Christmas Came To Me

Obsidian campground ice in my jug morning #1

Christmas Came to Me

I have had much to be grateful for this year of 2012. Wonderful children who are happy in their families, fun loving Grandchildren, both parents still around to enjoy the holidays with, friends as true blue as a field of Forget Me Nots. With an immune system compromised by the trauma of the previous year, life threatening food sensitivities led to more near death experiences that I can count on my hands. Some that were closer calls than other, but all crazy serious. These challenges left me ever so grateful for many things I wouldn't think twice about before. Gratitude for life itself. As an example. When people would ask 'how are you?”, my reply became “I hear that breathing is good”.

Trail to Jerseydale2009

Truly, the journey through healing has brought much enlightenment to this soul. New perspective on things like “plan for the future” have evolved. One thing I know from all I've been through is that the future, for me and all of us, is the children. All I do in life seems to bring me back to this. I continue to be blessed by the little ones around me as as well as the ones who now have little ones of their own. How quickly they grow. If I could show them, like a picture book, how very precious they are, I would unfold my pages, let them bend my corners into dog eared crumples, get sticky stuff all over the paper so that the pages stick together and tear. If I could show them, each and every one, but alas, they too must travel through life, their own journey to experience.

Now, this being a Christmas post and all, I am slowly and along some bunny trails getting around to that very subject (as is the way I do things). With all that I have and hold dear to be grateful for, and Jesus being my mate since I was 8 years old (a WHOLE other story!) why, then shouldn't I be embracing Christmas more than ever? No matter how I tried, I got deeper in a funk. Not Scroogy, just not getting Christmas. Having truly experienced Loves True Light first hand in a most blessed way, surely I should. Well, I hadn't done any of the things I do like harvest yummy fruits, making sauce and drying them, putting together baskets of yummy stuff etc... but, that wasn't it either.

Mowhawk Rock. My snowshoe tracks. 2009

Finally, with no particular reason behind it, just as I'd abandoned any hope of Christmas joy, it came. I needed not search any more. It came, out of the blue, Christmas crept, slowly filling my heart, just as I have known it to be. I have no profound words about it, it just came. I turned on the Christmas music, got out the box of decorations, sat down here and began to write. Soon I will harvest rose hips, make spicy tea, and move on from there. No big bang ending here, but when it's all said and done, it makes good toast.

Peace, Love and the Joy of Life,

Jeannine 12/7/12

Thankful Light

It's that time of year again where I subject friends and loved ones to my wonderings and babblings. 

Thanksgiving upon us makes me look inward, which hasn't been hard for me lately. The past few years have been the most difficult in my life and this last two, I barely survived...literally . As Dorothy said “there's no place like home” Looking inward, cleaning house, dredging up all the old treasures and sorting them out from the junk allows one to move forth and extend themselves outward. This Dear ones is my hearts desire.

Last night I saw a friend who I love so dearly and have since I first met her 21 years ago. When I told her how very much I always admired her, she said “there's a lot you don't know about me Jeannine”, like my love and admiration would change if I did. What she doesn't know is that nothing she's said or done would probably shock me, or change my heart for her, and the things I admire are the parts that rise above it all. When I connected with this friend, I saw HER, not her body, her actions, or any of the outer shell of her core. What I saw was a light that shone through all of that and lit up those around her, including me. She's beautiful.

I watched my friend raise her children, sometimes nearby, and sometimes in a way that was like being in a cosmic parallel play ( Peuoget, child development stuff. Playing along side each other, but not really interacting). I knew there were rough times, but I knew those children always felt loved. Because of that, they are incredible people today.

The challenges of these past few years have made me more grateful and aware than ever of family, friends, new people in my life and my own very soul, all of us shining our lights through the layers and lighting each other. Looking within and cleaning house has enabled me to see the treasures that are a part of my house, and you all are treasures. Your lights keep mine lit, and light it when it dims.

It would be all to easy to say how grateful I am for my children and Grandchildren who bring joy to my heart, but we all know this. I am ever so grateful, but my gratitude and thankfulness extends far into the Universe this year. Perhaps my heart will burst from it and my light will then shine down from above, who knows, but when I see your faces, or receive encouraging comments from you, it makes me shine with thankfulness to know you. I am thankful for those who have been drawn to my light as well as those who''s light has attracted me. Thankful for the ones who have held my hand through the rough times, without judgment... as the teeter toter tottered, as it always will. Thankful for the lights I see in new faces when I am invited into their “house” and look in, even just on the street, or in the market.

While marching through the streets of gratitude, I am always, always amazed at the children. So open to letting their lights shine. People say I'm a “teacher”, but the children have been the teachers for me. I try to facilitate their environments so that they can shine as far as they are able, but inevitably, they are the ones who light my heart. I'm truly thankful for the children and the children that I see in us all. Look within, put fear aside, and let your childlike light shine. Maybe I sound all new agey, tie dye hippie, but, hay, would you expect anything else?

Love, light... and just enough darkness to show the light,

Jeannine

Hearts Of Nature

john Muir Trail Yosemite National Park

Natures Heartbeat

Nature’s heart beats over the Land with rhythm & cadence nourishing the souls of her Daughters & Sons

This time of dieing begs for honor, gracing the earth’s mossy bed with sacred permission

Permission to soak in the nourishment of our Mother and die in her arms

Surrender garments of light that were draped about supple Spring skin

Their colors reflecting those of wildflowers & clear streams

Out weary arms to be cloaked in blazing fire & heavy darkness for it is time

One more time put forth all that is left within and more, for the Universe to store

As the spider makes mad her spinning of webs, the Deer rut and the Squirrel scurries ~

so we must lay aside the sensibleness of the time of life & relinquish societal reason

Lay down in her arms, beat lulling & softening desires ~ her firm, but loving fingers caressing trusting souls

Pull snugly blankets of Fiery red, yellow and gold, fading to brown… prepare to nourish once again the earth ~

die with joy a certain death and come what may ~

bleak cold, warming once again ~

once again if again so blessed ~ Springs Life

~J~moonmango 10/7/2012

As inspired by Nature herself muses along the Jon Muir trail of a beautiful tree surrendering to the earth, bleeding sap like jewels & a moist fern still full of life flourishing in a crack in the rocks. We all have cracks after all. That’s how the light gets in

 

Trail to Half Dome

Trail to Mirror Lake

 

Long Way Home ~ Again

Been gone awhile, busy taking the long way home

Always seems so endless- miles of stretches of barren hot ground

Wildflowers & oasis’s spotted between

Sometimes now I get to wondering if I’ll ever make it home ~

If it’s worth the journey ~ why I go…

Each time I arrive, hungry, weary & battered, each time ~ I know

~J~moonmango 9/2012

Along Parker Creek East Side of Sierras

Hoping for food on the Half Dome Trail

 

Psycodellic Demon Shit

Shape of a wing, colored black & while with jagged distinct lines dividing the two colors.

The demon appeared as invited in the form of a huge dark grayish, blackish bird, the wing of black & white joining into its back. Slashing claws, which wanted to slash at my tendons, nerves & such reaching for the bone marrow. Long neck & opening beak twisting & tossing about threatening with dark vacant eyes, light deep within.

“What do you want?” I asked as instructed to do. “your life. To kill you” the demon replied, staring directly into my eyes. Nuff said (Sam Elliot, various movies, but especially the one about the Forest Ranger) Pain subsiding…

“What do you need from me?” “Your life” it said, seeming to mean as a gift, a sacrifice, not as a death by being killed thing. I understood.

“Will you leave me alone if you get what you need?” The creature knashed, changed shape into a more compact beast, nastily throwing a tantrum, spewing out fire spit. “Tell me what you need & stop that fit” More knashing & spitting. “I’m not afraid of your tantrum, so get it out & get in on, what, tell me what!” More of the knashing & spitting (pain escalating) “Get down, now and tell me what I need to know!” I boomed. The creature writhed and subsided.

The caldron boiled with a jellyfish like flower thing pulsating in the middle with light off to the left. The demon drank from the caldron missing no bits of bone & flesh in the pot, changing into a more dragon like creature as it drank. As it finished the last bit, it began to glow partly from the male orb & partly from the jellyfish flower. It transformed into a dragonfly larve, then a full dragonfly with a glowing light in the middle.

“”Do I have an ally?” I called out wondering if the dragonfly was my ally. In swooped an eagle like, humming bird/bug eating type bird, snatching up the dragonfly as I laughed! “Will you be there to help me when I need it?” I cried out in question to the bird. As I spoke, the bird shat out the dragonfly, grinning as she shat, the crap turning psycodelic along with the bird, now glowing. A faint figure of a dragonfly could be seen in the psycodelic shit.

~J~moonmango On the journey to healing...a death to live 10/12

 

Is it that one door opens for every door that closes, or do we just become aware of the open door that we never bothered to knock until the one we were so comfortable walking through slammed shut?

~J~moonmango 9/12

Obsidian Dome

Procrastination Will Have To Wait

Coyote comes to me, dressed as Wolf

Spirit Guide the Great Horned Owl remains absent

Some imposter screeches all night into early morning

Telling me...what, telling me something, telling me to pay attention

pay attention...to what?

Blessings pour forth, yet no time for rest

Peace & joy well up like the baking soda volcanos in the sand

No matter, it's time to look and listen, be alert

Somethings going down....somethings heading this way

something, something...but what? Oh, I think I may know...I had forgotten

Like a child who played too long and forgot about the chore she was firmly told to do ~

I had forgotten. I thought I could rest, thought I could play

When my chore is done, that's what's going down, like a scolding

Like a warning before the consequence ~ Procrastination will have to wait...

I have work to be done. Brother Coyote came to warn me, screeching owl has been at me

Spirit guide has left me to what I was prompted to do ~awhile ago~

~J~moonmango 11/7/12

Much thanx to Mighty Mouse for saving the day once again...

Sun setting Half Dome Trail

Coyote howls alone, no longer dressed as wolf. He passes almost unnoticed into the brush, telling me the path is chosen.

Enter Spring, hearts full of love...

Sunflowers, Daisies and Other Happy Things!

Sing into the crook          

The place you see, where sky meets sea, & earth, that’s the place you sing into. Sing into the crook with all that is within, sing your heart, your soul, your life…right there, where sky meets sea & earth.

~J~moonmango                     8/5/12

Inspirational thanks, and or otherwise mention of gratuitive sorts goes to David Pearson who taught me to breath, sing out my breath, sing into the crook, and know my song! 

Where the sky meets the sea, Julie & Hermano Friendly Cove

Driftwood Dog

 It seems there is a mutant strain of loveliness going on in my garden!

Double Header

 

Two Headed Daisy

Tears become like extraneous wet spots on a two headed daisy, bent & broken at the stem…by the painted pony that parked itself there…crushing the plants lush body, breaking, bending and stripping the stems of it’s supple leaves.

Loveliness of the flower with it’s duo bursts of delicate fingers reaching outwards even in the mutated form of a two headed monster ~ shows the decomposed compost rotting & smelly turned into black gold. Good and evil, they co-exist, one transforming into the other depending on the path chosen ~ and how it is traveled.  

What does one do with a two headed daisy with a broken stem? Kiss it sweetly, shed a tear for the kindness in the firmness that must be shown for the love, yes for the love of self, the love of those who are us all. Mutated just a bit, each of us a two headed daisy,  with extraneous wet spots.

Cut the stem up high, leaving what’s broken, to wither with the crushed organic matter that was. Take a photo, and place it in a jar of water, with the other broken daisies after all, it’s not the broken plant, the table where good memories were formed, or the blue horse that one day you rode in on.

It’s the lightening in the storm, the thunder that follows so quickly behind…shaking the daisy with threats to strike and burn through all that extends into the earth. It’s the raindrops that lightly sprinkle on a blue moon eve. Leaving wet spots on a two headed daisy, extraneous wet spots, on a two headed daisy… after all~ after all?

~J~moonmango                                              8/3/12

Human Nature

Never does a day pass when I fail to be amazed, amused and utterly in awe of human nature. Not just the children, growing and learning so quickly with their honest tongues ~ speaking without hindered restraint of self conscious societal chains. All of us, yes all of us.

Expecting the unexpected has become a mindset that puts me to bed at night wondering, and wakes me anticipating the day. Days such as this...I am floored, flat as the French pancakes my Grandmother cooked up while saying "eat all your mush first". Flat.

 Blow sweetly breezes warming as the day moves on. Blow the wonder of dandelion puff, a star unseen, the drop of water in the falls, the whisper unheard. Blow sweetly breezes, carry to my heart, all that I can't imagine & blanket my soul.

~J~moonmango                             8/6/12 

This makes me so happy!

Forming Committees

Monetary recompenses so to speak, don’t seem to have a place right now.  We live, we love, we get through our trials, allowing each other to be ourselves, forming committees only in our minds, never expecting attendance or participation…well, maybe sometimes before rethinking, but there we have it, we help each other to stretch, like rubber bands becoming brittle with age and weather, but never breaking. Not yet.

~J~moonmango                 8/1/12

Inspirational credit to Ruth Smiley for her ideas and intangibly intriguing thoughts that she transforms into tangible acts. This piece spurted out in a letter, but alone is a poem.

 

Loosing Your Paddle

You’re paddling up that creek again, the one you know so well…one with the thick brown water & that real ugly smell.

It’s ok. You’ve been here before…you know the way. It’s a hard bout, but somewhere it opens up, leads right on out

Sooner or later it’s free sailing in open seas, hoist the sails over the swells and just…catch the breeze

Ore slips from your fingers, …you remember now, it happens this way, you don’t know why, don’t know how

You reach, you grab - ore bobbing free in the murk, , a motor boat goes by making waves that give it a jerk

Further and further from your desperation that ore floats…all of a sudden you’re just happy ~ happy to be in the boat.

Then you remember it happened before,  the way it must go. Look, look ahead…Moby Dick soon will blow!

A sputter, a blow, a mighty wind the great whale does make, causing turmoil and truly…one hell of a wake!

Holding on tightly as you’ve learned so to do…the boat you hang onto blasts from that creek full of poo

Out to sea the boat, the ore & you all go sailing…hanging on tightly, wind & sea in your face all the while flailing

“Hallelujah, Hallelujah I’m bloody well out! I’ve made it, I’ve made it Hallelujah, Hallelujah ” you joyfully shout!

The paddle hits you on the head…BAM & you’re out.

~J~moonmango                                   7/25/12

 

Observing myself

A slight head duck, glance from the side, smile a bit to the left of hello & goodbye. I watched it from outside myself, it took me by surprise, like watching a movie… someone else in disguise.

Someone showed me, I didn’t mean to step out, but there I was standing just a tad above and to the left…observing myself.

This person who is Me, was doing a thing… she’s done for years ^ right under my nose. I never saw, wondered why the trouble…now I know, the trouble is myself~ stirring the pot.

Traitor to myself, always screaming “why?” how could I be angry, she just perfected an art, something she could produce, with no effort at all ~

…leaving the flounder gasping on the shore ~

Who is me and who is she? Am I the watched, or the observing fool? How do I not love someone so beautiful, but how do I love what I don’t really know?

Standing there outside myself, I wonder how it works…can I  just go through life, observing, while i carry the burdens, be the watcher, not feel the pain, the joy, just observe?

Fascinated with the person I find most tedious,.. Do others see me as I saw myself that moment, not as I do from inside my own tired flesh?

Laying down with the moon, but wakening with the rain watching me, watching me, dancing with the stars…never alone, dancing, dancing with the stars…observing… that…which is ~ Myself…

Observing….

   

                           ~Myself~

                                                                                7/30/12 ~J~moonmango    

Lacking Pigment

 This stretch of time has held many in the affects of the Transit of Venus. For this vivid dreamer, it has produced visions & dreams lacking pigment, a bit crystal like...intangible & not my own.

My Heritage

 A trip to the East Side of the Sierras with my friend NanO drew me to embrace my heritage and for the first time in my life, defaced a tree, adding to the Basque tradition of tree porn on the Eastern Side of the sierras. Note the interesting placement of a spiders egg sack in the old carving that I incorporated into my new one.

The Holy Dove Has Flown

The ups and downs of life that seemingly should even out by the age of 51, have proven to have sharp curves and rocky slopes. Hang on for dear life, then brake at the cliffs. Life would be smoother & easier were I a more practical sort, seeking stability and evenness. Subtle head strongness can be exhausting for an old Grandma, but a sit with a dear friend reminds me that even exhaustion can be transformed through art (never close yourself to what a friend may offer at the most unexpected moment).   Plowing through each obstetrical like a mule in a corn field full of rocks seems to be necessity for some. How else can you ever plant a crop that thrives? Right now...my best crop is Purslane!  

Learning my camera (the technical parts of it) is a must for me at this point as well as pursuing an opportunity to write a children's book with an artist who would make a perfect match as the illustrator.  Of course there are rocks to be moved. This post is the beginning of  major excavation in hopes, no, intent on plowing through the block that is, was, can no longer be the granite stone in my row. I suppose being a daughter of a Farmer from Chualar/ photo journalist/ English professor has a bit to do with my analogies here.     

Some recent poems & photos of nice times spattered about this post as well as perhaps bits more of my blatherings. I hope intend this post to be a milestone in the waters of uncertainly which seem to wash over my life. 

The rock (moved it myself)

The hard place (what drove me to move it)

_{Pains Whisper}

_{Soaking in like rain on sphagnum moss ~ your love for me}

_{Rolling off like rain on a ducks back ~ my love for you}

_{Beauty beyond a fairy’s lucid dream, the pain you pour forth}

_{Never had I known…the loveliness that blossom’s from pain.}

_{Must this spiraling inferno posses me so ~ breathlessly?}

_{Could the wind never cease to blow ~ so hot, so slow ?}

_{Slain was the dragon who blew the windy fire from below}

_{The dragons den…bones, whimsical chimes, snow & rain}

Clinging to loves sweet supple fruit ~ mangos ~ ripe to squeeze

_{A slipper, comfortable, warm, dependable ~ tossed out the door}

_{The wrens drop on it a spat with seeds…  Spring’s Clarkia}

_{Place the heart of the dove in the Dragon’s den, gently as she came}

_{Lay me down in a field of blooming mallow ~ color my cheeks}         

_{Press me like the field poppy flattened in the book ~ of my youth}

_{Honey so sweet in the morning, laying in my bed, forming crystals -}

_{what sparkle  all around, gently stroking, gently stroking…the flame}

 _{Breath of life, sorrows blessed curse ~ weigh upon the moth}

_{White as down in a wood nymphs bundle ~ yet it does glow}

_{Softly the whisper states all that stirs in this suffering heart}

 _{Parching all that wafts along, coming close, resting from pain}

_{Vacant light, transcends the orb quieting the Universe ~ a grain}

_{Sand as far as the mirage deceives, or perceives ~ a whisper}

_{Softly, softly the whisper that sweetens the morning with light}        

_{Whisper softly, whisper softly, 
                                    whisper, whisper…whisper…softly}

             
 _{~J~moonmango      7/9/12}

Well, it aint' gonna get any better after all...

Azure on flower Burts Canyon

Camping at Obsidian
Campgrounds on the East Side
with NanO was a great way to spend the 4th of July. Hardly a soul in sight except the bear that ate our apples & the 20 odd baby grouse at our feet, many birds & bugs. 

An apple would be nice now...

Where you hang your hat...

Loveliness

Rough life~

Tight Aster

 The petals of a flower wild ~ friendships sweet blanket ~ a cloak ~ a crown ~ a throne

Hardly A Morning…

Hardly a morning passes when the sun does not greet the moon in passing upon my breast from gentle star lit darkness to warming light.

On occasion, the suns crepuscular rays brush lightly upon my back as I wake…colliding warmth & coolness into electric thunder; awakening every cell to ecstatic bliss.

The times when morning comes slowly, lingering upon its horizon, seem most precious somehow. Morning waking with tenderness and cool breezes which stir deep within, subside, then stir again what lies patiently anticipating~ anticipating~ anticipating…the day?

Silver crescent moon & bright planets bowing and backing away, making way for the suns light * these days and nights of the Universe transitioning, reek mayhem and ravage every sense upon my rising.

All this, only to leave me weary, then rise up in calamity once again…again, weary, rising up in calamity ~  once again…

When silver orb & golden ball of fiery light forget each other at times, the wakening to the stars and crisp air stir me cognizant from unconsciousness, kindle and revive ~ that which lay lull in zoetic light of moon.

Lingering days stretching long keep warm the moons time… allow morning sun rays to caress uncovered flesh, gifting it such with pleasant glow, like fine beach sand ~ slowly sifting ~ through a child’s fingers to sprinkle a freshly formed castle. Moon & Sun intertwining in silky warmth … spreading out along a river of stars & clouds  

Hardly a morning passes when the sun and the moon upon my waking breast does not set the tone of anticipation of the new day. A Union of cosmic syrup; like honey & molasses coat and run down, blanketing that which lie exposed.

Hardly a morning….

                              Hardly a morning passes~

                                                                Precipitating …anticipating…

                                                                                                             Hardly a morning~

~J~moonmango            7/16/12

 A trek part way to Jackass Lake with Lori & her pooches was beautiful and made me realize how much my health has taken a dive this past couple years. Time to push!
 This time of year is magic. The garden is bringing forth bounty, the fledglings are fledgling, music begins in town and the whole community comes alive. How truly blessed I am to live life in my backyard.

Tiger Lily

log dogs

Follow the signs...

Lori & her worship team.

This post, like the others is to share with you the leg of the journey I bumble through at the moment. Each stretch would have me crippled & unable to carry on if not for that which hold me in a palm and each family member & friend in these posts. If you are reading this...you are in these posts. In between each line is everyone who impacts my life.  Funny how we can make a difference without even knowing. A friend posting the right thing at the right time to encourage...how could he know? An old friend...who just knows... Family, always family... An elderly gentleman I cleaned for yesterday impacted my life hugely and may never know how much. In the two hours I cleaned, and the 20 minutes I spent after he took my hand and said "sit with me a minute" he taught me how to sing into the crook, dance on the  kitchen floor, hear lovely music, laugh at all that is simple, drink good wine, and settle for no less than I deserve. All this applying in all ways to every aspect of life. The morning began with "you look especially nice today...why is that?" So much to learn, so much you all teach me, so much to be grateful for.