Category Archives: Friends

Aging, Family, Feelings, Fourth Phase, Friends, Health, Kabbalah, Literature, Myth and Story, Shadow Mountain, Tarot, Writing

Tireder

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Lughnasa and the Michaelmas Moon

Friday gratefuls: Orgovyx. Biologic Pharmacy. The Roger. Phonak. Cheaters. All the little accessories that make aging so much fun. Pulmonologist, too, of course. And, Kate. Always. Jon and the kids. Coming tomorrow. Chicken pot pies. Fatigue. Cool nights in spite of warmer days.

Sparks of Joy and Awe: Kabbalah and the Gates of Light, by Mark Horn

Tarot: King of cups

What a difference. Yesterday Biologic Pharmacy called and said they were shipping my first prescription of Orgovyx for which I have to pay. Co-pay, $10. Boy, that assistance fund really whacked away at that $800 number.

I am, of course, happy. But. My friend Judy says big pharma wants to cover all of our co-pays for these expensive drugs. Why? So they can charge medicare or insurance companies a higher price without resistance from patients. Don’t know, but seems possible.

When I get into any thought process about medical costs, insurance companies, and medical professionals including hospitals, my brain goes hunting for Ariadne’s thread. So far I’ve not found it. Getting back out from the maze of deals and restrictions and downright cruelty has so far eluded me.

In my second week plus of Orgovyx. It’s kicking my butt right now. The hot flashes have become more frequent, though not too bad. At least not yet. Cheer up, eh? Fatigue, however, has literally laid me low. Backed out of MVP last night after resting most of yesterday. Shortness of breath and no stamina.

This may sound like complaining, but it’s not. I’m grateful for the opportunity to use Orgovyx since it has fewer cardio-vascular risks, lowers testosterone to castration levels in the first month, and has become affordable. We’ll know more at the end of the month after blood work. It can create anemia and I’m wondering about that as an explainer for the fatigue.

Gotta say this was all simpler when I got cured after my prostate removal. Wish it had been true. The journey. My life’s ancientrail from birth to transformation, reincarnation, mortality.

So much happening in the world. That damned Texas abortion law. The possible cessation of the Gulf Stream. Hurricane Ida’s aftermath. Trying to get people to avoid death with an easy vaccine. These painful divisions in our body politic. Trouble passing voting rights legislation. Voting rights! Rights. Trouble getting the second large infrastructure bill through the Senate.

Where to put any inflection, any thumb on the scale I can manage? Seems difficult right now. And, I feel sad. Work other than staying alive feels so hard right now.

Although. I keep drawing Tarot cards that push me toward creative work, art. To get back to it. Example: King of Cups. Three of Stones, Wildwood Deck. Bear, the Animal Oracle deck.

King of cups: Druid deck

A well fed, calm man, a Celtic king, looks out over the ocean, possibly the Irish Sea or the North Sea. His feet, planted on bedrock, show some eagerness to get moving. The bard’s harp behind him speaks to his creativity, his status as king to Fire, a creative element, and the Irish Wolfhound behind him to his character as a compassionate, loving king who will nonetheless protect his subjects. Dawn has begun to rise over the forest behind him and a salmon, the salmon of knowledge, I imagine, jumps in the sea to his left. The small crab at his foot connects him both to the unconscious and to the Zodiac sign of the crab.

The king of cups represents a well-balanced man with his emotions and intellect working together. A great resource for the creative life. Cups as a suit focuses on the emotions so this card is the animus figure, the male energy associated with emotions.

Three of Stones: Wildwood Deck

A Green woman leans against three large standing stones, two pillars and a cap stone. Her hands rest on an Auroch, her right, and an ancient Horse, the Przewalski, her left. Her body has become rooted to the Earth, Wood and Stone and human flesh embrace each other.

The Holy wells of inspiration, of creativity are ancient and eternal like the three standing stones. They are vital and nourishing, like the Green woman and her rootedness. They feed to and from the animal energies of the Horse and the Great Auroch.

This card speaks to my anima, as have several I’ve drawn over the last week.

The Bear: Animal Oracle

Again, a focus on creativity. The Bear suggests a time to relax, to let inspiration and the muse rise to the surface on their own. He’s the monarch of the animals, no need to hurry, to rush around hunting for sustenance. Take a nap.

I’m going with the Bear for right now, going to ease back into writing Jennie’s Dead. But, I am headed there.

 

 

 

 

 

Cooking, Dogs, Family, Feelings, Friends, Kabbalah, Mountains, Mussar, Shadow Mountain, Tarot

Yesterday and Today

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Lughnasa and the Chesed Moon

Thursday gratefuls: Prostate cancer. Orgovyx. Kristie. Kep and Rigel, my companions, my friends. Passing out of the dark valley. Exercise. Safeway grocery pickup. Express delivery. 47 degrees this morning. Rain on its way.

Sparks of Joy and Awe: A Year Spread

Tarot: Three of Cups

Friday gratefuls: Rigel and Kep. Snuggling, staying with me, greeting me. CBE. The Bread Lounge. Donating. The spread sheets of the Rider-Waite deck from fellow student, David. Mark Horn and his Kabbalistic Tarot. Jung. His thought. Archetypes. Following our own hearts. The ancient ones. My friends. Diane. Mary. Mark. Cardio. Doing it.

Sparks of Joy and Awe: Rain

Tarot: Two of Wands

 

 

 

Thursday

Did myself a service yesterday. Writing about my feelings, then choosing to exercise after my Tarot and Kabbalah class. Lifted my mood. Finished my cardio day today. 30 minutes. 5 minutes longer at 3.0 My IT band complained so that may not have been a great idea.

Got a few errands to take care of today, then I’m going to mussar at CBE. So, short post.

Yesterday I picked up groceries from Safeway, finished my Tarot and Kabbalah class, exercised, and felt good. Getting exercise in always makes me feel better. Also, errand completion.

That’s why I’m going to take off in a few minutes. Gotta get my title revised, register Ruby for the upcoming year, buy some sourdough bread and get breakfast. Donate diapers and feeding tube liquid to Mt. Evan’s Hospice. I keep forgetting to do that.

 

Friday

Went to the DMV to change Ruby’s title into my name, get new tabs for my plates. Like the Social Security administration a guard, this time a deputy sheriff, was at the door. Have to have an appointment. Oh. Woulda saved me an hour the guy in the leather vest and cowboy hat said. Me, too, I joined in.

Over to the Bread Lounge to pick up a loaf of sourdough, my go to bread these days. Had an egg sandwich before I went to Mt. Evan’s hospice to donate feeding liquid. They didn’t want it. Not sure what I can do with it now. Highly specialized. May have to throw it away. Mt. Evan’s is close to CBE so I went there and waited in the sanctuary for mussar to start.

Looked over the clever sheets  David from Tarot and Kabbalah had created using a color printer. He printed out all of the Rider-Waite deck using a color printer. The copies he used for himself, hung by his computer were quite large, but he gave us all color copies, too, on eight and a half by eleven thick paper, six sheets in all. The Major Arcana take up two sheets and each suit has its own sheet.

This is in service of becoming familiar with each card in the deck and the deck over all. Very helpful. Gonna figure out how to do that for the Druid Craft and Wildwood decks at least. Learning the individual cards can seem overwhelming, this gives the task a gestalt it’s hard to get without putting the cards on a table face up.

Also signed up for a four session class with Mark Horn, who’s written a book The Kabbalistic Tarot. This class will feature a Tree of Life spread. Starts in October. Learning turns my crank, keeps me moving, the engine purring.

Van-Leyden St. Jerome in his Study by Candlelight (1520)

Just remembered that it’s fall, or at least fall-like. Certainly meteorological fall. A season of transition for temperatures, plant life, animal life. Hyperphagia. The Rut. And, for me, often a time of melancholy. So much so that Kate and I had phrase for her to say, “I sense you’re falling into melancholy,” when she saw the signs. Have to channel that part of Kate from now on.

The recent shift in my feelings, less upbeat, less resilient are markers I recognize. As is a leaden feeling in my body, a sense that I might be telescoping downwards, toward my feet. Mom died in October. The school year starts. The turn toward darkness is well underway. Two hours more of darkness for this date than on the Summer Solstice.

Michaelmas, the Springtime of the Soul, comes on the 29th of September. It may be that melancholy is a tool the psyche uses to prepare us for Michaelmas. Turning us inward, focusing us on the more narrow ambit of our own life.

Gonna stick with it for a while, remaining conscious of melancholy’s potential to turn toward depression. Use it.

See you on the darkside.

 

 

 

 

Dogs, Family, Feelings, Fourth Phase, Friends, Great Wheel, Holidays, Kabbalah, Mountains, Reimagine. Reconstruct. Reenchant., Shadow Mountain, Tarot, Third Phase

The Year of Grieving ends in Wisdom and an Irish Wolfhound

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Lughnasa and the Chesed Moon

Sunday gratefuls: 49 degree morning. Ruth, only a strained shoulder and sprained back in a car accident with Jen. Gabe o.k. A quiet three days. Subway. Tarot. Kabbalah. The Hermit. The Magician.

Sparks of Joy and Awe: Ruth’s ok

Tarot: finishing the Life spread

 

As you may recall from yesterday, I created a new Tarot spread. Forgot to say it’s my final project in the class. We all have to show something we’ve learned. Not gonna go through the whole thing with them, too long. And, I imagine you didn’t read it through. But, I have. And, I will again.

Why? Because the tarot cards have the capacity to breach the veil of consciousness into the collective unconscious, to call out and up to awareness archetypal energies at work in my life. The only way to do it? Hardly. Poetry. Art. Friends. Kabbalah. Torah. Sacred literature. Movies. Literature. Nature. The tarot works for me much to my surprise.

#8. Samain/Binah, Three of Wands

“Keywords: Confidence, Realizing goals

Hard work begins to payoff…Realizing long term dreams and goals.” DTB

Perhaps Steiner’s springtime of the soul. A man, a farmer? an arborist?, stands with his hand on a Tree, looking out to the horizon. Beside him three wands have begun to leaf out, signaling that his work is vital, growing. A scene of future possibility. The full grown tree recalls earlier work, perhaps of another such man, now mature.

“Binah refers to the analytic, distinguishing aspects of God’s thought.

It is the uppermost feminine element in the Godhead, and is symbolized as the mother of the Shekhinah. Many of the symbols associated with Binah are therefore identical to those of the Shekhinah.” Jewish Virtual Encyclopedia

8 is infinity stood up straight.

Samain is the time when the veil grows thin and the boundary between this world and the other world is at its most permeable. Thus, Halloween, Dia de los muertos, All Saints. Coco.

The Celts chose to start their year now, at Summer’s End. The seasons between now and Ostara are Samain, Yule/Winter Solstice, and Imbolc. With Ostara these make up the first half of the Celtic year.

All this suggests that my life after Kate’s death may take a turn at Samain rather than Michaelmas. If her spirit/soul lives on (I make no assumptions.), then she will be able to communicate easily with me. I will make her an offrenda, my altar surrounding her ashes is a good start.

We’ll have a meal together, as Latin and Central Americans do in their graveyards on dia de los muertos. We’ll discuss her life and mine. She’ll have a glass of chardonnay, scallops and rare steak with fresh boiled asparagus. Finished off with some espresso, doppio, and a flan. I’ll have the rare steak, fried potatoes, and asparagus. Espresso and flan. A Paulaner Thomasbrau.

Perhaps I will achieve binah about her death and my life, discerning understanding.

#9 Yule/Tipharet  Ten of Wands

“Keywords: Demands. Burdens. Overwork.

Carrying the weight of responsibility or obligations on your shoulder…Uncomplaining acceptance of your perceived burden. Reassessing priorities and values.” DTB

“Tipharet represents the ideal balance of Justice and Mercy needed for proper running of the universe.

This Sefirah unites all the upper nine powers.” JVL

The season of Yule, midwinter. The season beginning at the Winter Solstice. I feel strong, centered, in midwinter. 40 years a Minnesotan. The winter will not be ten wands on my back, though I would say that those wands don’t look all that heavy.

The man here, who does look overburdened, has walked a long way and has now begun an uphill segment. Might be me, coming back from down the Hill and through the Valley of grief. Navigating now a new life, back up on the Mountain. It will be, could be, that the new understanding of life will have created a tension between the old ways of life with Kate and the new ways of a realized life without her physical presence. That may be the ten wands.

But tipharet is the beautiful, the balanced place between Justice, Gevurah, and Mercy/Chesed. So it may also be that the wands will have begun to balance themselves, their weight distributed well for the climb.

#10 Imbolc/Hokmah  Ten of Pentacles

“Key words: Blessings. Prosperity. Legacy

You may be in receipt of a legacy, or are creating one-either for your family or the wider community. Even difficult circumstances can carry hidden benefits. The chance to count our blessings and discover that they’re too numerous to count.” DTB

This is the last card in the spread, having now come round the full Great Wheel from Ostara to Imbolc. That it should have an Irish Wolfhound on it tells me all I need to know. The circle of Kate and mine’s life is in this card.

The woman stands in the black, out of the frame, perhaps out of this world. Perhaps in the other world. The gray headed man has a blond haired granddaughter by his side, Ruth, and a young man, perhaps Joseph over his shoulder. This represents the family left after the woman has gone into the blackness of death.

Though dead, the woman still holds a pentacle, a symbol of earth and abundance. Her presence is yet a source of comfort and grace for the family still on this side of the veil.

She is not absent from the lives of her family, just absent from Malkut, the physical realm.

This card strongly suggests to me that a full year after Kate’s death will find me, and our family, living and celebrating together, informed and supported by Kate’s legacy, her person and the wealth that she created. The spirit of the Irish Wolfhound, kind, compassionate, loving, loyal made present to all of us.

Since this is also the card for hokmah, or wisdom, I’m also inclined to believe that the year of grieving for Kate will bring to all of us a better sense of how to live our lives, both with each other and for each other.

 

Friends, Health, Kabbalah, Mussar, Tarot

The Fire This Time

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Lughnasa and the Chesed Moon

August, 2017

Tuesday gratefuls: Mary’s card. Alan. Pet scans. Cancer. Urology Associates. Rigel, snuggling in with her head next to mine last night. Dogs. All of them. Each of them. Blue Sky. Green Lodgepoles and Aspen. Oxygen. 8,800 feet. Shadow Mountain. The Rocky’s.

Sparks of Joy and Awe: No name baby Giblin

Tarot: Princess of Wands

 

PET scan at 1 pm today. Nothing but water after 9 am. The ritual rules now applying to me, not Kate. Wear soft clothes with no metal. BYOB. Bring your own benzodiazepine. (for my claustrophobia) Got my single pill yesterday at King Sooper Pharmacy. $.06. I plan to take it at the same time as the axumin injection.

Paul’s daughter Claire had her Baby! In August, pretty close to Kate’s birthday. New life. The wheel turns.

Tomorrow a bone density scan. Friday, the new hearing aids. A positively body week.

Tomorrow is the next to last Tarot and Kabbalah class. I’ve gotten a lot from this class. Mirrors of the soul. Or, better, mirrors for the soul. Take the Princess of Wands I drew today.

Wands are a fire suit, focused on the spirit, on chi, prana, life force. The Princess brings the earth element to fire, representing the role of Malkut, the physical realm, in the Fool’s journey of the spirit. Malkut is this world where the Shekinah, the anima of divinity, rules. The Princess in my daily draw adds to the cards speaking to my anima.

Cancer is a fire burning through my physical body, affecting my nephesh, my animal soul. It brings fatigue, weakness, struggle. Yet fire is, too, the element of spirit. And, yes, even cancer has its role in the Fool’s journey of my spirit.

Mortality, a signal characteristic of Malkut, often hides behind career, fear, distractions. And, Quests for meaning, or money, or fame. We put mortality behind the Wizard of Oz curtains of success, reward, trophies.

Cancer sets fire to those ambitions, those frail and evanescent forms of the earthly. Into its fire goes health, focus, even life itself.

As its flames burn hotter, it sears away the dross of expectations leaving room for nothing but soul. It may even burn away the physical body, sending the nephesh on its journey back up the Tree of life to the crown, the keiter. Because nothing is lost. Transformation is the only rule.

The Princess of Wands is this transformation of the earthly into the spirit’s furnace. She reminds us, me, that even cancer can be a tool for spiritual growth, for change.

Mussar practice:

Name the context-The day of my PET scan. Putting location and quantity to my cancer. A day of truth. Truth used to help my body last as long as it can.

Name the feelings: Fear. Mild anxiety. Calmness. Curiosity. Acceptance.

Choose which ones to express: Calm. Curiosity. Acceptance.

Dogs, Family, Friends, General, Health, Kabbalah, Shadow Mountain, Tarot, Third Phase

Low Anxiety

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Lughnasa and the Chesed Moon

Sunday gratefuls: Eye moistener. Cool nights. Anxiety. Kep, a sometimes loft dog. Right now, for example. Rigel. Marshdale Burger Company. Fried cheese curds. (a Wisconsin health food) My chair. Friends like the Saltzmans and Tom. The Ancient Ones today.

Sparks of Joy and Awe: The Lady

Tarot: The Lady, #3 of the Major Arcana Druid Deck

 

Trying to remain present and/or distracted. Woke up though wondering whether my usual morning aches were, really, BONE PAIN. Don’t think so, but that idea, once planted, seems determined to hang around. Reached over to pet Kep and I was right back in the day. Another good thing about Dogs. They’re in the present, all the time. And, have the capacity to take me there, too.

That PET scan is on my mind. What will it show? Am I riddled with cancer? Probably not. But that thought wanders through. Not helpful. Are there metastases in parts of my body far from the prostate? Again, I don’t think so, but I have no evidence either way. Knowing with greater precision where the cancer likely is, the PET scan’s benefit, also means knowing I have cancer. With images. How much will they show? What will they mean?

The Orgovyx which shows up on Wednesday means hot flashes, sarcopenia, fatigue. Big fun likely to last the remainder of my life. Oh, boy.

OK. Yes. A bit over focused on these things right now. Hard to be casual about them. I know wondering, worrying will neither change the results nor help me now. I KNOW that. Have to figure out how to live it.

No more Kate focused events until April 12, 2022. Her yahrzeit. Between today and then the off and on grief, integration of her presence, rehoming the remaining items of her personal life. Living with the fact of her absence, her death.

This month through the end of September sees a lot of particular expenses: long term care insurance, 3rd quarter taxes, house staining, new hearing aid and microphone. Big ones for me. I’ve planned for them. And, the new Social Security payment should begin the third week of September.

Cooking for one remains a challenge. It’s not that I don’t know how to cook, I do. But will I spend the time in a day to do it? It’s easy to fall into the easy, the big easy. Not make a salad, follow a recipe, make sure there are fruits and vegetables. Last night I went to Marshdale Burger Company, for example. Easy.

I’ve gotten back into mussar, into MVP, taking my class on Tarot and Kabbalah. I find myself less willing to go to services and other events due to Delta. The risks still seem too high to me. Might be inertia. Can’t tell yet.

A most unsettling fact about death is the ongoingness of life. How cars still whoosh past on Black Mountain Drive. How Centurylink and IREA still send their bills. How the people I know still look the same. How the days on the calendar keep coming and going. Death is so big it seems like it should blow up reality. Instead it rearranges bits.

Later, all. If this sounds gloomy or unsettled, I do have those feelings. But I also have the Lady.

 

The Lady: The Lord and the Lady are the lovers of Major Arcana 5 in the Druid deck. This card is the Lady alone. The God (Cernunnos) and the Goddess make love in the Spring. Fertility. The Lady oversees the time from Beltane to Samain in my thinking. The Maiden shows up at Imbolc, replacing the Crone, who appears at Samain. These are the three stages of womanhood, the full seasons of the year, the psychology wheel which turns in all of our psyches.

This card, and the one from yesterday, the 8 of pentacles, make creativity, abundance, vitality a center piece. Suggesting the same for me. A suggestion I need. I’ve let that slide.

 

 

Aging, Friends, Health, Jefferson County, Our Land and Home, Shadow Mountain, Tarot, Third Phase

In This Body. Now.

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Lughnasa and the full Chesed Moon

Saturday gratefuls: Cancer. The full Chesed Moon. Emergency responders in front of the house last night. Congregation Beth Evergreen. Alan. Pet scans. Orgovyx. Cool morning. The dogs who love me. Friends and family. Fatigue. Claire and her new life.

Sparks of Joy and Awe: Soul Mirrors-tarot, torah, tanakh, astrology, friends, memories, art, literature, poetry, wilderness and wild things

Tarot:  Eight of Pentacles

 

Yesterday. A stay at home, I’m too tired to go out anyhow sorta day. Any time I feel weary now I hear Kristie, Dr. Eigner’s PA, asking, “Have you been experiencing fatigue? Bone pain?” Meaning, is the cancer causing you to experience either of these symptoms? Maybe I’m just tired? Or, maybe not. Acchh. Not needed.

Cleaning up. All of Kate’s personal belongings have been donated or targeted to certain people like Ruth. That’s a key part of the first phase. Now I need to clean up the clutter, pitch the items that no one wanted (mostly toiletries). When that’s done and Marina Harris’s crew has cleaned the house (Monday), I’ll be ready to move furniture. Oops. No, I won’t. Ruth still needs to move her sewing things to Jon’s house. A lot.

Anyhow, when they’re gone and the sewing room is empty, I plan to reuse it as a family dining area, a place for large meals. The grow room idea for the front part of this room is still in progress, uncertain. I also want to create a conversation area in front of the fireplace. That means getting rid of those two display cases. That’s not yet accomplished either. Someday soon.

The conversation area will take Kate’s chair from downstairs, the Stickley, perhaps my chair from downstairs. Or, maybe I’ll leave the couch and put the Stickley and Kate’s chair across from it. TBD.

At some point rooms will get painted, more art hung, and the photographs moved to the new dining area’s metal shelving. I’d like to accomplish all this before Thanksgiving, even better, before the end of September.

Cancer news: Alan will take me to Aurora on Tuesday afternoon for my auximin scan. Have to be there at 12:30 for a 1:00 appointment. The inevitable and voluminous paperwork. The presentation of the cards. Then, an injection. “Axumin® (fluciclovine F 18) injection is indicated for positron emission tomography (PET) imaging in men with suspected prostate cancer recurrence based on elevated blood prostate specific antigen (PSA) levels following prior treatment.” Takes about 30 minutes to circulate before the PET scan can begin.

Somewhere before that I’ll take whatever drug Kristie ordered for my claustrophobia. Enclosed spaces and me? Not a good combination. The scan itself takes around an hour, full body. A week later I’ll get the results unless something urgent is found. I hoping for a week later.

On Wednesday I get my first shipment of Orgovyx, the pill-form replacement for Lupron. It has 50% less impact on cardio-vascular issues, important for me. Could cost as much as $140 a month. I balked, then remembered that I’m paying exactly the same for Kep’s cytopoint injections for his allergies.

One step at a time. “A practical, patient, and methodical approach to a project may be needed. These qualities may be needed to improve your health and nutrition.” Tarot’s prince of pentacles. Especially important because this line from the 8 of Pentacles is also true: “(It)…usually will symbolize that you have been working hard for your health goal and yet you are not seeing the desired responses. (see below)

Prostatectomy. Radiation. Androgen deprivation. All of that and I still have a 7.4 PSA. Not the desired response. I appreciate this as well: “Do not allow yourself to become overwhelmed with the larger picture.” A day at a time. Stay in the present. Be here now.

I’m doing pretty well with that. I spin out once a while, but the ultimate question on the table, my mortalityspan, does not send me there. Dying is ok. Expected. Necessary. It’s the hassle of the last days, as Kate experienced, that challenges me. Again, though, not often. I try to stay here. In this body, in this place.

 

 

“The Eight of Pentacles is a card that represents a work in progress. The card can be somewhat concerning in health because it usually will symbolize that you have been working hard for your health goal and yet you are not seeing the desired responses. Whatever your health concern is, right now you need to take a step back and look at the process you are taking. Consider what ways you are doing counter-productive actions and which efforts are simply not enough. Do not allow yourself to become overwhelmed with the larger picture at hand. Take one step at a time and do not lose sight of your goal.” Auntyflo

“A positive card, you should expect good things to happen when you see it; especially aspects relating to a creative industry, or a project or part of your life that you have worked extremely hard on and dedicated yourself to. A good card to draw if you are intent on learning a skill or trade which you have a lot of passion for.”  tarot-explained

 

 

 

Family, Friends, Health, Kabbalah, Memories, Shadow Mountain, Tarot, Third Phase

The Weight

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Lughnasa and the Chesed Moon

Wednesday gratefuls: Kate, always Kate. Her 77th. Sadness. Grief. Down. Plunging. Rigel, the slow to wake. Rain. Kate’s ashes. Touching them. Canning. Kate in the kitchen. Cancer. Treatment. PSA. 7.4. Life is short; death is sure.

Sparks of Joy and Awe: BJ and Mary here

Tarot: The High Priestess, #2 of the major arcana

 

Feeling the weight. Yesterday. Today. A sinking in, slowly, a light burden tied around my feet. Watching joy and peacefulness go by. The surface getting fainter. Can’t say I’m surprised.

Wish it would have waited a day or two. The folks coming today. Kate’s ashes. Her birthday. Being a host not my thing. At all.

Even my fingers seem slow. Not as nimble on the keys. An opaqueness behind my eyes.

Talked with Diane yesterday. A good talk, mostly about cancer, but still good.

Afterward I loaded almost all the remainder of Kate’s personal belongings in the Rav4, ready to donate to the resale shop in Bailey. Two and a half cases of nutrient liquid and adult diapers for Mt. Evans Hospice. Felt weak. I mean, geez.

Waited on a call from Urology Associates. Got it. Rocky Mountain Cancer Care will do my pet scan. If my health plan approves it. They often drag their feet, the nurse from Urology Associates said of my insurance carrier. This may have been the stimulus for feeling the burden.

It took me back to the bad old days before my radiation therapy and just after the recurrence, the first one. When I found out on the day of the test that a pet scan would not be covered. I felt abandoned and devastated. Then.

Now. The specter of an insurance company closing its fist around my life. About all the various incidents with insurance around Kate. Around the imaging studies. The constant trips, waiting rooms. Diagnosis. Prognosis. Each time a little worse, not better.

Feeling it all. In my chest, my face. My vision. A lassitude creeping over my muscles. An inertia in my bones. Not wanting to move. Take action. Be present.

Grief. Sadness. The profound exhaustion and stress. Kate’s long illness. Today. All present. Visiting me at the same time.

Won’t last. Will pass. Equanimity shattered for the moment.

My practice.

Name the moment: Kate’s birthday. Cancer matters swirling. People coming. A celebration of Kate’s life.

Name the feelings: Loneliness. Sadness. Exhaustion. Inertia. Grief. Resignation.

Choose: Yes, I’ll let these come. They all feel appropriate, timely. Necessary.

An instant feeling of relief when I chose. No longer pushing them away, trying to rationalize, or deny. Yes. These are my feelings. And, I am not my feelings.

The Jewish idea of the lev: the heart/mind. Which suggests to me, again, that the heart and mind are one, yet severable in a moment. The heart affects the mind and the mind affects the heart, they work in synchrony. Except when they don’t.

Right now my lev is one. Wracked and wrecked. OK with it. Need help today. Especially. A tough one. Yes, there it is. I need help. Today.

 

The High Priestess:  “Entering the stillness. The High Priestess seems to bar our way forward-don’t be in a rush to move onwards…true passivity is strong and fertile…Open to the stillness and the depth within you to gain strength and wisdom.” Druid Craft Tarot Deck

 

Over the last week plus I’ve drawn the High Priestess card three time and the Queen of Swords twice. My anima. Gaining ground, becoming stronger. Taking me down and encouraging me to stay strong, to act when the time is right. Wu wei. The Te, the integrity, of the Tao, the way. Strength for me right now, the path, involves surrender, slowing, resting in my inner sanctuary.

She who is me. And the feminine side of my intellect. Together. Nourishing each other. Counseling my animus to be still. To wait. To feel. To ask. Yes.

 

 

Family, Feelings, Friends, Health, Kabbalah, Shadow Mountain, Tarot, Third Phase

Sad

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Kate, Glenwood Springs

Lughnasa and the Chesed Moon

Monday gratefuls: Swinging low. Cool morning. Kate, always Kate. Jon. Rigel and Kep. Allergies calming down. Appointment today. My future with cancer. The Ancient Ones and Love. The clan gathering in person and in spirit.

Sparks of Joy and Awe: Sleep.

Tarot card: Seven of Swords, Druid Deck

 

 

A bit of darkness in my mood this morning. Allowed, I guess. Cancer on the comeback trail. A focus on Kate, her life, her loved ones. Will bring her death closer. God, I loved her. Love her. Miss her. Sadness and longing for what cannot be.

We had so many good years, so much mutual support and kindness. So many hours of gardening, cooking, dog caring, traveling this world. Enough, really. Desiring more may seem to make sense, but it doesn’t. Enough.

With cancer raising its ugly presence again I’m tempted to say the thing about my own life. Enough. And, when death arrives I’m confident I will be able to say just that. Enough. Desiring more may seem to make sense, but it doesn’t.

Singapore, 2016

Kate, my strong, noble, beautiful Kate, knew that desire was no longer hers when she said to me, “Death with dignity.” Brave. Real. True to her self and to our relationship.

No, I’m not there in any way. Not yet enough. Although I will say that what has been has been good, has been what I chose, what I needed. And, that I expect the same, living into the next few years with joy and anticipation.

Not without the occasional darkness. Darkness, my old friend, comes to visit me each Winter Solstice. A determined, long night holding me, reminding me of the time before life and the time after. So, when darkness comes into my mood, as it has this morning, I welcome it. The sinking into myself, the quietening of outside noise, a veil between my feelings and the world. Necessary, at times.

Not to say I want to stay there. No. But that I will go into myself, take my journey underground, hunt for Tiresias. Or, my Virgil. For the learning that comes from pursuing the inward and downward path, away from the sun, into the fecund night.

Finding, as I often do, that writing about my feelings changes them. Feeling now more like tackling the day, getting on with what comes next: cancer, house rejiggering, the celebration of Kate.

 

The Seven of Swords (Druid Craft Deck): “Insights. Strategy. Research. New ideas challenge old assumptions and great progress is made. Using intellect, wit, or charm to gain an advantage or recover something that has been lost..Strategic planning or research.” from the Druid Craft’s accompanying book.

Bald, gray, intensely thoughtful. Seven different swords available for his use. Working late at night as a waning crescent moon shows itself among clouds.

“Charlie, You’re a Druid!” John Ackerman, my spiritual advisor back in the mid-1980’s. I had gone deep into the Celtic world, begun to use the Great Wheel as a way of understanding life and death.

Not exactly a Druid, but a man deep into the way of the natural world, the Te of the Tao. Following a path that’s often fuzzy, mysterious, yet comforting and ever present.

I see myself in this card, willing to go into the darkness with or without illumination, to learn from it, to report back to the lit world.

Will need new ideas today at 2 pm. How to counter the cancer’s return. Yes. Making great progress? I sure hope so.

 

 

Family, Friends, GeekWorld, Great Wheel, Kabbalah, Plants, Tarot, The West, Third Phase, Weather +Climate

Kindred Spirits

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Last day of Summer and the Lughnasa Moon

Saturday gratefuls: Mini-split air con units. Thanks, Tom. Mark’s suggestion for a topic on Sunday. Lotta sleep last night and this morning. Feeling good. An excellent meal with Jon yesterday evening. Rain. Cooler weather. Smoky on High. Lush mountain meadows, filled with waving stalks of pollen.

Sparks of Joy and Awe: Sashimi. Japan.

Tarot card: Ace of Wands, Druid Craft Deck

 

Good news. At dinner with Jon we talked about our new relationship, one with Kate no longer physically present. Though she remains a psychic presence for us both in powerful ways. We agreed we wanted to continue, be family. Over sushi, sashimi, and crab wontons. Uplifting.

I spent yesterday handling various matters. Groceries. Bills. Emails. Workout. The dinner with Jon. Must have worn me out because I slept 9 hours +. Also, rain and a cool night helped.

Tom helped me find the mini-split air conditioning system. It will work for my downstairs. Just have to find a contractor and get it installed. Too late, unfortunately, for Kate.

Taking this Saturday as a rest day, a travel day as Kate and I called it. We always took a rest day after long travel.

It was a big week. Ruth and Gabe here Sunday night through Tuesday evening. A lot  of pruning work with Ruth. House cleaners on Tuesday. Kep into VRCC for his allergy shot. P.T. on Monday and Wednesday. Tarot and Kabbalah on Wednesday. Alan for breakfast, Jackie for a haircut, and mussar on Thursday. Donating the wheelchair and the rollator. Errands yesterday and the time with Jon and the evening. Not to mention laundry, folding clothes, cooking, feeding the dogs. You know, all that ordinary homestuff.

Pruning goes well. I’m on a hiatus from it until Ruth makes up her mind about all the sewing related things. Still hoping to have it complete, or almost, before the 18th. Get furniture moved around over that time period. Try to get a new feel for the house sorted out by Thanksgiving.

Have had to modify the 18th because we learned this week that Ruth and Gabe’s first day of school is the 18th. Shifted activities to late afternoon and evening. Only possible wrinkle? The Delta variant. If it continues to rage, as it has of late, it may interfere with travel. If that happens, we’ll push this out to 2022. See this from this mornings Washington Post:

“The newly resurgent coronavirus could spark 140,000 to 300,000 cases a day in the United States come August, fueled by the highly transmissible delta variant and the widespread resumption of normal activities, disease trackers predict.”

Thomas Cole and William Cullen Bryant, Kindred Spirits Painting by Asher Brown Durand

Ace of wands. Rather than go to the Rider-Waite interpretations, I’m going to read this one on my own. The Druid Craft deck speaks to me as one grounded in Celtic lore and myth.

A bull elk with an 8 or 10 point rack stands on a rock that reminds me of the Pulpit Rock in Strand, Norway. It also reminds me of a painting by Asher Durand.

A steep cleft in the mountains separates the bull from another precipice, one shaded by an autumnal aspen grove.

Above the mountains the blazing sun sends fire to the tree, the elk, the mountains, the sky while a full moon hangs, almost invisible in the fiery presence, above a small spire of rock behind the elk.

Bull with water lily, 2015, Lake Evergreen

The wand lays itself over the sun, perhaps having summoned its energy. Or, in the process of summoning it? The wand has reddish bark that seems still living, as if the wand had only recently been cut from a tree, or somehow remains alive anyhow. Perhaps a rowan? The wand as alive seems confirmed by the green leaves, eight in all, mysteriously falling away from it.

The whole scene is peaceful. Some key words that come to mind: majestic. natural. communal. creativity. fire. determination. mountainous. lone elk. aspen grove. single wand.

Black Mountain, 2015

Perhaps the wand has become a conduit between the sun and the natural world at its fall change. The push of the sun’s fire has caused the wand to send its green leaves, which it needs to continue living, on a mission, as angels, messengers of the sun’s creative power.

The elk and the aspen grove, animal and plants, both salute the sun. A bull elk with a rack like that is ready for the rut, the annual fertility rite for all elks. The aspen grove, with its just turning toward gold leaves, has begun to prepare for winter, a time when it will have to live off foods stored in and around its interlocked root system.

The positive session with Jon last night, the on pace pruning, Tom’s visit a week ago, the Tarot and Kabbalah class have me feeling grounded, yet still transforming. Moving toward the creative energy of the sun, soaking it in with the Bull and the Aspen Grove. In the mountains. On my Pulpit Rock, where I stand with my kindred spirits, the river and mountain poets of Chinese history.

Life on a different, yet familiar ancientrail.

 

 

 

 

Family, Feelings, Friends, Mountains, Shadow Mountain, Tarot, Third Phase

Besties

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Summer and the Lughnasa Moon

Monday gratefuls: Ruth. What a sweetheart. Gabe and his puzzles. Jon. Rigel and Kep. The three of swords. Rain, hail. A cool wind and a cool night. Good sleep. Rebecca and p.t. Pruning. Facing front. Kate, always Kate.

Sparks of Joy and Awe: Ruth

Tarot card: Three of Swords

 

The Ancient ones. The best decisions in our lives. Easy top two: Kate and Joseph. No doubt. Kate for love, for mutuality/intimacy, for discovering the best selves of two injured souls. Joseph for love, for nurturing, for satisfaction of a need to parent, for his wonderful life.

After that came one you might not consider. I decided early on with Kate’s illness that I would do for her what she could not do for herself. And, that I would greet each task with yes in my heart, with love. The depth of that decision was, I think, clear to me at the time. It was a choice to live that part of our lives primarily for her.

The fourth best decision, at least as I ordered them yesterday, was our mutual decision to move to Colorado. We did it to be part of Ruth and Gabe’s life in a meaningful way and to have an adventure in the Rocky Mountains. In unexpected ways, like through the long arc of the divorce and through Kate’s illness, we realized both dreams.

Black Mountain

If you find this idea intriguing, you can help research on big decisions by looking at this website: The Ten Biggest Decisions.

After the Ancient ones (9 am Sunday mornings for me), I worked on pruning. Got almost all of Kate’s jewelry gathered together for Ruth to go through. Did a bit more work in the sewing room, dividing things between the Patchworkers and Ruth. She’ll go through both over the next couple of days, decide what she wants. The rest will go to others: the Patchworkers, Mountain Resource Center, and a consignment shop in Bailey.

In Korea, as Seoah told me, the equivalent is taking the deceased’s clothing and other belongings outside and burning them. I understand this. There is a need to purge the personal items like clothing, jewelry, hobby material. They carry an emotional weight, for some survivors heavy, for some not so much, but there nonetheless. Donating them, burning them. Both honor the significance of the deceased and their choices about what mattered to them in the realm of the very personal.

Later, Ruth and Gabe, Jon, came up. Around 7 pm. Ruth and Gabe will stay today and tomorrow. Ruth has work to do, figuring what she wants as her legacy from her grandma. Gabe, not so much that, but he loves being up here with the dogs and his Grandpop.

I spent a half-hour or so with Ruth, catching up, figuring things out with her for today.

The Three of Swords. Not a happy card. How could it be? A heart pierced with by three sharp blades, rain, and storm clouds. This from Labyrinthos: “This card comes at a time when you need to prepare yourself for this next stage in life. While the grief may be extremely hurtful, it enables you to forget your past and focus on your future knowing that you have control of what actions you take afterwards.”

You might imagine, given Kate’s death, that this card reflects turmoil in my life as a result. Nope. Just not where I am with my grief. I’m in a solid place, integrating Kate into my life without her presence. Working at tasks that move my life forward without regret or shame. I feel good there.

No, this card represents the family member I mentioned earlier. “A harder day yesterday later. A family member and I got crosswise. Yet again. Disturbed me before I got to sleep. Will have to get more clarity about this. Say my piece. Not let it drag me down, too.” This was Saturday.

My upset after the anger this person let out troubled me. A lot. Got in the way of my sleep, left me restless in my heart. I decided to face front with it and scheduled a lunch where I said we would have “…a serious talk.”

This is not easy for me. Something I’d rather avoid, but circumstances demand that I lean into the pain. Some resolution is necessary for life here on Shadow Mountain to retain one of its primary purposes. Wish I could be more specific, but I can’t.