Pilgrim

I was getting the music ready for tomorrow's Mosaic service today because tomorrow I will be attending a moonlodge service (more on that later hopefully), and this song just spoke words of wisdom to me.

I know that Enya has been described as cheesy (and she can be), but her art connects me to my spirit and breathes wisdom to my heart.

I give you Enya's song Pilgrim.

The lyrics:

Pilgrim, how you journey
On the road you chose
To find out why the winds die
And where the stories go.

All days come from one day
That much you must know,
You cannot change what's over
But only where you go.

One way leads to diamonds,
One way leads to gold,
Another leads you only
To everything you're told.

In your heart you wonder
Which of these is true;
The road that leads to nowhere,
The road that leads to you.

Will you find the answer
In all you say and do?
Will you find the answer
In you?

Each heart is a pilgrim,
Each one wants to know
The reason why the winds die
And where the stories go.

Pilgrim, in your journey
You may travel far,
For pilgrim it's a long way
To find out who you are...

Pilgrim, it's a long way
To find out who you are...

Pilgrim, it's a long way
To find out who you are...

I hope your journey take you to a beautiful place.

Troubled times

Spring Skies, originally uploaded by hannah8ball.

I had a dream about tornadoes again last night. The tornado dream has been a recurring one for me and they usually go something like this: I'm doing whatever I normally do in a dream, and then I look out a window and the entire landscape is covered in tornadoes. I then spend the rest of the dream running and hiding and generally spending my time freaked out and high on adrenaline. Usually, I am by myself in my terror and my running and hiding.

These tornado dreams usually come in periods of high stress, when I'm dealing with difficult issues or having upsets in relationships. So, I wasn't really surprised when I had a tornado dream. Things have been really stressful lately. We just moved (stressful in itself!) and my whole ordered world has been turned upside down. It really doesnt help that things at the new house just haven't quite been working out like I thought they would. The house we thought was move-in ready, turned out to not be move-in ready. Of course, we only discovered that AFTER we moved in. Fast-forward a month of chaos and exasperation, things finally seem to be getting back to that baseline of content with the house at least.

But, as these things tend to work out, it's never enough to have just one stressor at a time. My relationship side has been rather tumultuous as well. Thankfully, my husband has been extra strong and supportive through all of it. But I feel like I have been on a roller coaster lately, with no sign of the end. I'm beginning to feel like this time, this ride, I'm going to have to come to a decision. With all of the broken hearts and dashed hopes and lost opportunities, I'm not going to be able to sweep this one under the rug - we're going to have to decide to turn it into art or to leave it all together. And right now, which way I'll end up is as murky as the end of the ride.

So, what was different about this dream was two fold. First, I wasn't by myself - my daughter was with me. Which meant that I wasn't just concerned with protecting myself, or with how fast or cleverly I could run away from the storms, I had to protect her first, bring her with me first. Which made the whole dream that much more terrifying and frustrating. The second piece is that this is the first time the tornado has ever caught me. Every other time, it's been close, but I have escaped the storm itself. This time, no such luck. The storm caught A and I, and we were thrown around inside it. I woke up from this dream, protecting A with my body, and I was whispering (like a mantra): "Please be gentle; please be gentle."

What does this all mean?

I think it means that I can't avoid this one, the storm has come to me and there is nothing to do but head into it. Which makes my heart beat hard just thinking about it. I really would rather not face this head on, now is not a good time (when is it ever?); and I really don't need this right now (when do I ever?). This conflict is weighing me down so much, I can feel a physical weight on my chest, literally keeping me from being able to take a full breath.

My dream confirms that this time is different, this time I have to take a stand and ride it out.  I'm not by myself this time - I have someone else to think about, to protect. And maybe, the end is that everyone will be fine, but we'll all be moved to different places with a sense of wonder that we were spared. Or maybe the storm will destroy us completely, so that what once was, is no more and we all have to pick up what is left and move on. I don't know. I don't know. I don't know.

I don't know how to weather the storm. I don't know how to protect myself or my family. We are completely at the mercy of this thing, this chaos, this tumult that has caught us up into it and all I can think to whisper is please be gentle. Because it is already too late to ask to be let out. Please be gentle.

On the fence

On the fence, originally uploaded by hannah8ball.
One of the things I will miss dearly about living on the edge of the city - being able to walk to pasture and uncivilized land. We'll enjoy it while we can. 

The moment

You know what I'm talking about.

You settle in with a hot cup of tea or coffee, or a cold beer, with a good book, or your knitting project, or your new game. You've had a good day. You had a lot that needed to get done today, and here you've managed to get all the balls in the air at the right time, in the right order, and everything fell into place just like it should have.

You've called the babysitter to remind her about tonight. You've prepared the dinner fixings so everyone can eat. You even managed to try that new bread recipe you've been dying to taste.

Your husband calls to let you know he's ahead of schedule. So you move your timeline back and hour to make sure that everything still gets done before the horde descends and this moment of calm is overwhelmed.

At this precise moment, when you feel your body relax. Your brain betrays you.

Suddenly you realize that you have forgotten one very important thing. That one thing that needed to be done before you can enjoy the evening with your love, before the babysitter gets here. That little load of laundry with the baby's things in it that absolutely must be done for her to be able to go to bed tonight. That also requires the hot water you'd been counting on for your nice, hot shower.

At that moment, every word your mother ever told you never ever to say comes streaming out of your mouth. That moment, all of your well laid plans, and flawless execution. All meaningless.

Why is it that I always forget the one thing that absolutely had to get done until it's too late to get it done?

Things I Have Said or Thought in the Last Week

2.5 years and I've finally put a diaper on the child without waking her. I am amazing!



Dead means no more moving (discussing with my child about why the fly wasn't moving after I gave it a good smack with the fly swatter).

Dear mother of god, how long is it going to take these charts to print? (after I'd already been waiting on it for 30 minutes, and we were only at page 6 of 16)

Here comes a tornado (it didn't, but the wind did blow down our fence).

What's the best way to approximate creamer?



They almost hit us (the person who was turning left into our lane stopped just shy of t-boning our car)!

Has had a week to remember

First, my beloved cat, Ivan, who was the first cat to ever choose me to be his pillow decided he wanted to spend some time outside and went missing on Saturday morning. Just poof gone. We were, unfortunately for him, getting ready to head out on a romantic weekend and so we had to hope that he'd be there when we got back. But he wasn't there when we returned. And he still wasn't there after we got back from Mosaic. I'd decided that he was just gone and was getting ready for bed when I decided to call for him one more time in the garage. Sure enough, I called him, and he waltzed right back in the house as if he'd been gone minutes instead of days! I'm still in a bit of shock that he actually came back home, but I can tell you that I'm being extra vigilant about him getting outside!



Going back to the romantic getaway - Jason swept me off to Dallas for a fun-filled afternoon and evening. We met up with our friends Tim & Jenny and had a fantastic dinner at Bengal Coast. The food was delicious and we got to chat it up with the chef who was the one who sat us at our table. If you are ever in the Oak Lawn area of Dallas, you should definitely check it out. Great food and affordably priced. Then we headed over to Chocolate Secrets for dessert. Wow. Chocolate + wine + live jazz = perfect way to end the evening. My eyes ended up being way bigger than my stomach and I think next time I'll just get one chocolate and one glass of wine instead of going with the chocolate and wine pairings (FOUR chocolates and TWO glasses of wine - oh my!). Still, the chocolates were fantastic - I'm hoping there's more of this place in my future :) We got a great deal and scored a luxurious room at the Warwick Melrose. Did I ever feel pampered! It was a great weekend and Little Bit had a blast at the Lientz's - I think we can definitely do this again.

I'll leave you with a link to my last picture - my neighbors apparently have decided that they want a bit of ad revenue in their lives...

Pandora and her box of goodies

So, coming up with a topic to blog on once a week is, well, rather difficult. I am in amazement that there are those out there who blog just about every day, or more than once a day - wow.

This week started off crazy, but ended well. I find myself with a glass of wine from a local vintner, hoping my daughter decides to fall asleep, listening to my Ulrich Schnauss station on Pandora. And let me say, this is a good way to end the week.

First, if you haven't had the pleasure of interacting with Pandora, then well, take a moment, check it out. Not only is it FREE (which is amazing in and of itself), but it is so intuitive and user friendly that it has drastically changed my radio/music listening habits. Pandora is the result of the Music Genome Project. And let me tell you, their database is amazingly complex and just wow.

I'll admit that I am an info junkie. It is after all, my number one strength (or in some cases weakness); but I am really excited about the fact that someone has created a database that compiles hundreds of characteristics for millions of songs.

What is incredible to me is that it learns my likes, so songs and/or styles that I've marked as yes show up on other stations - but not in an annoying way. Is it weird that my musical wants are so well understood by an algorithm? But seriously, you type in the name of an artist or song that you want to hear similar music to, and voila, you get endless hours of music.

If you are already a Pandora fan, share some of your favorite stations with me. Its like the new version of the mix tape!

Before I forget, you must needs watch Ira Glass's This American Life. This is one of my favorite radio shows, and the TV version is perfectly, wonderfully the same interesting stories, only visually.