changing colors

so much action lately, getting projects done.  lots of changing colors.  changing fabrics from one color to another.  changing walls from one color to another.  changing the front door from one color to another.  i changed some of my hair from one color to another.   some of my teeth have recently been changed, in a way, from one color to another- a new crown was needed, a few fillings that actually brightened my teeth where the grooves were from the wretched clenching - i am starting to wonder if i can meditate my way into a new pattern of an open relaxed mouth and jaw,  aaaaaaaaaaaaaah, yes, i can do that.  clenching and grinding my teeth is not a requirement for me to be who i am.  nope.  i can let go of that habit.  i know i can.  changing nails from one color to another. changing max's bedroom floor from one color to another (out with the old wall to wall carpet).  change.

trusting in the timing of all this stuff.

i am questioning.  do i want to keep taking classes at the university?  is this a smart use of my time?  it is an instant yes, but the style in which i go at it may be what i need to tweak a little.  my motto for the last three classes was, i am here to learn, not impress.  my introverted self just about died from discomfort in the two creative writing classes.  i know i am a little tougher now, having been hardened off, or something like that, but geez, that was hard.  i like to think of the joker too, and tell myself, what doesn't kill me makes me stranger.  i'm so down with being stranger.  i'm trying to be mindful of my stress levels though, you know, the wretched clenching that's ruining my teeth.  putting myself in super uncomfortable situations is riding the edge - right in between growth and debilitating stress.  i'm on a path it seems that will keep me in therapy for a long time.  both for personal reasons, and for the marriage.  david and i took two weeks off of marriage therapy just now, after three weeks on.  it was clear in our two weeks off that the therapy wakes us up, and without it, we are falling asleep kind of quickly.  what the fucking fuck?  holy fuckness it is hard work to stay awake.  once again, i bow down to the teachers, the therapists, that continually meet us with gentleness, fierceness, and love - they don't judge us, they just keep shining the light and keep on helping us discover how to be honest with ourselves and each other.

ok- back to the style at which i go at these classes.  yeah.  ummmmm.  i need to be more relaxed.  i need to not stress out.  i need to not be so shy...., and self obsessed.  i just saw a bird yawn.  i'm sitting out back at the trident and there are birds playing in the water fountain back here.  i never knew birds yawn.  maybe i need to yawn more in class.  i'll be the older lady who yawns all the time.  whatever it takes.  bitch ass mofo.  being shy sucks.  oh well.  thinking about it, perhaps, sucks even more.  so that is that.  i'm gonna let that hot air balloon go.  i'm gonna take my classes and learn some stuff.  it's simple  as that, it really is.  i want to learn some stuff.   the hot air of my fear can just rise on up.  baby steps.  i am a baby.  so are you.





so, i used to be in a womens' group.  twice a month we met.  i started the group.  then we went our separate ways due to irreconcilable differences, from which i still feel a twinge of ego or something all intertwined in the differences around who was right and who was wrong.  i wanted some new members to be invited in.  for personal reasons, the other ladies didn't.  it was hard.  i played the righteous card - something like, 'i can honor your reasons for not wanting these other women in the group, but i have to leave to honor myself too' - anyhow.  now i meet with one woman, a few times a month, we have a semi set regular ladies night.  at our last one, i brought all the fabrics i was going to tie up for the dye baths.  she saw my dress and suggested some very intentional placements for the tying.  so you see what happens when ladies getting together.  we are very good for each other you know?  i keep thinking, and feeling, that we will ask some other women to join us eventually, but it hasn't happened yet.  david and i have pondered about an all sexes group that has the focus of creative work accountability.  that is a neat idea.

anyhow....


blackness

the girls laughter at seeing the ass on my dress was to die for



it's my female power dress, or something.  definitely my female parts dress.  ssssssssssss.


i dyed something for all of us.  i will only wear my dress at home.  i'm just not the girl to wear this dress out.  unless it was for an erotica ball.





working with these toxic dyes freaked me out a little.  the black burned my eyes.  i wore gloves of course.  but since these toxic dyes,  i have dyed a couple white things in black tea, and that felt so much better, even though i love how the toxic colors turned out.  the red is fabulous.  look:




this linen wrap shirt is the shirt i wore to max's baby shower.  it was a super pale blue originally.  i stained it at some point and haven't worn it for years cuz the stain was on the front and an eye sore.  i've been meaning to dye this for a long time.  worth the wait.


i can wear my dress with the red wrap over it.  and nobody knows what's going on under there.  ha.


the purple was fun:

before


after  (zhi's tie dyed pants look awesome!)

max's bedroom wall color, first choice there.  ha.  my subdued boy.  i asked him to number his first five favorite colors, from one to five.



******°°°°°*****°°°°°°******



my back hurts, my wrists ache.  i think i need a hot bath.  it't approaching that time of the month.  alleluia.  i will embrace it this time.  i will embrace my dark slithering self.  i will paint my nails brown every day if i want to.  i will slink.  i will lock myself in my bedroom if i want to.   i will drink tea instead of coffee, but only because it sounds better today, not because i am forcing myself to do something i don't want to do.  i will slow down time by slowing down myself.  i will let go of what is ready to go on.

 going down.



snakes are showing up these past two week in my life.  live ones in our yard twice.  images i keep seeing.  in my dreams.  epic snake dreams.  in zhi's dreams.  in the magazine i picked up at the dentist monday.  on the shirt max thrifted the other day, that he is wearing today.

i have to pee.  the kids are calling me.  sssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssss.





love.

snakes, acclimation, practice, music

My kids love to rub my belly, and notice how it sticks out a little.  They are tender and sweet with it, like it’s a relative or a pet.  Sometimes I think it’s because my belly isn’t flat and its unflattness is calling attention to itself, But mostly I know they love to rub my belly because that is where they came from.  They don't know this is why they are rubbing my belly, although they do know this is where they grew their bodies.  They just know they are drawn to put their  little hands on this part of my body, over and over again.  A strange instinctive effusive hi to their first home.  I love my belly too.  It’s a seat of magic.  There’s a potency in there, a tenderness.  And a fierceness that roots me and lifts me at the same time.  

(not pregnant if that up there reads to make one wonder.  nope.  just pondering on my kids' sweet love of patting my stretchedoutbybabies belly.)
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we went to a music festival two weekends ago....rocky grass to be specific

zhi told me a few nights later she dreamt of blue grass, literally

she said it was growing near her school, and that i came to cut some, and it turned into snakes

she said i then started cutting snakes in half

she said it was scary


oh my lover


i've been through a lot these past few months, and there may be a few of you who didn't catch which train i got on when i paused this lightandmacaroni blog.  i went to a safe refuge, and there i did all i knew to do, i wrote the story.  i'm easing back into this old light space, my first web home (ha).  (is that like going backwards?  trying to climb back into the womb after having left it?)

(i am a fan of diving in)

you know, it was cold at first for sure here, nobody really here holding my hand, or waving hello.
and being alone reminds me to dig deep to remember, and then soon enough, i am acclimated.
yay acclimation.  i've been thinking on how being tough in our psyches or our personalities, or our hearts, isn't necessarily a hardening, in the closed off sense, it can be an acclimation.  like how plants harden off to the sun or the cold.  we toughen up too, over time.  i guess i'm interested in looking to see if i'm still open to receiving water and light, and love,  even through whatever toughened form i've taken.  am i open and tough or closed and tough?  aaack, vulnerability.  fear of true intimacy rises up, and i can stay open.  i can.  i can.  i don't always, but this is my blessed practice.

my tiny festivarian, on the way last saturday morning

we got some good spots, for our highback chairs

i find that sitting at a music festival for a while is slightly like sitting on an airplane, only in that it makes me want to french braid my hair.  this is weird, these two spaces are the only places i seem to get that urge.




olive went off with some friends for a while and i snuck a few photos




david is looking nice in his father's day hat i knit him
max is looking magical in the wizard hat he bought himself at the festival







(and here we have a small intermission to bring you the reconciliation ceremony of david and heather cohen...way back in februarty, after two solid months of being split up, a strange blessed turn brought us back to each other, wild hearts only can understand the ways of our splitting and rejoining.  it was immediately after reconciling that tickets for the summer music festivals went on sale.  i went on line and celebrated inside that we would go to our favorite festivals together yet again.  rocky grass sells out fast, so it's a plansixmonthsahead kind of thing.... timing and our musical hearts.)



okay..back to music festival photos...

these now are on sunday, just arriving, sitting in a different spot, right in front of the giant silo.  we thought that was handy because this is the first year we've let the kids walk on by themselves to get water or to look at the shops, to buy ice cream, or to chase each other.  'just find the silo if you get lost and then you'll be found.'  this was such a huge step, for max especially.  his sense of place, his personal way of orienting to where he is is unlike most people's.  he did really well though.  he didn't get scared which was also something i thought might happen if he looked around and felt lost.

we were listening to bluegrass gospel, sunday's first musicians blessed us all


and then the sky opened up, maybe becoming emotional at the beautiful sounds


the sun came out eventually, and
i painted olive's cute face.....





i got a new dress

and then the sun's descent began  and keller williams came out.  i'd never heard his music, and it had a gentle power that got me out of my seat.  the kids too.  it was uplifting music like i haven't experienced in a long time.  the kind that speaks to your body, bypasses your mind, and so begins dancing.  very simple.  i forgot glow sticks.   note to self: remember glow sticks at next festival.




what does dumbledore say about music in the first harry potter, as he is welcoming in the first years?


"Ah, music," he said, wiping his eyes.  "A magic far beyond all we do here."

that line caught my eye recently as i've been reading the book to the kids.  yep.

and so we have begun piano lessons.  lots of the pink panther theme can be heard erking out of the windows of this house lately.

sigh.  summer.  love.