Enchanted Blueberry Forests

Last week my sister Anna sent a text asking what I was doing early Friday Morning.  I like to help/hang/laugh with her on her many merchandising adventures, so I responded "Working with you?".  She mentioned we'd have to get out the door by 6am - and did it up right - made to die for crab cakes for dinner to thank me in advance, promised to wake me with coffee; all that awesome stuff that sisters do when they are helping each other out. 

Here is what I know - if I'm going to spend time with Anna, it's going to be fun, no matter what we are up to (well, funerals not so much, but we are working on some rituals to help with that too - stay tuned) so I was in.  I am a pretty flexible girl and knew that if I was able to be back to put in a few hours of accounting, it would be worth the time - that's just how we roll.

She even filled my girnourmous water jug for me - thought hmmmm - wonder what I've gotten myself into for a fleeting second, but then just enjoyed the journey.  We neared a clinic that while we sat at the stop light advertised every single kind of therapy known to mankind - and a few additional for martians too, I think. We joked about stopping on the way home and see what kind of a family discount program they offered.  I asked if this was finally the part where she took me out to the  middle of the woods and well, you know....because we were going further and further out of town where only cows, a few farmers and some pine trees live. I was getting curiouser and curiouser....when we turned onto this gorgeous twisty turny, curvy road and pulled into what looked like a bit of a starter camp for some sort of gorgeous bush/tree with these pink, purple and blue berries just dripping off the branches.

I had been SUPER DUPED..  I had been kidnapped and taken to the Enchanted Blueberry Forest - a place that up until that moment had been a legend.  Can you say charmed life anyone?  THIS is where I get kidnapped to?  Wow. I will admit to you, gentle reader, I teared up as I got out of the car and leaped into the field of this magical trees bearing such beautiful fruits I fully expected tinkerbell to jump out and surprise me any second by sprinkling me with pixie dust so I could float and pick berries.  I also must admit I thought about dancing down the aisles, but I digress.

Next thing I know, I'm handed these fabulous buckets in beautiful, bright, happy colors and sent forth.  I'm giggling a lot like a 4 year old in a candy store at this point as floods of memories come rushing over me of time spent hiking to, picking, and consuming berries in my glorious childhood with my sister Kate and my pal Bill Richards - I swear I can hear them giggling with me with the pure delight that comes with happening upon something so amazingly delicious and such proof of how much the Divine loves us.  I'm grinning my way down rows, cutting over to others tasting, just tasting the pancakes of breakfasts past both filled with the fruits of our adventures, but smothered in their syrup.....

There is more to the story, like the not so scary at all guard cat that decided we were allowed to remain on her land, and the adventures at a neighboring farm, but I love to just revisit the joy this morning gave me.  How sisters just know what feels so great after a few weeks of really hard work - just how to celebrate life at 6 in the morning.  

Thank you, Anna Banana for the magical adventure..... it was delightfully perfect. 

   

Have you heard?

We have officially launched our Facebook page!  

 Our mission is to inspire creativity in various magical ways.

Won't you join us?  The water is simply Divine.....

https://www.facebook.com/TheSplashOfAMermaid

Epic, sweeping, love story spanning continents.....

Often it feels to me as though the best way to thank people in my universe is to show by example some of the magical things I have learned. This is for my mom, Mary Lee and my sister, Kate - both extraordinary examples of motherhood. I sit in gratitude that somehow I ended up related to these two incredible women - I will choose them over and over again in all of my next lives....

This is an email exchange between Kate and I from many moons ago that I treasure endlessly.

From Kate:

Ok--so it's 2am.  I found out yesterday that I have 2 stay at the Hong Kong Hospital tonight for surgury on my other (right) hand Thursday a.m.  My son is laying wrapped in blankets on the corner of my bed (naked, i find after rousing him to return to bed--)  The cat is sprawled on her back in a crevice between the kid and i--stretched to maximum cat length.  I, myself, am laying with twisted legs to avoid squashing kid/cat, and twisted arms among the half a dozen "prop pillows" to keep the casts from scarring my forhead like the night before.(Did you know if you rub a plaster cast on your forhead all night it leaves a rather large strawberry resembling rug burn?)  My husband, who has the nack of sleeping through hurricanes--is enjoying the honeymoon bed to my left, just East of chaos, and snooring readily.

I wake up cold and hurting and not really wanting to attempt the aerobic yoga it will require to reach medicine for comfort...or to pull up the blankets for that matter (with my teeth).  I wait it out as long as i can.  I finally, thinking it MUST be morning, make my move.  Now, keep in mind, it is Never this cold in the tropics but the current temp is 40--COLD for here--and I do not have ANY shirts that fit over casts (and are warm).  Nor do I have any warm pants I can pull up and down on my own.  BUT, Afin, my saintly house helper, is finally starting to catch up (poor woman) on vacation laundry. When I approach the closet the first thing I see is this GREAT fleecy robe that my sister so generously donated to me at my wedding--(after much wanton gazing from afar on my part).  You see, I've long been seeking out the perfect robe.  My friend Sheryl makes them, but I have yet to commission one and when I laid eyes on jenn's--it was the closest I've seen thus far in my seeking.

So i quickly go through the possibility that the robe may fit over my arms and that maybe I can even get it on by myself--without  waking the husband from his snooring nocturnal bliss.

And low...

it does work.  And it is warm.  And comfy.  And I can even tie it by myself (which is more than i can say for my coat around my waist--ask the vulnerable woman at the bookstore in Hong Kong,"Could u do me a favor...?" I said.). 

So, keep in mind during all of this--I hadn't had a chance to sit quietly fireside in my lovely ski condo in my newly acquired robe on my honeymoon--due to the unfortunate snowboarding incident.  This, was my first magical experience with the robe--and i discover it even has pockets.  Rather Bulky pockets I am thinking---but it was just washed so they must be inside out--so im trying to adjust--with my cold, hurting, broken arms flailing. Oh.  It's a newly dried/washed piece of paper.  Probably a receipt--NO?  Maybe, just maybe, a love note from my sister!  We do that sort of thing, our mom taught us how good it feels.  When Michael moved to China the year before I did--I put notes everywhere--some of which he was still finding after I moved in...  BUT you never want to get too excited expecting a love note and it turns out to be a grocery list. 

But low,

it was a love note.  But, not ONLY from my "real" sister--also from my "sistas", the Goodlife Inn Keepers.  And--I sit--in the bathroom of my home in China and think of all the women in history who experienced going off on their honeymoon, scared and nervous and a bit issolated--without so much as a love note from mom.  But here I am, pre-SECOND-surgury, a little scared and nervous and a bit issolated, and I am reminded from the warmth of my robe of how beautiful my life is and how fortunate I am to know my friends and how great mt family is... And how perfect it is that I found the note now, in a moment of literal cold darkness--and even after chinese water torture via washing machine..

Perfectly in tact--

without so much as a smudge--

a love note to me and my new family.

You might drop a random love note somewhere today--in hopes it makes your loved one feel as special and warm as my robe.

love u,

k

From THE ROBE & me: 

Dear Kate:

As THE ROBE, I wish to congratulate you upon your recent discovery of the comfort and utility I am to provide you.  Even though I exist merely as a rather suitcase size of fleece imprinted with suns, moons and stars I must admit that (apologies for egotism) I knew I was made for you. I was quite apprehensive to come out of the suitcase my first evening at the GOODLIFE INN.  I had overheard the crowd and realized that I would be in great demand even as your sister flaunted me through the great room and flopped down in front of the fire place.  (I'm FLEECE for the love of God and all that is flammable!)

It was then that I lengthened my pockets so that you would receive love notes.  I widened my sash so that you could tie and untie me as needed.  I knew that I would comfort you like no other.

Do I miss your sisters slovenly ways?  NO!  I dare to shout that the last foster puppy she brought in to the house narrowly missed me during yet another annoying attempt at disproving any and all theories of house breaking.  Often I would lie discarded on the bedroom floor as a mere bed for Mama Zen, the ungrateful shedding beast of a cat.  

Now, I am a robe with meaning and purpose.  A ROBE with a mission to keep you, my mistress, in comfort, warmth and poetry filled pockets.

Coveringly yours -

ROBE

Reader:  Though my previous wearer did not truly abuse me, I always wondered if she truly needed me; especially as she resides in the TROPICAL CLIMATE of Florida.  It is not my intent to slander her by any means.  

___________________________________________________________________________________

Never underestimate the power of a love note, especially written in permanent ink. 

Rebel with a Cause

A few months back I attempted to read THE BOOK that a gazillion people recommended, and that kept popping up every time I turned around,  even going so far as to one day fall from a high shelf and hit me on the head.

Being the bright girl that I am, I thought perhaps it might be time to actually read THE BOOK.  I opened it up late one night before bed, and was able to fall asleep more quickly than ever before in my entire life.  I tried again and again - even during hours I should not be sleepy. This author's written voice simply did not speak to me yet, I felt it was an important topic and I wanted in on what others had learned.

I struggled through the preface, the intro (never have understood why anyone would need both) and about half of chapter one, feeling as though I'd be dead before I ever finished it, when all the sudden one day, it dawned on me that I didn't have to read it.  I'm 43 years old and quite capable of making what may appear to be rational decisions most of the time.  The book had not been assigned reading for me over Christmas Holiday and there would be no 10 page summaries due either - ever, in fact, unless 10 page self help book summaries are the kind of thing I decided I might like to take up as a hobby.

The next morning, I sat at my desk (because I had tried everything could think of including reading it during work time to see if the naughtiness that comes with reading during work hours may just make it feel more illicit and thus more tempting) when I took one last look at THE BOOK, and put it back on the bookshelf in complete and utter surrender, while saying "Hey, I can't get into THE BOOK even though 5.32 million other people could, but as a gift to myself, I'm just not gonna read the damn thing".

There was a certain thrill in stating "I'm not going to read the damn thing".  I felt like a rebel with a cause.  The cause:  to keep extreme boredom from my very own life.

I talked about it publicly too, I told my pals that I loved them, but that if they ever recommended a dry book like that again, we would find ourselves at the beginning of some trust issues.

I even considered that just as we translate Great American Novels to German and say, Swahili, perhaps we needed to take dry books like the aforementioned and translate them into the non-foreign language of humor.

It was wonderful learning enough to A) recognize I have a choice B) realize I was actually respecting my own time and C) know I'd better be damn certain that anything I ever wrote would be accused of being dull or boring. 

It did cross my mind that I was saying it was boring so that I didn't have to learn yet another 6.73 million daunting lessons.  Sure, that was possible, but by not reading this book last August, didn't mean I'd never read THE BOOK ever......

One thing was for sure - it was not time to read it then, and I am resting easy in that knowledge still.

Happy New YEARS!

 

Happy Solstice to you, your Spirit and your loved ones. May blessings of love, light and deep joy be yours and may wondrous and magical adventures await you in each new doorway. 

Radical Kindness, Now Please

For years, Thanksgiving was  my favorite holiday.  I love the fullness of energy with many of us sitting in gratitude at the same time.  I practice gratitude so often it's save my life, so I've a certain obvious reverence for it.  Gratitude is a requirement in my daily intake - like air and water.  

I realized a few days ago I love the Christmas/holiday season for the same energetic based reasons - lots o' people practicing love with a little more intention and focus. As I looked at this, I thought again, this is how I try to live my life every single day. 
 
This year, I made a deal to not put pressure on myself during the Holiday season as part of my trek towards being kinder to myself at all times.  Many amazing reasons exist - like I moved recently; I'm learning more balance in general, including finding a productive writing/creating structure, financial, emotional and otherwise; the bulk of my peeps do not live in even the same state as I, and so on.

Yet, while sipping my coffee this morning, I looked around the room at all the things I felt would be good to get done/mailed/finished/made/created/wrapped/blessed/baked/etc.  before Christmas and I found myself wanting a nap at 7:38 AM.

So, here is what I've decided:

While I shall absolutely enjoy the warm, love-filled feeling of all Christmas Holiday type activities/etc., to the fullest extent, I am declaring it Christmas-giving all year long.  I forgive myself in advance and totally allow myself to go with with feels right and wonderful whenever that might be.

I'm not insinuating my alter ego Elf Rowan needs to die, or that I am refusing to celebrate this beautiful season at all, or that some surprises aren't under the tree or in stockings already.  I love the scents, the foods, the sights - the glow - the ritual of it all.   

What I am suggesting, insisting even, is that I love and cherish my family, my friends,myself and Spirit every day, period.

Instead of rushing about trying to cram all that love into a few dinners where people aren't present with their ever monstrous running to do list in their minds - or trying to snap together some serious "quality time" to share holiday cheer - nope.  No more.  I'm going to stretch the warmth of the season out to the entire year. 

I'm going to go stark raving mad and send more real mail - a note here, a crochet trinket there, those kinds of, sweet, silly surprises.

When I think of someone - I'm going to get radical and stop for just a second and use Facebook or email to the power of good and send a note, or a quote or a silly picture, and I'm going to tell them I'm thinking of them and that I love them. 

I'm ever grateful for the grace-filled gift of kindness and I'm excited about my new Christmas-giving everyday plan.  

Blessings, love and light to you and yours.

Ode to Sit/Stay

I try, at least once a week to have an entire day that is only about me - anything goes. In fact, the only rules are whatever it is, I must gain pleasure and that I must not catch a glimpse of guilt.  
 
One of my angel sisters taught me that downtime (AKA sit/stay for all you dog training speak people out there) is a vital way of keeping balance in my world, and that rest is likely one of the most healing zones in the universe for the core spirit.  It is self care - not selfISH. This has been one of the most lovely and productive lessons of my entire life.  Feel free to insert ironic giggle here - downtime equals productivity?  YES. 

Sometimes  I eat soup (and yes, crackers) in bed watching movies for the entire day in my PJ's.  Other times it's crocheting my heart out - or writing - or cooking - or reading - or doing 12 crossword puzzles - or going for a hike - or learning something about a topic that has been burning me with curiosity - or I build a mental a fort of blankets to block the energy of others.  For quite a while, it meant two, that's right gentle reader, TWO naps in one day. I proudly call that my sloth period.  I went wild one Sunday and took three baths.  I may stay away from all communication technology - or not. My choice.

One of the magical parts of this concept, is that often, I will do one of the things on my to-do list that has been giving me pressure.  Or (as my friend M calls it) J(z)enn day - pressure suddenly turns into pleasure. 

This morning when I woke, I realized I needed to have a day to myself,  STAT.  It's not holiday stress - that's not my style, as I dearly love this season that is all about love - it feels as though everyone has joined me on my daily take on life. 

So, what's up, Jenn? - that's what I had to ask myself.  (It's always a good idea to actually get in touch with yourself, I've noticed here lately)

What I realized is that during this transition time from my recent move, is I've been putting subconscious pressure on myself.  The garden needs my attention. I owe countless responses to emails.  I offered to help a friend with her resume and didn't realize she had a deadline.  I washed my sheets yesterday but they never quite made it on the bed.  (Well, they are on the bed, but in a pile at the foot of it - unfolded I might add- I just pretended I was at a slumber party last night)  I've got a list of gifts to make for people.  I've had some incredibly deep, life-changing conversations recently that I've not fully processed. 

Ring, ring.  It's for you, Jenn - it's the universe phoning to tell you to slow down.
 
Doing, doing, doing is not necessarily being. 

Sometimes I feel as though I need to justify J(z)enn days.  Then I stop and ask - to who?  Why? The more I treasure and take care of myself, the better off everything is.  I even posted on FB that I was officially declaring this day as all mine. The responses were  beautifully stunning - everyone told me to enjoy myself - that I was worth it. I assumed it may appear that I was isolating or even (GASP) being lazy.  The real question in those assumptions is whose life is this? 

Sometimes the answer is simply this:  It IS all about me.

It is my greatest wish that we all begin to realize self care, especially when under pressure is the only choice - the only answer.  Sit/stay.

Must dash - The Sloth Era discussion reminded me I need a nap and my soup is ready.