DatingGod

Fuzzy, Toasty, Thankful

I kind of dread the end of the year holiday season, though probably not why you might.

Sure, there's the horrible xmas music, blaring from all directions, starting sometime in early November. And the stress folks go through, trying to pull off a big family feast with the least amount of family fireworks. Or the crazy spending of wads of cash on stuff, stuff that isn't usually either needed or wanted, usually slapped on a credit card with an interest rate that is not dissimilar to a kind of date rape with no hope of prosecution. 

Yeah. But the core source of my dread? Other folks who well-meaningly want to pull me into the middle of the fray, to give me gifts and then feel hurt when I don't give them one in return, or invite me to thanksgiving to witness the fireworks of their family. They don't understand that I simply opt out. Truly out. Just say no.

Because what I feel to opt into during this flow of season is hanging with my tribe, my fuzzy band of tricksters, my pod of snugglers, my weaselly brethren. Because we really, truly, just want to hang out in bed, explore the rich possibilities of impossible snuggling positions only found in an apartment heated to 63 degrees, by three cats, one human, and a pile of blankets and pillows, maybe get up and have a little protein, then hit the snuggle caves again, and laugh and purr and maybe bite a couple heads.

To me, the holiday season means time and space and freedom to chill. I'm not lonely. I don't get lonely. I don't need for any of the humans in my living to prove their love to me through stuff on a certain day of the year. I don't need to be part of a group of humans and share a specific meal to feel connected to my tribe. And I know that the folks who love me have gotten used to me opting out in this way, and hopefully feel some relief that I'm one less loved one they have to stress out over and pour energy to. 

And as for gifts and shared meals, when they occur, it is so very sweet. I received an email the other day from Black Phoenix Alchemy Lab and I ordered a couple of bottles for myself of the limited edition scents they concocted for their birthday. And then saw an image in my mind's eye of the lovely Kelly and so ordered a bottle for her. Or when she gets the urge, she sends me jars of her fantastic homemade pickles, or hilarious stuff off etsy that is so me, like a cell phone case made of felt with a crow embossed on it.

Or my sister, and how we get together and share a meal and have a few laughs, usually around rednecks or poop or how crazy we all are. Or she does as she's done for several years now, and gives me enormous bags and bags and bags of designer clothing, passed on by the wealthy women-who-hobby-shop whose homes she cleans. Or I give her the gift of a half dozen hours over a week of talking with her on phone, when I seriously, seriously hate talking on the phone if it isn't work related, but she's going through something, and I listen to her, huge smart phone mashed all up in my ear. Or herbs she's been thinking of trying but hasn't made the jump with, or some weird granolahead food she's tried at my house and actually liked and so I get her the special vinegar, or vanilla almond milk, or dandelion leaves so she can make green smoothies.

But the truth of the holidays for me is being with my fuzzy guys, having the space and time and freedom to just hang out together for long stretches of days. Of looking deep and long into the magic that is Baby Malcolm's chocolate lips. Of inhaling the hay and sun scent of Baby Wallace's fiery fur and have him sniff me back while purring the sonic rumble of heavy breathing that shows his weaselly ecstasy. Of spending an hour in the dawn light, drifting in and out of sleep, Emmaline doing as she's done since she was a four-month old kitten, laying directly on top of my face like a balaklava, paws wrapped around my neck, leaving me a single nostril to myself with which to happily take in air. Of jumping back into bed after turning the heat up a bit and having Baby Wallace settle onto the top of my head like a toasty toque, complete with paw-shaped earmuffs. Of dancing in my living room, having Malcolm squeeeek so that I pick his 19lbs. of love up and he crawls up out of my arms and onto my right shoulder, riding it like a carousel pony as I dip and twirl and shake my bootay. Of laying on the living room floor with a big plate of thanksgiving takeout, joyfully joining in the slurps, prrps, and arwarwarw that is the fang-toothy consumption of ham and turkey and sugary dessert cream topping. 

So the real reveal is that I love the holidays, so look forward to the love and joy and giving that is life with my core tribe, so enjoy the sharing of food and love and Yes. I give the gift of toasty and foodies and Yes. They give the gift toasty and their Themness and Yes. And Life is good . . .

I just want folks to go off and do their holiday thing and leave me and the fuzzballs to do ours. Not to give me pity eyes when they hear that I'm spending the holidays with the kitties, or to do their best to try and talk me into thanksgiving at their house with their family and the in-laws or with a group of single people who have nowhere else to go. Maybe this year I can answer that yes, it was a lovely holiday spent with my loved ones, and they'll leave it at that and just smile.

I'm good: I'm with my family. I have someplace to be: in the center of a kitty purr-rumbly pile-on snack-fest.

So happy thanksgiving, ya'll, from the center of the Yes that is my living, to the center of Yes that is yours . . .

 

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Dammed

(and because they haven't said howdy to you folks in a while, gratuitous weasel pics at the end of this post!)

I had an epiphany on the acupuncturist's table Friday afternoon that writing is what this being has used and still needs to keep flow occurring in heart and mind, saw so utterly clearly that in this personality, writing is medicinal, and that without it, the sh*t, the waste, the No tends to build up inside, creating blockages - much like an unwashed cut is more likely to become infected.

And continuing with that metaphor, what's really occurring is an overhaul of the immune system than powers this body-mind-heart. Instead of turning to pharmaceuticals to create a sensation of health, the focus has been moved to diet, exercise, content of actions and duties that make up the daily life.

Okay, it's not just metaphor, that's what's really happening. Instead of energy being spent on formulating a career - public health, holistic or otherwise - or maintaining a blog based on keeping readers engaged, or maintaining relationships to cultivate friendships or soulmates or mentors or mentees - energy is building up inside, not in height, but in depth. Energy that normally would be extending outward to keep all sorts of life components going, is being used to clear the decks of No down to the wood grain. 

And yet there is no more big push of burning, no more dramatic Torch This Muthaf*cker to The Ground. None of it matters. Whatever. And yet if presented with the choice between more pain or less pain, I choose less pain. And yet when I see an opportunity to choose more pain that leads to less pain in a fraction of the time, I'm still taking it, much like during the time of big torching. 

Like acupuncture. Really good, authentic acupuncture. The kind that hurts in a way that causes shrieking, deep inside the body and mind. Especially when combined with Tui Na, which is a kind of oriental/chinese medicine massage which is not unlike having muscle fiber and fascia ripped apart, which is probably not far off from what actually happens. The day after treatment, there are real bruises, and it hurts to touch even the skin, like after a car accident, or a bad beating.

And yet, the healing occurring in body and mind in its wake is astounding. Yoga hurts, too. And between the two - acupuncture and yoga - my body is becoming free again. 

I'm still fat. Still in pain. But where this body is is light years from where it was even six months ago. And there is a spaciousness in the mind that allows even thorny predicaments to fall away like a sigh. 

How do you free yourself? It really is about just saying no to drama. That's such a buzzword - drama. But it is a real symptom of western living. And you really can opt out of it. How do you opt out? Just say no.

Why don't you just say no to drama? Is it because there is some belief inside of you that says you're suppose to deal with it, or accept it, or not walk away, or that you have to because it's a boss or neighbor or child or mate or friend, and this is how a good person is with these sorts of people?

Why do you have to not walk away from these people, either as a one-way walk away or simply a walk-away in the moment? Is it because you believe these people give you, provide you with something - a physical or emotional or mental resource - that you can't live without?

But is this true? Do you really need what they offer, or is that you keep waiting for them to cough up their end of the bargain but they never do, or never to the degree they've promised or you expected? Or is the resource just another one of western culture's shell games, delusions? Like 99% of Face*book or country clubs or hobbies or the "food" in grocery stores or the "medicine" doled out in doctor's offices?

And what is walking away? It's genuinely saying adios mutherf*cker, sure, but at its simplest it's saying No Thank You, and watching as the other person finally, finally understands that they won't be receiving what they're demanding, and they get bored or peeved or whatever and they wander off to find someone else, someone who wants to do the drama dance in the same twitchy, frenetic, howling way they want to, too. Or in stilettos, or with this season's fashions, or in full face makeup, or while chanting the right tone of Om.

And does this mean that we have to be selfish assholes who refuse to help anyone else? Or does it mean that, in the moment, we have to listen to the energy, and then follow what it says, be it move closer or move away, regardless of what mores or rules or shoulds are squeezing our minds and hearts? 

Can you see the commonality, the through-line in this post? Can you hold the seeming dichotomy up to the light of your brilliant beam of discernment and see the truth in that ray of Yes?

Can you see how it changes your living forever? Can you see it's the only tool of enlightenment you really need? Can you see how this world would utterly transform if we all just started walking away from the buttheads, just collectively said No Thanks?

You want to change the world? Then do it in a way that you absolutely can do today, most likely in the next few minutes. Just say No Thanks to a butthead. Just opt out of someone's screeching drama. Just take a deep breath and allow yourself to put down that action you're pushing yourself to engage in because you think you should, or because you're afraid you'll miss out on something.

Absolutely do what Life is beaming Yes at you around. Push through the pain if you know it's about breaking through scar tissue. But seriously, it really is okay to just say no to a bad time.

How do you tell the difference? I have great faith in you. You'll figure it out . . . 

Wave Riders

Back in January I applied for the perfect public health job for me. A fellowship - so they'd be teaching and training me. An amazing project on a cutting edge aspect of health care reform. With a top notch non-profit with a 15+ year proven track record. Flex time for working hours. 1/2 hour free during work hours each day to exercise. Healthy stipend hiring range. 

I got an interview, and as they're in Chapel Hill, they humanely let me do it on the phone. I was really sick that day, but took some of those decongestants they make meth from and was able to breathe and think so did okay. I got a second interview, this time with the CEO, and again they humanely let me do it over the phone. This time I'd had a killer day in Hiveworld, and with the phone interview at 4pm, I drank a big mug of green tea beforehand, which made me a little manic, but again, I did okay. They narrowed it down to three candidates. For the third and final interview, they asked me to come in person. 

The week before, my boss in Cubicleland asked me to apply for a permanent position with them. The interview time of course was scheduled for the same day. I talked to my boss, and this is what a genuine prince he is: he let me take the day off to drive to Chapel Hill, and allowed me to interview for Cubicleland the day before.

After the Cubicleland interview, my boss called me into his office and said he hoped the Chapel Hill job went terribly and we had a good laugh. Then he said: seriously, there is opportunity for you here, in a couple of years, you'll be in management and in a great career for yourself. I thanked him, genuinely thanked him for all he's done for me, and told him I'd keep it all in mind.

I drove up to Chapel Hill, taking a half tab of a beta blocker my doc had prescribed so that I wouldn't have to manage that god-awful heart pounding that kicks in in interviews for me. (I used to be queen of the interviews, but now that I hate talking about myself, interviews are murderous :) And it worked. I met for a group interview with four people, plus another staff member teleconferenced in. They started out pretty guarded, but by the end we were laughing and making jokes and sharing inside comments about feng shui. They rocked the casbah. I actually had a good time at an interview, and was able to tell them and show them what I genuinely had to offer them, let them see what I'm genuinely like to work with.

The following Friday I got a job offer from Cubicleland. And on Monday, the non-profit. As crazy as this sounds, I told them both I needed to think about it. Because on Thursday, Jacinta got sick. (I didn't tell any of them what was going on, just that I needed some time)

I had a feeling I'd get the public health job too, but on Friday I made the decision to accept the Cubicleland job, because a move would be too hard on Jacinta. I looked at my sweet sister and got: f*ck the perfect job, let's get you healed.

But on Saturday, I faced how sick she was, and looked at the big picture. Not just what I wanted in the moment. But all of it. My life, the lives of the kittens, and Jacinta. After her treatments and tests, I was down to $2000. That's it. After that, if my car broke down or Baby Wallace's virus flared up again, we were toast. And accepting the public health job was out of the question, because there'd be no money for the move.

And it wasn't that I didn't want to go into debt for Jacinta, it's that what I had left wouldn't be enough. The next round of tests and treatments they wanted to do - another ultrasound $375, a feeding tube $600, tests and treatments for her lungs - would have used most of what funds were left. And if those three things didn't work, we'd be done. Not just Jacinta, but all of us.

And so in the early morning of Saturday, tears streaming down my face, I asked the vet: should I do it? Will it likely cure her? And she said that the other two vets she'd consulted with said that a case of pancreatitis this acute didn't bode well, at all, and since the treatments so far weren't working, at all, there was most likely an underlying condition like Cushings or heart disease, which would mean a whole new area for tests and treatments, which at that point, we wouldn't have the money for.

And then I looked at my friend, my sweet sister, and saw she was dying, she had been for days, and in that moment I saw the way through. I didn't like it. But I didn't grab ahold of her and cling for dear life like I had with Grandma, or The Hoon. Instead, I let the whole of the situation flow through me, let the truth of all of it, wash through me, inform my heart and brain and limbs. 

In that moment, I felt an adulthood I'd never experienced before. An ability to truly see my own living in the light of What Was Really Going on. I could see through Hope to the Truth that lay beyond it. For a flash of a moment, I was a warrior on a battlefield, and I saw that this was a battle that was lost. I could stay on the battlefield with my dying friend, and die with her, or I could help her die by my hand, not at the hand of the compassionless enemies coming for her, collapsing lungs and heart, or what Wallace, Emmaline, Malcolm, and I would face without resources.

I had them leave us alone in the room for a while, and talked to her, held her, her body just the week before sturdy and solid, now as light as a feather. Then I let go, and I helped her let go too. And I helped give her as peaceful a death as I could.

And of course, my mind has gone over and over and over everything. It wants to punish me, for the choice I made, because Jacinta is no longer here, and that is unacceptable to the mind. Someone is to blame, and because I took full responsibility for everything, because I only sought council from the vet, and only briefly, making the decision completely on my own, it knows I'm to blame.

If I would have had $5000, I probably would have tried. But I always empty back out at the knowing I had in that moment, the knowing I still have, that it wouldn't have mattered. It was the end of her life. With money we could have prolonged her living, but the quality was declining and would have steadily gotten worse.

And at some point during this week as I've been talking to her, wherever she is, I said that I hoped when it's my time, there's someone with me who will help me end my life peacefully, and that I die in their arms, knowing how much they love me. And I mean it. I hope that my own death will have the meaning in someone else's Waking Up, that hers has had in mine. Because the love that moved between us helped me grow up. 

It doesn't mean I'm off the hook. I know that I'll carry that in my heart and mind for the rest of my life. I took the life of my sister. Just as I took the life of my brother. That's how it is in this world. Death comes for all of us, and sometimes it comes with pain and suffering. But it doesn't have to. But the price? You have to be grown up enough to pay the price. 

And so Saturday I took her life. And Sunday the kitties and I were surrounded by a profound sense of relief, of love, of Yes. On Monday, the public health job offer came through. On Tuesday morning I picked up Jacinta's ashes, along with a small mold they'd made of her front right paw. On Tuesday afternoon, I accepted the public health job. And yesterday, I drove up to Chapel Hill and found the perfect apartment right outside of Carrboro, and signed the lease, with for the first time, all the kitties' names on it as well. (Can you imagine a place more perfect than one with a landlord who wanted the kitties' names on the lease because they're tenants too?)

I don't write much these days for so many reasons, but mostly it's because I usually don't know how to write about what I'm going through. It doesn't show up as Waking Up, but I'm pretty sure it is. It's about healing the life, about letting go into what Life wants, while at the same time, opening the arms and heart to what I want, what I feel is true for me. It's about holding the possibility, the hope, the opening, while at the same time holding the rejection, the ending, the closing at the same time. The experience is like walking a tightrope, a razor's edge, because you can't fall to either side. Or suppress emotion as it rises, nor hang on to it when it does. 

It doesn't sound like much of a big deal: to hold Death while simultaneously living Life. But it's huge. It changes everything. 

And there has been an enormous shift in my psychic and shamanic abilities. I've been able to use them for clients for years. But for myself? Not so much. Truthfully? Hardly at all. That's changing. And it's wild to watch.

I knew I only needed to set up the one apartment viewing, but I didn't know why. Was it perfect and I wouldn't need to look anymore? Will the public health job offer be rescinded and the landlord is so nice he'll tear up the deposit check and lease? When I got lost twice looking for the apartment, and then the landlord's home to sign the lease, I began to tone and chant, connecting to guides and animals exactly as I do when in session with clients. Driving down interstate 40, I did a healing session on myself. And I turned it over to that power I feel that's greater than myself (just like I do when with clients, so that the energy can pour through me, into them, but now it can flow into me, too). I didn't pray for the details of the How, only the result of the Yes: my ability to see what the real deal is, and then the courage to act on it, to do what needs to be done, whether it's say No Thank You, or sign on the dotted line.

And I don't know what's going to happen. I only know I'm following the same psychic and shamanic info I've been giving clients for years. Something in me finally acknowledging that I'm worthy of it.

So even posting is a tightrope act. Needing to write, to place story around what's unfolding, maybe to continue to leave breadcrumbs. But also protecting this process that I'm in, that I'm going through, from the bozos who do that to folks who are in the tender shoot rising from the earth and reaching for the sun phase of Waking Up. 

I'm so grateful for you folks out there who love and send me and Malcolm and Emmaline and Baby Wallace well wishes. For you gentle folks who somehow manage to transcend distance, your love traveling down the wifi and into our hearts and minds.

Much love to you too. We send you love and well wishes too. Keep to your course, burrowing inward. Keep trusting your life process. Keep living in motion the knowing that Life is unfolding your own Waking Up through the circumstances of your daily living. 

Know that you are loved. Always. All ways . . . 

Sunday Morning With Furry Babies

Sweet Jacinta

This post is disjointed. Maybe I shouldn't press publish, but I get that I need to write it. Because I need to deal with my grief somehow, and this is all I know to do in this moment.

Like with The Hoon, I've known for months she was going to go. Even as I understood that taking her to the vet wouldn't do anything, wouldn't stop what was coming. But feeling it coming helped me be clear in loving her. Even though before then, for the past few years, I've been loving her like every day would be our last.

That sweet weasel was so loved. And she loved me so deeply, so hilariously and with so much slobber. Kittens are loving, but Jacinta and I had a long time love. 12 years. We knew each other's stuffs. I'll love her for the rest of my life. And if there is something after this, I'll be loving her in that space too.

But of course the past few days, with all I have going on right now, I've been distracted, and when she called to me on Wednesday early morning, when I was sitting here at this computer checking emails or surfing or something equally as inane, I remember kind of brushing her off.

Thursday morning she didn't eat. Thursday night when I got home, she still wouldn't eat, so I called the vet for an appt the next morning. By 8pm though  she was in bad shape. Throwing up bile. In terrible pain. 

1:30 am and $475 at the emergency clinic later, they ruled out liver and kidneys. 9am the next morning and $610 at the vet's they ruled out a cancerous mass, and diagnosed a mild to moderate case of pancreatitis. Almost tapped out for money, they loaded me up with DIY supplies - a hanging bag for sub-q fluids, syringes for pain and nausea meds, and for feeding. They kept her for the day to dole out professional love, attention and meds, and I picked her up after work, took her home.

But she only got worse with every passing hour. By 2am she was crying in pain, and I gave her pain meds, all the pain meds, all five doses for the weekend all at once. It helped. But her breathing grew labored.

By 4am I knew what the deal was. Actually, by the time I set up the first vet visit, before the emergency clinic, I knew. But you have to go through all the steps, right? 

The worst thing would be for her to die in pain, even if it was at home in bed with me, or god help us, by the side of the road like with Cassidy. The second worse thing would be for her to die in that godawful emergency clinic. So I kept a vigil. An all night vigil by the light of the full moon. Watching her breathe. Doing energywork. Speaking sweet words to her. I didn't talk much. Because I finally, for the first time in this life, understood that love doesn't need to be spoken aloud. But I know hearing the tone of it always made her purr, so I when she was in the worst waves of pain, I spoke to her in that language I always spoke to her in, and through her pain she could recognize.

If things got too painful, we'd go to the emergency clinic. If not, we'd hold out til the vet opened in the morning.

I watched the clock go 4. 4:20. 4;45. 5. On and on until we made it til 6:30.

We got to the vet's by 7am. They let us in at 7:45. 

Lungs filling with fluid. Maybe a heart issue. Maybe the pancreatitis was secondary to something else. Maybe Cushings. Maybe there was cancer that wasn't caught by the first tests. But it all requires tests, procedures, money. Lots of it. But would it even help? Would it make her well?

I just realized one of the things that has been so painful about the past couple of days is how I kept trying to distract myself from the fact that she was dying. Is that what I'm doing now? Trying to distract myself from the fact that she's dead? Or am I facing it more clearly by this writing?

But I do what I know to do. So I do this.

I had five appointments with holistic clients today. I cancelled them all, for folks to reschedule for tomorrow or next weekend. The old me would have muscled through them. Let my heart be all raw and ripped open and mythic. But this person I'm becoming understands that there is no need for heroics. I'm grieving. My sister died this morning. 

Then my mind, the cold, evil part of it says I'm a heartless bitch to kill my friend because it costs too much to keep her alive. I let it pierce my heart, because there's truth in that. I have about $2000 left in credit and cash. I know it wouldn't have been enough. I know the most any of this would have bought is a year or two. Maybe. Maybe only days. Or ten days, like with The Hoon. But I weighed all the possibilities, of having three other kitties to care for, a possible move for a new job in a few weeks, the insane debt load I already carry from school, from the first year out of school before I began making money again.

I told the vet point blank: no heroics. If you feel strongly, let's do it, but I don't want to keep throwing things at her, torturing her like she was last night. No more pain for her, no more suffering. We need to do the right thing. And she said doing the kind thing would be to let go. And even though I knew I didn't need her permission, or her approval, it helps me now, in this moment, when the evil part of my mind rises again.

And then my mind remembers last night, the pain, the suffering of my friend. And I'm so grateful I had the courage to tell the vet No More. And the vet said it's the kindest thing. And in the moment I felt an adulthood I hadn't before. Not out of my mind crying. Crying yes, but focused, clear thinking. 

While the vet prepared things, I talked to Jacinta. Just saying all the things I've always said to her, the same phrases over and over the years, the things I'd sing. She purred. And gave me the love look, the first time since before she got sick. In those moments, I felt her understand what I was doing, and feel relief with it. She could feel me loving her, loving her like I always did. Keeping her safe. Protected. 

Even if I couldn't protect her from death, I could protect her from pain. I could help her have a peaceful death. 

And so they gave her a sedative. Then took her in the back to get the iv port in place. Then came out and placed her in my arms, and let us be together for a while. I waited til she and I were ready, then when someone came in, very gently, to check, I nodded. The syringe emptied, and a few moments later, she flinched just a bit, then her heart stopped. 8:32. 

I stayed with her until her body began to lose warmth and I could feel she was gone. I smelled her fur one last time. Kissed her sweet head. Then handed her over to be cremated.

The vet computers went down. Estimated bill $500 more. They say I can pay it when I pick up her ashes.

It'd be easy to post this without talkinbg about the money. But of course this is also about money. About money, love, adulthood, courage, willingness, gratefulness, broken heartedness.

Driving home in the impossibly bright Carolina sunshine. Then to deal with urine and vomit soaked sheets, blankets, rugs. Clothes covered in urine and drool. In the wash. Needed to clean out the parts of her that were only about the last two days. Although a part of my mind inhales the scents, and yearns, because all it knows is this: this is Jacinta.

Malcolm and Emmaline and Baby Wallace, all so extra kind the past two days. To me. To Jacinta. They keep coming and laying on me, giving me love looks. Emmaline came twice last night to keep vigil with us, not scared away by the sound of Jacinta's pain and labored breathing. Baby Wallace keeps checking in on me, squeeking and sending me love. Malcolm is in my lap right now, purring, purring.

Outside my window, birds and trees. The sun feels obscene. But then I remember how much Jacinta loved the sun. And I feel how the sun and Jacinta will always be intertwined in my heart and mind.

I'm the only one left now of my tribe of the Hacienda of Ckats. We were about healing and chasing adventures and being bold and snuggling and snacking and watching tv and being a good family to one another. Brother Calhoon. Grandma Booty. Sister Jacinta. Now just me.

I have a new tribe. Yet we're not sure what our deal is yet. More shall be revealed. We're a young family.

Jacinta.

Can't take it back. She's gone.

I miss her.

I love her.

Baby in the sun, 2005:

 

Baby In The Sun, one last time, taken yesterday evening right after I brought her home, 3/18/11:

 

Hearth Tribe

I did three sessions yesterday. For the phone sessions, Emmaline and Jacinta hung out with me on the couch. As I talked with the folks, I held my face up to the sunlight streaming in through the open windows. Ever so often, one of the sweet kitties would nuzzle me, roll over so I could rub the talisman of Yes that is their silky belly fur, or they'd lick my fingers, reminding me I'm here, in my physical body, even as I traveled all over the place in my mind and heart and energybody as I read energy for the nice peoples. 

For the in-person session, it's someone Malcolm is madly in love with. When she visits, he always comes out and gets right up in her face, peering into her eyes with the most innocent expression of wonder. And when we do the energywork and she's laying on the table, he hops up and lays on her chest or belly. Yesterday, though, it was Emmaline who purred her Yes into the client's second chakra. And as I did the energywork, Emmaline would open her eyes, make that soundless small squeak of 'Yes' that is more of a flutter of her tiny lips, give me the sparkly love eyes look, and go back to blissful purring into the chakra.

I woke up this morning right before dawn. Because I turn the heat down to 60 at night, it's chilly. This morning, snuggled under kitties and covers, I felt toasty, except for my neck. No sooner than I had the thought, I felt a kitty rise up, walk delicately amongst the others, and maneuver back and forth for a moment before settling in at the most perfect angle around my neck and head. Furry and warm against my bare skin, nestled in my hair. Perfect. Sweet Emmaline . . .

I finally woke for good around 8 am, which is sleeping in super super late for me, but there was no push to get up. Instead I just lay there, all relaxed as one by one the kitties came around, doing their morning thing: 

Jacinta was purring, the loudest purr in our land. She purrs like a trucker, like a feline Harley Davidson, like ocean waves pounding the sand. She crawled over to tuck herself under my right armpit, where she nursed the cotton of my sleepwear as she has her entire life, since she came to live with me when she was an undernourished 6-month old. I'm used to the wet patch her sweet slobber will leave on the sleeve. I don't mind. I smooched her big ole head again and again. And the sound of trucker purrs filled the room.

Baby Wallace was staring out the window at the wee morning activities of things feathered or bushy tailed. But when he heard me stir, he waited til Jacinta had found a good groove, then walked right over to do his morning inspection of my breath. Deep, long sniffs of inquiry. He always squeaks, a single high pitched note that only Baby Wallace can make, (I'm never sure if it's alarm or feline for "a-ok"), then alternately lifts and bows his head so I can more easily rub his beautiful fiery puma face, run my fingers along his spine for a little massage, lightly stroke the enormous silken triangular amphitheaters that are his ears. This morning we did all this in slow-mo, til he felt satiated and wandered back to the window.

Emmaline then climbed me like I was a small hillock. She settled on the summit of my chest, peering into my eyes, silently giving me love looks. I rubbed her back and stroked her tiny face, telling her what a good girl she is, how beautiful, so sweet, so very sweet, "yes, yes, yes . . ." I say over and over.

Baby Malcolm, the tabby-stripey behemoth that he has grown into, circled around in and between the others. Most mornings he dives right into the preliminaries of Food Bowl Dominance Order, chasing kitties back and forth around the bed, then remembers that I give good rubbinz, comes for a scratch, then goes fuzzily postal on Baby Wallace, who goes postal right back, all paw smacks and head bites. But this morning, Malcolm was calm, sweet, chill. He tucked up on my left side, small snores and an occasional long squeak that sounded like "ahhhhhhhhhh". He knows when I finally settle in at the computer to answer emails, he'll claim my lap as his toasty chaise lounge. He can be coolio. Because the vibe is mellow, and food and more snuggles are most definitely on his horizon . . .  

I'm with my tribe. We sleep together, eat together. We watch tv together, stare out the window at the wind and birds and sky together. We do healing sessions for the nice peoples together.

If you would have asked me ten years ago if this would be enough, this life with kitties would be enough, I would have laughed. But Life has a way of knowing exactly what we need. I'm so taken care of. I'm so loved.

I'm so grateful for the days and hours and minutes, every second I have with my fuzzy tribe. And Life, if you grant us more, we humbly thank you, and offer up our Yes to you, to continue to use as you see fit . . . 

Thank you Life, for this morning, of fuzzy love and snuggles, of toasty warmth, and squeaky Yes . . . 

Thank you for our lives . . . 

Blurry

I'm in bed by 8:30 or 9 pm each night, asleep within 15 minutes or so thanks to melatonin. But not last night. Last night I saw midnight come and go.

I've had this very thing happen in much the same way several times in the past year or so. I lay in bed, eyes wide open, staring out into the night time sky, the stars and moon blurry without my glasses. My mind whirls. Not in a frenzy, but in a clicking, calculated sort of way, going through all of the very practical things that would need to occur - either to do them or have Life do them for me - and the order they'd happen in for my living to shut down, for the story of Katherine to stop.

Each time I reach the same end point: it would all just start up again. In other words, whatever fuels this human continues to fuel, and until that gets dealt with, or Life deals with it, it'll continue to pump out story.

Sure, I listen to it less. I'm much less involved in the story of my life. Every day I watch dispassionately as another things is lobbed off, or falls off. There are things I still holler about, but it doesn't last long. Because I keep remembering that it isn't important, that nothing is important.

And last night, after I reached the same old endpoint, the same old realization, my eyes clunked shut, and with my nose buried in the belly of Emmaline's fur, I was instantaneously in snoozeland.

Maybe I write, maybe I don't. Maybe I drop this life and wander off, maybe I don't. Who knows? Who cares?

Weaselville Idol

Baby Wallace has decided he wants to be a pop star. How can I deny Baby Wallace anything he wants?

Here he practices for his audition doing his take on "Pretty In Pink", that delightful Psychedelic Furs hit from the 80s:

Emmaline joins in as his backup singer, although Baby Wallace has stated firmly that she will not be allowed to accompany him into the audition room. Emmaline says we'll see about that, Mr. Pinkypants.

And then The Call of The Nap overtakes her and she's out, snoozing and dreaming of feline fame where canine assisstants bring her feathered snacks in bed and she tells the paparazzi: Talk To The Paw. 

Jacinta says: f*cking kids and their f*cking noise. You little bastids and yer caterwauling make me wanna . . . zzzzz.

 . . . f*cking kids . . .  zzzzz . . .  gimme snack . . . zzzz . . . drool . . . twitch . . .  

Malcolm says: Who needs fame when you got all this lovinz so much lovinz and dinner is so purrdeliciouso?

 

Luscious Fiery Weaseliness

I thought all my pics and vid from when they were babies were lost in the harddrive crash a year or so ago, but look what I just found in my typepad blog archives:

Wow, that is one flicky tail! 

Addicted to Lactobacillus

Emmaline is just wild about keeping her intestinal flora and fauna partying with happy friendly microbial friends:

 

If you took me out for a frozen margarita, with salt, and fresh lime, this is what my face would look like too:

Yogurt should come margarita flavored. Though Emmaline is still holding out for tuna. To each his own.  

Emmaline & The Gorgeous Chicken Leg

In leui of a proper post, I give you . . . Love:

 

It Ain't Easy Being Weaselly

Baby Wallace, interrupted in the middle of morning ablutions says: A Little Privacy Please! To which I reply, dude, this is payback for all those times you stare at me while I'm in the middle of mine. Seriously, Baby Wallace, you watch me brush my teeth or take a wee and the look on your face is simply . . . haunted. Why, Baby Wallace? Why???

 This is Baby Wallace's pirate impression. He's only interested in the seafaring life for the tuna. And the rum.

Aaaargh, matey. Where's the grog?

 

 Jacinta just wants to know why the hell I brought in all these kittens and their head biting and paw smacking and food stealing and the poops, oh my god the poops.

 

Baby Emmaline and Dastardly Malcolm,  so busted. (interrupted in the middle of one of their clandestine meetings about various snuggle & head lock techniques, the pros and cons of eating furniture, and whether or not to begin Tiny Weasel Revolution for World Dominance today or tomorrow or maybe later on this week if they keep getting access to plain whole milk organic yogurt. And cheese. Cheese figures prominantly in Tiny Weasel Revolution for World Dominance.)

 

 Dastardly Malcolm, when his dastardly has caught up with him.

 

 Baby Wallace says: those damm kittens work my last nerve . . .

 

 Emmaline, a cautionary tale on the effects of getting high . . .

It ain't easy being weaselly . . . but obviously these are pros . . .

Essentials: Stevia & the Sweet Fang

By now, everybody's heard about stevia.  Genuinely natural sweetener made from a South American herb. Super low glycemic index. Actually helps with pancreas function. The total opposite of those weird chemical sweetners sure to cause cancer in American lab rats like you and me. You can even buy stevia now in most grocery stores. But as with all once truly healthy foods/supplements/herbs that have gone mainstream, you now have to read the fine print to make sure you're not buying something "natural" instead of healthy.

Allow me and my attractive model, Emmaline, to walk you through the world of current marketplace stevia, and how to navigate it, how to recognize the faux, the pretenders, much like you did when Lay*s potato chips came out with "organic" chips and you knew something very, very unhealthy and bullsh*itty was awry . . .

I'm a big fan of the "SweetLeaf" brand. In part because it's the brand I've been using for ~fifteen years, but mostly because their stevia is pure, clean, no weird stuff added. And seriously, although I'm sure other brands are out there that are clean, I haven't found them yet, and let me tell you: a lot of very weird stuff is being added to stevia these days.

One of the common issues folks have with stevia is that it can taste bitter. The reason for this is that stevia's "sweet" is so concentrated that you only need a very tiny amount, and unless you have one of those itty bitty 1/8 teaspoon scoops, at least in the beginning, you're going to use too much and it'll taste bitter. To help combat this, stevia manufacturers added various "fillers" to both smooth out the taste, and bulk the product up to make it harder to overuse. The more clueless and/or unscrupulous ones added things like maltodextrin (sugar) or maltitol (chemical sugar substitute that will cause your colon to do the hula, and yeah, not really what you're looking for with your iced tea). But SweetLeaf makes their powder using inulin soluble fiber made from chicory and various veg/fruits, which is the best of both worlds.

The powder is good for cooking with, and for adding to hot drinks. It doesn't mix that well with cold drinks, unless you add it very slowly and stir as you go. The plain liquid stevia works well with hot or cold, though again you're back to dealing with the super concentrated issue.

But my very favorite part about SweetLeaf are the flavors. Above, Emmaline gets all up in the Chocolate flavored liquid, which is ridiculously yummy with coffee, tea, added to plain whole milk yogurt and berries and bananas and melon. Yum. Oh yeah yum.

And here Baby Emmaline gets all licky with the vanilla flavored. I use the fruit flavored ones, like Orange, Grape, and Lemon in the summer, to turn plain water or soda water into a "soda". And okay, I'll tell you my secret: it's what I use to make my Tequila Weasels.

My main issue is that my system is so hair-trigger that sugar/high fructose corn syrup/cane syrup causes my blood sugar to raise, my heart to pound, with a rather unphun energy crash on the other side. It's not such a big deal at night, but during the day it's like a 3pm slump for hours on end. And the artifical sweeteners like splenda and aspertame are of course pure poison. So for me, I cart stevia packets around, smuggle a club soda mixed with grape stevia into the movies, etc.

And dude, I am so going to order the Hazelnut, and the Cinnamon. And they have toffee and peppermint and root beer but really, I'm too tired to add one more dang link. This whole info thing is so more work than just plain old kvetching . . . But chocolate and vanilla stevia? Seriously worth passing on the yum . . .

Saturday Prrp

Good morning . . .

 

Welcome to your weekend . . .

Slip N Slide Weasel Style

The bathroom rug, in its happy home.

The bathroom rug, after kitties have played slip n slide on it, which they do every single freakin day. I spend half my waking hours unclumping the rugs.

The kitchen, in all it's lovely be-rugged glory.

The kitchen, when I return from work after a long day slaving at the cubicle farm.

Yes, the weasels, caught in the act, their eyes aglow with: yo, don't harsh my mellow, either climb on a rug for a ride or get us another snack, Katmama. Otherwise, talk to the paw cuz the pointy swivel ears ain't hearing ya.

Or I shall attack your feet, Katmama! <<gripping, gnawing, insertion of tiny fangs thru thin socks>> Argh! Arghhhhhhhhh! Arghghghghghghghghghghg!!!
 
  
Different day. Same hijinks. I've learned that getting up in the middle of the night can be trecherous, little rug mines scattered all over and whatnot.

And the clothes drying rack? That ain't no stinkin' drying rack. It's a pitching range for feline paws. Those are not socks. They are potential feline fastballs.

Does this capture the majesty that preceded this pic? I think not. Best to picture two tabby felines swirling around in the sink like silky vermin, and then Katmama turns on the tap. Look at those paws fly!

Not really. I didn't turn the tap on them. See the bowl on the right? That's their water bowl. Dastardly Malcolm likes to pretend he's Mark Twain on the Mississippi and his paws are a paddleboat. Why is their water bowl here and not with their food bowls? Because they don't want it there. They want it here. How do I know?

Because I am the Katmama. I know these things. And I am here to serve . . .  

 

Moods and Fur

I woke up yesterday morning feeling so incredibly sad. No particular reason. Just a deep sense of gloom and even a bit of doom tossed in. I reached out to touch Emmaline and she got up and walked away. Baby Wallace moved away from my hand when I went to pet him. I raised my head and looked at the four cats, watching me from different areas of the bed in dispassionate feline Whatever. The saddness expanded.

"I don't ask a lot from you guys," I said to them in the pre-dawn light, "but some days I just really need to touch you, okay?"

They all looked at me, unblinking. Then Emmaline did her high-pitched tiny little squeak, walked over, and tucked her head under my hand. I snuggled into her, rubbed the silvery crunch of fur along her spine. Baby Wallace walked over from the side of the bed, leaned in, and took two long sniffs of my face, staring into my eyes, his eyes softening into the Kitty Love Twinkle as I lightly scratched him under the chin.

And then we got up, and the day began.

This morning I woke up to the rain, kitties scattered here and there on the mattress, and felt cheerful. Go figure.

Live From Thursday Morning

My camera died a couple of weeks ago. Served me well for six years and then, as you may have noticed, the focus just went myopic, as elderly viewing devices are wont to do. My new camera has video. Maybe not the best, but a good place to start. Because why not? You deserve to see the weaselly wonders that are Baby Wallace, Granny Thug, Dastardly Malcolm, and Emmaline, our resident tank-flower hybrid. 

It's unedited (still need to learn imovie :) The lighting blows. The camera movement is shaky. But it's weasels! And that's just so dang cute. 

My first attempt at posting video. Enjoy. . . 

Weaselville, Live From Thursday Morning . . . from Katherine Turner on Vimeo.

Photographic Evidence of A Successful Mental Health Day

 

Dastardly Malcolm

Malcolm is dastardly:

  

You can tell this is true by the fierce, faintly feral look in his eye.
  

So very dastardly.
    

And with his big ole fangs latching onto everything he can get their pointy tips into. . . 
  

He chews his way through the household. Seriously.
    

The covering over the tv.
  

The back of a couch.
  

The clothes drying rack.
  

The 4ftx7ft rug i spent a year crocheting that is now utterly, totally swiss cheesed.
  

This one, though, made me wonder if he'd weren't trying to self-medicate some buried trauma from his kittenhood. Perhaps his bung wasn't washed enough in his formative weeks? Perhaps he needs a soul retrieval? (if you live with kitties you are at least smiling right now; if you don't you most likely really, really wish i'd stop posting about kitty bungs.)
  

Malcolm likes to chew on animate objects as well. And he gets as good as he gives. Malcolm has no issues with his masculinity. He doesn't believe in passive aggressive.
  

He likes to turn the bathroom sink into a water park. "Party in the bathroom in 5!" he's been known to holler as he herds the other cats into yet more hijinks. He's in charge of all A-Level Hijinks in our home.
  

But he isn't just dastardly. He's not just a fighter. He's a napper, too, as you can see by the many hours spent chilling in his hammock aka the clothes drying rack that he's learned to scale like a freakin tabby colored monkey swinging up the monkey bars. (You think I'm kidding? Dude doesn't need opposable thumbs. He's got like, spidey paws or something . . .)
  

Okay, so we're back to the bung issue. Definitely a soul retrieval is needed.
  

But whatever, cuz he's a lover.
  

Like a feline Steve Guttenberg, he's always snuggling someone. 

  

Like me.
   

For which we are all eternally grateful. Becuz he's as sweet and luscious as he is dastardly. Not just full of testosterone, but full of full-on multi-dimensional lovins. 

   
Yes.

  

Life is good with Malcolm in the house . . . 
 

Gratefulness, Full of Coastal Carolina Sunshine and Day-Off Yes

I don't think I'll ever get over the delicious feeling of having provisions stored up, tools and environment tended to, all beings in my care relaxed and smiling.

I had sessions scheduled for today and all three of them either cancelled or postponed. It's the first Saturday I've had off in a long, long time. I slept in late, til kitties biting my toes and licking my eyelids drove me from bed at 7:45. I drank coffee and wrote emails to friends and clients and chased kitties around for a couple of hours. Then I made things right in my kingdom.

Did a mound of dishes. Cleaned the apartment top to bottom. Did laundry. Turned the mattress and changed the sheets. The latter took a half hour because the changing of the sheets brings all kitties running, to dive under the fitted sheet, trapped and tickled by The Hand Monster, kitties all jumping on and around each other as the light summer blanket comes down, then up, then down, then up, me pretending that I need to just lift and float it down one more time to get it on straight, but really, you know it's just to see the kitties scoot and scramble just one more time. 

Then out into the world. . . 

A check! In my mailbox! From the cancer insurance folks! Which paid off all my medical bills. In full. Even the most recent digestive related ones. Al*state: you suck, but in this moment, you rock, you really do.

Car gassed up, put in a quart of oil, wiper fluid. To the grocery store for the things I can't/don't get at the coop (litter and tp and some of the more seriously on sale or stuffs/veggies/fruits that just look dang good.) 

To the library to take back the Bryson's bio on Shakespeare, a non-fic about what would happen to the earth if humans vanished, some novels that I read a few pages of then closed, uninterested in. And to pick up more novels to take a whirl at, including Daniel Suarez's Freedom, the sequel to Daemon, which although not as well written, is just as freakin prescient as William Gibson, and which I can't dang skippy to wait to dive into.

Next stop: Tidal Creek Coop, where I dropped a cool $140, and bought organic and mostly local fruit and veg, enough kitty food to last for the next couple of weeks, mineral bath salts for detoxing, salt for the neti pot, coconut milk for coffee, and cowgirl ranch dressing to spice up the homemade vinaigrette I make, red chili powder to spice up the Crazy Wok N Roll I've been indulging in, and sprouts and local goat cheese and millet bread, and local eggs in hues of green, brown and speckled white, and gluten free poppy seed lemon cake and vanilla ice cream because really, just plain yum. 

And fruit juice sweetened lemonade, which I am drinking now with apple favored vodka, because it's 2:30pm, and why the heck not? 

I love being single. I love being crazy. I love not shaving my armpits. I love working in Hiveworld with my Hilarious Coworker and various crazy/wonderful/crabby/big-hearted Cubicleland folks. I Love hanging out with the neurotic and elegant and very very pink Baby Wallace. And the delectably sweet, fiesty, tiny fanged wonder that is Emmaline. And the big, impossibly-soft-n-fluffy hunk of testosterone that is Dastardly Malcolm. And the licky, puffy, squealy, Yes that is Jacinta, our beloved Granny Thug, the All-Star Gangsta Granny we all love and adore.

Life is good. So very good. May this find you deep inside your Yes . . . your demons starved into silence, the beings around you loving you in all your sweet, f*cked up glory, and the plant world sharing their grainery/greenery love with you, all to rights in your own kingdom . . .

Party on . . . you are loved . . . 

Spiritual Bon Bon or Hard Work or Just Plain Good Luck?

I had an amazing day yesterday. 

• I woke up, drank my yogurt, flax seed oil, maca root powder, green food powder water. I felt sad and tired and hopeless. "Do you feel awful?" I asked myself. "Yes," I answered. Then I went for my three-mile walk and as my feet flew ever faster, and the cobwebs and funky mental fog blew away, I planned out the summer - work on the novel and my health May, June, July, post audios of the Sunday night journeying classes and launch combined websites in August, begin doing a class or two a month starting in September. I arrived back at the house happy and joyful and full of vim.
• I cleaned my house, and the resulting feng shui-ish quiet had me walking room to room, just to inhale the Yes radiating in each room.
• I got my car back from the mechanic, a friend of my sister's who installed a brand new radiator (how awesome that I won't have to fill the radiator up every few days!). He also did new brakes, spark plugs, air filter, oil change, and I'm sure some other stuff. He picked my car up from my sister's place on Thursday, took it Leland, then brought it back yesterday afternoon. All for $200. Which my sister paid for, and refused, absolutely laughingly refused to let me pay her back for. So I took the money I'd saved and went and had new tires put on the car, which I'd been meaning to do for many months because the front righthand side tire was so bald it was totally smooth, not even a hint of a tread left.
• I ate only healthy, clean foods all day, avocado and tomato, pineapple and watermelon, rice crackers and organic cheddar, hazelnut coffee and almond milk. 
• The kitties attended the soul retrieval sessions according to some calling only they hear. A guy arrives and Baby Wallace sits at his feet, staring at him with the sweetest of expressions. When we do the healing work, Wallace jumps up on the table and curls into the space between his feet. When the guy leaves, Baby Wallace goes into my bedroom. A woman arrives and Jacinta comes out, which she very rarely does, and talks to the woman, these pointed mreowwwws that has the woman leaning over and talking back to Jacinta in a very caring way. Jacinta stays with her for the whole hour and a half. The woman leaves, Jacinta disappears into the apartment. The next client arrives and Emmaline and Malcolm come out, Emma spending the first ten minutes sniffing and licking the woman daintily, which delights the woman, and Emma gives her the love look, you know the one, over and over. E and M then nap on the floor, Malcolm at the woman's head, Emmaline at her feet. After she leaves, all the kitties come out, and sit, watching me as I shut things down, turn off the drumming track, blow out candles, fold the blankets and put them away, fold up the massage table. Then they all disperse. I know this is a main reason I knew I needed to work from home - so that the kitties could do their work too. 
• I went to the grocery store and stood in the cake mix and frosting aisle, eyeballing something called "chocolate explosion- just microwave and eat!" for many long minutes. It took that long to get to the knowledge: this will make you sick. As I put it back onto the shelf, I felt a sliver of gratitude, the smallest poof of virtuousness, but mostly what I felt was a profound grief that stayed with me for approximately one minute, then was gone. When I left the grocery store, without a single product made from wheat or chemicals or sugar, the sun felt brilliant and healing, and I smiled all the way to the car and back home.
• Instead of going to the movies to see Iron Man 2 and eat popcorn, I drank a banana and pineapple and vanilla rice protein shake, and scratched and rubbed various kitty pelts, and watched Fringe and Medium and Flash Forward and Stargate Universe off of  Side*reel and Hulu. Then I went to bed, read some more of The World Without Us, kitties all up in my stuffs, and listened to the suburban soundtrack of birds and squirrels and dogs and wind as we drifted off to sleep.

Maybe this would have been a more or less normal day for some folks, or for others, with the economy the way it is, a freakin joyride on a magic carpet. For me, it felt like everything that's going on is a confirmation of the hard ass, bone grinding work I did the past few years. 

But then I think: maybe I'm just having a streak of good luck. But I remember I don't really believe in good luck, or at least good luck in the form of Yes just randomly zipping into a life, then zipping back out. And then there's the fact that this "good luck" always always seems to come in the wake of doing hard time in the inner mines of spiritual work. 

Then I think: maybe this is just what happens when someone quits being all erratic and flighty and buckles down to a regular "normal" job. I've been working seven days a week - five days in Hiveworld, then shamanic healing work clients for three to five hours on Saturdays, then shamanic journeying class on Sunday night. A phone session or two on the weeknights. Keeping my apartment clean. Being on time. 

And then I get: this is the beginning of Human Adulthood. This is what a life is like when a person drops the emotion, the batsh*t crazy rage and judgment and addiction and depression and hopelessness and victimy blame and romantic love and delusion and belief that anything means anything (the ones most people pretend they don't feel, but which all but the tiniest percentage of members of our western civilization tribe indulge in). It doesn't mean these vapors don't still come around - it means they are so much less attractive that a person doesn't stare at them, reach out a paw to grab them as they whirl past. This is what happens when a person stops buying into the insanity of the demons that nip at their heels, not turning to fight them, just flinging them off, keep climbing, further, always further. This is the beginning of Human Adulthood, and it isn't something that is achieved so much as surrendered into.

I highly recommend it. I give my stamp of Yes approval to turning toward whatever horrible awful No is vibrating in your world. I support and encourage you, as the No begins to surround and then consume you, to chant the mantra "Yes, yes, yes, Yes." And then as the No changes into Yes, and you begin to laugh at how hard you fought all these years against the supposed No, when you see how it always was and always will be Yes, go sit in a chair, and watch the wind move the trees, and watch the movement of your mind downshift into floating, and the pointlessness of your life to reveal itself as quiet joy and sweetness and hilarity.

It's not your life. You just travel in it.

What a beautiful day . . . 

Mmmm, Birds

 

Our Fuzzy Friends

When Katrina hit, I didn't send money to the Red Cross or any of those organizations. I gave money to the Humane Society for their rescue efforts of the pets left behind. And with the devastation in Haiti, same thing. Because when the people are struggling, our furry guys, already many levels down on humankind's consciousness scale of worth and importance, seriously need some help.

All of you know at least a dozen folks who've lost their jobs, their homes, their cars, and most of their identity. And shacking up with the mother in law or in a week-to-week hotel usually means no pets allowed. And so you can just imagine how animal shelters all over are desperately trying to keep these guys fed and sheltered until homes can be found. And the furry guys in Haiti? They are in desperate, desperate need . . .

If you want to do a good deed this week, please let it be this one. Even $10 will help.

Local shelter - Pender County

or

Adopt an Angel (where Baby Malcolm and dainty flower Emmaline were liberated from) adopt@adoptanangel.net 

or

Humane Society Haiti Disaster Response

Spread the love, spread the love . . . we have so much, we are so fortunate . . . share the love . . .

So Very Much Lovins

Sometimes, we curl all up in a pod of snooze

Sometimes we get all pretzelly

Sometimes a haunch makes a happy pillow for my head

 

Sometimes love means a tongue bath

Ditto

Ditto back at ya

Hello. May I lick the skin covering your third eye? Really. Just lean in a little closer and my tongue of enlightenment will cascade your living with my Yes

Oh yes, mush my face, my face, my face, yes, mush it, mush it

Oh yes, your lap is of luxury, if by luxury you mean love, because there is love here in my heart for you, so very much love

Write away, sister Kate, do your verbally thing, I shall remain here to keep you toasty, and filled with the Tiny Rumbler purrs of my Yes

We love you, we love you, we love you . . .

Yes.

Co-Food

Although I am feline, and I like tuna as much as the next hairball, cake makes me happy. Especially gluten-free. I'll take the corner piece please.

Although a spot of yogurt never did a weasel any harm. Lactobacillus and my colon are happy friends. 

What is this? I don't know. Might I taste again? I still don't know. But I like it. There are top-notes reminiscent of wiggly things. I like wiggly things. They are my go-to comfort food.

Mmmm, breakfast. All things halt when I feel the desire for sustenance. Your writing means nothing to me. Unless it will pay for more breakfast. In which case, may I be your muse?

Yes, the palate must be cleansed for the next course. Please, lift the cup a little higher. This angle vexes my tongue.

Butter tastes better off your finger, it definitely does . . .

Except for straight off the stick. Mmmm, butter is my guilty pleasure...

One for Katmama, one for weasels. We don't much like fruit. But we dig yogurt. Hard.

Mmmm, the last of the tuna, mixed with mayo. Not crazy about the cracker. And really, pickles? Again? Talk to the paw. Just as soon as I'm done leaving you with a bare naked cracker to chew on for your lunch.

Cream cheese. It really is Nectar of the Weasels. But again with the cracker. What? You think we don't get enough fiber in our diets? F*ck fiber. I'm a protein man all the way . . . 

 

Bars Cannot Separate Us

I reach for you . . .

And when I face the fact that I cannot touch you, I lay on the bars of your imprisonment, and pine, and love you from inches away . . .

Yet the inches may as well be miles . . . these bars are cruel . . . 

I reach out to touch you . . . because you are magic . . . and so very, very fuzzy . . .

And Emmaline says: I love you too, my mighty weasel warrior, my knight in shining fur, my gluten-free corn muffin of love . . .

O My Luscious Punk Princess! So tiny and weaselly! I will gnaw you free with my teeth, and though they look small, they are sharp and mighty!

But when the gnawing fails, I will pick the lock with my crafty paws, and will sneak into your chamber to be with you . . .

And to sample your food . . . which is quite tasty, my love . . . the rations they give you are mmmm, deliciouso . . . like our love . . . 

Because all I wish to do in this world, besides snack, and chase wiggly things, and bite the head of Jacinta, and greet the dawn with Baby Wallace, and snuggle the Katmama with our heartbeats of Yes, is be with you, my tiny love, my tasty sweet, my luscious little weasel . . . 

 

Deconstructing the House of No

The emotional death I went through the past few years was horrible and painful. Thoughts and yearnings for suicide were with me more on than off. I was afraid to die. I wanted to die. I couldn't take anymore. The feeling of being peeled, skinned, eviscerated was too much, I couldn't bear the agony a second longer. And the then the weight would lift, and it was like the sun burst through, but from inside, the sun inside, shining through every cell, Yes, Yes, Yes. And I would see that the pull of death had been the death of who I thought I was, death of "Katherine", and I saw that I wasn't her, and the space, the freedom without her, was luscious, hilarious, Nothing. Then another round of death would commence. And this went on for years.

Now the physical portion of the dismantling goes on. And it is just as painful, with death just as present. But now it's not suicidal thoughts or yearnings, it's watching as my body goes through some sort of death throes. The digestive pain, the back pain is so intense I wake up several times a night, wide-eyed and sweaty. I'm going to see a gastroenterologist next week, but I put it off as long as I could so that I could get the clearest picture of what is going on.

I've written about it before. It's addiction, which is powered by fear. It's from this life, the lives before this one, and the ancestral karma I carry, and the chunk of world suffering I carry as my due. All I want to do is eat refined carbs, watch tv, sleep. I watch this. Surrender to it when it shoves me over the cliff. Make other choices when there's enough space in between the lines of bullsh*t. 

I've discovered that love makes the pain go away. And not just softens it, but makes it go away. Because it's most acute in the mornings, this is when it's the most noticeable. 

Often it's the kitties, and the love they show me, so natural and simple. It's a grace and a gift. I wake up, Emmaline walks over, lays down On My Face, and then lifts a paw so that I have breathing hole. It sounds crazy, but in the chill morning air, it makes me unbelievably toasty, and snuggled, and relaxed. Then she slides down into the crook of my neck, and reaches up to place a paw on my cheek, her eyes slowly blinking and sparkling that Kitty Love Yes look. And as I write this, Malcolm walks onto the desk, gets a few inches away from my face, reaches out a paw, looks at me, waiting for permission. I lift my hands from typing and he crawls down into my lap, snuggles in, purrs, goes to sleep.

And it's also the people that come to me while I sleep, in dreams. Most times I wake up and only feel an essence of them, but other times, like this morning, it's like living with someone, having spent the night sleeping in their arms, or taking a walk and talking, or sitting together as things get explained. Who are they? They are friends, lovers, teachers. Men, women, animals, plants. Beyond that, I don't know.

I don't know if I'll make it through this. Whatever that means. But whatever this is, I both do it on my terms, and utterly surrender. In relation to the world around me, I stay away from folks who know not what they do, walk away from the situations that resonate No. In relation to this physical death that I go through, I have no choice in any of it. I know that it's all Yes, and that's what I work toward every day, all day. Yes. Yes. Yes.

I'm so grateful for all of it. It's like watching a giant jigsaw puzzle being put together. I'm no longer believing that I have to choose the right piece and put it in the right place. I'm only watching, clapping my hands in delight when I see the most impossible looking piece fall seamlessly into the most impossible looking place. 

My life is forfeit. I'm along for the ride. I'm so grateful for it all. What a ride . . . 

The Dark Says to the Light: Kiss My Grits

And for the flip side, I woke up this morning and none of the cats wanted anything to do with snuggles. Wallace gave a perfunctory sniff and was off. Emmaline wanted me please to let her the freak go so that she could wander around a bit, and the vet okayed it, okay and maybe not for her to run wild and flying about the house but could I please talk to the paw and stop gripping her and just let her roam in the pre-dawn magic because there might be wiggly things or at least Malcolm's head to bite? And Malcom? Malcolm downloaded a floppy disc so fierce that there is no question that his bung channels the power of the Incas. 

And once I survived the morning it was off to Hiveworld for a monitoring audit. By a major big Hiveworld minion out of the state capitol. Everyone tells me not to worry. It's a leadin to a federal audit coming sometime soon down the road, many many months. My hilarious coworker is a bit worried too, but not as much as me. It isn't as if we aren't doing a good job, a job that folks aren't pleased with. This is a new program we're doing. All they gave us back in July were a few quota numbers per month and a manual that hadn't been updated in, no shit, 2001. And by November we had created the top program in the state, using social media and all sorts of normal technological whatnot but for the state? Innovative. And one of the governor's folks issuing an email to all the offices to follow our lead was a bit weird. As has been the gleaming smiles of our bosses. Because my hilarious coworker and I just laugh and cut up and do stuff for our folks and the social workers and everyone gets taken care of the best we can in this f*cked up economy and the quotas get met and what's the big deal?

The job is a cakewalk. If they give us another state sponsored headf*ck we just laugh, roll our eyes, get down to bidness, get creative, crack that walnut, solve it, and as the hilarious coworker says "done and done". But these audits? Pure administrative stoopid ass-itchy un-fun cliche-state-job-hell seriously not phun. 

After the audit, I went and got a burger and fries minus the bun. Then Cadbury eggs to bring back to the hilarious worker to celebrate with in lieu of champagne (cmon, caramel creme is a bit champagne like). And then after work I stop by the coop and buy cheese and bread and wine and I come home and eat bread and cheese, drink wine, insinuate myself into kitty hijinks and watch The Good Wife and Southland and it's nearing my bedtime. and all I want is to befriend the greenery if you know what I mean.

And I'm grateful for this job, for this thing that pays my bills and allows me to go to the doctor to get an antibiotic for an earache and take a comp hour to go and do it. But really? I hate that I have to know the difference between a BR459 and a BR549A and that the procedure is so outdated it no longer works and that if you want to help folks you have to circumvent procedure which can get you fired but since no one trained you anyway you just had to figure this sh*t out but it's the cliche, that you can be fired for not following procedure and not getting trained is no excuse and why didn't you follow the manual? And I think: you mean the manual that the hilarious coworker and I covered in mock hieroglyphics and faux Sumerian symbols and which we forgot to remove and the auditor saw today and his eyes widened?

But really, besides this job being a cakewalk when it isn't horrifyingly state-like and stultifying? It's about being with folks. I can get on the phone and make things happen for folks who are poor and uneducated and out of the loop. With a phone call I can offer someone the opportunity to change their trajectory. Most blow it. Most don't care. And I don't blame them. Sometimes I envy their lives of liquor and weed and hollering and what the frak. But some do care. Some want a life of less pain and don't know how to get to it. I hope I don't lie to them. I hope they get it's a raw deal on all levels, but that it really, truly is less raw with the rent paid and a fridge of food and a vehicle in the driveway, and that as far as I know, work is the way to get that. But maybe I'm wrong. Who knows? 

But regardless of whether I really lend folks my slightly higher perspective, or whether it's all a shellgame, whether the fiver I slipped the guy to get to a job interview will actually go towards a pack of smokes, whether I get called 'my boo' and 'my girl' really means anything, 'whether we passed the audit or launched a big fat fail whale, or whether any of it really truly matters, it matters not. In the moment I follow the energy, and it all feels true. This is what Life has brought to me and every day I face it with Yes.

Especially tonight with with KEXP songs of the day playing, kitties squeeking, and red wine telling me how very much it loves me. 

Crustacean

I dreamt last night of roiling oceans, me adrift on a plank of wood, grasping hold with clenched hands, legs dangling in the water, knowing that sharks and other fish with teeth swam underneath. As the huge waves broke, I saw an enormous octopus, it's tentacles dark pink, sinewy, so very very many of them. And then it changed into a huge lobster, leviathanesque, antennae like stalks, rolling over and over in the huge waves.

It was early morning, and I woke up with a horrible stomach ache, aching back so intense it made me wince. This is nothing new. This is how it is most mornings. And most mornings, I wake up around 4am, get up, take ibuprofin and digestive enzymes, lift the Barnacle out of her crate to get her all snuggled and toasty under the covers, so that when the morning alarm goes off at 5:15, I'm warm, relaxed, and pain free. Not this morning.

This morning I just lay there. The new "daylight savings" 4am painted my bedroom pitch black. My stomach pain was a direct wraparound to the pain in my spine that radiates out like the roots of a tree on fire. The nausea, the discomfort of my distended stomach, reminded me of the half bowl of homemade veggie chili I ate last night for dinner, with a half a piece of millet bread. I didn't mean to only eat half, but fear kept me from finishing. Fear of pain. Fear of what I would feel in the morning.

And as I lay there, the cats one by one began to realize I was awake, and one by one began to purr. The sound of purring filled the room. Malcolm slowly climbed from the curve of my legs and tucked into my side, the weight of him on the bed, but his paws and head laying across my belly. Jacinta reached out her paws and lay them atop my shins. Baby Wallace made a trip up from the ottoman at the foot of the bed and sniffed my face for a long minute, let me smell the delicious umami of his fur and breath. I reached over and opened the door of Emmaline's crate and she slowly walked out, stretching her leg long and lifted like a ballerina, then snuggling down on my neck and shoulders, purring, purring.

And as I lay there, totally surrounded by love, the sound of contentment, the feel of soft fur, the warmth and gentle weight, I realized I felt no more pain. All I felt was Yes, Yes, Yes.

And I felt grateful, so grateful for this life, for this body, for the love that surrounds me, the gift that stewarding felines brings every day, every hour, and on mornings like this, profoundly so.

And then I got up and another day begins . . .

The Story

I've had several conversations with folks lately about story. Their story. My story. Stories in movies, tv, books, blogs, news. About the importance or lack thereof of dropping personal story. Whether it means anything, or if it's even possible. I don't think it is. Possible, that is, to drop it. I think that it drops you. At least that's been my experience.

At the tail end of one of those huge emotional burnings, those ego bonfires where the me that I think is me but of course doesn't exist but because I believe it does it hurts most excruciatingly, I've had a reoccurring image. Not knowing what else to do, either to stop the burning or to make the fires burn hotter and get the whole thing over with quicker, I picture myself going out on the front lawn and laying down, and not getting up. I've no clue what this means, and I've done enough following through on this sort of stuff to know it doesn't lead anywhere, that it's the symbology, the metaphor of it that is what is triggering in my brain.

But I'm not in a time of one of those wildfire emotional burnings right now. This is more of a targeted burn, specifically torching an area that is too overgrown and has to go, burned down to the soil, so that new things can take root and bloom.

What's burning is addiction. To food. And to sadness. The food is about comfort, and nurturing. The sadness is around Poor Me, and why people should be nice to me, and not mean. And a huge part of why both of them are ridiculously difficult to burn out, is that their roots are entwined in survival modes. We need food. We need other people's assistance. Maybe some people can be airatarians, or live deep in the middle of a forest  (if such a forest even exists anymore) but those twenty-three people? I'm not one of them.

So every day I face it. This morning I turned down a Hardees Break*fast Bowl in favor of mint tea and a nut and fruit bar. Last night I ate half a bag of vinegar and salt chips. Yesterday for lunch I had a green salad with seeds and nuts and veggies and homemade carrot miso dressing. And then on the way back to work I got a bag of peanut M & *M.

The hard part is facing it and walking away. But the really hard part is facing when I don't walk away, when I find myself maxed out with a titillating combo of excruciating back pain and worked nerves from listening to a certain Barnacle screech because really she just wants to run around and play. And the thrumming in my brain for serotonin wins and I find myself hoovering up a cadbury creme egg or pillowy millet bread or Tequila Weasel.

It's no different than anything other folks face in their lives. What's different is that I've come to understand the futility of forcing my way through this, attempting to browbeat myself for noshing or shaming myself for having a dinner that consists of more than miso soup. The only thing I can do right now is to be as gentle as I can, walk myself through the feelings and pain when I can, and be as nurturing with the cleanup, the digestive pain and sugar crash and puffy face when I can't.

Because my story is still here . . . still playing itself out. The health issues. Writing the novel. Taking care of kitties. What else can be done other than let it? To live it as it unfolds?

Onward. Further. Even when it appears that I'm moving backwards . . .

The Marketplace

I don't think about enlightenment anymore, try and head towards it, plan for it, create it. I doubt that I even knew what it was, or know now. It seems irrelevant. Even as I get rushes of Waking Up, or YES, or however I'd describe it if I'm in it. I'm not in it in this moment. Right now, I'm just a chick living a life with a kitten as a barnacle attached to my left shoulder.

Sometimes I'm not sure why I'm still blogging about this stuff. Does it matter? Does having a belief that it matters matter? I continue to experience trickles along the lines of "leaving a trail", although I still have no proof that what I'm doing is True as opposed to Freakin Bonkers.

I've got too much action going on to wallow in the rumination. I'm utterly consumed with aligning myself with the Yes, and in support of that, jettisoning as much No as I can get my hands on. Life brings stuff as each day unfolds, and then I go to it. You guys have been reading. You know how nuts things have appeared the past six or so months. And I wouldn't change a thing. It's been magic. I trust in what is occurring absolutely.

Identifying the Yes from the No looks like it would be complicated. How can you tell the No that is reisistance from the No of regular old No? How can you tell the Yes of Life from the Yes of addiction? Right now, it seems to be about wrongness and rightness, not in a moral sense, but in a gut/intuition sense. And if you're patient, pretty soon it becomes crystal clear which direction the energy is headed - toward or away. And then it just becomes about not fighting the motion, no matter what thoughts or feelings the mind or body is generating.

So much of it is also simply about walking away. When the energy is moving away, chasing after it is pointless. Not fighting the No, or trying to convince it to be Yes. But accepting people as they present themselves, and saying "excuse me", walking away, and then not coming back, no matter what the mind says. If the energy is moving away, I don't owe anyone anything, except maybe myself, in allowing my living to flow with more fun and grace and hilarious awe. Not taking the bait when folks get aggressive is also key. Or allowing their misconceptions or misunderstandings of what I'm up to bother me, or even prompt me to try and explain. Smile. Laugh. Walk away. Someone in their righteous mind won't go nuclear if you say something isn't working for you. Someone deep in the heart of their No will.

It's this clear. It boggles my brain sometimes how clear it all is when you take the time to slow down, stop taking actions, and simply watch. I feel so grateful, so glad. I don't have to solve my life anymore. Just do what I feel to do, follow the flow of energy. Until the next pocket of No opens up, navigate that, surrender into it until the Yes at it's gooey center is revealed, and then just lay back and enjoy the sun.

A couple of months ago, an enlightened guy came to NC. Someone I'd met before and felt to meet again. He invited me to come hear him speak. And then offered to even drive to Wilmington to meet with me. This is an enlightened guy. Maybe his enlightenment might rub off on me. That's the general belief these days, right? Get as close to the light as possible. But all I could hear was NoNoNoNoNoNo, a sense of dark pressure. And in the end he came and left and this sense of Yes made itself known. Why? Hell if I know. I only know that I wasn't supposed to meet with him. So I didn't.

Someone told me several months ago who Jed McKenna is. The real guy behind the pen name. And it didn't matter. I didn't try and contact him. Didn't have any questions for him. His books are the single most powerful object/thing/energy blast to have moved me in a true direction. They showed me what I'd suspected for so long - that New Age really *was* pap, and I could let it go for the delusion that it is. His books were the catalyst that broke me out of the concrete I'd walled myself inside. And because those books were so effective, I've no desire to contact him. Why would I? How could he have anything else to say to me other than "howdy" or "you give nice ash"?

I like to remind myself at least once a week how I might be profoundly mentally ill, that all this stuff I do and think and feel might be merely proof of Bonkers. The whole jist of my living right now is about fluidity, in my body, my mind, my heart, my living. Anything hard or crunchy or weighty or dense has to go. I can't hang onto it anymore. I don't want to. And so nothing is left out, everything is fair game for the pyre, and nothing is taken too seriously.

Blah, blah, blah :) I've got a love barnacle on my lap who needs a smooch, and if I've gotta choose between typing and smooching, in this moment, I choose the smooch  . . .

Yes.

Ramblin' Squirrel

Whither we goest . . . The Barnacle goes too . . .

At night, before we go to bed, Daughter of Conehead snuggles into the leopard blanket of warmth.

In the mornings as we wake up and breakfast and caffeinate and fishate.

At night we surrender to the magic that is hulu.com.

At dawn we greet the day with glowing eyes and electric hearts.

And Jacinta the Bristly says: your love makes me slightly irritable but I'm okay with it.

We congregate and fill the Vibrant Living Room with the healing powers of Fuzzy Yes before the Shamans' Circle Journeying group on Sunday evenings. Come lovely humans! The Yes is waiting for you!

We greet the day, hanging with our homies, the platonic greenery known as Phil and Nettie and Basil.

We prepare the Vibrant Living Room for it's function on weeknights: the place where Katmama shucks (most of) her duds, partakes of grainery and greenery, and shuffles off the No, replacing it with Yes, and Yes, and YES.

(Kelly! Where are you?!? Luscious vibes of Yes, groovalicious Speahead calls us forth! Dance, mama, dance!)

 Life is good . . .