Category Archives: Judaism

Family, Feelings, Great Wheel, Health, Kabbalah, Shadow Mountain, Tarot, Third Phase

Inner Weather: Cloudy

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Lughnasa and the Chesed Moon

Wednesday gratefuls: Tarot. Kabbalah. CBE. Rabbi Jamie. Downton Abbey. High level schmalz. Sadness. Grief. The occasional desolation. Lymph nodes. Orgovyx, stretching itself. Rigel and her persistent communicating. Even when I don’t understand. Kate, always Kate. Ruth’s healing.

Sparks of Joy and Awe: Jackie, my hair stylist, a sweetheart

Tarot: Two of Cups

 

I miss this woman. So much.

Inner weather: cloudy with a chance of tears. Using my mussar practice for the month:  what’s the context? what are the feeling(s)? how do I choose to experience them?

The immediate context includes graduating from p.t. on Monday morning, doing doggy things like nails and getting Kep’s allergy shot, getting my own hair cut, taking out the trash, getting groceries, having cancer in my left pelvic lymph nodes. And, five and a half months of grieving. Finishing up the Tarot and Kabbalah course. The imminence of the High Holidays.

What are the feelings? Sudden desolation. Mourning. Sadness. Frustration. Joy. Attaboy. Resignation.

How do I choose to experience them? The mourning, sadness, desolation. I embrace them, say yes to them. They are my psyche’s tools used to carve and paint and write a new vision for my life while honoring Kate. Visit a while. But, don’t overwhelm me. Unless, of course, you just have to.

The frustration, an outgrowth of my now 6 and a half year experience with prostate cancer, prostate cancer treatment, tests, side effects. Cut it short. It’s past oriented and unhelpful. Resignation. Resist this one. It’s a road I do not wish to travel. Acceptance? Yes. Resignation, no. Joy. Come on in, dude. Make yourself at home. Stay a while, a long while. I sure need you.

It’s been a tough week and a half. The PET scan, the bone scan, waiting on the results, the results themselves. I’m feeling vulnerable because of them, mortal. Also the strange road of the cancer that can be managed. A 2 year course of androgen deprivation therapy. Off and on for the rest of my life. Prostate cancer has become part of me, literally, and as an identifier. Oh, he’s the one with prostate cancer.

On Friday I’m going to have homemade ice cream with a friend who has ovarian cancer and is on her third recurrence. Cancer is a bastard, and still too often a homicidal bastard. A lot of progress has been made, that’s true, but not enough for the word cancer to lose its bite.

I’m achy, my body adjusting to the new med, Orgovyx. Even though I graduated from p.t. (no hat, darn it), I’ve not yet got my exercise routine back to, well, a routine. I keep scheduling things in the morning and by afternoon I’m too tired. Gotta change my scheduling practices. I’m part way there.

The first impulses to prune, to reorganize have hit a temporary seawall. Cancer, my need to exercise, feeling low. I got a lot done, a lot. There is still more to do and right now I have no energy for it. Makes sense. A lot going on physically and emotionally. Still, it frustrates me.

I want to get to a new life, a new way without Kate’s physical presence; but, I feel ground down, worn down with lots of steps between today and that new way of being. Whatever it will be.

When I took the garbage out today, recycling and trash, I felt weak. Wondered what it will be like lugging them through the snow. Then, I remembered I lost my snow plow guy and have to find a new one. Another task to add to the list.

It feels like I’m dog paddling, making a little progress with a lot of thrashing around, when what I want is the Australian crawl. Fast, crisp, leaving a wake behind.

 

Tarot: Two of Cups Druid

I continue to draw cards that focus on my anima. This one, though, may refer to the energy available when my anima and my animus work as one, focus together as lovers and creators.

I sure need this sort of energy right now. It reminds me to not follow only one inner path, watch the one the anima takes, then the animus, find where they intersect. Stay a while. Enjoy the heat and the power.

 

 

 

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.

 

Family, Great Wheel, Health, Kabbalah, Our Land and Home, Shadow Mountain, Tarot

Quilting Life

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Lughnasa and the Chesed Moon

Friday gratefuls: Hearing. A day off. Two days off. Three.

Mary in Singapore

Cool. Summer waning. Snow. No, not here, but in the high country. Prostate cancer. Orgovyx. Pet scan. Diane. Exercise. Leg much, much less stiff. Mary’s 69th. Wow. The Ellis siblings getting old.

Sparks of Joy and Awe: Maxwell Giblin. A new life thread woven into the tapestry. May his life be for a blessing.

Tarot: My Wheel of the Year Spread

Hearing folks called. For want of an ear mold the appointment was lost. Ear mold company backlogged. I can imagine a whole line of other folks’ ears waiting ahead of my single one. Somewhere. For some injection molding machine. Unique, one of a kind. Necessary. No new hearing aid. No Roger’s microphone until the ear mold folks do their job.

Removing that appointment from the week allowed the week’s theme to solidify. Cancer and Tarot. The PET scan results, next Tuesday. My new Tarot spread will be my presentation at the final Tarot and Kabbalah class next Wednesday.

Got a call back from Bear Creek Design. They’ll be out next month to help me redesign and remodel the kitchen. I want a kitchen I love, one that makes me want to cook in it. Also, one that’s prettier, more integrated with the Mountain home, its cedar exterior and its location. I need the boost, both the design changes and a place I want to use. Hope this will help me focus on diet.

Cozy. Kate finishing a quilt gift for Sandy, who will have surgery again this week

Lauri and Jamie, who collected Kate’s stash and books and other items for donation to Bailey Patchworkers, have found several of Kate’s pieced quilts. Piecing is what most folks think of as quilting. It involves designing, cutting, and sewing what we think of as the top of the quilt.

Quilting is the process of adding batting and backing to the pieced top, then sewing them together on a long arm quilting machine. If you look at a quilt, you’ll see stitches that often curve all over the top and back of the quilt. That’s the work of the long arm.

Both Lauri and Jamie hope other quilters in the Bailey Patchworkers will quilt Kate’s pieced tops and return them to me to give as gifts. I hope so, too. It would be delightful to have some of her creative work to offer others, especially now.

Kate’s life and death. A journey completed. The ancientrail of life finished. Where does that trail wind after? Who knows? Well, I do. At least in part. It continues when I see a hangar she used, a jar of her foot cream, or a word like penultimate comes up in conversation. It was a favorite of hers.

It may be true that we die for real when the last person who remembers us dies. Or, we may live on in ways unknown. Perhaps in plants we planted that bloom, or fruit. Perhaps in a jar of honey stored in someone’s pantry. A word or an idea that enters the mainstream of thought. Perhaps in a comfortable night’s sleep under a quilt made by hand in Andover or Conifer. And, yes, perhaps in the great web of becoming which envelopes us all.

Going to write a second post today detailing the Wheel of the Year/Tree of Life spread I’m creating.

Family, Health, Kabbalah, Tarot

The Great Wheel. The Tree of Life.

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Lughnasa and the Chesed Moon

Thursday gratefuls: The lost conversation. Thanks, Benzo. Tarot and Kabbalah, learning at a deep level. Bones. Bone density. Dexa scans. Finding Sally Jobe. Horchatas. Voodoo donuts. Hot dogs, New York Style. Orgovyx. Circulating.

Sparks of Joy and Awe: The Tarot

Tarot: Hanged Man, #12 of the Major Arcana

 

It came! It came! Just like my Red Rider BB gun! Orgovyx. A pill to rule them all. All them damned cancer cells. No, not really. A pill to starve them all. Those damned cancer cells. Yes, I’m dropping my testosterone once again, by as much as 93%. Food for prostate cancer infested cells. Fedex. Everything comes by delivery these days.

The medical churn has begun again; this time with me at the epicenter. Go here. Find this place. Get this test. Wait for these results. Then go here. Go there. Rinse. Repeat.

Exhausting. Driving. Waiting. Wondering. Days given over to the medical-pharmaceutical complex. Sometimes it feels like agency on my part, sometimes it feels like the loss of agency. Confusing.

Spoke with my cousin Diane. She’s a good listener and familiar with the medical scene, her mother a charge nurse before her death. I need the connection, the time being seen. Always, of course, but more so now. We all do, yes. I’m just acknowledging that need.

Celtic Cross tarot spread

Next week presentations in Tarot and Kabbalah. We learned the Celtic Cross spread in class yesterday. Rabbi Jamie asked me about its link to Celtic thought, “Charlie’s our Celtic expert.” I said I hadn’t thought about it.

Well. Now I am. The Great Wheel. 8 seasons. Midwest. 4 seasons. Winter=Samain-Midwinter, Spring=Imbolc-Ostara, Summer=Beltane-Summer, Fall=Lughnasa-Mabon. Kabbalah: 4 worlds Assiyah=physical, Yetzirah=emotion, Briyah=conception, Atzilut=connection. Four directions and Six (up, down). Four winds. Four elements.

The traditional presentation of the 4 seasons and the four worlds is two dimensional. The 4 seasons happen in linear time, the winter of 2021. The four worlds go up in a ladder on the tree of life from Malkut=Assiyah to Keiter=Atzilut.

Rabbi Jamie has suggested that the tree of life is better envisioned as a circle, perhaps even a sphere. That’s because the relationships between and among the sephirot are dynamic, bursting with energy going from one to the other and back again. Nothing is higher or lower.

As in the Great Wheel. No season comes first. The seasons need each other, feed into each other, create problems and solutions for each other.

More. We could overlay the four worlds on the great wheel. I would do it this way:  Assiyah=Spring, Yetzirah=Summer, Briyah=conception, Winter=Atzilut. You might choose different linkages, but in a sense it doesn’t matter since both represent energy moving from one form into another, then back. Sort of like E=MC2.

This last idea has the effect of overlaying the tree of life onto the great wheel. Or, vice versa. But, only if the Tree is circular.

In spite of the risk of way overloading the boat I’m going to throw in a bit of Taoism, too. With wu wei we follow the tao rather than forcing it. We bend with the transformation reality brings to us, adapting, leaning into it. This feels very sephirotic and great wheelish to me.

The seasons come and go; we live in them with coats and shorts and hats and gloves. We adapt ourselves to the growing season, to the fallow season. Our soul’s journey may seem physical here in Malkut, but the soul can break free from Malkut and travel back up, or, better, over to the Crown, the Keiter and past it into the ayn sof. Then, return.

Still have to add tarot in here. I hope this doesn’t become too Rococo, but it does feel true to my understanding. More to come.

 

 

Great Wheel, Health, Kabbalah, Mountains, Shadow Mountain, Tarot

No Rage Against This Machine

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Lughnasa and the Chesed Moon

Wednesday gratefuls: Rocky Mountain Cancer Care. Tarot. Kabbalah. Positron Emission Tomography Scans. In a trailer. Axumin. Drugs. Benzo. Air purifiers. Purified Air. Rarified air. 8800 feet. Living in the Mountains. On a Mountain. Alan. Tesla.

Sparks of Joy and Awe: Axumin tracer

Tarot:  Eight of Pentacles

 

Boy did I relax. Took the benzodiazepine. Slept 3 hours and 40 minutes when I got home. Got up at 7 pm and the dogs hadn’t been fed. They were lying in the family crate with me, willing to let me sleep. Calmed me way down.

Not sure it helped much with the scan. I’d read the wrong information about the scan. I read the information for a PET scan where the wait after injection of the radioactive tracer is an hour. In the case of the axumin scan? No waiting. After injection the axumin travels to the prostate bed, the most important site for the scan. Right away. They want you in there soonest. Oh.

I popped the small pill and waited. I think they had mischeduled my scan. The main tech was in a bit of a hurry. She slipped the butterfly IV in my right arm. Said she’d be back in a bit. She was. About five minutes later she injected the axumin and I went into the bed of the trailer for a lie down.

Oh. Yeah. This is the newest PET scan machine. The latest and greatest according to the tech. Just got it in April. We had to walk through the receiving bay for ambulances, out into the parking lot. Sure enough, a long white tractor trailer sat on a stretch of asphalt behind the main building.

Watch the stairs. The handles are loose. They were. It felt like going up the steps to a carnival attraction. Step right up, see the amazing, the latest, the greatest, PET Scanner!

Lying on the curved bed of the scanner, knees up on a naugahyde triangular pillow, after the techs had left the room, I remembered. Hey, hey. My hearing aid! They came and got it. No metal in the machine.

The bed wiggles a bit when it moves but otherwise goes forward and backward smoothly and precisely. Gotta get the right parts to the scanner. I closed my eyes, the benzo had not yet taken affect. The bed moved. I opened my eyes.

Oops. Closed them again. I was in the middle of the tunnel, surrounded on all sides by curved metal. Just the thing that triggers my claustrophobia. I’m ok. I’m ok. I’m ok. I talked myself down though the urge to crawl out of the tunnel and run away was strong. Gradually the drug began to work and I calmed down. Took about twenty minutes, maybe a bit more.

Now, somewhere, stored in bits and bytes, the current story of my prostate cancer has visual imagery. In the next couple of days a radiologist trained in the dark art of reading such images will make a report. If there’s nothing urgent (I don’t know what that would be.), I’ll get a telemedicine call from Kristie, Eigner’s PA, to go over the results next Tuesday am.

After that, I imagine, will come a referral for radiation. Probably back to Anova Cancer Care in Lone Tree.

I drew, again, the eight of Pentacles. “A time for slow and steady work to fulfill a vision. Focus on one step at a time rather than the final goal.” And, “Whatever your health concern is, right now you need to take a step back and look at the process you are taking.”

A holistic look, a vision for my health, not just cancer, not just post-polio, but my healthspan.

The cancer path has clear steps now and I’m following them: orgovyx comes today. Had the PET scan, await the results and what they suggest. Nothing more to do now. My bone scan is today. See what I need to do for my bone health. The new hearing aid and microphone come on Friday. That will help me, especially as  mask mandates return.

I’ve restarted my exercise routines, gradually building back up to three sets a workout, 15 reps, three days a week. Longer cardio on off days.

My spiritual life (I don’t like the word spiritual, gotta find a better one. It has no there there.), for lack of a better term, continues strong. I am part of the world, part of the natural world, ensnared by entropy. I will return to the earth, dust to dust. That is certain and ok. The Great Wheel turns and I turn with it. Rejoicing in the seasons: of the earth, of my Kate, of myself.

The place I could improve the most is diet. Want to get that kitchen remodeled so I’ll want to cook in it. I need to get better at preparing food for myself rather than going the easy routes of frozen meals or take-out.

One foot. Then another. And, another. The path? The ancientrails? Life. Health. Creativity. Friendship.

 

 

 

 

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.

Aging, Beyond the Boundaries, Cinema and Television, Family, Feelings, Great Wheel, Kabbalah, Myth and Story, Original Relation, Shadow Mountain, Tarot, Third Phase

I am

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Lughnasa and the Chesed Moon

Monday gratefuls: Helen Reddy. I am Woman. The Women’s movement. Cancer. Its sequelae: pet scans, orgovyx, friends reaching out, fatigue, persistence. Shortness of breath. Family. T-shirts. Living in the moment. The Day. A Day. This Day.

Sparks of Joy and Awe: The voice of the 1960’s

Tarot:  Prince of Pentacles

 

Watched I am Woman. A biopic about Helen Reddy. Got drawn in by a snippet of the movie in which Tilda Cobham-Hervey sings Delta Dawn. Didn’t know that was Helen Reddy. I’ve been listening to it in my head for weeks now, since I thought about a parody featuring the Delta variant.

Not a great movie, but a good one. My anima is strong, perhaps even dominant. Movies which feature women overcoming obstacles and flourishing speak directly to me.

Many tears. Why? Well, sixties music almost always moves me, reminds me of the passion, the wonder, the promise of those magical years. Speaking truth to power. Yes. Especially when the vulnerable do the speaking.

Remembering Kate. Her determination to go to med school. The Dean who tried to turn her away because “You’re already married to a doctor.” Her determination to conquer the obstacles in her life: back pain, sexist managers, a lost voice, her final illness. A strong, smart woman. Ill-used by many of the men in her life. But always, always getting back up and going on.

Cleansing, the lacrimae. Sacred waters. Draining pain and sadness and nostalgia. Bringing me into the present after a trip through the past.

Got a lot done over the weekend. Money stuff. Pruning. Cleaning. Writing.

What is a good use of time? A key question for those raised in the success obsessed American culture. I still clip articles about improving my productivity. Why? That ancientrail, my highest potential, trapped me in a long and narrow tunnel, one I’ve struggled against, embraced, knelt down and crawled through on my hands and knees.

All those novels. Unpublished. Kate wanted me to publish before she died. All that injustice. Still there, seeming deeper and more entrenched now, after all the work. That damning number, carbon in the atmosphere. Still rising.

And then we die. Leaving behind an unjust world, a world heating up behind human endurance, creative works birthed but never raised into adulthood.

Tarot cards speaking to my anima, encouraging her, telling her to dive in, create, dance, sing-the High Priestess, the Lady, even the eight of Pentacles. Today, again, the Prince of Pentacles. That’s the patient, methodical, practical approach guy. Speaking to my animus.

Animus and anima working together, literally yin and yang, vibrating, humming, feeding each other, feeding off of each other. My neshama emerging, cheering them both.

I am Woman. I am Man. I am. Both.

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.

 

 

Family, Feelings, Garden, Kabbalah, Plants, Shadow Mountain, Tarot, Third Phase

Blindfolded and Bound

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Lughnasa and the Chesed Moon

Irises in Andover, 2014

Friday gratefuls: Kate, sinking into the top Soil, nourishing the Irises. Her birthday. Now over. Seeing Mary. Jon. Ruth. Gabe. Yesterday. Mussar. Being seen and heard.  Living with cancer. Advanced. PET scan on Tuesday. Allergies waned. 45 degrees this morning.

Sparks of Joy and Awe: PET scans

Tarot:  8 of Swords, Druid

 

August, 2010, honey extraction

I needed everyone gathered on Wednesday. Kate’s birthday. The first since her death. Their presence honoring her also buoyed me up, made the day rich, meaningful, even though painful and sad. I especially appreciated the sense of joy added with the balloons and the yellow Roses. Kate’s work with simcha, joy in Hebrew, included giving yellow Roses to each participant in our mussar class.

Yesterday was a quieter day. I worked out in the a.m., took a nap, then went to mussar at CBE. Took the opportunity to tell folks about my PSA and Kate’s birthday. Being heard and seen. By folks who care. I said yes, I’m alone, but, not lonely. Living alone suits me, two thumbs up. Of course, I’d prefer if Kate were here, but, she’s not.

On the way home I stopped again at the Chicago beef food truck; it’s parked on my way home. Two hot dogs with pickle, mustard, and relish. Two chili cheese dogs. Ruth and Gabe stayed the night on Wednesday. We all love hot dogs.

Mary transferred out of the cabin Sarah rented through Air B’nB. She got a hotel downtown, ready for her first train trip to Chicago and then on to Tomah, Wisconsin to see her friend, Debbie. She’ll be in the continental U.S. for quite some time visiting relatives. BJ left yesterday morning.

Mary, Jon, Ruth, and Gabe attended a Beatle’s cover band concert at Red Rocks last night. A cool, rainy evening. I had a ticket, but chose not to go. The last two days wore me out, down. Feeling a little lost in my inner world, needed time. Not to mention the crowd and the Delta variant.

Eight of Swords: Gonna write about this in the main text. Because I resisted this one. Victimization? Sense of being trapped? No way out? The first card I’ve drawn since the Tarot/Kabbalah class began that didn’t make sense to me. I read a few interpretations, relooked at the card. Nope, not me.

Then, as I wrote. Oh, maybe.

I do not see myself as a victim. However. I do have two unyielding realities dominating my life right now: death and cancer. Both of these restrict me, bind me to themselves. And, I have no choice. Kate is dead. My cancer has returned. Trapped? Not exactly, but constrained, captured, bound? Yes.

Looking at the card, it seems to me that a dawn has begun to emerge through the trees. The woman’s bare foot, her left appears ready to take a step, a step toward the opening in the swords. A way out of the dilemma. If she touches a sword, she’ll realize she can cut her bonds. Then remove the blindfold on her own.

Both grief and serious illness have a way of cloistering us, making us self-involved, self-engaged. And often blind to the needs of others around us. Ourselves, too.

Wednesday it was hard for me to focus on others, see them. Grief clouded my heart. Under the Chesed Moon and in this month of repentance and self-examination, Elul, I’m inclined to understand, forgive myself.

Being unavailable to others is not where I want or intend to live. Yet. Scooping out Kate’s ashes, getting the date for my PET scan put me there on Wednesday and some of yesterday, too. In the late afternoon I felt the blindfold begin to slip, slip far enough that I could put my bare foot out another step, release myself from the binding by cutting them on the sword of reason.

Yes. Cancer and death. This week’s emphasis, no doubt. Yes.

My reaction to both of them is in my control. When I let myself remember that. Today I’m committed to staying conscious, aware, not letting either Kate’s death or this cancer recurrence dominate my inner world.

“A practical, patient, and methodical approach to a project may be needed. These qualities may be needed to improve your health and nutrition.” The Prince of Pentacles from yesterday. These two cards together. I see.

Both cancer and death need a practical, patient, methodical, grounded way. Allow each one the time they need. Follow through. Keep putting one foot out, then another. Cut the ties that bind, slip off the blindfold and see, really see.

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.