The Time Between.

Childhood is measured by sounds and smells and sights, before the dark hour of reason grows – John Betjeman

In the season that felt as though it was only ours – the time between the falling of leaves and snow, my sister and I would walk to the park near our family cottage in northern Michigan.  Most of the summer folks had gone, having  only left behind echoes of loving, joy-filled laughter.     

One particular afternoon, my sister and I discovered the trees were a more than the usual generous audience – swaying to the rhythm of our song – We Are Family – sung at the top of our lungs lying on our backs with the merry-go-round spinning around and around.   


It was one of those times we instinctively knew whose turn it was to get up and push, running around until jumping onto our revolving stage.  

We were one. 

Within the silence of nature with the waves from the lake lapping as our percussion, the gentle wind, our string quartet , the scents of fallen leaves,  you name it, we knew had back up in the form of a higher power.

I am aware to this very moment it was one of the most enchanting, freeing, healing afternoons of my young life.  As we walked back to the cabin in reverent silence, I realized it was the loudest conversation I'd never had.  It’s likely this is the day we learned that in our way, though 5 years and 5 days apart in age, we were twins and carry with us an ability to converse without ever saying a word.  

So cheers to family found, or otherwise.  

I am finally remembering that the time in the between is where real life exists.  

The Fine Art of "Let It Be"

Thanks to Facebook and my Aunt Ellen, our family genealogist, for whom I could not be more grateful, I have been able to connect with cousins once & even twice removed, half brothers and sisters,  the greatest of great aunts and other semi-interestingly titled family member here and there.  I've even enjoyed some conversation with these people otherwise know as my family which is lovely, having not seen many of them since I was something like 7 years old.  

I'd yet though, to find myself in the midst of any life-changing memories or even what may felt like a full on connection,  Well until, that is,  that one day when Dan Bearden, some sort of a first once removed, possibly great second cousin, and I began to chat.  

Dan and I occasionally found ourselves in conversation via Facebook, especially when neither of us could not sleep and it was soon that we discovered we had a common love that transcends all barriers - Folk Music.  I came to call him Cuz/Bro and he called me lil' sis/cuz.  Precious.

He invited me to a Folk Music group and without hesitation I joined.  I particpated occasionally and I was always pleasantly surprised by how much better I felt when I'd take the time to listen to another song.  

Dan passed not long ago and because I was missing him, in particular one day, I went into the group and read that they were looking for a co-administrator.  This isn't any kind of a fancy job that pays a million dollars - but it is the exact kind of thing that keeps us tied as a global family.  Stories have always kept generations alive - no matter the format, but song seems an especially lovely version to yours truly.  

I inquired as to what the job might entail - so as to not over-commit, but thinking it  would be a lovely tradition to carry on and that I would still be able to feel our cuz/bro lil'sis connection.  I thought a lot about it; it felt important to me to be able to do it right.  I even went so far as to ask for a sign.

Meanwhile purging/spring cleaning here in Southeast Alabama and I came across a box of things I'd tucked away into the "I'm not sure what I'm supposed to do about these things, so I'll let them sit/stay until I can figure it out" zone.  Not to mention if tossing physical clutter doesn't make you ruminate, I'm not exactly sure what will.  I remembered the colorfully wrapped in scarf scented with my aunt's (on the other side of the family, for the record) perfume gift to be cotton, picked from a friends field in West Texas.  One to heed wisdom from my elders, here lately, I thought - ya know - you'd best be unwrappin' that cotton and see what goes on with that bandanna type thing. (sorry - I'm just lazy enough to not put in all the required punctuation and my editor is on personal leave, speaking of said aunt that smells good and sends super thoughtful gifts)

Suddenly - what to my wondering eyes should appear but an image  of "Mother Mary" - going by many other millions of names in this particular rendering - but I saw MOTHER MARY clear as day. (see above photograph, because not even my most clever self could make THIS stuff up)  And then the Beatles joined the party in my mind.  I was instantly transported to one late night talk, when Dan and I attempted to define "Folk Music" and him saying something to the tune of  "it's whatever we want or need it to be.  It's when we try to define things that we end up in trouble - or missing something really amazing."  

Ahem. Sign delivered.






I took the job - and hopefully I'll fill those shoes well.

That day and today The Beatles; "Let it Be" is a folk song of pretty serious magnitude to me.      

I'm ever grateful to all the parties involved in bringing me a moment as simply divine as that one.

PS - Don't worry, cuz/bro Dan Bearden - we'll keep the music playing.  Mother Mary said so.

Joy Hunting; Chapter One "Her Flock"

I am a mighty joy huntress.

What is a joy huntress, you ask?

To "Hunt joy" is a phrase I created a few months back, just prior to a potentially toxic situation my friend and I were headed into. I knew, beyond a shadow of doubt, this "potential toxicity" was based on my old beliefs. Once I shifted gears into the gratitude zone, all would be well, as usual and thankfully,  I have learned that within even the tiniest of normal circumstances, there is joy to be found.  I'm on the case like a bloodhound named Sherlock Holmes.

Exhibit A:

I had lived in Ohio for some time and began to frequent the store just around the corner.  It was convenient and the people that worked there always left me feeling like I had been not only been cared for, but about.  

I went to the store at Halloween time and discovered one of the rather demure, ever-cheerful, elderly woman clerks dressed as a green M& M. We talked and laughed to the point of tears. Her bravado and customer skills impressed me so much that I was moved to write a note of praise to the store's corporate headquarters.

For the record, it took me all of three minutes to write said letter of praise including extensive time spent with spell check.       

I returned to the store a few days later and there was the woman again - she was wearing her normal uniform and clothing (not that I'd ever see her the same again, I might add),  except for she had pinned a note underneath her name tag simply stating "Thank you to the lady that sent the email."

I acted as if it wasn't me  and asked her for the story. To hear her recant the joy over the situation was incredibly precious to me.    She was glowing.  I was near to tears, I was so excited that it had brought her that much loveliness.   I did manage express that it was obvious to me why someone would take the time to 'turn her in', with as well as she took care of us, her customers.

I felt like she needed to know we had become her flock.

I often wonder how many times on those days that she wore that message under her name tag, that she shared the story.  I still attempt to imagine how delightful that must have felt - to anyone that may have asked and most importantly, to her.

There is something quietly magical in the opportunity we all share as members of the human race to  joy hunt.  It's restorative in ways we forget unless we live it.

Did you hear that?  That joy was the sound of the Splash of a Mermaid.

Farewell Autopilot Eeyore Mode

I recently experienced an extraordinarily vulnerable patch in this thing called my life, and I have to tell you, I could not be more grateful for it.  I'd been carting around this rather make believe mother lode of burden over some things it it felt like I'd never  - I mean never ever be able to do anything about them.  I had made up some some seriously awful stories in my head and realized I had put myself in the Loserville zip code for all my life. I'm here to tell ya was pretty dark in this little head of mine....

Blessedly I have several very strong, very compassionate, very brave friends and family who love me more than I could have imagined  - and in a way, they gathered to do a spiritual intervention.  I'll be honest, it was super scary, but then it got easier and easier and easier - and are you kidding me?  There is a parting gift when you are so wide open that ya show your innards?  You get even closer to your people? Thank you Gods and Goddess's in all forms.

One of the really interesting things that happened was that I realized I now had all this space in my spirit since the burdens were out out in the open now. It's like I did a serious spring, summer winter and fall cleaning of my soul.  There was time now to think ahead instead of just getting by.  Suddenly it dawned on me - I've never really had a dream.  I was so busy wallowing in  fear that I never really took the time to ask myself what I might like to do with my life.

I began to get so in touch with myself on a cellular level to really find what made my spirit soar with joy. I started to do things like make crochet prayer shawls that I could sell and writing for my blog and as I watched myself really putting my creativity out there - I was rather stunned - inch by inch bravery began to strike and I was liking the taste of that....I'd really comprehended that the Divine had my back and I was ready to start this life on a more ethereal level. Talk about rebirth - wowza.  It's lovely to wake up the middle of your own life, by the way - thinking let's get this party started instead of autopilot Eeyore mode.

I'm well on my way to building a brand - and it's all mine - I'm filling my life up with things that I love.  Period.

A few days ago, I invited some friends to my Facebook page and just moments later, I got an email from a friend of mine I know from my work in the animal care profession - he's currently in the Bahamas and in fact traveling all over the world now, to speak about canine  behavior.  In this email, he had attached a picture.  Of what you might ask?  The red-headed mermaid that was watching over him while he worked today.

I am a FIRM  believer in signs - and thankfully I'm pretty often aware enough to notice them and feel some rockin' universal validation, but I can't  say that I've ever had such a clear sign sent through another, to me .

I just have to shake my head in total wonder and grace and enjoy how much the Divine loves me. Not to mention the support that is surrounding me like a pod of dolphins from all of you; please know I am so grateful.

Did you hear that?  I think it was the splash of a mermaid.....

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.