Sergeant Pepe the Duality Dog, and the Tree

Today the Queen of Bohemia went up a different mountain on the other side of the Kingdom. She hadn’t been there in a while, and she wanted Sergeant Pepe to be off leash for he had been promoted to Prince Pepe. For you see, Pepe had been groomed at the Penelope’s Pet Palace outside the Kingdom. And although for the castle and the court he was fluffy and lovely like a black-and-white pom-pom on four legs, truly he has the wild side along with his master the Queen. He’s out again in nature and the mud to get dirty, but he might as well show off his new do to the other big dogs, chasing them vigorously before happily catching up with the Queen out of love, his territory claim marked as yellow snow among the big dogs.


My dog, Sergeant Pepe, is the trickster. I manifested him. The black-and-white duality dog is he. Years ago I had envisioned a set of children’s stories with characters that imparted yogic wisdom. The dog character would be the trickster, based on the black-and-white Zuni clown. So Pepe showed up at the humane society one day when I was looking for a dog. This half Papillon, half border collie cutie. We called him a “half-ion,” or a “scrap-ion.” I never made the children's book characters, but I have Pepe now, and he gets me out to walk.

We walked this time up near Devil’s Thumb. From the South Mesa Trail in Eldorado Springs the rock formation looks less like a thumb but rather a penis shape, which was obvious on all the school hikes up there, but left unspoken. Pepe is pretty well trained, however, sometimes he just won’t come. Reasons are usually when he sniffs something intense in the woods, which means it probably was bear, coyote or mountain lion. Another reason not to come when called is to eat certain types of poop (Yuck!) or chase after prairie dogs (Panic! Is there a ranger watching?) At other times he is just the trickster and times unpredictable. That’s the trickster’s role; to let you know that just when you think you’ve got everything in life under control, he comes along and pulls the rug out from under you. Such is life in duality.

So when I walk, it’s a matter of training and suspense. Pepe’s gotten good with his off leash skills in the open space. So when a dog approaches, I’m no longer chasing after Pepe who is in pursuit of the dog and its owner for a quarter of a mile back down the trail. And I don’t have to constantly carry treats. He just naturally has his fun with the big dogs, being like the rabbit at a racetrack for the dogs to chase around and show off this hilarious Papillon spin to him.

Whenever I see a dog ahead on the trail, however, I still get this feeling of, ”Oh, no. How is Pepe going to behave? Is it going to be chaos? Or calm?” For the other day he decided he didn’t want to get back on his leash and I had to chase him across several people’s yards in the snow for ten minutes before I tackled him.

I figure life is like that. I can be content in the moment, but every time I see something coming ahead, I don’t have to feel anxious. I’m just in a calm state of quiet alertness, ready to act, but available in the moment to seek options and alternatives to the problem. It’s a trust in the moment that the answer will arise and the problem solve itself. I've learned that the tiger is content because he knows he has everything he needs in the present moment. I’ve been at it so long, now I really realize the secret is not reacting to anything in the first place, which leads to suffering. When you’ve suffered enough, you are like the rat from college psychology class movies that has endured zillions of shocks for the cocaine and finally realizes this hurts and it’s not worth it! Such is evolution. I now feel am calm and confident that I will figure out what to do with the sight of each dog coming down the trail. Sometimes it is luring Pepe with a treat, or chasing him for half an hour, and most of the time he just behaves because he loves me and wants to please me so returns to me and continues walking.

I had my father over for lunch the other day. I made a fresh avocado and lime soup. We sat at my house and talked. We talked about the coming economic collapse, and he assured me not to worry because we are all going into the fifth dimension and the UFOs are going to make disclosure soon. He forwards me newsletters via email about alien disclosure, and how the disclosure date was moved because Obama still won’t reveal the truth and how disappointed everybody is. Waiting for the savior! That myth keeps popping up every millennium or so. I figure, why not UFOs? They've been in our psyche for a long time now. I think Star Trek might as well be true, I mean the I-Pad is out! Jung said that the imagination is real. It exists in energy, and in the Yoga Vasistha there are myths that echo the idea that things are created because somebody thought of it. Like in the novel Sophie’s World by Jostein Gaardner. Or like Shopenhauer, who said that the universe is being dreamed by a single dreamer in which all the dream characters dream too. And then there's the Aboriginal dreamtime. Might as well make my own dream time and believe in it!

Also, we had a rare event of my kids and my younger sister and I taking my father to see the movie Avatar. I saw it for the second time, as did my son. I can’t remember ever seeing a movie with my father. I feel the movie acts on a subconscious level, drawing us toward the psyche’s need for balance. Jung said that Americans are incredibly one-sided, completely ungrounded and weren’t ready for yoga because they were not in their body. This movie pretty much sums it up, how cut off we are from nature and the feminine functions of the psyche and our body. So nature corrects itself. Mother is pissed. Durga! The machine is stopping.

Avatar is a powerful myth for our time. Man as the machine, heartless, murderous, plundering and pillaging for profit. As if we finally need to confront our past that we have been in denial of for so long. The history of Western colonialism -- murdering natives, enslaving them for capital gain and keeping us triumphant over nature by denying mother and death and to acknowledge (root meaning of the word confession) those nefarious deeds. A Reuters article recently reported a study that proved that luxury actually makes one more selfish. But if we are selfish and separate, then we are alone. So terribly alone. That terrible fear, like a story from the Upanishads. Even the divine, once aware of itself, was afraid of being alone. So it divided itself into all the creatures of the world. So that it could play and love and not be alone, yet it is also still one. That’s the beautiful paradox. We embrace the paradox. The dark stuff isn’t so scary any more. It’s just playing its part in duality. Like Bush ushering in the destruction of America. Somebody had to play that part. Maybe the devil really is the most beloved angel of God, like the Muslims believe. Or like the dogs on the trail. They just keep coming. No need to fear them, just accept them coming down the trail, and be prepared to draw upon your training and experience. Epicurus said that tempestuous storms make skillful pilots.

Avatar inspired me into the heroic life. What is it to really give yourself over to something? In The Ernest Becker’s Pulitzer Prize winning book, The Denial of Death, he says that the biggest problem young people face today is that they have no call to the heroic life. Death is denied in our culture, however, it is facing death that creates heroism. I remember I heard that when I worked as a stringer for the Bakersfield Californian. I had the northern Kern County beat. I regularly covered Delano, where the Cesar Chavez grape strike started. I also volunteered to do religion reporting and stumbled on a story of these three sisters. They owned a bar and restaurant on Delano’s skid row, but they had an experience with the Pentecostal movement and realized they were contributing to people’s sin and suffering. So they stopped serving alcohol and put on these parking lot revivals on Friday and Saturday night. I remember the sounds of the distorted voices through the bullhorns cutting into the darkness. I remember the Hispanic women and migrant workers standing and waving their hands near the stage, giving themselves up to something. The man I interview told me, “If you haven’t found a reason to die, you haven’t yet found a reason to live. That was Christ’s message.”

Living the heroic life. Find a good reason to die, what else is there? Haven’t we finally learned to believe in our eternal nature? What is there to lose? Just our egos. Physics tells us energy can neither be created nor destroyed. We are identical with the powers of the universe. The Mayan believed that the world tree was actually the Milky Way. This tree that connects us to the cosmos. This tree that is us. I think of my nervous system like the branches on a tree - reaching into the ethers and sensing the divine energy flow, conducted through the tinier branches. They say that on December 21, 2012 is when the center of the galaxy is lined up with the earth. Maybe we don’t space travel linearly but by consciousness itself, manifesting bodies at will, manifesting what we need across the dimensions of time and space. And we are at one again with the universe and are in accord with nature, not against it and alienated from it and only consuming in it, but participating in it. We are participating in the myth, and that makes all the difference because we give ourselves to it whole-heartedly. And besides, it's a hell of a lot of fun that way.

The Queen thinks, what does she want to do? What is this life about? She decides that it is to really follow her bliss, put on some clothing in disguise, leave the Kingdom and the castle and set out to explore the big-wide world. And do something wonderful because it makes her heart feel so good. Sergeant Pepe agrees.

The Optimist Queen and her Transvere Abdominus

The Queen hiked up the mountain today, but alone, for Sergeant Pepe was getting groomed for the ball and to go as Prince Pepe instead. She hiked up, footing skillfully the ice and snow. She remembered her mountain goat self, her steady, rocky ascent uphill. And she remembered her reptilian tail, her fishy, watery instincts in her hips on down. She felt the bird bones and she was quite comfortable there as they propelled her on.

She wore her crown, with the big sparkly blue jewel in it, and she sang her song the Shaman gave her and the feeling that was in her body swept over her. It was a lovely feeling. When she reached the top, she did her usual proclamation to the big, blue mountain, and she said, thinking there should be something to affirm or overcome or wrestle or struggle with and instead she said, “I am at peace.” There was just the moment, and the moment was perfect. Even though the King was still at the bottom of the earth, she knows and feels the shift. He turned the corner, he is headed north again. Her heart is so relaxed and full at that moment it touched eternity looking at the mountain. The Queen’s court called just then. The King’s heart was at her Castle Door! “I’ll be right there!” And the Queen hiked back down the mountain, mindfully but very excited and with a quicker skip to her step.


The past few days have been nothing short of remarkable. It’s amazing how the more you surrender and the more you love the more things fall into place. I think it's because the mind is in harmony with the body and the body is in harmony with the environment, and that's when the boons come. That's what purpose myth serves. Then synchronicities show up. Because you live the mythic life. Things have their own meaning, their own story. You start with today and now and shape it the way you want with the ritual of images and words and intention. No wonder witches were burned at the stake. They were powerful!

I spoke at the Boulder Optimist Club today. It was good for me to go, even though I had a little bit of an upset stomach for some reason and felt a little sluggish in the morning and less than optimistic. I was invited by the 80-year-old widower, Carl, across the street. I had gotten him and my Dad together for lunch at my house to talk war stories no long ago. I like hanging out with old people. They have such great stories and history. So when he asked me I said yes, even though I don’t get paid.

I had a dream a few nights ago exactly standing and talking to the group exactly as I did today. In the dream I was giving a presentation, but said I didn’t have anything prepared. The dream was initially anxiety over the upcoming speech. I needed to think about it and pull it together. Finally I decided to just tell them about the dream! And not TELL them about yoga and story, but just ALLOW them to EXPERIENCE it. So I told them the Buddhist story of the Spirit Who Lived in a Tree, although I didn’t tell them it was Buddhist, and we talked about what images they saw. The Tree. The movie Avatar’s Tree is so powerful too. As if this basic life force and mythic image is erupting full speed ahead! The mother! Most people were senior, and one man was in a wheel chair from a stroke. I taught them how to breathe deeply and rhythmically and watch their thoughts. Then we just stood there in mountain pose, getting into our bodies. Just standing there in our bodies and noticing them and feeling them. I got the feeling that this was the first time for most of them they ever paid so much attention to the sensations of their body. Then they did tree pose, very simple, using the chair if required. I sat them down and then had them close their eyes for meditation and relaxation and told them the Christian story of Jesus on the water, although I didn’t’ tell them it was Jesus, just a master in a boat on the water with his 12 students.

It was nice to just be with people. Hear their stories. Old people like to tell stories. It’s nice to have somebody to listen to them too! Especially those old war stories. He made a point to tell my Dad's concentration camp story as an introduction. A woman bought my DVD. I thought, this was nice. I taught people to breathe, to notice the present moment. It was quite a joyous experience. It goes beyond any measurement our culture can come up with. For it’s measured in the depths of being, of the heart, and that’s where the alchemical story is taking place. As things transform, awaken, emerge. Truly a renaissance is happening to me, and to my heart and the person I love. And as much chaos erupts in the world, the reconsiliation of paradox takes place and there is just that much love, awe and wonder taking place. It’s all taking place in the heart and it’s fascinating. The joyous and loving feeling I had at the ceremony takes over, it lightens the heart, opens the throat. My bird sings, it’s joyous and flowering and so very, very new. Like the birth dream I had not long ago. The baby was coming out fast.

I’ve been having wonderful synchronicities with the King. As he has voyaged to South America and to Antarctica, to the bottom of the earth, to the fierce storms and winds and water, whales and iceburgs. While he was having his epiphany and turning point, I was having mine that same day. Yesterday, I knew it because our symbol, twin birds, showed up.

For in that day’s Shambhala meditation class, Contentment in Everyday Life, this woman I was paired with wore these gorgeous, Mexican twin bird earrings! I shared that last class was profound, as I felt the effects of meditation assisting in my mythic and heroic journey of getting over myself and the mire of struggle and relishing the freedom revealed.

It reafirms the natural goodness, the gentleness and openness of the human nature, not that there is some mistake, something must be fixed. That's how I felt my whole life. No longer. There are tools to assist us in life’s trials, but they are nothing to be of conttradition to each other to the joys of life, but to live in the paradox, and balance those out. Lessen the tension between the two opposites. Undo the complexes and patterning we are born into and are in this organism infused with energy and life force. How we undo the patterns and complexes to purely and simply bask in eternity.

We had been working with emotions last week. Seeing how they arise and working with them in meditation. I shared how this week I didn’t flip out and get my body worked up into a hot, angry fit filled with victimhood, self-righteousness and the need for justice when all in this just one week Speer tenant’s going to skip paying rent and use their deposit instead without my permission issues, repressed landlady who won’t let you paint your daughter’s bedroom something other than stark white issues, slimy ex-husband who isn’t paying you back the judgment you received because he allowed your house to go into foreclosure and not pay you $30k issues and other emotional issues reared their head.

The woman I was paired with wore lovely artsy clothes of red, and the twin bird earings. She’s a painter and a teacher. We had to share the feelings of trust and confidence we had in the past and now and how we may have had mistrusted or feelings of deceiving someone.
I told how the world wasn’t safe for me, didn’t trust many people, didn’t have much intimacy with people because of an isolated childhood with a violent schizophrenic mother and a concentration camp father. The present moment wasn’t safe. But to have the trust, love and confidence in myself that I have gained from showing up in the present and not identifying with my mind allowed a stability and a grounding to take place that my trust and confidence was found experientially through my body and awareness. And I found that the more you surrender, the more you align. And it’s very hard to do, that surrendering, but surely somehow it seems that the universe all along was doing all that icky devil stuff to you just to get you to give up on your ego ideas and point you to the light. And that ever since my ayayuasca ceremony it gave me the shift and incredible vision that I can never forget. The past is past and all that story gone. All I have left of it is a work of art in honor of all the love I have for it and the people in my life of past, present and future. Her story was interesting because she had the opposite, provided everything from her parents and had everything done for her so it created a terrible insecurity about herself, but that she is at peace with her artist self that even if she never sells a painting at a show that's not what it's about. it's about he making art. I really connected on that. We artists just need to create art. We do it for art's sake and because we have to! Hence my showing up at the Optimist Club or creating anything at all! And there is no clinging to an old story, no digging in the past anymore, but rather a starting from where you are.

The rest of the class was an Oniki traditional monk eating lunch. We brought each three bowls, each smaller than the other. We ate in meditative silence, and two women served simple food from bowls, tempeh, sesamea seeds to sprinkle on, mixed vegetables of asparagus, carrot and squash, brown rice. The second third pass was for condiments of tamari, salt or pepper and the sesame seeds. The third pass was for tea in the third cup. I had put food in it not knowing! And had to clean it out of the soy sauce!

We ate in silence, enjoying each texture, the sound of your neighbor crunching, of the different tastes and sensations. It was magical, so present and glowing reality.

Then a woman gave a demonstration on Japanese Ikibani, flower arranging. The two main stems, heaven and man, then the flower, earth. The stillness and arrangmenet meant to stop you in your tracks and point you toward eternity. It’s a doorway, a symbol that juts you beyond time and space and wakes you up to the now. Somehow I find lately everything is doing that - mountains, trees, chairs, flowers and art. Children's faces and even war and terror.

Later I drove to have lunch at Chipotle and conversed with the women in Spanish for my lunch. I stopped off at Guiry’s for art supplies before heading to my body work session.

I was blown away by this session and the depth of knowledge this guy, Jeff, knew. I had met him the weekend after my ayahuasca ceremony. Feeling self love gushing, I went to get a hair cut. I was early to the salon so I ducked in next door for a 10-minute massage for the pain in my neck I had from doing all the hot yoga classes and stretching the muscles so deeply only for me to stop taking the classes due to getting busy with kids and life again and for the muscles to cramp up severely and cause agony in the spot in my choulder from my car accident was 17 years ago and was nagging me all through the movie Avatar. So I had decided to do something about it and that's how I met Jeff.

I learned about my transverse abdominus muscle and how pregnancy separated it and was causing the destabilization in my pelvis and my organs and issue in my ascending colon because of undigested food! The work he did was hard to pin down, he had such an interesting style but I was so impressed with his deep knowledge of anatomy, the nervous system and how the body functions. I did decompression breathing, deep breathing all the way to the nerves in my head and slow exhalations, five per minute. He held the area of my udyaya banda and wehre the abdominal muscles separated and it was an incredible feeling. Like a psychic hole that was leaking out energy had been closed. And as he said, “You will be like before you were a mother.” Like a virgin again! So there is something to that process! It is an energetic feeling at the uterine, abdominal level. I also felt in one position as I looked down my body from the position on the table as if I were back in the hospital giving birth at one point. So powerful is the body’s memory. It was very real and huge. I felt so calm and peaceful and aligned after leaving there. And I naturally Googled everything on the muscle and what to do about it and look forward to more sessions because it’s so healing! I swear, all my health problems related to that issue! And I had no idea! And my son will be 12 this month!!!

And the Bohemian Bombshell never has felt more comfortable in her body, even thought she is plump, by Goddess she is full, FULL! Full I say! Full of life and it courses through her body, her breasts, belly, thighs, hips and arms. It just radiates life and all the good food of the earth moving through her in grace.

The Queen returned to her castle and found the King’s heart there. She knew that it was only a matter of time before the King’s body, mind and soul caught up and were here completely at the castle. And she’s so exited about that. But the Queen is at Peace. She’s at peace with everything right now. And she’s ticking down the days until the King finally arrives.

The Big, Blue Sparkly Jewel

The Queen of Bohemia went up the mountain again with Sergeant Pepe to the village science complex where there was also an art gallery. It was a pleasant walk up. There was no rush, no pressure, no where to get but there when she got there. Her heart rested, as if a hand that squeezed it had finally released it from its strangling grip. Each step is slower than usual; she pays attention to it and yet also notices the spruce trees, low-growing rosehips and wild strawberries in their winter modes. The Queen now hikes further than before, or at least in a very long while. She’s a little bit tired of doing other forms of Queenly exercise, so just hiking uphill gives quite a clearing to her head. There is a peace, a quiet that is in rhythm with the step, in rhythm with the moment and the depth that is there and where she meets all of creation. Where everything sinks down and melts into one.

The Queen was delighted in all the art and felt positive that among these dark ages brought about by the Dark King Bush, there will be a renaissance of science, art and learning once again! She took up making quite a bit of art herself, as the King sent some amazing materials to play with and she passes the day until she can see him again working away. And she feels like life is just beginning.

With the King in my life things have changed for the better. My loneliness and struggle have subsided. My heart can rest. I sleep better and dream profoundly every night. I trust the universe, and I trust that the last seven years are up. The intense difficult times are up, or at least a phase of them. And I honestly believe that because of my shift in this thinking, and from the ceremony experience and vision that I received, that good things are now ahead and not disaster. That let’s my heart go. All the post-traumatic stress melts away. The present moment is a safe place to reside. There’s no explosions, terror or upset to pull you out of the moment again, fray the nervous system. There's just this amazing moment and contentment. Regular sitting meditation does wonders to reprogram your nervous system and make deep grooves that are alert, aware, pleasant, and rooted in regular daily rhythm. Time does change things. Regular ritual, that repetio materi descendi, repeatedly descending into matter. You really do create your own universe just by showing up to it. And it’s amazing how the universe just irons itself out and works out well once you get all those self-imposed obstacles out of the way.

My older sister, Narada, came over last Saturday. It was completely unexpected. Her daughter, Radhika, called and said she had some rehearsal in Boulder so she’d drop her mother by. I was hiking with Sergeant Pepe at the time and quickly called my father. Since everything was so last minute – that’s how Narada had announced she was moving to India – I had the excuse that I’d have no special Krishna food prepared! What a relief! Naturally once at home I pulled out what I had, inspecting the gourmet cheeses for evidence of Rennet, pulling out the organic blueberries and mochi.

It was wonderful to see my big sister. It had been so many years. She left when I was in the eighth grade. She was six and a half years older than me; she really was the one who mothered me. Yoga, religious, gardening and vegetarian cooking passions were passed to us early when we were young through our father. That’s what we did together growing up. And only so often would Mom interrupt us with her insanity and her blows. Nancy was her name when we were young, and she took the brunt of Mom’s blows. Small wonder she ended up a Krishna. Years later I confronted the grief of losing her. For the years following her departure were marked by growing up alone. My younger sister would be removed by social services from our home, my brother would join the Navy, and I faced high school alone with my mother ranting about my siblings. I became a bulimic, raising myself alone and becoming the family cook, prepared by Nancy’s vegetarianism and by a 6-month stint as a 16-year-old working as a cashier at the 28th Street McDonald’s.

But now Nancy’s back! As Narada, and it was just her. Not her husband, Sri Raga, whom my mother always called Sri Rag Mop. Quite frankly I don’t like him either and was actually glad he was not there. Narada seemed relaxed and free. We talked about the food issue and she said it was Sri Raga, too strict, and I nodded my head in fierce agreement and vindication, at last! She told stories of India, roaming peacocks at Mayapur, the Bengali people. How I loved arm-chair traveling that moment and would love to make a trip to India one day!

I made her raspberry tea with agave syrup. She wanted honey and I felt guilty I didn’t have honey, for it was crystallized. It made me realize how often I feel I have to feel guilty about some mistake, some issue about me or anything. I think my kids know this and manipulate me about it. I’m always trying to cover up for some perceived error, some mistake. Chogyam Trungpa talks about this in his works. I still go to my Tuesday morning meditation class, Contentment in Everyday living, and I do believe I feel more content, in the moment, accepting of all things. It’s just that the difficult parts have evened out finally. It’s more balanced.

But Trungpa says how Western Judeo-Christian mythology expounds original sin, something wrong with us. And Buddhism emphasizes natural goodness, openness and experience. The west has this feeling of guilt, and children are taught from what’s wrong with their work, using guilt to improve. Rather than what’s right.

I still wrestle with that for me and my daughter. I struggle to perform for the machine of public education and do the worksheet homework at night with my daughter teaching Colonial American geography and map skills. It’s frustrating because she doesn’t know basic things, even though she’s in the 4th grade. But I can’t show it, because it mangles her self-esteem the way it did mine when I was her age in school and didn’t understand what was going on. What's wrong with her? What's wrong with me? What crap. i just want to be happy and good!

My son has moved downstairs and is happy there. I have to be firm though, because his teachers say he’s not turning in English and math work and has an attitude about it. Gilbert took him boxing once, and I’m trying to get him to go to gun club with him. When Narada was over he had fun looking through an airplane and war book with Opa. Guys need guys!

That night my daughter snuggled with me in bed. It’s so fun to have a 9-year-old daughter. We had fun playing a spelling game in which you make up a word based on the last letter of the word just said. Elephant, tomato, octopus, Sergeant Pepe. We laughed in the darkness and we said, “I love you,” to each other. Then she said, “I remember when I was little and you’d say, “’I love you,”’ to me and then I’d say, “’I love you,”’ to you, and then I’d feel all happy inside and see this big, blue sparkly jewel.”

That was everything for me. That moment. It was a Big, Blue, Sparkly Jewel. All of life is one. The simple joys of life. It’s everything. It’s so simple and so clear and wonderful.

Before Narada had left and when Radhika came to pick her up, I heaped lots of presents left over from Christmas that I didn’t get to give them and other stuff. Clothes, books and games the kids had outgrown; we rummaged through my closet and I just pulled lots of stuff I’ve had for years and didn't use. Funky beautiful clothes that I've performed in but rarely wear. There were clothes that I didn’t fit in anymore just hanging in the back of the closet. They needed to be cleaned out. The Bohemian Bombshell is never going to be a size 4 dress again and doesn’t even want to try, so out of the closet it went into Radhika’s arms. I gave Narada some wool coats and scarves for her adjustment to Rocky Mountain winter from Bengai India, and some blueberries I had. The house and my heart and psyche felt 100 pounds lighter.

She wrote me an email thanking me.
Sydney, Thanks for the photos and thanks again for the earrings, blueberries and so on. I plan to wear the earrings on Gaura Purnima and other special days. I used the blueberries in some muffins this morning and offered them to Krishna. The family loved them! I have extra batter and will bake more so that Kamesvari can take some muffins to school in her lunch bag.

I thought about you this morning. It is true you are also a devotee of Krsna...in your own way. I am really happy thinking about that.

Love from,
Narada (priya)


Life is a miracle, an offering, a grace. When you get to the source of the background of anxiety that plagues you like a sick ghost you wear around your body, you can be free. That it’s just the mind and the habit of the mind, but when you meditate you create a new habit of a place to hang out in. To identify there and exist there, untouched, unstruck. The heart rests, the intelligence of the Buddhi mind, rather than the Manas mind, radiates through. And there’s no rush, no hurry. Truly you have arrived. You have arrived in the present moment, and all of eternity is there too.

The Queen of Bohemia now wears the Big, Blue Sparky Jewel. right in the middle of her crown.

And Still the Heart Dances

The Queen is fasting after realizing that the sludge of holidays needed a bigger kick at leaving the kingdom, and she took Sergeant Pepe for a walk. Moving in rhythm with her body once again up the mountain, up, up she goes, forgetting the mind, just being with the body. She was, however, a bit distracted, lots going on in the castle and its interior realms, workings and people and she didn’t like the cold so decided to turn around. Sergeant Pepe resisted, pulled her on. The Queen did continue up the mountain, reminded that she had forgotten to proclaim herself. “Thank you dear Pepe!” she said. Pepe winked.

Finally at the top she stood there, looked at the mountain and said, “I am the Queen of Bohemia, and it’s happening! I can do it myself! I believe in myself! I see a solution!” That and with a lot of great people in my life I can do anything!” And then she walked down again with Pepe leading the way.

The Queen has a very fine court. HER court, no more dreadful TRAFFIC courts. She is driving the speed limit, and she has to admit, it feels good to slow down. But the Queen still had to rev it up it a good 10 MPH in certain spots in the country where she rolls her eyes and can’t figure out how possibly on earth anybody with a brain would post it that slow and which village nitwit was it?

The Queen has been gathering the HEALTHY advisers around her and they assist her in her decisions. And just by waiting and breathing in and breathing our rather than jumping to impulsive actions or freaking out and panicking and grasping in terror, she realizes that she can make it through the tension and come to some good solutions as she gathers the information over time from advisers and makes a decision all on her own. Why Queen Elizabeth would be jealous.

The village people are freezing in the rental cottage on Speer and want out of their lease early. The Queen quietly contemplated the situation for a full three days and after doing some investigating, decided what she shall do. She feels great. Calm, and by George she feels LIKE THE QUEEN.


I’ve been working with my chest lately, the throat. The hot yoga really gets in there deep, works things out. I’m among all these young people at the Core Power, and a lot of the time I’m doing a variation for my personal benefit to get deep in my chest, deep in my shoulders as I see fit. Hell, I'm 43 and I don't care. There is an expansion in my chest I haven’t felt in a long time. I can breath deeper, it’s in the center of my chest and it goes up my throat. I like a lot of back bends, something I've always resisted, they open these up. I can do the deepest backbend ever, which is huge for my usually so inflexible spine because of two herniated disks. Just as the cadaver lab teacher said, "The thoracic spine is what makes the heart dance." So it is happening.My heart is dancing. Once John Friend touched that spot behind my heart when I was in urdhva dhanurasana and said, “There’s your stuck spot.” I can never forget his touch at that spot. The back of the heart. In my chest, with the fear gone, the shoulders can slide down the back. I focus on my tail bone and relax. I am grounded and speaking from my heart, not my head and neck.


So the spine dances the heart, the heart opens. My chest spreads and my throat opens. My bird in the tree wants to sing, breathe deeply, make music, tell stories, be free and expressed. And my bird is happy. She is content. The jaw loop is engaged and it helps the shoulders go down the back. I focus on the tailbone and everything drops down to the floor and I am centered in my heart, relaxed, ready and alert, witnessing the miracle of the present.

I remember my feet, mulha banda, the pelvis grounded, my core my refuge, my shoulders to be relaxed. It opens the chest. I can gain the stillness of the moment. The peace of not grasping, not needing to grasp because you don’t have to worry about survival, that you won’t starve, die, be murdered like your ancestors.

I think it’s the root of my fear. Besides the uncertainty as a child that was programmed into me that at any moment that my mother was going to start screaming and doing something terrifying to me. It’s an ancestral fear passed down generations. Fear of annihilation. My father, who survived a Japanese concentration camp on Java as a child, his terror and grief subconsciously filtered through to his children, to me, to my children. They carry it too. A massage therapist who works me and my kids said that we all as a family have tight neck, shoulders and backs of legs. My father has the same thing. I massaged his shoulders and neck as a child. Our body patterns follow. The lingering unconscious influence of the parents’ psyche. But my story isn’t very different from others. How about somebody who is Jewish and their grandfather was only one of eight children to survive the Russian pogroms. Or a Native American on a reservation who doesn’t trust a donation of fine fingernail polish because she suspects that there is some poison in it because they want to exterminate them. The world is filled with some very sick people who start wars and kill others in a self-righteous rage.

The fear becomes less with stillness. With grounding in the body. Slowing down, being in sych with the world and being PRESENT, being PART OF IT. Surrender to how the body feels and moves in every moment. It's a form of safety.

With less fear in my life things become more and more clearer. They are much simpler. I am down to the root chakra where I know what I can and can’t do. As I always do too much and I typically do it all myself. But my work and future projects are very clear. It’s simple, manageable. I don’t have to rush around. I have people who help me in my work. My family life is balanced. I have time to take care of myself and have hobbies other than my hobby of work. Like cook, garden, read, go to the theater or a movie, hike and travel. Slowing down to the rhythm of nature just moves you through the heart. There is a definite trust. All you have to do is really learn to be patient and wait things through. I’m typically impulsive, the first to say, "I Love You." I’ve matured, seeing what waiting actually does. It provides a great foundation of being and knowing that this is the right choice so that you can proceed unencumbered.

I’ve been gathering information about Speer. A friend is helping me make some choices about it. Things are moving forward. I just let the creditors call. Thank you for different ring tones! I’m waiting to see if I can get my money from the house. I’ll forge ahead with my passions and my work. Despite the fact that tenants want to move out of the cottage before the end of their lease because they are freezing, since it’s been abnormally cold here and Justin did such a shitty job on remodeling it in the first place. Not even the insulation I installed helps. Ah, well. Such is life. And still the heart dances. Still the Queen lives in awe and beauty of such a fine opera. And her flowering tree with a little bird in it center blooms in winter. "Caw! Caw!"

New Year

The Queen had to go to Court today. Not HER court but THE Court. TRAFFIC Court. Somehow on the road at a certain point her carriage turns into LA GATA NEGRA and transforms into a wild black cat and it gets her into trouble on occasion. It just happened to be in COMMERCE CITY, of all places. Is there anything IN COMMERCE CITY besides the power plant that as a child looked like the city of Oz to her? The Queen was confused. “What? I can’t just write my check and be done with it? I have to GO TO COURT!” She was horrified, aghast. “It’s so unbecoming of a Queen. AM I GUILTY?” she wondered.
Among the masses of bad drivers, delinquents and indigents, she nervously confessed her penchant for speed to the Big Wig who seemed not impressed and figured her being from Boulder had some cash to plump up the city coffers, and who merely lowered the fine but only by a little dispite her chirping about “a lot of stress” when the Big Wig asked her “IS THERE ANYTHING YOU’D LIKE TO SAY.” Overall the Queen felt the day was wasted, however, she did get to visit a friend and get some work done at the same time and praised the technological advances that so discretely allow her to cheat and fill the dreadful time that is supposed to be, she guesses, punishment. She drove in her carriage the speed limit all the way back to her castle like a good little girl, but she knows the desire will return down the road. One day.

There is a rhythm that one can align with. It’s the rhythm of nature. It’s a synching, and aligning. It’s a slow process, one that doesn’t let you go without some kicking and screaming. But it’s the good sort of kicking and screaming. It’s the type that cleans you out. Because you need it and by George, it seems the only way because really you just don’t get it otherwise so it becomes necessary by all means.

The new year is off to a good start. An amazing shift of solstice energy, dying and then being reborn into light – has proven powerful. Wonderful surprises, realizations and also painful ones. It was a pleasant enough time with the kids. The Festivities, the good friends and food, and then the purging of the house. Getting rid of all the gaudy tinsel and clutter which makes me can’t stand a shred of Christmas the day after, my birthday, so out it all goes and I undertook a massive cleaning and reorganizing of the house. The Christmas tree is outside, ready to be chopped up for fire wood. It felt wonderful. And then a shift and clarity in my work and naturally surrendering to its process. Not being afraid of waiting, not being afraid of the uncertainty. Just sitting there with everything and enjoying the moment anyway.

We opened our presents on Christmas Eve with my father after lunch of lox and bagels and homemade carrot ginger soup. My younger sister, didn’t show up. My older sister, who has just returned from India, didn’t make it either. It was a bit disappointing and lonely for some reasons, but also wonderful for others. I put their wrapped presents in the closets and didn’t cry.

Of course with my sister’s it’s a source of old pain. That same old story. What are you doing for them? You set things up nice, and they don’t show up. Pretty typical. Pretty disappointing. I didn’t let it bother me. I shifted my focus on my kids and did fun things like sledding and going to movies and making lots of artwork. It was offensive, though, that my older sister demands thing. Like that I should prepare food for her. As a Hare Krishna devotee, she demands rigid food. Both my sister-in-law have run ourselves ragged in years past to provide fine vegetarian food for their demanding and austere pallets, only to be snubbed when her husband won’t bless the food or it was cooked in the wrong pot or, God forbid, was made with KARMIE HANDS. I remember nearly three years ago when she suddenly announced she was moving to India, drove up from Dallas and she showed up the day before her flight. I had surrendered and not prepared anything, knowing it could not pass her satisfaction. She seemed offended. “I should have called ahead and told you what to make me!” I felt terrible, ran out to Whole Foods and bought wonderful vegetarian items. But once I returned she said, “Oh, my God! Syd! I forgot to tell you! Today is a special day! We have to fast front grains! I’m so sorry!” So half of my purchases were useless. Thank god for my niece, who I call “Krishna Lite,” said, “I’ll eat it. I don’t care.” Needless to say I get a long with my niece. But I sense some kind of redemption. My older sister coming home. What needs to be said? Reconciled?

I know it is about my value. I remember my mother. When I was a child, calling all us girls whores and dirty bitches, screaming at us, beating me with a stick. Am I worth anything? I had given birth to my daughter. I had been home from the hospital less than a day. I sat with my baby daughter in my arms on the couch and my mother shuffled in. She had a crumpled up paper grocery bag in her arms. Her hair typical and matted and unkempt, her clothing torn and ragged. She thrust the bag, my daughter’s birthday gift, into my husband’s arms and announced to me, “I’m ready for a pizza. Mushroom.” I didn’t cry. I just breathed in and out. I was never allowed to shine. It was always her. Or my father. Or my sister, or other sister or SOMEBODY. It was never about me.

I remember her gift. What was inside that brown bag. The gift from my mother to her granddaughter. My daughter. Me. 1) a sample of a Kotex, opened. 2) a bracelet of coins, broken, from a garage sale purchase 10 years ago. I remember it from her jewelry box. 3) two clipped coupons for Knox Borden condensed milk to save 10 cents. 4) 5 apples, with worm holes, from their backyard apple tree.

So I realize, what is it about me that is unable to see my own value? My own worth?

But I do see it. This New Year. The grinding of the wheel one more time. To face oneself in the harshness of winter. It’s very cold again. Bitter cold. It’s been icy. Things have not melted as usually promised in sunny Colorado. Al Quaida seems to be penetrating deeper into US territory. It’s getting at things. Putting a mirror up, rooting things out. A numerologist once told me that I was supposed to learn about taking care of myself. Standing on my own. I didn’t want to believe it. But it’s always that way. You set it all up for people. You get little in return. I’ve tried ludicrous means of finding my value from other people. Only to be once again disappointed. All along I refused to believe that I could get it met through my own talents, my own worth. But I guess it’s that pressure that cooks up innovation. Maybe I will turn Speer into a medical marijuana grow house and salvage it. I was there today, collecting the laundry coinage and trying to figure out why the hell the new dyer isn’t working. Heavy Sigh. Maybe I’ll just really focus on my work, discipline myself in yoga, build a community of HEALTHY people around me, and watch my own star shine.

I talked to my father today. He had some X-rays for his legs, which are puffing up, causing pain. I find myself caring for him more and more. I do, out of love, but caution. Where is my light? Where is my shine for caring for myself? He told me about my younger sister. Her car broke down – again. She wants my dad and his neighbor to tinker with the motor and fix it. Somebody help her. Somebody help me. That learned helplessness. The Powerlessness. The black mold in the basement. It strikes us all. I recognize it in me. Nobody is going to come to my rescue. I keep putting energy into it, it buys me time, and heartache, and ultimately I do come up with a solution. Why not believe in yourself? Is there any other choice?

I told my lawyer, who is wonderfully, finally, preparing the complaint against my husband to the department of regulatory agencies to try and collect my money from my house he had foreclosed on and failed to sell as a realtor. I’m in holding pattern. Breathing in and breathing out. Showing up now at CorePower Hot and Yin Yoga among all the young CU Boulder student bodies, and sweating and cleaning and releasing and feeling good. Accepting what is, my body, my self, my talents, my life. It has all the echoes of a sweet surrender and a beautiful composition.

I feel more aligned. Slowing down does the trick. So does surrendering. I couldn't whip myself into a frenzy if I forced myself. I'd rather be in balance. Anything else is just too painful. I'll just go with the flow, thank you very much. There is simplicity, balance and presence. There is redemption, fulfillment. Ah, the last thing of my mother. She really visited today in her ghost. I remember reading her letters from Europe. 1955. Her adventurous self. But never allowing herself pleasure, satisfaction. Ah, the guilt, to splurge on a better room, a better seat at the opera. Do I deserve it? Am I worth it? I see how my mother set it all up. I see how I pierce it all and rewrite the story. The flowering tree in winter. It keeps me rooted, keeps me blooming, keeps me present, no matter what.

My father said today that he talks to my mother. "She's well now, you know." I think she is. It's the retroactive healing of the ancestors. your healing heals them all. "I believe it." I told him. Not sure if I believe we are all going into the fifth dimension and that aliens are about to be revealed and nothing will be left by 2012 so don't worry... but I believe my mother is well. And that so am I.

It’s a slight adjustment. A tinkering of sorts. Clean out the last corners. Kick off the New Year with a Bang. Recession be damned, we all know artists will save the world AND our souls. So why not just keep being one. It really doesn’t matter. You just align to your dharma. You believe in it. And that faith and belief is like a strong horse. Once you get on, your destiny’s ride is assured.

So is the Queen’s New Year. 2010 is going to be her year.

The Birth of the Bohemian Bombshell

The Queen is born from the waters. Her bottom matsya self. Reptilian, earthy and watery. Her body is remade from the fires of the earth, the sweat of the rhythms and pulsation of life. Her heart opens, and her wings spread and her breath releases a beautiful new poem. A song, a mantra and it mixes with the air and sky until it waters down and fertilizes the earth she walks on.

I am the Bohemian Bombshell. I’m re-sculpting my body. I’m re-storying my Self. No longer do I carry the stories from childhood that were stuck in my body. I am re-patterning that groove in the record. I’m a hot yoga junkie now that I’ve tried out the Yoga Pod. I don’t get the headaches; it’s a shorter class and we do a downward dog!

Slowly the heat and the alignment and movement along with a new guiding myth in my life are re-shaping me. A rebirth. Just like after shavasana, there is something new out of that death period of rest. I have forgotten the terrible worthlessness, the shame. The shame of my house, myself, my body. This terrified little girl, so afraid and ashamed of her house that she could not call the police when she came home one day her senior year in high school and found that her little sister had attempted suicide. So ashamed that she had only herself to comfort her and she did it with bulimia, building more shame, more self-hatred. More hatred of her body, her self.

I will be 43 in 20 days. I have a new guiding myth. The Queen. I love my body. I love myself and I have value. I’m cleaning my house out swell. My body is full, 145 pounds typically. Up 15 pounds from three years ago. It's OK. It's right. Because I feel so good in my body. It’s strong and healthy. It's sensuous, sexy and beautiful. All my flesh, all my wrinkles and peeping gray hair. What a difference. My little girl of the past is OK with it too. She’s healed too. She doesn’t have to be 115 pounds like in her youth. She just gets to be healthy. She gets to be happy, trusting and safe. She gets to be herself. So everybody gets healed. Even my mother and father, sisters and brothers. It’s heaven on earth. And it’s in the body. It’s in the Bohemian Bombshell.

I am the Queen, the feather-plumed serpent, or the mermaid, half goat, half fish. The alchemical toad and bird chained together. I’m finally rooted, my energy balanced and back down toward the lower half of the body instead of rising in fear upward. I have a stable pelvis, that lizardly area, grounded and solid, and flowing freely with the energies of life. The hot yoga gets more deeply into my chest. For now my upper body lifts toward heaven. My heart, no longer a heavy stone, collapsing, pulling me forward and protected by rock-tight shoulders paralyzed by fear, but a bird, light, open and liberated. Free in the breath, present and powerful. And everything ceases. This is where Durga comes in. It’s that presence, unmistakable mother in her death and life. She’s in the heart, that amazing organ that has arteries running from it and to it, giving and receiving. It’s a Shiva consciousness. I can see more clearly my ego self because of the distance that mediation has gotten between me and my ego story. I like to reside in the Shiva spot more. It's an addiction. It’s protection, safety. It’s a silence that is yet so loud with the roar of the cosmos.

In hot yoga, I slow down to the heat and real rhythm of my body, notice every toxin in it. With my deep breathes I can feel every nook and cranny, any mis-alignment. It’s a slow melt, a smeltering, a crafting, as the new mythology kicks in. That I am of value and worthy. For I am the Queen of royal, cosmic blood. And my value does not fit in with the passing economic age of imaginary money, or even precious metals, but my value goes beyond, into something that cannot be measured by any earthly means. The value of my self and my work is not able to be assigned a measurable value, but it is rather unspoken, and connects to every living being on the planet. It connects and communicates with the herbs and the plants and the seas and water and the moon and the stars and the sun. It connects in faith, as it is confirmed and knows that an upheaval is necessary. To rebalance things. The classic Star Wars myth goes agrarian with kings and their peasants revolting. Politicians and proletariat. Corporations and taxyapers. So I’m not too worried any more. I’m excited. It’s time for some good action. We are all assigned our roles and so now it’s show time.

So is Birthed the Bohemian Bombshell.

Jamaican Queen

The Queen and her children went on vacation to Jamaica, courtesy of the King, who arrived later. How the Queen loves to travel, get outside her realm, experience something new and different, even though the KFCs and Pizza Huts have spread their tentacles even to the Caribbean. How courageous was the Queen so many said, to manage alone her children through airport security checks, immigration and feeding times all throughout. She loved escaping the harsh, dry climate of the mountain top and revel in the moisture abundant and tropical green scenery everywhere. How she loved having fun with her children and how she loved spending time with the King……

Although she wasn’t very happy about the speeding ticket she got when she returned to the castle.



Jamaica is a beautiful place. I like the people and culture. People are happy here, and Bob Marley’s image, music and presence seems to float over the place like a loving, happy father. I’d love to see and learn more and return. Even do give a yoga and storytelling/writing retreat!

I love the Caribbean, this being my second time here. Like the U.S. Virgin Islands, the breeze in Jamaica is sweet and the turquoise waters softened by salt that supports you as you float oblivious to the world and just stare at the blue sky and white clouds above. I love the humidity and the oxygen and the pressure here -- huge shift from the harsh vata-aggravating climate of Colorado. This is good for my health and my energy. I realize that is probably why I like Bikram yoga so much, the humidity; it holds your body; it cleanses it.

The all-inclusive resort we are at is just that. The Lady Hamilton Grand Palladium, Spanish-owned and rushed to finish. This new place is cracking at the plaster, tiles coming up, but the people are super nice, the food sumptuous. They hand you alcoholic drinks at check-in, and from the boisterous voices of Eastern-European sounding men at the swim up bar that opens at 10 a.m., the drinks don’t seem to stop. I haven’t drank alcohol in a long while, so I thought, it’s vacation! But I imbibed modestly, except for one night. I remember too well the affects of this particular poisoning. I feel so much better without it. Same thing with the food. This incredible abundance of decadence, but one has to remember one’s own power of choice. I choose not to be a pig, gorge on everything. And ultimately feel horrible afterwards! I marveled instead at the fresh fruit and steamed fish. But I have to admit there was so much to try - i loved Jamaican bammy bread and Italian gnocchi - I did start in on the heavier carb stuff and you just couldn’t resist the little desserts!

The kids sure loved it and I was happy to see them happy. Even though when my friend who treated us to all this fun was there for a few days, and I relished in talking to an adult about interesting array of subjects, he left and I was back to the empty fourth chair at meal times. That loneliness of being a single mother. I have to catch myself always with my son, not making him like a parent, talking to him about history and economics, and he tells me how Opa is always telling him about space people coming. That too! I said.

As my daughter stood up from the table at lunch one day I imagined Frank here with us at the table. How would his presence affect us? Are suicides really condemned to stay nearby invisible and assist the loved ones they abandoned and wounded so much? Are their silent presences to be felt to steady you in times of great overwhelm, loneliness and grief? What would it be like to have him here? On a family trip? What would my daugher be like to have her father in her life? Something she has never known? What would it be like for her to have a male presence in her life? A father? For my son? A man like him.

There is a Roman theme about this place, large Doric columns everywhere, if not completed beyond any further aesthetic quality rather than to keep costs low. The decadence is there, yet it seems this resort, opened not to long ago, was built at the tail end of the last gasps of capitalism. As if the credit ran out and they had to cut corners just to get the place open. But my kids love it. Just to swim, eat, do nothing, and watch a lot of TV in the room. (since we don’t have TV at home.) They’d be just as happy in a Comfort Inn in Westminster, Colorado. But we are in Jamaica, and it’s good for them to see places outside the U.S. And if anything they have had geography and history lessons hammered into them and even my daughter knows Jamaica is in the Caribbean now.

I re-read Jamaica Kincaid’s A Small Place on the plane and by the poolside. Such an amazing author. Such an amazing voice. Her brazen scolding of colonialism, and how she admits not much changed after emancipation. Sure, here the blacks serve the whites in a gluttonous stream. I love how Kincaid implored the rebuilding of Antigua’s library, which was destroyed in an earthquake and never rebuilt. How important education is - literary and artistic exploration and encouragement. How that is society, culture, humanity. Rather than decline or the reclining class lounging in artificial pools when the real prize of nature is but a few feet away at the beach. But then I stopped being so critical and enjoyed myself. I started thinking that this place could be converted into and make a great commune and education center and have a yoga storytelling retreat.

I went to the resort’s morning stretch class and ended up teaching it with yoga. There was a couple from Philadelphia I helped with their back pain, and even the bow-legged employee Smiley I gave exercises to help his condition. I miss teaching adult yoga. Perhaps I will return one day. Grow Medical Marijuana in the basement of my father’s house and offer other herbs and yoga therapy. It might make the right combination.

In Jamaica I could just rest and let go. Floating around in the Caribbean waters, I found that staying focused on the present and letting go of thoughts, and by gaining awareness of old patterns, stories, that no longer serve me I get some distance from the thoughts and patterns, which allows a certain energy to be released, a certain spell to be broken. The traumas and grief of the past are finally gone, a story, a house, let go. Like the house the old man hauled around in the movie UP, which we watched on the plane.

How that old attachment really makes things difficult, hold you down. They really are grooves in the koshas, your layers of being. You have to lift them out of the layers, smooth out the surface again, float around in the Caribbean water and feel your body supported, free, safe. There is a turning point, a new story all together. Like the sun gaining length again after the winter solstice. The shift. Re-patterning really takes hold. The old yearbooks of military history and authority and sorrow have faded. There is peace. You are rooted in being. Grounded in a feeling of peace and safety. You don’t have to be or feel unhappy anymore. You don’t have to be confused or upset. You don’t have to act out the rage that your mother had inside her, the frustration, the powerlessness, the grief and fear. You get to feel at rest, at peace, in balance and aware and it feels great. And happy. I was happy, floating around in the Caribbean sea in Jamaica. And although I knew the moment would pass and I'd be back home eventually facing difficulties and fears, I felt a shift in attitude. Something good and beautiful and loving is going to happen in life, regardless of everything else. Regardless of any old tragedy.

What do you do with the memory of the tragedy? You create art out of it.

I think of my grandmother, whose husband starved to death in a forced Mitzubishi tin mine outside of Tokyo during World War II. How my grandmother survived concentration camps and the soul-destroying hells of war with children. How those scars on the children and mother and family run deep. Generations deep. For I am her all over again, a widow with children.

I see this abundance of food at the resort, the people at my service. I think of my father, as a little boy separated from his mother. My Oma, not knowing whether he is dead or alive for two years. My father, eating snails from the river that was also the latrine to survive. Eating snakes and burying dead old men.

The grief is in the body. It is in the heart. Little by little you can coax them out, just like the mold in the basement, and get a good look. And then we see that it was not really anything, a story, a passage of time, in life. A book on the shelf, a memory, and we return to the present and it’s radiance and it is that radiance that makes us safe and happy.

The End of Food book I read was amazing. We really are headed for disaster. How I am returning to my healthy self again, no drinking, a regular routine. Because it really reprograms you.

Bottom

The Queen was overwhelmed by the demon Black Mold. It all seemed so hopeless to go up against it. It was down there in the basement. The darkness now has eyes, and the creature has now been awakened. She wasn’t quite sure what to do with it, just sitting down there underneath the stairs. It’s eyes open and glowing. But at least its presence was made known. Now she can get to the bottom of things. She just might be able to deal with it.

But the demon Black Mold is very powerful. It tells the Queen to go back to sleep. Ignore it. It’s too powerful for her to deal with at this time. The Queen feels sleepy, she fights to stay with the demon, even though she feels overwhelmed.


I was driving down the road this morning when I realized that I had forgotten my yoga mat for Bikram class. I came back to the house, and accidentally left the door open and Sargeant Pepe ran out. “Oh, drat! Now I’ll be late,” I thought, because it's hard to lure him back in. The kids joke that the only thing I trained Pepe to do is to run outside in order to get a treat. So that’s what I had to do. Go all the way back in, get to the fridge and get a treat, lure him in, and dash myself back out again.

I observed the frustration brewing. I had to fight to focus on the out-breaths and get present and not fall into the old trapping of negative emotions. Those old feelings are too painful to indulge in anymore. A gift of about to turn 43. I’m like the rat who finally realized that those shocks hurt, and you need to give some things up if you’re going to survive or evolve and if your children are going to survive and evolve. Wisdom is the gift of age and the gift to the world.

I think it’s old trauma, old patterns related to stress that start to wear on you. It's post traumatic stress. I think about Frank's death. I think about my father. I feel so sorry for all the soldiers returning from Iraq. I’ve witnessed it in my father all my childhood, all my adulthood. How we children of concentration camp and war survivors are affected. How all children are horribly, horribly affected.

Finally back in my car, I was backing out and I had a flash of insight. It was the same kind of insight I had, incidentally, when I was backing out of a driveway when I was on the way to be with my mother dying in the hospital. I had just dropped my infant daughter off with a friend, and backing out I saw an image before me of her as a young woman. I got a call from my younger sister not long after that with the news that mom had passed.

Backing out on the way to yoga, I had the impression of powerlessness. The brutal stamping out of hope. My father as a 9 to 12-year-old imprisoned in a Japanese concentration camp for Dutch colonialists on Java during World War II. That experience of horrible atrocities during the formative years, it scars so deep one gives up on affecting the outer world and there is only anger turned inward, its oppression total.

My father told me a story once about the war. That he was at camp Ambarawa 7, which had a monastery and nuns. One of my father’s few possessions was a towel his mother, my Oma, monogrammed for him. One day it was missing from his bed in the barracks. He climbed up high in the rafters one day and watched the nun come in and he witnessed her removing the threads from his towel.

He climbed down and confronted the nun. “That’s my towel,” he said. She just glared at him and said, “No it’s not,” and went back to work. He mustered up the courage to complain again, “It’s mine!” “You’re going to hell when you die and you’re not going to need it,” she said of his protestant soul.
My father wanted to hit her, he told me. “What could I do? Me, a little boy, up against the nun? That’s when I started to get angry.”


That’s what I carry of my father's onto my experience of reality. I react to it with his unconscious pain. That powerlessness I felt against my mother and her illness. It’s my mother, yet she’s raging at me, terrifying me and hurting me and my brother and sisters and my father. You try to take care of them, you feel guilty for their suffering. Because you love her too. She's still in my body. She's in my shoulders and psoas. She’s the blackness.

My father’s migraines, the rock-hard muscles in his shoulders and neck. I’d massage them, give him a head massage just like the nurse Babu did for him on Java. After yoga I can see still where my tension is in my arms, the collapsed chest, the shallow breath. How trauma and powerlessness shut you down. Unable to escape my mother’s prison as a child. Now able to finally be aware and get present rather than dwell in the past. Snake is a good friend.

The Black Mold is just a reminder, an opportunity to wake up. To look here and check this out. My mother's healing too, just like the dream, she's helping cleaning. We're searching every corner of our energy bodies for leftover stories. What powerlessness and discouragement do we feel when stress arrives? What hopelessness? That depression that renders us without courage to face life. We find the courage again and this time its grounded in being.

Shall I move forward on my desire to clean out and fix up my father’s house? Now that I’ve hit the basement and found the snake and the mold and the rot, discovered the rat that gnaws at the tree and the toad that blocks the well. Now that I know the facts and what needs to be dealt with, I can summon the community to help me deal with it. Now the castle can be rebuilt again. The samskaras have been removed from the layers of being and now I am free to create anew with the power of the present. And the community makes all the difference. Something I didn't have as a child, isolated here on Kilkenny Street East of Boulder out in the country with the cows and the corn.

I wrote Dad a letter. I said I could not live there. And that he should consider living with my brother for his health. Today he said he was down there with some bleach working with the mold. Gads! Julia was supposed to be over there today. I hope she convinces him that a Haz Mat unit needs to be consulted!