Letter to myself

I posted this poem on face book a few days ago and got a lot of responses and comments of support, relating and encouragement both on the page and as I ran into people in my life.  Again and again I am surprised by how sharing pain leads to deep connection.

late night early morning writing;

A letter to myself and anyone reading this
A prayer
When I wake up like this 
In the middle of the night
With loathing and self doubt
Afraid

When fear takes over that I have no savings. Retirement, IRA
May I remember that I don’t believe in perpetual growth and hoarding and interests on the backs of others labor.

When I judge my lack of success and accomplishment, may I respect
The times I was there
To hug my sister
To clean up the vomit and diarrhea from the bath room walls and floor
of a sick friend
To cook
Healthy food
To play with children
My own
And strangers
To look at the worms they showed me
And to marvel at the wonders of dirt and the sweetness of tomatoes
The treasure of potatoes.

When I judge the wasted hours
May I remember the joy of dancing
The radiance of painting with orange
The sunflower seeds
And the dog petted
The comfort needed
The rest and recovery

When I see all the choices I made
That lead us here
Floating, isolated, separate
The choices we didn’t understand
The ones I don’t want to sing about,

When I hide my flaws
Judge you
Your use of drugs

May I see again with eyes of compassion
The pain we felt
That sent us down these paths
And as we climb on the road
The dirt clay road
With clumps and holes, rocks
May we walk, may we climb
Together
Back up to truth?
Back down to connection?

Oh sing and cry with me now
For we are so beautiful
And injured

I long so much to only love you
And I am so full of fear

I am here only to live
And die

May I feel safe in the face of imminent doom
Oh dark mother
Wise father
As I slither through this tangled life
Spaghetti clump worm pile
Of glory and rightness
Pain and doubt

Mother hold me,
hold me tight and long.

Father tell me
Tell me
It will all be all right.

A few tips from my summer kitchen

I thought i would share some of the neat homemaking things I have adopted over the years that I do in July and August.

Water melon smoothy!  Freeze water melon and then blend it up with what ever kind of milk you like.  I add a little half and half and rose water or lavender water that I buy form the   A wonderful warm weather treat.   I buy my flower water at Shiraz on Oakland.  

Eat you weeds!  
I repeat eat you weeds they are so GOOD for you and take no effort to grow!  They plant themselves!  If you garden than most of you have the best greens growing in your garden already. I go to my local community gardens and glean the unwanted food there.  I put likes below so you can find out more about them and look up how to identify them.  My three favorites are:

Purslane.  
High in omaga 3's !  Purslane is a relative low growing plant that loves the hot months of summer. I let it act as a ground cover for any empty spots i have in our garden.
I saute it, eat it freash in salads or alon with vinegar and oil on it or use it i might any green with eggs, in soups etc.

Chickweed. 
Another "weed" that acts as a good ground cover, it can get a bit carried away when it has enough moister but it is so easy to weed up i never consider it a problem.  I eat it in salads and sauteed mixed with my other morning greens. 

Lambs Quarters. 
I use LQ  as I would kale or spinach. My favorite is to make garlic oil.  Steam the Lambs quarters and then add fresh anise hyssops, basil and soy sauce to creates a great Tia flavor. 

Mint Vinegar.  
Now is a great time to pick a bunch of that mint that is taking over and stuff it in some vinegar.  I use mostly in marinades. use the meat in Chicken fajitas, yum!

Thoughts on relationships and our rat cages.

        

I sent out an email a few weeks ago and thought i would post it here.  It doesn't have any of the hyper links right now.  Happy Summer, Friends, Family, Neighbors and Pink House Community!         I am going to try making our monthly update emails more of a news letter, including some of my own writing and some of our teachers and guests, as well as a few tips or ideas from my home and kitchen. I don't have a name for it yet for this new "new letter" so if you have an idea I would love to hear it. :)  This month I have put together some of my thoughts on my eclectic home and work, our eclectic studio and creating healthy community.        I know a few of you have seen my house, but for those of you haven't, I want to describe it for you. All of our tables and desks are low, 8-16 inches form the floor.  Above our futon on the floor in the living room we have a " yoga swing," which is basically a nice soft hammock hung in a narrow drape.  Last year I added a set of gymnastic rings that the kids love to play and swing on.  I did all this in a effort to keep my own body nimble and strong, to help support my partner Chuck in healing his body and supporting my children in keeping the youthful strength and flexibility.  I often joke when new friends come over about making our home a really engaging "gerbil cage.         A few weeks ago I listened to a wonderful T.E.D. talk by Johann Hari and called "Everything you think about addiction is wrong." In the talk Hari tells us that our model of addiction was based on studies of rats that were alone in cages with little to interact with. These rats, when given the option of water with and with out heroine, would kill themselves by over dosing on the water that had the drug in it. However he says that's that rats in engaging cages or "rat parks" with other rats and lots of toys and challenges to play with when given the same choice of waters will choose the plan water and not become "addicted." He suggest that we need to rethink our whole approach to addiction. He ends his talk by saying that the opposite of addiction is connection.        When I was at Teaching Drum, the nature immersion experience I went to for 11 months the school guides often talked about relationship. They referred to a native American practice of talking about all the other creatures, plants and minerals we share this earth with as our relations.  They suggested not "studying" plants but creating relationship them. Using them, interacting with them.  I understood in relation to my own spiritual beliefs that we are made from the same stardust with the same gift of life energy and creation throbbing through us.  But I think I mostly pictured this relationship to natural and organic forms.  After listening to this talk I had another "aha moment."  We have relationships with Everything.  We have relationships with ourselves, other people, with nature and with everything we create; books, media, drugs… Every relationship triggers reactions in us.  Some of these reactions feel good, others don't.  We stick with the relationships we know and feel comfortable with and that meet our needs.  When I think of my home that means that I have been setting up an environment that increases our relationship with our bodies and our physical world and so that is why it feels healthy and good.          When I work with people with clutter, my clients have relationships with things or paper that don't feel healthy for them.  Often we think of these relationships as getting in the way of creating a healthier life style. And they do, but perhaps they are filling a void and creating new relationships to fill that void is what we need to do first. If we think that we have relationships to everything that we can see that even our relationships that we find challenging or that don't feel healthy are there for a reason.  Most of us cannot "let go" of these relationships unless we have other relationships to replace them with.  The rat in the "rat park" has the relationships she needs does not choose the drugs.  The ones that are alone do. They "need" the drug because they have the void.  Thinking about this more I came to see I even have relationships to my thoughts.  I become "attached" to them.  They take up space, give my life meaning.  I also came even more to appreciate my growing relationship to manta.  Mantra is consciously is giving energy, or rather growing my relationship, to thoughts that I choose.    This all helps me feel good about my crazy, wild, messy home, and motivates me in my work with the pink house, as a mover, artist, yoga teacher, doula, and as a gardener and promoter of fruit trees.  I can choose to feed real relationships with others.  I can choose to create relationships with accepting, empowering, positive and proactive thoughts.  I can choose to give and receive even more.  Then I can continue giving up the unhealthy patterns I have and help those around me do the same.   As I finish writing this the Riverwest 24 bike raceweekend has just ended and I feel filled with love for my neighborhood and even more connected to how powerful we are as individuals and as community can be.  (If you don't know about the race, click the link, it is wonderful, I hope to write more about it sometime soon)  Lets all keep working to make our own lives and our whole communities the best "rat parks" we can!       Sending love and blessings,  Sarah  dancingwitheverything.com As I