place works.”

“Are you getting all this Mom?” Grace asked, putting down the camera for a split second.

Finally it was time to say good-bye. The bobcats had lost interest in us and had gone back to hide in the bushes. Katie and Amanda had other work to do (thought they were very gracious and never made us feel like we were taking up their time). Shirley had a meeting to attend.

We said our goodbyes, thanking them again and they thanked Grace for raising the money to sponsor the cats. Grace and I decided we wanted to see the cheetahs before we left so Shirley gave us a ride to their area in the golf cart and then she went on. I managed to get a picture of her and Grace and the vehicle before she left.

We were lucky. Both the cheetahs were visible. They have a big long enclosure with lots of places to hide. One of them was quite close, but lying down. The other was farther away but sitting up. We watched one and then the other for a long while. We had nowhere to be. The cheetah that was sitting up walked around and we got to see her move her body which was thrilling. She looked strange and graceful in her walking, and very elegant as she paced up along the ridge.

On our way out of the zoo we saw another interesting cat called a “Sand Cat” that lives in the Sahara. It was very small, about half the weight of our cat at home, but with a broad face and long thick coat. As we stood there a hummingbird came very close and sat on a branch next to the cat’s cage.

We stopped in the gift shop on our way out and I told Grace she could get something. She picked out a tee shirt with a leopard on it, and a necklace with a cheetah, and for once I said she could have both.

We left feeling very satisfied and exhilarated. It was so exciting to see the bobcats up close, to learn about them from such a knowledgeable young keeper, and to ride in that golf cart. I was extremely proud of Grace and I think she was too.

Green Love

I have never been very good with plants. You would think I’d be a better gardener with my intense appreciation for trees and birds and all the time I spend drawing and painting from nature, but I am not. It’s not that I don’t try. I have a garden that is usually limping along and a few (okay, just a couple) of houseplants that have either been with me for ten years or are brand new and still lively, or on their way out.

The few that I have managed to keep alive for a long time are sturdy as hell. They are succulents, which I seem to be good at. I love succulents and the desert climate they represent and which I happen to live in. But I also love the woods and am very fond of ferns. So I am always trying to grow a fern in my bathroom and it never works.

The last one I bought is still hanging there, with two leafless twigs sticking up out of the dirt. I am still watering it, more from a sense of guilt at this point than any real hope that somehow it’s going to fight its way back from the brink. When I bought it, it was luscious and bright, busting out of its pot like it had needed a transplant a year ago but the florist had not gotten around to it. So being an intuitive gardener, I bought a bigger pot for it and transplanted the vivacious fern as soon as I got home. Two weeks later it was wilting badly and the leaves were turning brown at a speedy rate, so I called the florist for help (and sort of to complain). They said transplanting it was a mistake, that the fern likes being crowded, but that it should be okay with some extra care.

Uh oh.

“Put it out at night in the cool air, soak it every two weeks for thirty minutes, and give it something strong like ‘Thrive’.”

“’Thrive?’”

“It’s plant food that will give it a real boost. You can get it at the hardware store and I’m sure the plant will do fine. It’ll come back.”

Thrive. I put it on my to do list that the next time I was at the hardware store I would look for it. And I did, but I guess Home Depot was not what she had in mind. Whenever I found myself at a hardware store I would idly peruse the gardening section for it, but I never went up to the counter and asked, nor did I look on the internet to try and find it. I guess it was what the fern really needed because despite my taking it out at to breath the cool night air and soaking it once in a while, it never did come back. It held on for about a year, maybe more. But now it is just the two leafless twigs.

I was looking at my to do list today where it still says, “Buy ‘Thrive’ at hardware store” when it struck me. The color green, and why I never made the trip to buy the ‘Thrive’ to save the plant that was dying in my bathroom. Because this is a place where I like to fall short: The care of my plants. It’s one of the areas in my life where I need some improvement. Another one is managing my money. The color green hit me as the through line to ‘Thrive.’

I bathed in the color green this summer, constantly surrounded by it in Vermont for a month. The trees, the fields and the garden there are vibrant all summer long. The heart chakra is green and green is the vibrational color of love. As I drove along country roads walled in by the woods chlorophyll-rich outer layer I tried to feel the connection to my heart. Hmmmm. Green is the color of love and plants and money and I could use some extra love in my garden and in my bank account. And yet I resist. I resist the garden just as I resist the budget and the bills and I resist buying a bottle of something called “Thrive.” Maybe I am still a little afraid of thriving myself.

I am at a place in my life where it is really time to shit or get off the pot. It is time to get to those places where I habitually neglect what needs to happen. It is time to pull some weeds. It is time to dig into the hardened soil in my backyard. It time to plant seeds and lovingly water them. And it is time to make some changes in my life. Time to sit down and make decisions about what our priorities really are and where we want to be in ten years. And I need to go to the damn hardware store and buy some “Thrive.” Maybe I’ll spray it on myself.

Poulter's Measure

I am taking a poetry class right now and this pair was for our last assignment, a form called Poulter's Measure that is a meter made up of alternate Alexandrines of iambic hexameter, (12 syllables or 6 hard stresses) and Fourteeners consisting of iambic heptameter (14 syllables or 7 hard stresses). Because of the extreme length of the lines, each line of the poulter's measure couplet is usually divided into two near-even parts with a caesura.

The Girl’s Room: Day

The space is replete with color: rainbow curtains and a rug

Smallish beds sport doll collections, tea sets and a rubber bug

Shelves are stacked with plastic toys from Target hardly used

Exotic costumes in a wooden chest worn out and plainly abused

The princesses sit dead center surrounded by castles created

From beads and Lego’s attached with tape, their attentions unabated

Unnoticed I slip past the kingdom, garbage bag in hand

Teasing out broken hairclips, tangled necklaces no mortal can command

For if a disposal regimen is not religiously followed

It won’t be long before your highnesses in detritus will be swallowed

The Girl’s Room: Night

In the darkness keys tap quietly as attempts to sleep are made

A four year old who’s feverish ought to slide into slumber and fade

Alas her body is fidgety and a her mother’s patience is lost

The laptop lights the stillness of empty parental threats that cost

The child tosses the bed sheets and asks for milk in a glass

Mother fetches it while silently thinking “what a pain in the ass”

Frustration mounts in wishing that mother could go to bed

Misfortune sits its weighty bottom on her lap instead

I Am Lucky

I leaned over to smell a purple flower this morning and started to cry. The odor that waltzed up my nostrils was sweet, strong and surprising. Wild flowers in my experience, are not usually that fragrant but there was something else bringing up those tears. It was realizing how often I bend to smell a wildflower and am disappointed. I was bracing myself for that familiar disappointment when I was knocked out instead. How often do I brace myself for disappointment unconsciously? Honest answer: A lot.

I was hiking down the hill when this happened. I was hiking down the hill that is at the top of the big street close to our house and which I drive past nearly every week day taking my kids to school. The hill (really it’s part of a mountain but I like calling it a hill) calls me. In the fall I was hiking it several times a week, using it as a training ground for a backpacking trip I took in October. Since then I have kept going up there regularly but when the weather got colder and the days shorter, my routine petered out. Since spring arrived I have wanted to go more than I have made it up. Running and biking have been giving me a better work out.

But I missed my hill, so today I made time for it. As soon as I walked through the gate I was startled by how alive it all was. I was taking big deep breaths, consuming the odors of pine and eucalyptus. The earth was still holding some damp from the rain yesterday and the grass was tall and yellow. The hills stretching up in front of me were greener than I had seen them in a long time. All that rain this winter really paid off.

It was chilly, much to chilly for mid-May but who knows what's normal anymore? I had on a fleece shirt and it was buttoned up. I walked up the steep incline at a brisk pace, my new habit of running giving dividends in spades. I took that hill like I never have before. I was huffing and puffing and feeling fast. A wrentit was singing its long trill. I felt like I was with the family who have known me since before I existed. My earth, mountain, stream, bird and brush family. I was soaking it up and working hard to make it to the halfway point in record time.

I stopped at the electric poles and took off the fleece which was making me sweat. I was panting. The air up there was even colder and felt great in my lungs and on my hot skin. I looked out over the view of Pasadena, Los Angeles and the ocean. A crow was circling overhead. I felt lucky. Lucky to be alive. I felt grateful for the incredible accident that is the earth.

I had taken the girls to JPL on Saturday and we learned all about the solar system which brought me back to the incredible fact that we are spinning through space on this ball that has the perfect balance of water, atmosphere and minerals to sustain an enormous abundance of life. And the fact that we are the perfect distance from the sun to make that all happen. Seeing pictures of the other planets up close made me think it’s pure accident we have all this. Just like the accident that was my own conception in my mother’s womb. An incredible collision. That is how the earth and I were born. Out of a collision that produced the magnificent sun and about eight other planets and countless moons that are either too close or too far from the sun to sustain life as we know it. I was looking at that perfect balance: the mountains, the sky, the sun and the ocean. I am so lucky to be alive right now. So lucky to be here at all.

I started down the hill with a tremendous feeling of gratitude buzzing in my chest. I had only seen one other hiker on my way up. The trail was surprisingly empty for such a gorgeous day. I heard a shuffling on the path ahead that lacked the steady footsteps of a human. When I turned the corner the side of a deer was just a foot in front of me. It was looking up to my right and glancing back at me when I saw there were two more just a few feet above me in the brush overlooking the path. As soon as I looked at them they bounded up the steep slope but I was blocking the other one who wanted to join them. I guess I could have backed up but by then the deer in front of me had bounded up ahead. I watched as it cautiously peaked around the next corner to see if other humans were approaching. They must normally avoid the trail. But maybe they cross it regularly and I just never caught that moment before.

It was exciting to be so close to them. It brought me to the many other close encounters I have had with deer. The one that I always think of first is the time I was at a retreat with David Elliott in 1999. I went into the woods feeling very sorry for myself and frustrated with my problems. I was sick of them and wanted someone else’s. I walked up to a big pine tree. It started to rain. I talked to the tree. I hugged the tree. I told the tree everything. I complained about myself. Then I turned to walk away and there was a deer staring at me. Very close. Very still. I stood still and stared back at her. We just stayed like that, staring at each other with the rain falling on us both and pit patting on the leaves all around us. Then slowly she started to walk away. She was moving so slowly I could see each muscle contracting. I stood still, in awe of her grace and beauty. Her message was clear as a church bell. Be gentle with yourself. You are too hard on yourself.

I thought about how far I have come since that day. I am a healer, a writer, an artist. I was the same person back then, with all the same talents, but just frightened to death of myself. Now I am married to a someone I love to death and together we are raising two hilarious and wonderful children. I think of all those collisions, all the accidents that had to happen at just the right moment to get me here today. I mean really. I am damn lucky.

I was feeling all that when I reached the purple flower and thoughtlessly bent over it ready for nothing to hit my nose. Instead I was rewarded with a beautiful smell. What is the opposite of disappointment? Surprise? Satisfaction? Gratitude? It is all of those and more. Because disappointment is the result of having an unmet expectation. It is something I have to set myself up for. It is something I do. And I can just as easily do gratitude and satisfaction instead. Then the reward is a surprise!

Flight 1080

I could tell from the way she glanced at me and moved her things, that the woman in the window seat had hoped that the row, or at least the seat next to her would remain vacant. Anyone, except those odd people who need company at all times, might. But in her glance and her moving of her things was a reluctance so pregnant and complete that I almost felt sorry for asking. It wasn’t snobbery or selfishness that afflicted her, I decided. It was pain.

We were on our way to a funeral, my husband and I, and in that fact we felt assured in our purpose and the ethics of it that shielded us from any criticism or complaint we might otherwise be susceptible to.

I was careful not to notice her at all after we took up the two seats to her right, partially as a defense for the feeling I could not completely shake, that I had caused her some inconvenience or discomfort. But halfway into the one hour flight, when I put my book down for a moment, I noticed a stillness about her that was unnatural. She was no longer playing on her phone as she had been when I asked if the seats next to her were free. She had kept on tapping after the announcement to turn off all electronic devices long enough that I began to admonish and judge her in my mind as I was busy ignoring her, and reading. She had finally relinquished her iphone, placing it carefully into her small orange purse that was made of leather and gathered along the hasp but modest in size so that sitting open on her lap I could see all that there was inside. The Chanel compact she used to check her hair, the Gucci wallet, a pretty little notebook with a gold pen attached.

When I looked at her again as I paused my reading, she was sitting up straight with her sunglasses on, staring ahead at nothing. They were the kind celebrities hind behind, large and dark with rounded edges and a golden tinge to the frames. She was somewhere in the decade between thirty and forty. Her light hair curled gently around her jaw, fell into resting on her shoulders in attractive layers of wavy curls that were nothing short of perfection. She was wearing brown pants and a soft tan sweater that said she was all business, but had no need for the awkward restriction of a suit. She was poised, stylish and elegant. There wasn’t anything about her that called for improvement.

But it was her stillness that was most striking. Unlike every other passenger, she wasn’t fidgeting or eating or reading or writing. In her stillness there was the invisible movement that was all inside her head. She was thinking so hard she couldn’t do anything else. She was going over and over and over the same scene, replaying it in her head, letting the feelings seep out of her skin. Envy, regret, jealousy. Maybe she was planning her revenge. Or her comeback.

It occurred to me she might be asleep and I tried to steal a glance behind her glasses, after all I was only inches from her face. But it was dark enough in the cabin I couldn’t be sure about her eyes. They may have been closed but she was not asleep. Her body was not that relaxed. She was upright, and pulled together. In her sitting she was as organized as her purse.

At the end of the flight, a familiar sounding conversation started invading my ears from two or three rows behind. We were landing and I was not reading any longer, the turbulence of descent making it too hard to concentrate and keep my eyes on the same line. As I tried relaxing my body the man’s voice caught my attention.

In it I could hear everything there was to know. He was retired. He was lonely. He had no hair but he had once been fairly handsome though not entirely so and not anymore. He was more than friendly and charming, he was lecherous. But he was skilled at the game he was playing with the young woman seated next to him. He was asking her questions and pretending to understand her as a way of seducing conversation out of her. She was pretty, though not incredibly and was eager to make her way in the world, and in her line of business (was it marketing?) she had to be outgoing and charming and was always practicing her skills. She had no idea what he was doing. She saw him as an opportunity. You never know, someone once told her, who you might be sitting next to on a plane. He could be your next boss. She was not trying to impress him as much as she was impressing herself with how easily she answered his questions and how much smarter she sounded than she was used to. This was his gift and she was oblivious to it.

The plane hit the tarmac and I relaxed my outer layers to compensate for the reflexive fear. With my closed eyes I imagined the plane’s outer layers ripping off from the force of the wind as we screamed down the runway. The cabin swayed to the left and right, fishtailing a bit on the wet surface of the earth and then settling into its high speed brake from the flight. For those few moments it felt as if we might explode from the force. As we slowed down and rolled up to the gate at a speed that made me feel sane again, the conversation behind me resumed. He was wrapping it up and still trying to get something. After I took off my seat belt and stood up, I looked back at them. I was right and the contrast between their ages was much more startling in its visual truth. He was even older and she even younger than I thought. When they got up her face was starting to reveal some discomfort. It was in the edges of her smile. A forcing of the muscles. Perhaps she realized her mistake. That he was not just being friendly. He wanted something and had already taken it from her.

Spring Cleaning

I was throwing out a pair of red sandals that I had worn a few times, but which always made me feel a little dowdy. A pair of black flats that I never wore, not even once, followed them into the large garbage bag that the Vietnam Vets will pick up next week. After that came a pair of white sandals that I liked so much I bought two pairs. They were pretty well worn but even those make me feel like someone I am not feeling like anymore. All three pairs have been in my closet for a ridiculous amount of time. I think I had the never-worn black flats three years, the white sandals five years and the red sandals eight years or more.

A lot of things ended up in the bag for the vets that had suffered long neglectful relationships with me, but none longer than a yellow silk scarf that I had only worn a few times.

A French girl named Catherine (pronounced Cat-trine) spent a summer with us as an exchange student when I was eight years old, and we all fell in love with her. She was beautiful and kind. She wore colorful silk scarves on her head. I was a covetous little girl and I coveted those scarves and she promised to send me my own when she got back home. I made her promise again and again, knowing, even at that age, that France is a long way away and that when she got there that she might very well forget her promise to the little American girl she had spent the summer with. Months and months later she might come across something that would remind her of the promise, but by then she would think the little girl had already forgotten and she might let it go, the way any nineteen year old girl lets things go.

But she didn’t and about six weeks after the end of the summer, a flat package arrived in Brooklyn from Catherine. Under the brown paper with my name carefully written out in her swirling French handwriting was a square, flat, thin cardboard envelope with a fancy design on the outside. It was cream colored with a long fine line running diagonally across the front of it, and a single French word in chocolate brown lettering underneath it. That must have been the name of the place where she purchased the scarf. I remember opening it and feeling surprised and disappointed. I was expecting to see a single square scarf just like the ones she wore on her head all the time, tied back around and under her long brown wavy hair that made her look like a milk maid or something. There was a square one that was pink, but it was not the same as the ones she wore. The pattern was much finer, less bold. And then there was another scarf that was not square. It was a long rectangle and it had a sort of artistic, painted, yellow and white design instead of the intricate pattern of small shapes, like the other one. I was intrigued by the yellow one but also disappointed in both because somehow they just weren’t close enough to the ones she wore and I wanted to look just like her. I folded both of the scarves back up and replaced them neatly inside the cardboard envelope and closed it. For a long time I never wore either or them. I didn’t try to be just like Catherine.

That envelope stayed at the bottom of my underwear drawer in Brooklyn, and ten years later when I went to college it came with me. As I packed it, now the age Catherine had been the summer she stayed with us, I still harbored the desire to wear the silk scarves on my head the same way she did. Maybe now I could be like her. But college life never seemed right for the silk scarves and when I moved back to Brooklyn four years later, into a tiny room in a shared apartment on Dean Street, the scarves were still lying quietly at the bottom of my underwear drawer. Sometimes, I would take them out and unfold them and think about how I might wear one of them. I would hold them up and fold them again, admiring their intense colors. Maybe I would even go so far as to try them on in the bathroom, looking at myself in the mirror, folding the square one into a triangle, placing the long edge along the front of my hairline and pulling the two corners down along my face and then underneath my hair and tying them together. I would look at myself, trying to see if I was getting close to looking like Catherine did that summer, and I would pull the scarf down, dissatisfied, again.

I never lost hope for myself in those scarves and I know I tried on the yellow one once in a while too. And I never lost my affection for them either. My initial disappointment upon opening the cardboard package all those years before was long gone and replaced with a feeling that the scarves were totally unique and unattainable. My friends could not go out and buy scarves like these anywhere. They were from France and not just anywhere, they were from the little town where Catherine grew up. She said the town was famous for them. I knew they were special and I kept them folded up in their flat container, carefully hidden in my underwear drawer for many more years.

Today looking once again at the yellow scarf I noticed it was stained. The pink one had gone by the wayside at least a decade or two ago. The cardboard flat envelope I kept them in for so long was also missing. I remember its getting very worn finally, but I think I probably got rid of it and the pink scarf at the same time and kept the yellow one because I thought I might actually wear it. It had grown even more interesting with time.

I did wear it, finally, as a grown woman in her thirties. But not on my head. It was just long enough to tie around my neck and knot in what I felt was a European fashion that gave any outfit quite a lift. It was very bright light yellow, the color of the yolk from a store bought egg. There was white writing on the yellow, that looked like battique, which was unreadable. I wore it from time to time, to work, or to a party. Anytime I wanted to look smart and feel French. I may have worn it three or four times.

Tonight when I pulled it out of a drawer full of silk scarves and large wraps, none of which I ever wear, I dropped it in the pile of clothes for the Vietnam Vets without a lot of thought. I guess that is because I haven’t worn it for ten years and it had a stain on it and because I had long ago lost the desire to be just like Catherine.

Dreaming of the Albatross

Today as I read Dr. Suess' "The Lorax" to Frances, I was reminded suddenly of my dream last night about the albatross. The giant bird flew through an opening of some kind, and when it flapped its enormous wings they became wild and unkempt like Dr. Seuss' birthday bird. In the dream I pointed it out to the girls exclaiming, "Look! An albatross!" knowing I was right without having seen one before. Then another one flew through the same opening, with a younger and smaller bird riding on its back.

I retold the dream to the girls and forgot about it until later, when I was working on my new book and suddenly thought of the metaphoric albatross. The one that hangs around necks. I had been writing about myself as a teenager, precisely the moment when I felt completely misunderstood by my father and step-mother. The albatross had me thinking how traces of that same feeling had traveled with me all these years and was still cropping up, unexpectedly. Specifically around the book I just published and am starting to promote. The one about grief. Maybe not coincidentally, it was my grief that felt unsupported all those years ago. It was the grief that I was taught (in silence) to ignore. And here I am, count them, 3o years later still in the business of acknowledging my own adolescent grief. It is amazing when I think about it, how resilient and tenacious the human emotional cycle can be.

When I was a little older, in my twenties, my step-mother told me the story of the albatross. How they mate for life. How they circumnavigate the globe in a year, landing back at the same nesting site annually. How they can fly a thousand miles in a day, searching the open sea for food. How they can live 50 -70 years. How they only lay one egg, both parents raise it together, and it takes a full year until that fledgling is able to fly and find its own food. I remember, as she told me the story, realizing how interested I was in story-telling, specifically in the the sounds and the rhythm of the words.

Today I looked up the origin of the metaphor, never having known it before, and the poem, The Rime of the Ancient Mariner, written in 1797 by English poet, Samuel Taylor Coleridge (all this from Wikipedia). It's a long tale about a seaman who kills an albatross, thought to be good luck, thus subjecting the ship to a curse. The crew make him wear the albatross around his neck as penance, but his real punishment is to wander the land retelling the story, of how all except he were lost at sea because of his thoughtless act. I like Wikipedia's definition of albatross metaphorically as "a psychological burden that feels like a curse."

That albatross of mine, the thirty year burden (that sometimes feels like a curse) that I have carried in various forms and which has plagued me in different ways until now, was flying in my dreams last night. Newly free from the old story, from passing it on to my young, and searching for someplace to land.

There is

nothing more sublime than this old photo of Frances asleep

Three Days of Grief

This week I did a lot of pretty interesting stuff. I took a three-full-day course on my favorite subject, which is grief. I also had an astrology reading and danced with a large snake. Really. I did all that in five days. But the grief training was the most exhilarating and life affirming of the three. Which is saying a lot, because it was a perfectly profound reading and I don't think there is anything quite like dancing with a snake.

During the grief training I kept wondering, what is it about grief that I find so fascinating? Why does it feel so good to talk about pain? I decided the answer was that everyone there was someone who knew a lot about the subject already. So there was a lot to learn from each other. And a lot to teach too. I was the only non-therapist or caregiver in the group. I was the only artist, so I got to talk a lot about my experience of making art and how grief informs my work and how my work expands those feelings of sadness or longing into something bigger than me. Something tangible that I can show or read or give to someone else to be experienced in an entirely new context that has nothing to do with me. And that in that process, the feelings, my feelings, are also freed.

But the main thing I came away with from listening and talking about grief is that the best medicine for grief is retelling the story of the loss. Who they were. How they died. What happened. The whole story.

I listened to the tantric dance teacher talk about snakes for a long time today. When she talked about their shedding I thought, grief can be a lot like shedding, after a while. For some, it may seem to disappear completely after a long time. But for most of us, grief is something that comes up, over and over again. It revisits periodically and when it does, it's an opportunity for shedding some of the feelings, again.

old shoes

These shoes were purchased at Target and worn by both my daughters to this beautiful state of shabbiness. You could say they were loved to death. I don't think either girl thought they were any less beautiful when they grew out of them than the day they were purchased. They are pink with sparkles, and that made them both very happy.

Disney Day

Sometimes Disneyland really is the most magical place on earth, and I don't say that ironically. I knew we were going to have fun. I was with my kids and my 21 year old niece Robin, who is visiting from New Zealand and who we haven't seen for 5 years. I don't know if it was the perfect weather or my niece, but I wasn't expecting such a fantastic day.

Disneyland used to bum me out. I would get caught up in all the waste, the commercialism, the obesity, etc. and just find the whole thing ugly and distasteful and corny. Of course I had to pretend to have fun, which only made it worse.

But in the last couple of years, I have gotten into the spirit of being there, mainly brought on by watching my daughter light up when she saw a princess or devoured a wad of cotton candy. And today I found myself able to just be there, to be carried by the girls excitement and to feed off the joy that almost every child I saw was showing on their fat little faces. Kids love Disneyland! They don't mind the racks of junky stuff that is being pushed on them, or the fatty food, or the sugary treats. They are fine with long lines and long walks from place to place. They know they are going to get on some thrilling rides, eat some delicious food and easily talk their parents into three souvenirs. They are set. And if they see some characters along the way, all the better. The whole day is about them having fun, and they know it. If I let myself be a care-free kid again, it's easy to have as much fun as they do.

What I realize after a few years of carting kids to places designed with them in mind like the zoo, the over-designed kid's "museum", the aquarium, and other theme parks, is that Disney has a way of making sure everyone is taken care of. The place is clean, well organized and designed, and the staff are not allowed to be rude or pushy. Even on a day like today, when it was absolutely jam packed with people, everything flowed pretty well. We never waited that long for a ride and we got on everything we wanted to. We found the good food (which exists if you know where to go) and managed to avoid over eating. Amazing!

I also had a great time taking pictures. I saw things I'd never noticed before. The way the pink and blue sky at sunset matched the castle. How many birds there were. How great the fake trees look next to the real ones. How photogenic Tarzan's tree house is. And all day, the winter sun made everything sparkle.

Finger in the Blender

A finger, an absent mind, and a long history met on the sharp blade of a blender. If you know what an immersion blender is you might think me a little less stupid. And, as I said, I can’t blame my mind as it wasn’t involved in the incident. It was the pure non-thinking mind, the kind I try to reach in meditation, that managed to take over in what seemed at the time to be a very inopportune moment. It was a mind devoid of thought that had me stick my finger in to the small area around the blade to push out the black beans that had gathered there, just having finished pureeing a huge pot of soup. Blood was gushing from my finger as I dropped the blender having pressed the on button inadvertently while my digit was still cleaning out the beans. I could see the nail was sliced in half and there was a gash below the edge of the cuticle, but with all the blood I couldn’t tell if my finger was still intact.

It’s funny what happens in my brain when my body is in trouble. I appeared calm on the outside. Beyond a spastic yelp when it first happened, I was silent as I made my way to the sink, turned it on and ran water over my torn up fingertip. Wild thoughts were running fast through my mind: “Oh God, I have chopped off the end of my finger! I’m going to have emergency surgery!” But as I stared at the mass of bleeding flesh under the faucet, I realized it was just a deep cut. The question of whether it would warrant stitches remained, but that determination could wait. I was leaning on the edge of the sink with all my weight on my forearms, which felt like they were glued to the sleek black countertop. I wasn’t sure what to do, but I eventually stopped rinsing and pinched my finger back together with the thumb and forefinger of the other hand. I held it hard to stop the bleeding. Good thinking.

“Does it hurt?” Grace wanted to know. She was standing beside me having witnessed the event, and her question brought my focus to her and my nerve endings, both for the first time. The shock was making my brain operate like an internet connection that is weak and slow. My awareness finally landed on the fact that she was frightened. Her eyes were full of tears and she was gripping my other arm hard with both hands. I was barely keeping it together so I had no resources to calm her down, other than staying so myself. The cogs turned back to the tip of my left index finger. Quickly and evenly as an ocean wave, the pain rolled in. I realized yes, it was hurting more every second. “No it doesn’t really hurt,” came out in response.

It’s completely automatic for mothers to lie in order to reassure a child and it made perfect sense to me, in that moment, to do so. I added calmly, slowly, “Grace, can you please get Yoly?” She ran at lightening speed to the next room where Yoly, our babysitter, was reading to Frances, yelling: “Mom cut herself and it’s bleeding really bad! Come quick!” Yoly appeared at my side with her composure in tact and I asked her to get me some gauze to wrap around the cut. While I waited I started to feel dizzy. I realized my legs were getting too weak to support the rest of me and I started for the couch, unsure if I would reach it before collapsing.

By the time I got to it, I felt a thick fuzz coming over my whole sensory system. The room was closing in, I heard only the sound of my heart, I felt nausea and tingling and a wave of heat that made my hair wet around the edge of my scalp. I closed my eyes to relieve the dizziness and with hindsight I know I felt the way one feels just before a faint, but in that moment all I felt was sheer panic: “I am not going to make it! This is really, really bad! How could this happen?” Yet hovering above and overriding the chaotic thoughts was a sense of deep peace. It was a wordless feeling of serenity that had me sit there, still and with eyes closed, knowing I would be all right. That there was nothing to do but wait.

It was beginning to dawn on me that I had been here before. About fifteen years ago while watching a particularly gruesome scene in an episode of X-Files where evil aliens were cutting in to someone’s body to harvest organs, I started feeling the same waves of dizziness and black out. I had rushed out of my house and into the backyard to get fresh air. It took about thirty minutes before I felt normal again.

That was my first and worst panic attack, but it was not the last. For about a year I had them, all brought on by images of skin opening up. It didn’t have to be mine, it could be any picture of a cut. Eventually, and with a little help from a therapist, I worked it back to an incident when I was ten. My mother had just been diagnosed with breast cancer and I watched her get upset when her incision opened up a week after her mastectomy. I have recently been writing about this event and not ten minutes before cutting my finger, I was reading my mother’s own account of the very same incident, which did not include my memory of watching her. In her version, I wasn’t there.

Back on the couch, I am beginning to recover and Grace is sitting next to me getting hysterical. Since the moment I dropped the blender, she has been expressing my panic perfectly so that I don’t have to. Frances is there too but she has taken on the role of nursemaid. She is holding out a Band-aid. She has taken off the wrapping and the little white tabs and is ready to put it on the finger which I have still not looked at since the bleeding stopped. I am starting to feel better. The layers are gluing back together. But I don’t want to take any chances looking at it, so I ask Yoly to examine it. My nail had apparently protected my flesh from being cut at the top part of the finger and then the blade had come around again making only a single gash which was pretty deep but short in length. No stitches, we decided. I was lucky.

It was a perfect little storm of emotional and physical pain, designed to pull me forward, or back, or both. The way everything lined up to remind me that that moment when I was ten years old is still with me. Some pretty strong strings are still tied back to that scene. My mother sitting on the edge of her bed looking at her wound, the stitches recently removed and now opening up. Her fear. Her panic. I felt them, but I absorbed the feelings as hers, not mine. Just like Grace expressed the panic I was working hard to contain. I wonder what Grace will remember. I only remember feeling numb.

When I was thirty five, I had a lump removed from my left breast, the same side my mother's breast was removed from. Immediately after my minor surgery, I collapsed outside the OR, suddenly feeling the enormous toll of watching her sit there, terrified of what was happening. In a hospital waiting room in Westwood California, twenty five years later, I finally felt it.

Now here, with a band-aid (thank you Frances) on my finger and the recognition that this was no “accident”, I will paraphrase something I recently heard Patti Smith say in a radio interview: That time does not heal all wounds. You just get to know them better. And eventually, they become your friends.

How to Build a Fire

I know how to build a fire
First you gather your wood
You need logs that are split and dried
And you need kindling
And some balled up newspaper or leaves

Kindling is small pieces of fuel that burn easily
It can be small sticks and twigs
Broken up pieces of lumber
Pine cones or bark
Even cardboard or cloth if you’re desperate

Then you make a structure
A teepee is nice
But depending on what you’ve got
You might make a lean-to
Or even a log cabin

You go from small to big
Putting paper or leaves at the center
Adding the smallest pieces on top of that
Ending with the larger pieces
Making sure there is plenty of space for air

I hold off
From adding a log
Until I get a good little fire going
And start to see some embers that will last
Otherwise the log might put it out

You need plenty of matches
And when you start to light it
Catch the paper at the center on fire
Use your lungs to blow the flames
And keep lighting, if it dies down

You need patience
You keep blowing
You take care of it the way you would a tiny green sprout
Watching the embers
Blowing them into flames

Once you’ve got flames
(That are not just burning paper)
It is time to add a log
Start small and make sure
Not to smother the fire

You always lean your logs
So they are somewhat vertical
So the air can move underneath
Flames rise up
So you put the fuel on top

Then you sit back and watch
Making sure the flames don’t die
And when they do go down some
(This is my favorite part)
You poke the coals or move the logs or add more fuel

The flames will start back up
Building a fire is like a lot of things
It requires attention
A lot of love
And a little patience

Tarantula Speed

Two days ago, as the sun was edging toward the horizon and I was hiking along a beautiful trail in Joshua Tree National Monument, I met a tarantula on the path. Like a good hiker, I pretty much always keep my eyes on the ground ahead of me so I saw this wild creature well before coming too close. He/she was black, hairy of course, and about seven inches in length. I have never seen one out and about before, just in the glass cases at the zoo or the nature center in Eaton Canyon near our house. In captivity they sit pretty still, looking depressed. This one was walking down the path just the same as me, except a lot slower. I never knew tarantulas moved so slowly. His/her movement was constant, deliberate and sloth-like. Watching him was a little like waiting for honey to drop out of a squeeze bottle. Some part of me wanted it to go faster.

My tendency, or habit I guess, is to rush along. And that's what I was doing when I saw him. I was hustling to get back to the car before dark, even though I had plenty of time. It seems like I am always hustling to get to the the next thing or place, when I don't really need to. I used to always be late, so that made me rush, but now that I am usually on time, I still rush to make sure I am there on time. Pretty ridiculous, I know. My daughter Grace gets mad at me when I rush her out the door saying, "we'll be late!" and then we get there ten minutes early.

This afternoon I was rushing through my bedroom with several items in my hands, the way I often do, in a mode of "doing" and "picking up." Frances was in there playing with the cat and she started heading towards me. I was moving so fast (for no reason at all mind you) that I tripped on the edge of the rug and fell, taking Frances down with me. It was such a surprise to lose my balance and fall, not just to my knees, but all the way down, that I let out a strange sort of half yell/scream. Frances was just as surprised as I was and we just sat there stunned for a moment. Luckily we were both okay and thought it was funny. I had twisted my ankle a little and Frances had banged her knee so we just sat on the floor, not moving at all. I thought of the tarantula, and that nice, slow, sure-footed pace. What a good teacher for me.

Rawnt

On the way to go out to dinner Frances, from the backseat asks, “Mommie? What’s a rawnt?”
“Rawnt?”
“Yeah. Rawnt”
"Do you mean 'Rant?'"
"No. Rawnt."
“I don’t know sweetie. What IS a rawnt?”
“I don’t know” she says quietly.

“Well where did you hear it? Did someone say it to you today?”
Silence. Grace tries to help. “Do you mean ‘want’ Frances?” she asks.
“No,” Frances laughs.
It starts to get silly. I ask, “Is it like, ‘Mom, I really rawnt to go to California Pizza Kitchen?’”
“Nooooo!” she says giggling. Grace is laughing too. “Frances: Is it like , “I really rawnt a lollipop?”
“Nooo!!!” Frances says laughing harder. We are all laughing and making more rawnt jokes until we run out of steam and the car is quiet again.

“Mama?”
“Yes”
“What do we do at a restaurant?”
“We eat and relax and talk.”
“Do we rest?”
“Yes...”
“So when do we rawnt?”

Crazy Cloud

As I drove east across Pasadena yesterday morning, having dropped my daughter Grace at school, I noticed this strange cloud. The sky was an intense blue with a lot of bright white cirrus clouds stretched across it. But ahead of me was this dark cloud, low near the horizon, that looked like someone had taken a handful of gray charcoal and smudged it, diagonally across the low sky. I kept looking at it, as I drove, wondering if everyone around me was noticing it too.

An hour later I was hiking up my usual path and the same cloud was still sitting in the east, but now it was dumping rain. There was no sign of rain anywhere else in the sky, but this funny cloud was definitely letting loose. The light all around was that almost eerie golden light that can happen before a storm and there were deep rumblings in the distance. Smog was making a rainbow along the skyline. I stopped a pair of women on the path just to say, "Isn't this amazing? I've never seen anything like this before in LA!" (They agreed and kept walking.) It is so unusual to see a maverick cloud like that, especially in SoCal, especially this time of year. I continued up the hill.

When I reached the top an hour later, the cloud seemed much closer, the light was still incredible and the rumblings were louder. Didn't think much of it. I thought I might feel a few drops of rain but the rain didn't seem to be heading my way. A bit later as I headed back down the trail I felt a few drops and thought, with an already disappointed feeling, "Oh well, it will probably not amount to more than this light rain."

Well, as if to prove me wrong, that crazy cloud started dumping big drops on my head and just as I was about halfway down, it said Hello! I was approaching these three mega electric tower things and as I was about a hundred yards away, lightening struck the wires between them with a crack of thunder so loud it sent my body up into the air a few inches. I started laughing at my jumping bean self and let the air under my feet propel me into a sprint. I didn't want to be under those towers if it struck again. (I know, I know, lightning doesn't strike twice...)

I kept up the pace for the rest of the way down, the big drops drenching me to the skin, listening to the thunder travel farther away fast, laughing out loud as I enjoyed the rare and exquisite sensation of running in a real downpour.

Birthday Wishes

Tomorrow is the last day that Frances will be three. We had a small celebration yesterday with friends and will do something on her actual birthday, the day after tomorrow. I have always celebrated my kid's birthdays as milestones for them and of course for me as well. But this one is hitting me sideways and I am feeling a touch of sadness as I watch my little baby turn into a decidedly big girl.

It all happened so gradually. Just the way the crease in her thigh slowly disappeared, like a swell on the ocean, fading to nothing until all signs of it are lost. I can still see the spot where her fleshy leg dents in ever so slightly, but maybe even that is just my imagination at this point. (No one else can see it when I point it out.) I find myself relishing the way she says certain words the wrong way like breftik for breakfast and intreding for interesting. Any day now those will disappear as well.

So as I continue this week of celebrating her birth and the fact that she will be turning a big four years old, and as I am filled with satisfaction with the job she is doing of teaching us how to raise her, I am also allowing a little grief, a little sadness to be present as well. It is necessary to let go of all the sweetness that they outgrow and welcome the new sweetness that they grow into. I have so much to look forward to, which I know from engaging with her older sister on new levels all the time. But, there is a but...and part of it is just the baby fat that I will miss. Part of it is the funny words. Part of it is the incomprehensible but stunning writing that she does. And part of it is just childhood itself. A passage that has a beginning, a middle and an end.

Reentry

I am lying in the bathtub, soaking my muscles in hot, salty water, knowing something has changed but unable to say exactly what. What happens when I spend three days in the forest, precisely? What was happening when I laid in a field thirty years ago, staring at my feet? Even at sixteen, I knew in that moment that I was changing and I took a picture of my feet to mark the place in time when I recognized it. I still remember it when I look at that snapshot, now a middle aged woman. I still see in that color photograph that there was a part of me that wanted to be recognized, wanted to be acknowledged, wanted to be seen and heard and felt. It was the part of me that was completely and utterly happy to be lying in a field under a perfect blue sky. The part of me that wished I could stay there all day and night instead of having to be back at the barn to do chores in time to get cleaned up for a big dinner. I wanted to stay in my horse-smelling jeans and cowboy boots forever. I wanted to sleep in them, outside, in the grass, with the horses who were grazing next to me.

Instead I am part of the civilized world. Born and raised in the city, I still call myself a city-girl and though I have always fantasized about escaping it, I also wonder how I would fare. I lie in a bathtub after an arduous hike up a steep hill, relaxing tired muscles in a large white bathtub, in a big house. Tonight I will sleep in my comfortable king size bed with my husband. We will remark about how nice it is to be home and joke about cutting a hole in the ceiling so we can see the stars like we did last night and the night before.

I left some part of me back there in that magnificent landscape. The one we took in with big gulps of breath as we hiked down a switchback trail that hugged the face of a mountain, descending a thousand feet in a mile stretch. Pristine wilderness, mountains covered by trees and divided by a river stretching out for days. The kind of wilderness you have to drive a long way down a desolate road to get to the edge of. And then hike in for many miles down steep trails and across rivers and open meadows and through burned out woods to get to the camp. The kind you fall in love with every step of the way because it is so damn beautiful, so clean, so magnificent in it’s untouchedness.

But what happened there? Did I bring some of it back with me? Of course I did. I have the feathers that were presented in a great pile for me to pick a few from. I have the square shaped piece of granite. I have the small chunk of wood that termites carved their tiny hieroglyphs into. I have the images, carefully recorded on data machines and in paper notebooks, of the snake in the river, the black dragonfly being eaten by the yellow spider, the coyote that crossed our path, the bear that huffed behind a bush, the trees turned to charcoal by forest fire, the hawk and the eagle, the butterflies and the birds. I brought all of that out with me, carried like the garbage we made and picked up on the trail, packed it out like a good hiker. But there is something, still, that I don’t quite get my hands around. If the wilderness is where I find myself again, why does it feel like I left something of me behind?

Me + Owl = Truth

An owl was hooting in the distance when I started out on my hike this morning. The owl carried me up the hill, my body weighed down with thirty extra pounds, the hoots lifting my spirit up the path. Owl = Mother and I have been thinking a lot about her the past day or two. She is pushing through all the distractions, all the projects and telling me, it is time to write this story. Just an hour a day is all I need and it will be written. Get out of the way now, it’s time. And the owl kept calling me up that hill, each step a proclamation of my physical strength, my determination, my discipline. All expressions of my love for myself and all that I am connected to, but it starts with me in my center, my heart, my core. Love.

In Training

I have never trained for anything in my life. I mean, physically trained. But for the past week and for five more days I am considering myself in 'training' for a big hike into the wilderness. In five days I will be carrying thirty pounds on my back for twelve miles through rough terrain. Rough by my city-girl standards anyway. A lot of the trail is steep and when it's flat it's on soft sandy ground, which is even harder. Or at least that's what it was like when I did this same hike nine years ago. It's surprising how well I remember it but it left a deep impression because it was one of the hardest things I've ever done. I had to stop about every half mile or so (okay maybe more!) and rest which drove my partner (then a new boyfriend, now my husband of eight years)a little crazy. He has done this hike many times in his life and he can do it in about half the time it took us, but he was patient and sweet last time. We'll see how he handles my slowness now that he knows me better. I remember singing a lot to keep from freaking out about how much pain I was in. Everything ached and I struggled to keep my mind off it. Maybe now that I meditate daily, I will have an easier time with that. I will let you know.

Nine years ago, even though it was super hard, it was also one of the best things I have ever done. We didn't see a soul for the entire four days. We were out there all by ourselves and we had some amazing experiences. But I told myself, next time I have to prepare myself. I have to train. So that's what I'm doing, hiking at dawn most days, two or four miles up a steep trail near my house. I have new hiking boots and I can't wait to do it again.