the you-never-know-how-things-are-gonna-go department

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It's a mixed mood evening.

PLUR. Remember PLUR


Peace
Love
Unity
Respect

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On the happy side, I had my first piano lesson in years today. What a hoot! I hit it off famously with Bill Sabol, kind enough to "take me in" and teach me to accompany myself. It was a lot of fun to see what I do and don't know, and I really do like this guy - especially when he said that watching me was like watching a 6 year old in a sandbox. I guess I am a silly little nit.

It's going to take some time, but I think it will go much faster than I'd initially imagined. I already know a lot, thanks to devoted parents that made sure I was playing the piano early and often; I just don't know that I know it, and that's what he's already helping me to uncover.

Down the road, accompanying myself means freedom - it means a kind of musical self-reliance that I have been very hungry for. I'm glad to be joining up with Barbara, but musical relationships are even more ephemeral than personal ones, and I want to move beyond *needing* someone else in order to make the life sound of my soul. I doubt I'll ever be able to transcend wanting a human partner in my life for my heart to play with, but my voice can strike out on its own. And today, it took its real first step.

**********

In the you-never-know-how-things-are-gonna-go department I had a living space upheaval that was a little unexpected.

I've been bragging about how loose I'm letting myself become, giving up my house and getting "light" and "flexible". Meanwhile, a little part of me has been wriggling uncomfortably inside, not so sure that she likes the general trend that the rest of the Internal Board of Directors is lobbying for.

She spoke up yesterday, in a bit of a bad dream - something I very rarely have, so I always pay attention - and the first thought on my mind when I awoke was to go look for a place to live as soon as I could.

I tried to talk myself out of it. I tried telling myself that these next steps were a "partnership with Spirit" (so why isn't Spirit packing up the garage?). It seemed somehow as if I would betray my walk in flexibility if I cemented myself into another space to live, no matter how much more appropriate it might be.

Nick also came to mind. Nick's ability to be fluid was completely dependent upon his total commitment to fluidity. He did NOTHING that met with any conflict, and the minute it did, he went the other way. Meaning, he fully went - walked, left, hit another space - away.

I doubt that he would have stayed as sane as he did if he'd been forced by any circumstance - taking care of parents, children, a business, concerns - to stay in one place. It was his capacity to be completely flexible and move exactly where Spirit propelled him that gave him the ability to follow Spirit.

What was it that I said - half measures short change the fullness of a theme?

I'm not yet capable of such fluidity. I can dream about it. And even talk like its near at hand. But I have to get up in the morning to go open the store, because I am still holding onto some structures like family, and community duty, and general obligation to see a task through, that will not yet bend to a living Free Fall.

I have tried, of course. I thought about, and even wrote a bit here about, just housesitting and going where the flow would have me. And then I also remembered an experience I had in Southern California - I was living in a trailer at the tail end of a canyon in east Orange County. No running water. No electricity. I was in the Santa Ana National Forest. I worked a straight job in OC, and to mesh the two worlds was a huge amount of effort. You had to be in either one or the other, but you just couldn't straddle them without a lot of work, so you'd better love the work of straddling the worlds, and all the time and energy that it costs to do so.

And then little awarenesses started creeping in over the last week. I'd wake up in the morning, and move around my house, and take note of the fact that I really didn't need very much room, but I really liked about "this much" - about 1/2 the size of my little house will do my current lifestyle just fine. I'd wake up in my bed in the morning, and enjoy waking up in "my bed". I could put on music. Make my coffee. Wander around, sing, dance, write - stuff like that.

The prospect of sharing a household with my friends is enticing to my communitarian parts, but I also realize that I do keep rather different hours and personal energies than most people I know. I also noticed that, in the last two weeks - since I became aware of the night for the household's weekly meeting time - that I've found things I "need" or really want to do for each of the next 6 meeting nights. Not a good sign. Well, not a bad sign - it's actually good that my warning lights are working - but a sign that does suggest that I'd better pay attention, because some part of my Inner Council is putting a thumbs down on the group living *and* the bohemian scene.

So this afternoon I trekked downtown to see what I could see. It seems that I've found a tiny little studio in a sweet old historic building on one of the few streets in Eugene that has any character at all - trees, galleries, a block from the Hult Center and the weekend Farmer's and Crafter's Markets, and several blocks from most of the clubs I sing in. It would be simple to sublet when I go away, or cheap enough to cover while I'm gone. There are NEVER any vacancies, and today there were two, with south facing windows, over the trees.

I've called this evening and left a message that I want one.

I feel a lot better.

Visiting Chef Ray tonight helped. He reminded me how nice it is to live downtown, and he's right - the Tiffany Building is a jewel and I'd be a fool not to take it - and then I ran into another friend, who'd also spent a number of years in the country and has just returned downtown, and he told me that he's having a blast.

Ray says hello to you, and sends his love. He cares for you. He extended some fatherly wisdom to me today, when I told him that I'd found myself developing some feeling for you as well, and suggested that you were probably a bit too worldly - he didn't use that word, but it's what he meant - for me. He doesn't want to see me hurt, and he knows how I am, and I suppose he knows how you are, too.

It gave me pause, but the 8 year old little girl heart inside of me knows that it could easily be true.

************

And so, another good day. Most of them are. I live a blessed life. Sometimes I even notice.

-- Anonymous, October 11, 2001


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