It’s a SIGN!

My mother and I have a running joke.  It stems, of course, from a chick movie – Sleepless in Seattle, to be exact.  We’ve quoted and commented on Sleepless in Seattle so many times that it is now referred to, simply, as Sleepless.  It’s an unabashed chick movie, no doubt, but it offers agreeable stars, Tom Hanks and Meg Ryan, and many positive qualities in a decent movie of chick variety.  I like Tom Hanks in just about anything and everything he’s ever done – always believable, I say – and this was Meg Ryan when she was adorably beautiful – after Harry met Sally and before she did whatever she did to her lips.  It also had snappy, intelligent dialogue, and really a lot of good actors.  And the quintessentially perfect boy child as the motherless son, who would make almost any woman think it could be a good thing to have children.  Well, almost.

One of the oft said lines in the movie is:  “It’s a sign!”  It happens a lot, both cleverly and on the corny side.  It happens so much that it has become a catch phrase in the movie, at least in this house.  We had another one when I was growing up – from yet another classic movie, but not of chick quality.  No one was a big John Wayne fan around here, and in many cases I’ve found his performances wooden and unrealistic.  Of course it seems much of the acting from that time resembled that – a great change from the earlier movies when everyone talked so fast you could hardly keep up with the action of the moment.  But in The Searchers, his iconic line, offered several times during the movie, was:  That’ll Be the Day.  It became a mantra around my rather oddball existence of growing up in a dysfunctional household, and it covered a multitude of situations.  Insert typical sentence of many subjects, and the appropriate response was often: That’ll be the day.  We got a lot of mileage out of that.

It’s a sign! is turning out to be a likewise useable retort, and it pops up more often than you might think.  I had one jump up just today…..

So I’ve had this little “fantasy” tucked away in the files for a while.  With all the states of my life that seem to be almost perpetually up in the air – or “in transition” might be the more apt description –  there has remained the image of a vintage trailer occupying a little space for quite some time now.  Several years ago I bought a perfectly perfect salt and pepper shaker, only because they came in the form of an older model car pulling a little vintage teardrop trailer. When I spied it I bought it on the spot, having no need for a salt and pepper shaker, but instead the physical manifestation token of that trailer.  I have a compartment in my brain that says:  Vintage Trailer Here.  And it’s starting to collect little pieces and parts.  Well now, isn’t that interesting?

Events have been cropping up that are indeed surely interesting – I KNOW – that word, again and still.  It just so accurately represents the essence of so many situations without having to reach into the wordbanks for some more elaborate descriptive.  (Like I just did.)  The upshot of the latest events is that I find myself in search and pursuit of such a trailer, or at the very least a quest for knowledge of them so that I won’t go off half-cocked about something and do the wrong thing….. Who, ME???  The Queen of Follow Your Heart?  I?  Ever the dreamer/creator, making things happen before addressing all those pesky details that just might have tagged along, or refusing to give them much merit, or even attention.  Let us hope I have finally become a bit more adept at this Manifesting thing.  I am not without experience, and now it seems I have yet another chance to have a go at several possibilities at once.  Very interesting.

By way of a renewed friendship from literal lifetimes ago, (in people years), I may have a co-conspirator in this trailer business.  Someone who happens to be wise of counsel and firm of brain.  I know – again – not my usual M.O.  Yes indeedy, not at all.  I’m quite surprised and positively so at all that, but I know how this manifesting thing works, (at least in the concept and past results seen and experienced as such), and here it is.  While being wisely counseled about all things trailer, it’s also being presented without stress, time limit or threat of consequence, and how nice is that?  I’m even able to talk about old movies in between talking about trailers, and who would’ve thought THAT could happen?  There has even been talk of salsa dancing, so I have to keep my wits about me.  Do you remember from Laugh In those many decades ago, when Arte Johnson , dressed up as a German soldier spy or something, would part the grasses in front of him, or the palm fronds of a big houseplant at a party, and say to the camera in that accent: Ver-r-r-ry interesting…..  Yes indeed.  Interesting.

So there has been lately much time spent on the internet looking up vintage trailers, not vintage trailers, teardrop trailers, square-shaped trailers, decorated trailers, how much a trailer weighs, trailer hitches, little trailers vs. not so little trailers, plain trailers, the where and the how of trailers….. and the rest of regular life thrown in as allows.  There has also been mention and homage paid to the old movie The Long, Long Trailer, long since one of my all time favorites on so many levels.  It involves a semi-crazy redhead, a trailer, and EVEN ROCKS.  Need I say more?

A lot, then, has been swimming around in my brain of late, and it’s been pretty much fun thinking about it.  I’m remembering the Rules of Manifesting, as I can recall them, (good luck with some of that remembering stuff lately, too), and it can be what I “make it” to be.  Throwing in doubts and suspicions and What Ifs and my old buddy now on my Z list, Fear, would only introduce any or all of that into the mix.  I no want.  If I employ proper caution and a positive and happy heart, if no one has misled me about this Manifesting and the Law of Attraction thing, I could just be in for a swell time.

And now, you ask, What Sign?  Well, as I drove out of the edge of the neighborhood onto the Big Road on the way to mail some things today, (there now being a traffic light at the intersection with all this Progess we’ve been having), I found myself sitting there waiting for the green, not even pondering, and Mother says:  Look at THAT!  What goes by right in front of us, as if across a movie screen, but a car of some sort pulling just the cutest VINTAGE TRAILER.  It was not quite a teardrop, but that usual rounded squarish shape, and it was white with accents of turquoise.  It was cute as a button.  Breathtaking.  Perfect.  I sat stunned for just a second, for I’ve yet ever to see one on the road in recent memory, really, and then…. there it was.  Right in front of me.   Turquoise, even, just like the ones I’ve been looking at.  And then I said it, out loud:  IT’S A SIGN!  Ha HA.  Yessiree.  A sign, sure enough.

And so, as I learned to say those many months ago when in Learning Mode, (always stay in Learning Mode!), instead of getting all Big and Bold and saying, too strongly:  Bring It On!…… Instead I raise up my arms and say Thank You and then the rest of the mantra:  Let it Come.  Let it In.  All the good things.  Let them come.  Thank you.  We’ll just be seeing what happens next.  Maybe it WILL be the day.

Happy Manifesting, Y’all.

 

Shifting… with one foot on the soapbox

      

Fresh flowers from my room in Eve's Garden, Marathon, Texas

 

Bread Puddings/Baked Delights for breakfast at Eve's Garden

 

Just another breakfast at Eve's Garden: Eggs Benedict with exquisite Hollandaise sauce, baked grapefruit with meringue, and perfectly seasoned hash browns.

 

Chard from Eve's Garden

 

Marathon Kitsch

 

A couple of days ago, even though it’s officially spring, a late appearing cold front showed itself, and it was coolish, very coolish, again.  I was back into flannels and corduroy, and having those thoughts of living in the mountains or cooler climes.  But then I remember how much I am not fond of the cold these days.  This is about as cool as I want to be, actually, so maybe I’ll be fine right here.  Even though the heat is coming, with the heat comes the warming of the water, and now I remember how sublime it is to be floating in the water, becoming one with the water.  I know that sounds woo woo umma gumma, but it is one of the things I love the most about summer – to be in the water of the lake, feeling to be literally a part of its composition.  I missed it last year, and again two summers ago, and it makes a difference.  I am feeling a bit tender and precarious these days, and I long for strong.  I think it’s going to take me a while to get to strong, and it’s time for a shift.  A big shift.

It seems to be the time of many big shifts lately – both in myself and on the planet.  Things on the planet seem to be shifting us right off of it, and maybe it’s time.  We are becoming quite a pesky species, mostly mucking things up.  And if history has any kernel of truth, (except that revisionist stuff that is becoming so evident of late), we’ve been doing rather a royal job of mucking things up since we, as humans – more or less – hit the planet.  I know there are the high points – the Michelangelos and the Budda,  though I am loath to include too many religious icons, and damn near no politicians.  I’ll throw in John Muir and a slew of writers and philosophers, maybe Albert Schweitzer because he loved animals and seemed to be a real, positive force, and the whole lot of genuine good doers (and not those do-gooders), but I think they – then and now – are far, far outnumbered by the careless and the thoughtless… the greedy and the soulless… the stupid and the thinking impaired – that type being those who it never crosses their minds to actually think about anything, except perhaps in an evil or calculating type of way (without conscience), and act only in response to dull instinct, (without intellect.)  Sounds rather like I’m high and mightying myself here, but I don’t mean to.  Mitakuye Oyasin, and all that, (we are all one), but most of the time I have to say I don’t feel very one with most of what’s running around calling themselves human these days.  My bad, I guess.  Perhaps I am not as enlightened as I would aspire to be, much less profess.  Ah well.

What started all this rumination was the sighting of the first hummingbird of the season those days ago.  And it certainly seemed too early, even though it’s already been quite warm, and then abruptly very coolish again, and there came that hummingbird – looking for nectar and the feeder that just wasn’t there yet. Another thing to add to the To Do List, which goes somewhere past my arm, which is hurting far too much these days.  I’m supposed to be healed from the Summer of Broken Elbows, and just lately they are both bothering me.  Now what is all that about?  Just when it’s time to DO.  Lots of things.  Many things. Heavy things.  Lift and tote things.  Move big plant things.  And on, and then on some more.  More calcium then.  Wish I could remember calcium as easily as I do chocolate.

But I’m meaning to talk about The Shift… and all the inherent properties therein.

I’ve decided it might be an entirely interesting experiment to give a try at, and get ready now, here it comes… Being My Age.  Now, perhaps never having actually “been” my age, neither am I sure that I can appropriately pull this one off.  Having been “of an age,” for lo these too many years now, it’s a sobering thought to figure out how to live them, full and proud, and be merely satisfied with the whole and truth of who I am.  And that, again, opens yet another door, (or can of worms), in that I ask the question:  What will satisfy me as being/becoming the best me that I can attain – the one I’m evidently going to have to live with for the rest of my days.  And so you ask, (as do I), exactly who is it that I have been living with, being, for all these years?  I find it interesting, yet again, that I’m not sure I have an answer for that.  Too many times, when I ask myself these pithy questions, I so often hear from my responding self:  I’ll get back to you.  It’s not meant as a blow-off.  I am serious.  And still pondering.  Although it must be said that at times, most times, I am easily distracted from such ponderous ponderings, and then I am liable to fling myself down a river or take myself on a roadtrip, and the last of both of those outings seemed to be a bit out of kilter, and sometimes downright painful.  I don’t choose to call myself “old” just yet, despite all those copious years adding up to numbers that are the oldest I’ve ever been, and sometimes startling.  Perhaps I am not so old as just out of shape, and at least that I can do something about.  Ouch.  Otherwise I am in a downward spiral and that I do NOT accept!  Period.

 

So, I have to jump on the old wagon that carries the clichéd banner:  I’m as young as I’ll ever be, from now on – and there you are.  Hence the shift, or the attention to it, for if I don’t shift, I’m going to seize and stay in first or second gear, and that does not suit me at all in this particular time and juncture of my life.  It seems it’s gotten to be TIME TO MOVE.  Or sometimes put:  Use it (as in move it) or lose it.  The only thing I want to lose, (besides perhaps a dubious or negative or abrasive attitude), is a few pounds.  And quite happily, moving it will assist in the other losing it department.  Win win.  Good odds.

The warm is coming just in time, and I’ll just have to deal with the hot.  I started and ended my Celebration Month with a kayak ride.  Love that water.  I have to say, this last trip to West Texas sat on me heavy as far as thinking about relocating out there.  Oh it was dry dry dry, and I felt myself shriveling and forming dusty patches – on me.  I’m not so sure I can do with the lack of humidity, as much as we curse it around here.  So you pick your hours of tracking about in it, if you’re lucky enough to, and seek solace in the warm waters of the lake, becoming that water – that humidity.  Spoken like a true Pisces, of course.  Being here means giving up the sky and the stars, but then, I can always revert back to my old standby “fantasy,” and just find a way to have two houses – one there and one here – and gas money.  Timing not so good on that one, and oddly enough, gas and water, my two necessaries, are now becoming the most desirable, (and profitable, and not to mention excuses for War) properties on the planet.  Supply and demand, in spades.  But what astounds me is that we do our best, (actually our worst), to rape and pillage and plunder the planet to feed our insatiable needs, rather than find a way to live in concert with the elements.  Makes no sense, but ask yourself, what does lately?  Is it just me, or is it even more insane these days than it has been… and how long have I and most contemplating Humans Being been saying that?  Good grief.

So all this shifting needs to be going on, and the planetary shift seems to be out of my kin, and it seems to be doing quite well on its own to tell us it means business.  Nor am I doing any good at influencing any positive shift in the government, and it’s assumed a total life of its own, one I find vexing, unsettling, and damn near scary.  And now what to do about that when it seems we can hardly do anything at all.  So what is left to change, in my power, except the thing that is me.  I’m thinking a bit of the prayer they say in AA, and I’m sure in many other places:  Grant me the power to change what I can, accept what I can’t, (Acceptance, there’s a good one, often a challenge to the likes of me), and the wisdom to know the difference.  Amen and amen.  Serenity – doesn’t that sound just nice?

 

 

 

 

Time to stay home and tend to the home fires, instead of running off again.  I think I’m finally ready to tackle it, now that everything hurts, of course.  Yoga and gardening, walking and working, thinking and writing.  Plenty to do, and now I claim this time for me.  Capital Me.  I’ve got to get back to giving to me so that I may give to others.  Depletion is not a generous place to be, or give from.  Charity is sure ‘nuff needing to be at home right this minute.

Still, I learned from this last trip, as “un” as it was.  I saw friends, moved a bit, got some new music I happen to like a lot, and got other things out of my system for a while.  Next “tripping” will be work related, and that’s a good thing.  And I bet I find some pictures in a part of Texas I’ve not run around much – new material – and that’s good, too.

It’s no longer March, and I don’t intend to be the April Fool.  I just intend to be me, and work on the not so new, but improved model.  Maybe a little less chocolate, and more calcium.  Onward with the Rights of Spring.  Or summer, almost.  From flannels to shorts and tank tops.  It was 93 degrees on April lst.  I’ve got weather whiplash, but such is living in Texas.

April, come she will……… y’all.