My Precious Paragraph ;)

I want to do some yoga before Forest wakes up and “crushes the ball” because my body feels like she’s seventy years old (which is way better than feeling a hundred!), but then Chandra asked me if I wrote my paragraph yesterday (I told her I was endeavoring to write a paragraph every day, just to keep my writer self on life support) and I said no.  I’ve got all these wild paragraphs lashing my insides as I go about my crushingly mundane days and it makes me very mean.

 

I’m tired of being mean.  

 

The other day, Serena had a call with one of her teachers from the ananda school.  Just to stay connected during our global pandemic holiday. Ultimately I believe it’s all orchestrated by God’s hella intelligent hand… but for some deranged cosmic motivation, Serena got assigned to speak with the teacher she likes the least- because she purports that he never paid attention to her at school.  Marco. Both of our recent video chats consisted of her standing in front of the phone like a stone. No, actually on the first call she started to open up and share her world, but he derailed her with his “agenda” (singing a song). That was the end of that. She turned to stone.  

 

The second call, I was already irritated, because the morning was sunny and by eleven am I was exhausted by obsessive tidying up and desperate to get outside.  But I wanted to be in integrity so we waited for the damn call. I felt so frustrated with mute Serena. “Do you want to share your favorite book with me?” Nothing.  This game went on for like ten minutes, culminating with a song- “all the world is my friend”. When we hung up, I was livid. I laid into her for being so unwilling to participate.  (I wish I didn’t…)  

 

Apparently part of my tirade included the phrase “colossal bullshit”, because she tossed it back to me later.  I was like “where on earth did you come up with THAT???”  

 

She said, “From you.”

 

I was impressed. 

 

“Colossal bullshit” has become one of our inside jokes.  It never ceases to lighten my mood.  

 

Yesterday was Easter.  Giordano worked. He said he was only going to work a “half day” and then “stay with the family”. But it didn’t turn out that way. He pruned olive trees, mowed grass, burned branches, cut wood. Basically what I’m driving at is that I hate him.

 

Serena and I attempted to color eggs the day before.  It was my first stab at it, and measured against my expectations (frown) I failed.  Since I’m not allowed “fare speza” (grocery shop) with children (due to corona virus restrictions), and Giordano was way too busy to make a run to the store, I asked Benedetta to buy us white eggs and dye.  She brought us six white eggs and some vegetable based red and blue dye. She said I could use turmeric for yellow. (I was expecting some old skool food coloring in plastic dropper bottles.) I googled how to dye easter eggs and it said boiling water, white vinegar and dye.  The red sorta worked. And the yellow. Not the blue. I kept adding more powdered dye and vinegar, thinking it would make the colors leach into the eggs more, but it didn’t. It only ate away at the egg shells. Frown. In a relatively bearable tsunami of frustration, I dumped the impotent cup of blue dye down the sink, spitting some lamentations about flushing money down the toilet.  (I wince imagining what despicable impressions I am making on Serena.)

 

Forest is now in my lap, btw.  It’s a little after six am. Giordano is already out working in the olive trees.  So I’d better cut to what I really want to say.  

 

I hid the chicken eggs, along with some little organic milk chocolate eggs with hazelnut filling, wrapped in lusciously evocative neon green foil in our yard before Serena woke up.  Upon reflection, this is a BIG WIN for me. Too often, I am a fanciful dreamer who lacks execution. But I birthed this mo-fo. Mostly alone. Wow. I’m my own hella proud mother.

 

Serena hunted for them while I made lunch. Giordano’s mama (whom Serena ADORES) helped her.  I was not sure if she’d be able to find them because despite her slicing, ageless intelligence, sometimes I am struck by her rudamentary four-year-old-ness.  I watched from the kitchen windows, impressed by her capacity to find. I could feel her delight from afar and it flooded me with that thing we all chase and rarely stop to receive.  

 

Thanks to quarantine, we got to have a family lunch with G’s mom and dad.  Until about six months ago mama and papa were completely out of communication. It thrills me to witness the family tapestry mending.  I feel partially responsible for this small miracle. Also Forest is a massive catalyst. Babies are made to heal and unite families.

 

Anyway, lunch was sweet.  Except that Giordano didn’t pay a speck of attention to me.  I told him later (while spitting fire) that if we made a video of the lunch, innocent viewers would not even realize we were married, much less acquaintances.  Except that we shared a baby…

 

Half way into our picnic, I made an embittered comment… like “Hey, I’m here,” to which he retorted that I must be jealous of Forest, whom he was holding and fawning over.  (I had shoved Forest into his hands because he was invading my lunch experience, as he mostly does– trying to grab my fork and play the drum on my plate… Giordano had already inhaled his first plate of food and was now running his mouth off in italian, his eyes wild and distant.)  

 

I really hate him.  

 

If I was in the mood to be wholesome and objective, I’d say our relationship is better than ever before.  But I’d rather express straight from my guts. He has not taken a single day off during quarantine. Oh wait, he was home a few days during the snow week.  He did indoor work. That was sort of nice.  

 

I’m pretty sure I also love him… because even though it feels impossible to get fed by our relationship, when I express my perpetual ache, I see him impacted and determined to improve.  This touches me. And yet we mostly abide in this holding pattern~ him living in fearful anticipation of The Future and consumed in relentless doing. Me vacillating between vulnerable need and callous indifference.  

 

My body has lost all trace of turn-on.  My guess is that this is due to a combination of living in perpetual exhaustion,  being emotionally untouched by my husband and having sub zero time to be with myself- exercise, muse and express my profound, psychedelically persuaded inner dimensions.

 

Often these days, I feel cripplingly bitter about becoming a mother.  I had no idea it would be like this. So desolate. If you are considering having kids, don’t do it in the nuclear model.  It’s the most unnatural thing a human can do. Well, except maybe capitalism. But it’s all a big, unsightly modern tangle I guess.  Anyway, having Serena was my calling, hands down. But I feel enraged for the excruciating path that I am walking.  

 

I wish you could see Forest.  He’s currently gazing at my nipple with adoration and fascination.  Touching it surprisingly gently with his index finger. Oh wait, now he’s whining and writhing in my lap.  But I’m not done.

 

I want to tell you that the cherry trees are in full, explosive blossom.  It’s April thirteenth. I’ve been eagerly awaiting springtime since the trees started releasing their leaves in late September and the breath of evening began to chill my summer-lovin’ bones.  Spring is in full effect and despite the layers of rage, desperation, loneliness and excruciating frustration, I am madly in love with this season. In love with the ecstatic choirs of birds and the feeling of the sun’s rays beaming from within my own skin.

 

I keep coming back to the affirmation that all of this is an essential step on my path of awakening.   I didn’t take any wrong turns, really. It sure seems like this in too many moments. But I am where I belong and it is a sublime (though gritty) privilege to be embodied, to be ground into holy dust and to radiate light for all.

 

Destiny’s Harsh Hand…

It’s been a month since I’ve decanted myself here in Athena Graceland.  It’s five fourteen am. I feel afraid to write because an impressive posse of shadows are running amuck inside me, and I feel like barfing all over this pristine white space.  I feel extra vulnerable lately, like I’ve lost my skin. I’m not in the mood to be judged, or offered your shiny three cents… I almost hid out in my journal instead…

 

But then I realized that this chapter in my unfolding consciousness is essential, and if I don’t publish it here, the story of my Life will contain an insurmountable, irreconcilable gap.  I can’t live with that.

 

Writing and Orgasm.  I can see how they are two faces of the same wild goddess.  Both are eating away at my insides these days as I wander the dark labyrinth of early motherhood in a foreign country with a husband who I only see in the thick witching hours.  With both of these essential expressions of my innermost self imprisoned within me, I am jagged and dangerous. Tiny, winged demons proliferate within the folds of my calloused heart and tense body.  They wait on my tongue to leap out and attack when I speak.  

 

I shouldn’t write that!  So BAD to use my sacred gift of language to declare such warped nonsense.  Sigh. Maybe I should allow my crackling fingers to invoke purity and elevated consciousness.  But then my honesty will be suffocated by the blanket of contrived positivity… and for what? I trust myself to find my way out of this dark maze, through the power of literary alchemy.  One honest though artistically persuaded word at a time. Follow the electric rainbow brick road…

 

Actually, allow me to take a moment and announce a fantastic and certain revelation:

 

It WILL still be there when I get back!!!  Ohhhhh yesss….. 

 

Upon deeper contemplation, I have mined the inevitablity of this.  I AM that I AM. I might be walking a strange and haunted road… a road that I do not understand, and am having difficulty metabolizing… A road that requires layer upon layer of compassion and forgiveness and surrender.  But the psychedelic flame in me will never extinguish. This flame… is the “IT” that I cherish.  

 

Whoa, I just had a flash of a dream from before I awoke.  My home was not really mine… somebody moved in, and brought all their stuff, including a little dog.  I felt angry and resentful. I went into my living room and it was FULL of christmas trees and other holy-day decor.  Someone had slipped in when I was not home, and adorned it. It was lovely… and yet I felt violated. Somehow all this makes complete sense inside me…

 

Yesterday was the first sunny day in… some semblance of forever.  The greyness has been stroking my soul in washes of dull hopelessness.  Serena awoke with fever. But there was no way I could stay inside with this seductive lucidity beaming just beyond my dirty, aged windows… 

 

So I resurrected the stroller that has been folded up and aslumber in front of our house since late spring, when my belly was big and it became too difficult to breathe as I climbed the sort of busy country road beyond my driveway.  When I opened the stroller, it was a teeming jungle of bugs, spiders and even a colony of maggoty looking creatures. But I was unstoppable. I shooed them all away, fastened Serena in, Forest in the ergo, and pushed my impressive load up the broken, mildly trafficy road.  

 

I said “buon giorno” to all the yappy dogs on the route with a high-pitched, chipper, sweet voice.  This quieted them quickly. I realized that dogs, like people, have strange ways of asking for love sometimes.

 

Serena was unusually quiet, which was nice, because mostly when we take walks, she demands that I tell her the same stories over and over again… For the longest time it was the Three Little Pigs.  But these days it is a melange of Finding Nemo, Annie and most recently Moana. (I just bought her the dvd of Moana, because as far as Disney movies go, it is the only one I can tolerate watching too many times to count.)

 

Once I got off the main road, my thoughts softened and ran lightly about the distant, colour-stained rolling hills, leapt about in crisp piles of earthed autumn leaves.  I drank the cool, clean air, became impregnated with bright empty space.

 

It’s always a challenge for me to make friends with Autumn… even though she is a knock-out.  She rouses my unconscious fear of death… Yet her evocative, poetic majesty is undeniable. Breath-giving.  Massive oak trees brushing their brown and yellow leafy crowns against a pristine wash of blue infinity. The Voice Inside whispered to attune to the formless space between…  I breathed it deep, asking for guidance.

 

Why does it mostly seem so difficult to see… this Path that is never not right before my eyes and in my very bones…?  Doors that won’t open, no matter how hard I hurl my desperate body against them… and meanwhile I’m slowish-quick slip-sliding up a twisty hill that could be construed as a goddamn mountain.

 

But I want different.  I am aching for a break from this Italy life.  This married life. Married to a sincere, caring man, from whom I am unable to receive the sustaining nutrients of intimacy.  After sixteen months, the relational deficiencies are starting to weaken me. I need to tap out long enough to replenish. Wrap this tremulous, sweating body of chiseled spiritual muscles in sensuous silk and sip electric pink gatorade held to my lips by a proud, encouraging coach.  Let the heaving in my chest subside as electrolytes whizz and sing through my stillness.  

California…. Give me your elusive, mythic hand.  Pull me close to your ocean, desert, forested, urban, mountainous body.  Let me luxuriate in your free libraries, abounding with BOOKS IN ENGLISH, let me drink from your endless stream of effervescent kombucha, feed me sumptuous nibbles of your raw chocolate laced with maca and reishi mushrooms… Drench me in friendship, deep, soulful conversations, quality time and support.  

 

If me and Serena had visas, and Forest a passport, I would be on a plane yesterday.  But life has filled my pants with boulders and it is hard to move, which I know is part of the Divine Plan… but still I want to spit on it.  I am weary and worn.

 

Giordano is growing.  I don’t need to leave him.  And yet, I am starving. I need to feed myself.  Loving him is like living on spaghetti and pizza.  After a while, this body needs some damn vegetables.  

 

There is so much more to say… the dawning sky is grey… but the wild rainbow flame within blazes now that I have poured myself forth upon the page.  May it light my way through this dark, craggy wilderness which Destiny’s harsh hand is leading me.  

Will It Still Be There When I Get Back?

Back in my experimental drug days (which incidentally spanned across an entire decade), I took ecstasy alone once.  I was quasi living with a weird and sweet old hippy dude, in a room that used to be a “grow room”. The walls were covered with shiny, silver mylar sheets, upon which I was free to paint and write and express myself freely.  I remember a moment in the midst of my heavenly corporeal rushing, where the sky figuratively opened and luminous revelation rained upon me. I grabbed a black sharpie and furiously scrawled it into existence on the wall:

 

“Will it still be there when I get back?”

 

Post trip, I revisited the colorful lotus flowers and butterflies and strands of words that had flown through me… and for the life of me, I could not recall what the hell “it” was, or where I imagined I would be circling back to.

 

And yet… there was something about this relatively cheap and fleeting revelation that has caused it to stay with me for the nearly two decades since its dawning.

 

Now we ride the wild spiral of time to the mOMent fondly known as “today”.  Athena Grace, mostly alone in the foreign, wondrous land of Italy, with two small and miraculous Graces of her own.  Serena’s school recently closed in the mornings, because it was too “outside the box” for the conservative folks of Gualdo Tadino, who are apparently content inside their safe, comfy boxes of public education.  Hence the colorful and fiercely devoted sisters of “Wonderland” did not have enough children for it to be worth their while to say open in the mornings.

 

We asked Giordano’s mama to be with Serena two mornings a week (not much, but definitely better than nuttin), while we figured out another solution.  Raphaella is “a magician”, as Giordano once coined his mama’s Gift with children… They build magical 2D and 3D worlds out of paper and colored markers and leggos of various sizes, in which Serena’s dollies and plastic animals, dinosaurs and insects lavishly inhabit… three hours of pure absorbtion in lavish fantasy scapes.  (Plus 100% Italian immersion.) Serena is in heaven.

 

Just as we were settling into a nutritive rhythm, came the voracious, slobbering beast called “The Olive Harvest”, who has once again consumed every last drop of my already hella absent husband’s time and energy.  And his mama too.  

 

Yes, I know that I “should” loooove olive season, because she yields such unparalleled exquisitry.  Spicy, bright green liquid love to drizzle freely upon everything edible. But she chews my already consumed husband up and spits him out into my bed smelling of alcohol and weed in the wee hours of the night, and then beckons him again as the first light smears the sky.

 

And I…

 

Wake each day, replete with a jungle of wild emotions roaring and tearing at me from the inside.  Immense, unbearable longing. My wild, creative Self, desperate to live and express. My body, heart and mind, begging for stimulation, intimacy and holding.  And yet, my days are all weighted with the incessant necessity of domesticity and precious dependants.  

 

I live inside the question of “what if”… what if I just let go into this all-consuming river of rigor that is full-time mothering.  And housekeeping. (The grocery store is my second home) But I want to be so much MORE than just a mother. The wild woman, the (BEST SELLING) writer, the sex priestess, the yogi, the friend, the hermit, the unabashed trail-blazing leader, the ecstatic dancer…. OUR LADY OF GOD-DRUNK GRACE.

 

And so each day is a silent fight.  All those hidden “Me-s”, unwilling to to be steam-rolled by the daily G-R-I-N-D.  And God, is it a grind. I am turning to shimmering, galactic dust. But I won’t let go and be decimated in the jaws of this mundane machine of motherhood.  Because…. If I DO….

 

WILL IT STILL BE THERE WHEN I GET BACK?????????

 

Will I forget how to write and fuck and gallop and dream?  Writing it out, it seems impossible and even ridiculous… To take the Athena Grace out of Athena Grace…. 

 

Surrender.

 

I realize surrender has its own life, intelligence and will.  It’s not like I can just say, “And now for my next wondrous trick, I shall offer my entire self to the psychedelic, dancing flames of my all-consuming Now Moment.  Ladies and Gentlemen, watch in wonder as I dissolve in the oceanic ecstasy of pure, self-less BEing.”  

 

My days ebb and flow with holding on and letting go.  They are exquisite in their own way. I will look back on this chapter with a pervading flood of fondness and gratitude.  The privilege, the holy gift of quality time with my innocent, fully present, creatively ablaze kids. So many moms miss this… because the River of Life sucks them into other compelling currents.  

 

I can already see the woman that Serena is, outside of time.  And I know that time will catch up to the soul-full maturity she exudes.  Her childhood is a marvel. A miracle that leaves me blinking with wonder to behold.  How can such an ancient soul manifest with such lucid innocence? My own childhood is vivified; alive once more inside me.  

 

And Forest.  Even though the rigors of a baby ache and break my body… there is nothing as precious and tender as being charged with a pure, new babe.  Not yet lost and tangled in worlds of words. He speaks with his wide awake eyes, his wide mouthed smiles and his cries. I am drunk, kissing his squishy, bulldog cheeks, drinking his milky breath deep into my lungs.  

 

God I hope….

 

IT will still be there.

 

But the “I” who gets back will surely not be the one who embarked on this Journey.  

 

This must be the ultimate Cosmic Joke. 

 

A bridge between hearts

On the outside, summer has melted into the cool breath of autumn.  The gods have ostentatiously announced this turn by hurling copious lightning bolts and savage booms of thunder upon the green heart of Italy, as Umbria is fondly known.  Deluges of rain drench the earth with abandon.  This transforms the suffocatingly humid air to cool, sweet delicacy.  The trees are still green.  (I am dreading their impending shedding and nakedness…)  The days are no longer unbearably hot.  Just warm and friendly.  But winter winks and whispers from not too far off.

 

On the inside though, my hellish walkabout through emotional, spiritual winter is showing signs of thawing.

 

Forest’s arrival was NOT a graceful transition.  Preparing for birth gets so much hype… but often, the postpartum period gets left to the wolves.  This is mostly how it was for me.  I made a few feeble cries for help… and received a bit of blessed support around the ragged, jagged edges… Mostly in the form of a meal here, and a meal there… But my primary experience as a sudden mother of two with a thrashed and bleeding vagina, and a ripped open heart, was a desolate one.  I do NOT recommend this experience.  If you are pregnant, or intending to become pregnant…. ASK FOR HELP.  Demand help.  Feel wildly worthy of help.  Saturate yourself in support, postpartum.

 

I could get lost in the gory details of my searing postpartum experience, but that’s not what my heart longs to share.  I survived.  My body is resilient and strong.  Now Forest is one and a half months earthside.  And spring is breathing light and warmth upon the barren scapes of my heart and soul.

 

Don’t get me wrong… Life is demanding, and my body tense from holding and nursing a baby all day, while perpetually juggling the needs, demands and whims of an almost four year old and maintaining the impossible tidiness of a not-so-small house…

 

During my pregnancy, Giordano often expressed a hope that Forest would bring us all closer and balance the dynamics of our family.  Though deep down I shared this wish with him, I still mostly cringed when he spoke it… because it seemed like way too much responsibility to load onto a nine pound human with a soft, open skull.  (He’s twelve pounds by now…)  From my vantage point in this moment, it appears that Forest’s mighty soul IS actually capable of this superhuman feat.

 

It always comes back to the timeless chicken and egg quandary… Does the inside give rise to the outer?… Or…???  But as I grope about in these invisible realms, my intuition says that what we perceive as “inner” and “outer” are but one sentient, infinite ISness.

 

I always have a figurative finger on the pulse of The Collective.  Recently, I felt an intangible shift that was beyond me and my own paltry circumstances. AND at the same time, my said paltry circumstances began to shift…

 

Witnessing the depth of love and care that Giordano has for his son made it increasingly difficult to abide in my cherished, long-standing fantasy of fleeing with my children to the familiar and now legendary land of California The Beautiful.  I still mostly did not like my husband… but this distaste began to pale in the bright luminosity of his paternal love.

 

I challenged myself to practice approving of him… even in the face of my glaring distaste for his ways.  I really CAN be a critical bitch.  Honestly, I’d hate to be on the receiving end of my curdled criticism.  Simultaneously, Giordano became less aggressive.  He began to apologize faster and touch (and actually FEEL) me more.  You could argue that this was a function of my behavioral shift… but my sense is that there was a larger energetic gale at play.

 

Theories and hypotheses aside… more lightness is dawning upon our home and family.  I still don’t luxuriate in the company of my husband… but nor do I drown in distaste and pain, as I oft did before.  Forest is a bridge between our hearts and minds, where before it was mostly impossible to pass.  With this exotic flavor of newfound affinity, anything is possible for us…

 

Concurrent with my nuptial blossoming, I experienced a delicious, pivotal moment in my relationship with Italy.  I was at the grocery store with my kids…

 

Italian people are wild about pregnant women, and even wilder about babies.  Everywhere I turn, I am serenaded by a chorus of impassioned exclamation, “AMORE!”.  Women, and even a few men, lust for a peek at the angelic face of my slumbering baby snuggled against my bosom in his wrap.

 

So there we were, civilizedly foraging for food at the aesthetically mediocre Coop, which is nestled in the archaic heart of Gualdo Tadino, being fawned over by the masses.  An almost young, blue-eyed man offered me front cuts in the intimidatingly long checkout line.  But there was another couple between me and him.  Flustered, I looked to them for a read on the situation.  I was shocked when they both smiled and waved me in front of them, as though it was sheerly autonomic.  A red carpet sprawled open beneath my astonished feet.

 

I attempted and mostly failed to share a friendly conversation with the kind man who instigated the front cuts, but despite the lack of intellectual understanding, my heart and the entire mOMent overflowed with warmth.

 

Pushing the shopping cart into the warm, sunny morning, I had the warm, fuzzy thought, “I like it here in Italy.”  Followed by the stunned realization that I had never had that thought before.  I fondled and reflected upon this new awareness for a bit… and concluded that it was probably a fleeting fluke.  After all, my emotional waves tend to be drastic and dramatic and watery.

 

To my surprise, the feeling has lasted.  I realize that I have adjusted to life over here.  For the first year, I was painfully aware of what was missing.  Foods, friends, family, comfy swings that cradle your butt at the playground, the ability to have a damn conversation….

 

But I’m starting to develop a taste for pizza… I make my own peanut butter.  I found pickles that don’t totally blow.  I brew my own water kefir.  The list goes on… but the moral of the story is that I am synching up with my new environment and life.  I am not devastated by the often silence between Giordano and I when we drive places together.  Sure, in my ideal world it would be swell to love to talk with my husband… but silence is kinda okay too… He DOES put his hand on my leg mostly always…

 

I love our land, abounding with fruits and foragables… I love how safe I feel here.  Serena can wander about freely.  (Not that she does, mostly.  She tends to cling.)  I am able to understand quite a bit of Italian, even if my speaking is butt-ass remedial…

 

Reflecting on my suffering, my dear friend Dara invited me to reflect on my original Desire/intention for coming to Italy.  I had to dig a bit to get back there… but it was FAMILY.  I ached for family.  And now I have it.  Gloriously imperfect, as Life mostly is… but nutritious and beautiful too… if I’m open to it.

 

Given the incessant imperfection of life in/as duality, may I embrace the grace that is always here.  What a shame it would be to awaken to this ever-flawed goodness as I am blinking out of this existence.

 

Success in the Rubble of the Patriarchy

Recently, I googled “why are Italians so intense”, but I was disappointed by the lack of illumination provided to me by the omniscience of the world wide web.

 

This morning my BFF Anitra sent me an audio message which spoke to this burning curiosity in me.  She said she saw a time-tested latin quote posted somewhere that basically said “go fuck yourself” and mused on how this spoke to the ongoing culture of brutality that is Roman Civilization.  A sprawling history of dominance, beheading, crucifixion, thirst for “power” (as opposed to the real shit, which of coure is L-O-V-E).  Yup.  This feels true inside me.

 

I wonder what sorts of wars and festivals, rites and relations have happened on this very slab of earth, beneath the concrete mass that is now a tragically generic grocery store (at which we frequently shop), massive, double-decker parking lot and cafe (abounding with pretty, seductive morsels fashioned from white flower and white sugar) at which I sit splashing my musings upon the face of a benevolently glowing screen…  I guess the answer to this question could reveal a compelling story no matter which piece of earth one occupies.  Dense paper mache layers of history.  Past, present and FUTURE.  Maybe someday, this little piece of earth will be covered in flowers, gurgling streams and cute, furry animals.   Hopefully it won’t become a nuclear wasteland….

 

That triple paragraph musing didn’t really lead anywhere, as it would have in my “ideal world”… but I DO want it to be recorded in the annals of Herstory that in 2019, Athena Grace struggled (daily) to make amends with an environment which has endured a heavy-handed dose of Patriarchal influence.  A land where she never ceases to be amused and depending on her mood, also repulsed by the dirt-common practice of communication that lives like people shouting at each other.

 

My poor husband… perpetually perplexed by his utterly ordinary way of speaking often making his wife bristle, cower, cry.

 

I reckon no one is exempt from navigating the pitted inner and outer wastelands of Patriarchal damage at this point.  We are so steeped in it, we often don’t even recognize how warped we are.

 

Lately I’ve become too pregnant to “make anything of myself”, careerwise.  I was really giving it a valiant crack.  I intended to get my online women’s circles reignited and pumpin with shakti-sauce.  I feel sad writing that, because I SO want to.  But the reality is, I’m anywhere from tired to exhausted most of the time.  I have a three year old who needs so much of me.  My mom is dead.  My friends and family are an ocean and landmass away.  My husband works all the time.

 

I could suffer about all this… or just lay down my sword and shield and embrace the current weather system of ISness.  Or as Rosymoon perfectly summed it up once upon a time, “Yesness to the ISness is my Business.”  Damn straight Sisterhood.

 

Once again, I watch my deepest dreams and soul-full longings elude me; turn to sacred vapor in my pulsing palm.  To be a famous writer.  To be an inspiring leader of Women, trailblazer of global sanity, unapologetic, fluorescent luminary of Unity Consciousness.

 

But many of the sane and brilliant women whom I surround myself with have been echoing a similar message to me recently… they speak of their own inquiry into the notions of “success” and “fulfillment”.  Is our incessant striving for BIGGER-BETTER-MORE merely the deep scarring of a perverted, collective thought system?

 

It feels so true inside me that I want to BE SOMEBODY.  DO SOMETHING.  Create and generate from the raw passion that I AM.  But… is it not monumental to grow a human with my own body?  And not just ANY old human…. But an awake soul who embodies the potential to guide the world back into sacred balance?  My children will pick up where I left off.  And I have made a lot of progress in the Way of Love and Truth.  In the Way of purging Collective bullshit.  And I will do my BEST not to jam them in constricting boxes.  (God HELP ME forgive myself for all the little ways I fuck up every day… and affirm and reaffirm and celebrate the modest though cumulative successes we accrue.)

 

Is it not legendarily stupendous that my heart has opened to my husband?… Haha, after ten months and a nearly ripe baby…

 

I DO!  I finally love him!  Pop the chorus of champagne corks…  Ohhh… I miss that obsolete version of me…. Who wore flashy tights and short mini skirts and boots, and launched champagne corks to the moon before swigging the bubbly with (sweetly controlled) abandon.  Not that I ever want to be any manner of drunk again…. Well, yes, I DO.  I want to be GOD-DRUNK.  “Our Lady of God-Drunk Grace”, to be precise (this is the title I have my amazon orders addressed to actually…).  I want to feel less serious.  I want to cut loose and dance around and play about everything, with the gaily gurgling spirit of an Eternal Child.  But Lord Have Mercy, it sure is hard to “get it up”, when you’re trudging pregnant through a parched, scorching desert.  Cue up the fucking violins….

 

But while the violins moan and croon, I will sing to you of how I found love for Giordano….

 

Last week, the density of my Life crushed me again.  And I came damn fucking close to leaving this harsh land of Roman fall-out.  This time, it was not in reaction to cruel, barbaric behavior on the part of my “ball and chain”.  It was simply… EVERYTHING.  Some days I just hate my life.  I miss having friends.  I miss not being able to talk to “strangers”.  It feels so desolate and barren.  And often I feel just as lonely when I’m with Giordano… to no fault of his.  We just don’t jive.  He lives mostly in his intricate, self-proclaimed-genius (perhaps he really is one…) mind.  But in terms of emotional/relational intelligence, he often sucks ass.  But then sometimes he doesn’t.

 

On the heels of weeks melting into months of drowning depression, I told him I was considering going back to California.  He got scared.   And hence mean.  Like a cobra snake puffing up in defense of his precious little serpentine body.  But at some level I was glad, because his meanness justified my intended exit.  My dad told me he’d give me the money to fly home, if I truly felt this was the right choice.

 

But third time IS a charm.  Instead of taking impulsive action, I told Daddy Dearest that I have fucked up ENOUGH times making emotionally impulsive decisions… I needed some time to sit with the offer.  That night I didn’t sleep.  At 3:30am I came back to bed and Giordano awoke.  He asked me what was going on and I started to cry from the immense pressure and ache inside.  He embraced me with his raw, unguarded heart.  I realized this unconditional, saturated holding was my deepest desire.

 

He said he understood me.  He spoke of his played-the-fuck-out pattern to leave before he is abandoned.   He confessed the part of him that has been tempted to walk away before I do.  But he knows that territory better than his own… dick (Which I refer to as his “Best Friend”) and he’s ready to do something new.  Fucking Courageous.

 

I found respect for him that night.  And the entry point into the possibility of Trust.  We acknowledged that we have struggled to trust one another.  And that we both deeply desire to trust.

 

Since then, everything has felt different.  Something crumbled and fell away.  My heart feels soft and open.  Even when I don’t like him….

 

This MUST be “success”.

 

But life still often feels lonely and frustrating (believe me, I AM making concerted effort to count my blessings and savor the little mOMents of grace…).  This must be what if feels like for an ego to unravel.  Uncomfortable and confusing.  But maybe something good is happening….

 

“Emotionally Retarded Children” ;)

It feels like cheating to tell something that happened more than weeks ago.  I mean that’s how most writers roll. But here in Athena Graceland, my jam is to write what is emotionally alive.  Hot, steaming and still writhing around like a twisted pile of freshly spilled entrails. But the beauty of being not only an Artist, but also the Resident Matriarch of Athena Graceland, is that it’s my prerogative to dance barefoot upon my rules and protocols, as Kali Ma upon her bed of skulls.  Besides, I can be too rhythmic and habitual for my own good. Just as Giordano 😉

 

Even if by now, the Life material I inhabited two weeks ago is but the dead tail of a snuffed out comet, this installment of my story MUST be told.  But only in a whisper, and NOT from a mountaintop. Haha. (And certainly not on Facebook, where my “friends” feel they have infinite license to stand in as armchair asses-ers of my most intimate life material.  Often I enjoy reflection… but this is too vulnerable, and being pregnant, I am a thousand times more sensitive than the empty-wombed version of me.)

 

I did it again.

 

On Christmas Eve, I asked my Cosmic Dad to buy me and Serena one way tickets back to beloved California (which I paid for from the modest funds I received from selling my car).  I was sure I was DONE with the emotional turmoil that semi-rhythmically slaps me down like aggressive waves amidst a winter storm.

 

I must be ultra awake and sensitive as I tread the delicate territory of coloring my stories with poetic, dramatic language, while also managing not to portray Giordano or any of the details in a needlessly crushing slant of light.  It’s for the best that I’m not currently emotionally charged.

 

Cosmic Dad asked me AT LEAST FIVE TIMES if I was SURE.  I understood why. I am a fucking intensely emotional being, who is ever-rocked by passing swells.  I had my eye on this too. Because I’ve already played out the expensive and shameful mistake of buying tickets and then balking once, and it was an excruciating lesson.  To ensure that I was moving from Center, from Clarity, I requested to talk with our counselor, Manuela, before I took any binding actions.

 

We spoke for a good forty minutes.  And my FUCK YES to leaving this alien land where you can’t get a decent fucking dill pickle, a jar of tasty, crunchy peanut butter, a kombucha, or fresh, indonesian coffee beans was full sail, full steam, full throttle, full as a fucking blue harvest moon.  And of course it was not really about food at all. I just needed to convey to you my frustration around this stark, pickle-less existence.

 

It was a searing ache to see my brother.  To return to a world abounding with nourishing friendships and an abundance of transformation-based communities.  A world where I can speak (and LISTEN) with anyone and everyone freely, of all things heart and soul and beyond The Beyond.  Shmooze with the checkers at the grocery store and the seemingly random “extras” in my miraculous movie. EVERY ONE. This is one of my passions, and I feel like a defective, tongue-less lump, here in the pickle-less Land of Amore.  

 

And to be done with the Epic Struggle otherwise known as My Marriage.  Haha. It really IS such a phenomena. Giordano and I have a baffling array of dynamics.  I don’t think I ever “fell in love” with him. He showed up when I needed him. And we “fell” quickly into rolls that resembled family.  I often muse that Life put me into an “arranged marriage”. I will love to expound on this in a future blog.

 

Need.  I hate that word.  But it serves. I was hardened by the arduous path of single motherhood.  On our first date (to the Yuba River), he took Serena from her car seat, as though he had done it a thousand times.  He had the heart of a dad. And the dick of a God. Which I “needed” also.

 

But I digress.  On Christmas eve, Cosmic Dad bought the tickets.  Serena and I stayed at our friend Dhuti’s house. I barely slept.  And not because I was anticipating the clip-clop of mystical hoofs on the rooftop and a belly that shakes when He laughs like a bowl full of jelly.  

 

On Christmas morning, Giordano asked if we would love to spend the day together.  I said YES, as long as he could accept that we were really leaving, and was able to be unconditional,  present and share love. An ambitiously steep invitation, considering I was planning to abandon him, abort his baby, and shatter his dreams of family, leaving him figuratively bleeding profusely from everywhere at once.

 

Leaving was a very hard choice for me to make.  But so was having a baby with a man I don’t often trust, in a country where I don’t speak the language and have only three friends.  I imagined not being able to fully surrender to the love of my new baby, because it represented being trapped and confined to a life of suffering and dysfunction.  

 

Giordano rose to the challenge, but naturally was not able to keep his commitment to simply share love and be present.  He became quickly angry and pouring with poisonous words. I asked him to leave. He did. For a few minutes. Not long enough for my body to recover from the emotional intensity.  He came back. With more. He left again. He came back again.

 

This time he dropped to his knees behind the chair in which I sat in silent overwhelm, wrapped his arms around my waist, held my womb and sobbed sobs of the deepest grief I’ve ever witnessed.  I did my best to stay in my body and be with it. Without adding or subtracting. His expression was entirely pure.

My heart began a slow, continuous tear, straight down the middle.  We went home to see what Santa had brought. A Hello Kitty bicycle with training wheels, for Serena.  We drove to the park so she could ride it. Despite freezing temperatures, the sun was shining. It warmed my face.  Was I really going to leave the new, tiny bike and this budding life behind?

Giordano begged me to stay.  He said he would do anything to support me to go to California in the spring.  He said his family would help us financially. (Which in retrospect was a crock of hope-full bullshit….)  He said all kinds of beautiful and persuasive things. And the ripping feeling inside me increased intolerably.  

As you can see, I chose to flush another eight hundred dollars down the toilet and stay.  I was terrified to tell my Cosmic Dad. Which was an entirely founded fear. He was enraged and lectured us like out-of-line children.  Which honestly felt refreshing. He was unfiltered. A rare gift in a sugar coated world. It was a long lecture, so I won’t give you a play-by-play, but the essence was GROW THE FUCK UP.  (Actually the finest moment was when he called us “Emotionally Retarded Children”!)

And my own “special” message from Cosmic Dad was that he has known me for almost twenty years, and he has never seen me fully commit to ANYTHING.  This hit hOMe. And I wondered… how will I EVER make my dreams come true, if I leave as soon as shit doesn’t feel good? I NEED to realize my dreams.  Need.

Cosmic Dad said if we are really gonna do this, we must surrender to the US of marriage.  Any marriage formed by two MEs will dissolve relatively quickly. (And this gospel was delivered by a man who has been married three times.)

I find this invitation to fully surrender myself to the US both terrifying and thrilling.   

After this recent riveting, shattering, masterbatorily fabricated “peak experience”, we shared four whole days of affinity and understated bliss.  On the fifth day, returned the all-too-familiar feelings of fight or flight that arise when I don’t feel heard or respected. Whoopee.

But we continue to receive support from our personally assigned angel and guide, Manuela.  She is helping us dig to roots of our arguments, to uncover the fears that spawn the aggression.  Powerful. We both have so much fear inside. Naming it is revelatory and transformative.

Yesterday was Sunday.  We went for a walk in the sparking snow together.  We did some heavy lifting and transformed our living room.  We shared our hearts deeply while Serena napped. We made transcendent love.  All day long, I had a glimpse of the possibility of actually liking my husband.  And building and creating a beautiful life together.

I am praying, deep and sincerely to have many more days like this.

  

 

First Visit to the “Consultorio”

I finally got it together to see a doctor yesterday.  You know, for the baby.  Actually, here in Italy, it was called the “consultorio”.  This tickles me.  But not as much as the moment two nights ago, when Giordano came into the house with the clothing from the line outside (he was convinced it would rain, despite the forecast’s declaration otherwise), and he said, “The pantaloni, they was rrrigid.”  I am STILL laughing about that one!

 

Anyway, they don’t speak English at the cosultorio, so darling Giordano had to take the morning off of work to accompany us.  We fought a brutal battle in the car on the way, because I was not acting in accordance with his unstated timeline and he thought this was ludicrous.  He felt this gave him license to go on an emotionally charged ridiculing bender.  I did not agree.

 

I explained to him with calm, direct language that when he has an expectation around timelines, it’s best to articulate it with crisp, uncharged lucidity, because even though in HIS mind, his ideas are obvious, I inhabit a different universe.  And vica versa.  My words didn’t make it past the thick armor adorning his aura.  They rolled off like superfluous beads of (olive) oil.

 

This happens with us.  I communicate in what feels to me to be a very mature, generous, responsible fashion, and it gets lost in some sort of nether-worldly cosmic wasteland.  Then I lose it.  FAST.  Suddenly, “Go fuck yourself”s and “Shove it up your ass”es are whizzing and ricocheting about the dense atmosphere of the tiny Fiat, and Serena is innocently marinating in a soupy broth of verbal violence.  I hate confessing this.  I feel disappointed in myself.

 

I had mixed feelings about sharing THAT piece of the “doctor visit”.  But it was an integral part of the “consultorio” experience,  the ecstatic experience that is my marriage, and my soul’s current labyrinthian alchemy.  So I had to give you an honest depth of field.

 

But really I imagined starting off by conveying to you the alarm and desperation I felt when I walked into the minimal examination room, and discovered that my doctor was a man.  And not just ANY man, but an remarkably round man in a skin-tight, long-sleeve shirt that unabashedly flaunted his impressively voluptuous man boobs.  Seriously, I’ve never seen such full, perky boobs on a dude before.

 

I was already in a foul mood.  Now I was ready to turn around and run.  I stood frozen in the doorway for a timeless flash.  He gestured for us to enter, and I made my way to one of the blue chairs adjacent to his desk.  Giordano and Serena opted to stand.

 

As soon as he began to speak, my fear dissolved in his generous warmth and light.  He asked in Italian if this was our first visit.  I could understand, but even so, he quickly surmised that I spoke English, and he addressed me directly.  His bright brown eyes smiled through large-lensed glasses as he spoke. “Yes,” I replied.  And what had been fear, turned to innocent fascination in the gracious presence of this unique specimen of a fellow human being.

 

He looked at my belly and said “Five months?”  I flushed with self-consciousness, as I replied “thirteen weeks”.  Then I stood up, and he acknowledged that yeah, I really wasn’t so big… but my stomach was full of gas.  He asked if my digestion was slow.  “Yeah,” I frowned.

 

Before any more of the story slips by, I will testify that while we sat out in the hall waiting for our turn, “Giordano’s Best” returned from behind dense cloud cover.  He kneeled down in front of me, gave me his full attention and actually LISTENED to all that was still writhing and howling inside me.  He always comes around.  But the fanfare that inevitably precedes The Return sucks royal ass.  Juvenile.  Righteous.  Emotionally charged. (All elements which I am adept at hurling too, when my pain is roused, by the way…) But I’m learning how to accept the whole fucking emotional arc.  And bask in the perplexing rightness of the man and the circumstances that I have been given by Amazing Grace, Herself.

 

The next part is exciting!  I didn’t know WHAT was in store for my first visit to the consultorio… But it turned out to be an ultrasound.  Something I have mixed feelings about over all… because it seems a bit invasive and potentially damaging… but suddenly, BAM!  There I was, laying back on the examination table and getting slathered in translucent, blue goop.  And in a blink, there was “Baby Sister” on the little screen!

I felt like we had walked in on a private party.  There he was—the tiniest little person I have ever seen, just grooving to his own celestial beat.  He looked perfectly content, wiggling around without a care in the world.

 

Yes, “HE”.

 

The voluptuous and sweet-hearted doctor was amused that we were referring to this tiny wonder as “Baby Sister” (Serena was convinced she was getting a girl), and I think this spurned his drive to uncover the truth.  He prodded my baby with his “magic wand”, until the teensy creature uncrossed his legs and exposed his adorable little penis.  At least, I’m pretty sure that’s what it was.  It did NOT look like the tidy little crack that Serena displayed during her first (and only) ultrasound. (Doc said we can’t be totally sure until at least five months… but regardless, he was pretty convinced.)

 

I was not surprised.  I had intuited his boy-ness since the beginning, and have been emotionally preparing myself ever since.  But not Giordano and Serena.  Serena almost cried.  Literally.  And Giordano’s heart sank.  Sorry guys.  I was just tickled.  I’m having a little BOY!  What the hell am I gonna do with one???  I guess that’s the fun of it.  Discovering exactly that.  Loving a boy will teach me a lot.  I just hope he’s not a little terror.  I’m not designed to handle that shit.

 

Thankfully, God never fucks up.  Even when it seems sure that HeSheIt must have been hitting the crack pipe.  (Which lately seems like a frequent habit.  But really, I am enrolled in a rigorous, Heavy Weight strength training, and will surely emerge a Champion.)

 

We saw his little hands and feet, his brain, his spine… heard his perfect little heartbeat.  Eternally incinerated are any straggling fantasies of abortion.  This boy is MINE.

 

I must speak to the contrast between this ultrasound, and the one where I first saw beloved Serena.  That was an unbearably heavy day in my heart.  Ed took me.  We had barely been on speaking terms.  I think I was six months along by then.  It was summertime.  He stood at my side with somberness fit for a funeral.  My joy and delight was suffocated in the airless atmosphere of irreconcilable heartbreak.  I needed him by my side.  And yet his presence destroyed me.  After the appointment, we drove to Stinson Beach.  Ed grilled us a steak in the picnic area.  The day was unusually cold and overcast.  Then we walked the beach.  We barely spoke.  I experienced a surprisingly boyish side of Ed, as he delighted in picking up pretty rocks.

 

This time, I was with my family.  My totally imperfect, but wholly devoted and loving family.  And we were all sharing in a pretty damn PEAK experience.  Each swimming in our own sea of heightened, diverse emotions.  But still, together.

 

I was actually surprised by the magnitude of my quiet joy.  It melted from my center and spread softly across my day, in concentric circles, like a raindrop splashing upon a lake.

 

It was a wham-bam-thank you-ma’am sort of appointment.  The doctor set down his magic wand and walked to his desk.  He said some stuff to Giordano in Italian, as I wiped the blue goop from my belly with the paper towel that he had previously tucked in my pants.  He said to come back next Thursday (which as it goes, is my thirty-ninth birthday), for blood tests.

 

Then we went to another room where a woman informed us of the burocratic hoops we’d have to jump through in order to get full medical coverage for this pregnancy, given that I don’t yet have a family visa.  We would need to go obtain fiscal codes from a different office.

 

All this was transmitted in Italian, of course, and I had only the vaguest notion of what was being said.  Then as soon as we left her office, Giordano was on the phone.  I gathered with his mother.

 

I felt dropped.  Totally alone.  We had just shared a very deep and emotional experience… and then he had received information that I did not understand, pertaining to me… and… he chose to call his MOM???  It would have felt better if he connected with me first and said something like, “Oh my GOD, I’m so excited, I want to call my mom and tell her we are having a boy!  Will you excuse me for a moment?”

I didn’t feel like his partner.  In that moment, I felt like his MOM was his partner.  The one his heart was with.  This weighed on me for the rest of the afternoon… until I found the right moment to share my feelings with him.  To his credit, he received me so generously.  No defense.  Pure empathy and presence.  My husband… He may be an unpolished mother fucker, but he is truly giving his ALL to becoming better.  A better version of HIMSELF.  Not some random schmuck.  He isn’t evolving at my preferred rate.  But I suppose this is for the better too.  Because not being in control of any of it is certainly polishing the fuck out of me.

 

Just think how strong and shiny I will be…..

 

 

 

 

 

 

Field Tripping Through Darkness

Whoa.  Is it just me?…. Or is some Collective shit going down?  Maaaaan, I’ve been field tripping in some of the darkest reaches of my Being.  It’s been horrid. Thankfully, groping along the darkened walls inside me, I finally happened upon a Light switch.  Phew.

 

I’m not exaggerating when I confess that I was on the brink of intentionally miscarrying.  And perhaps fleeing to California. Which, come to think of it, I can’t even do right now, since my visa is expired and I haven’t been to the Police yet to request an extension for “family reasons” (being married).  But the more burning agenda item was to not be pregnant. Isn’t that atrocious? That’s the shit nobody admits. Except Athena Grace.

 

What had me lurch to such X-treme measures?  A combination of always being cold, having one-the-fuck-too-many crushingly unpleasant exchanges with my stressed-out, unevolved husband, and an intolerable lack of community.  Oh, and let’s not forget, a full moon and early pregnancy hormones, which are oft reminiscent of Bad Acid.

 

All these factors were eating away at my insides, as though the Devil had gratuitously sloshed a fresh batch of battery acid all up in me.  Meanwhile, beloved California is burning down, my best friend got a double mastectomy, another dear friend is fending off child protective services, thanks to an A-hole ex-husband…. What the fuck is going ON on this glorious planet?  

 

Have you ever sat in the messy middle of your Life, blinking and shaking and wondering how on earth it managed to turn out like THIS???  It’s wild. To feel repulsion at that which I called into being. Flirting with an aggressive urge to hate. But then I turn towards my Self… and despite my perplexion at the hand that me and God Almighty have co-dealt… Miracle of miracles, I still love myself.  Nothing makes sense. To be so angry and confused by my choices… yet… to still feel my own tender pulse of fallible lovability.

 

I’ve been haunted by the skipping record thought of wishing I left Italy back in August, when I had two fat, juicy tickets.  But I didn’t. I chose this Family. Nuclear family. Honestly, I want to hurl the nuclear model against a wall and watch it smash and hopelessly shatter.  It’s a broken system. MY broken system, for now….

 

But the grace wrapped in the rotten cheese of my circumstances, is that this desperation has compelled me to be fierce about seeking community.  On saturday, Serena and I went to Benedetta’s for dinner. After that, I felt a pinhole of light wash into my cell. On sunday, I took my girl to Sunday Service at Ananda.  Something I’d been resisting since I got here. Honestly, it was a little dull…. But my thirst was so dire that I didn’t care.

 

Actually, the holiest of holy moments, “The Revelation” was when Ishani, after hearing my troubled heart, holding my gaze with deep, compassionate, sparkling brown eyes offered, “and by the way, EVERYONE’S husband is annoying.”  HAAAAAAA!!!!!! I totally forgot this quintessential, ageless wisdom.

 

After service, we hung around with Benedetta and her boy, Eliseo, who is Serena’s age.  They climbed all over the place and goofed about. Benedetta fed my girl bites of yummy food from her plate.  My heart smiled bright beams. This is how it is “supposed to be”. The Village, I mean.

 

When Giordano showed up, I actually felt I could love him.  And receive his love. Which, by the way, (though flawed as fuck) has been damn steady.  Even though he rarely behaves the way I wish he would, he continues to stand in unwavering love and devotion to me (and Serena).  Sometimes I actually wonder if he’s retarded for this! I mean I can be a total cunt when I’m upset.

 

And by the way, if you’re wondering how this blog will sit with my darling hubby…. I AM TOO!  Haha. Seriously, this is all such risky shit to say. But I’ve told him from day ONE– writing is my first LOVE.  I have a NEED to be transparent on the page, and I need his support. He totally gets it. And supports me. It is never my intention to portray him as a Villain, or douse him in ugly light.  My aim is to unpack my innermost self, for the purpose of finding relief from the pressure of my inner chaos, to discover insights and perspectives previously concealed, and hopefully, to illuminate your Journey and the deepest, perhaps hidden reaches of your BEing.  Because after all, we may be living out a vast panoply of scenarios, yet we are still One. We are breathed by the same Breath.

 

All this hellish suffering and grievance really put a damper on my sexual openness.  After Sunday Service, I put Serena down for a nap, and Giordano wanted to give me pleasure.  I felt my body closed to a degree I have never experienced with Giordano. But who can say no to Orgasmic Meditation?  Not this bitch. Fifteen minutes of attentive strokes to my clit and I was reborn. After that we shared more… ahem… “Love”… and I was touched by his serviceful attitude.  My body melted open to the flow of love, and the day was Saved.

 

Sex.  It’s one of the strongest aspects of our connection.   For better and for worse. When it’s missing, shit is warped.  But in order for nourishing sex to occur, the emotional piece has to be relatively solid.  It’s such a damn delicate equation.

 

I have reflected a butt-ton since all this excruciating discomfort began.  You know, like on the quintessential meaning of my life, my relationship with God, my priorities…. That’s the beauty of suffering.  It can be such a clarifying Force.

 

I’ve remembered that Ultimately, the meaning of my life is summed up in Rumi’s quote:  “Your task is not to seek for love, but merely to seek and find all the barriers within yourself that you have built against it.”

 

I have been crushingly intimate with the barriers inside me.  And so happy that I have a husband who helps me grind against myself in such terrible (and exquisitely helpful) dimensions.  Even though I often hate it, I think it might somehow be good…

 

Oh.  And then there is Serena.  Through all of this, my love for her has kept me functional and sane.  It calls me forth. She is an endless stream of blazing innocence, imagination, curiosity, love, creativity, presence.  I can only step forward in Service of her Magnificence.

 

And my Friends.  Most of you are oceans and land masses away in the 3D…. But you are Golden Angels in the flesh.  You hold me and shine a light when it gets frighteningly dark in here. You are my wealth. You are my Salvation.   I love you, I love you, I love you…

 

I LOVE YOU!!!!!!!!!!

Feeling for a new alignment

I lust to be a famous writer.  I do!!! But in reality, my drive to write is deeper than outcome.  I show up here because the fire Inside gives me no other option.  Without putting my heart, mind and BEing into words, life feels like racing tigers, melting into butter, sliding through my stupefied fingers.  And I can’t live with that.

I’m pregnant.  Sorry if I haven’t told you personally.  It’s really friggin early to go around singing it from the mountain tops.  I only conceived twenty three days ago. If I had any “sense”, I’d be quiet about it for a while, and just let my poppy seed-sized fetus gestate in blissful anonymity.  But gosh… then what would I write about? I have a burning need to cut to the heart of It All… And right now, this is the heart.

Was this a conscious choice?

Yes!  And… I was still broadsided by “The Call”.  (The soul whispered loud in me.)  My ego had other plans. Like always… Back in September, during our trip to the seaside, I was overtaken by deep and sudden urge to bring this strangely familiar, yet concealed by the veil, BEing into the world.  This strong feeling left me blinking and seeing neon, dancing stars. I was just getting “my life back”. Serena would start school in a matter of weeks. I would start a solid exercise routine.  And write my utterly fabulous memoir. Getting knocked up would be the Setback of the Century!

But my soul’s drive to create family body-slammed my career ambitions.  I guess that’s how the human race has made it this far… Imagining Serena as a big sister, I felt this to be essential for her.  Strange, because not too long ago, I couldn’t even fathom loving another human being as much as I love her. It didn’t compute. But by the Grace of God… now it does.  I was just minding my business… and suddenly my heart expanded. Neat!

Giordano and I both had “trauma” (Haha that word is so popular these days….) around bringing in our first child.  He separated with baby mama during her pregnancy, and she didn’t even tell him when she gave birth. He found out three days later.  This aches his heart… not to have been able to love his sun into the world. And now, the boy is mostly raised by the mama and her boyfriend.  Who have completely different lifestyle and values than Giordano does. Which is often painful for him….

For me, I can’t even believe I survived the heartache I went through during my pregnancy with Serena.  Her dad consciously impregnated me…. But then when she took root in my womb, he freaked and asked me if I was sure I wanted to keep her.  (Like, “Duh, Stupid!”) Then he had one foot out the door for the whole pregnancy. I barely saw him. I loved being pregnant. It was the most magical and beautiful nine months of my entire life perhaps.  Still, my heart bled profusely on a daily basis. Ed showed up for the birth. He held and exquisite masculine space for me. But then at 6am, he left us alone in the hospital, like a party that was over. It was just me and her.  For nearly three years.

I consider this a great blessing… mostly.  What fortune to have such an INTIMATE experience with a soul who is so cosmically dear to me.  Talk about some deeep karma. And it was hard as fuck. To be the breadwinner, the one always holding.  Rarely held. I still remember the epic-sized teardrops that spilled from my eyes in the first weeks after she was born.  Seriously. They were straight from a monsoon.

I’m digesting this painful life material at a deeper level as I enter this new pregnancy.  It sucks to carry it in my heart. I just want it all to burn off like sweet rose petals falling into the sun.  

When I shared with Giordano my sudden desire to conceive our child, he was an unwavering yes.  Like me, he had surface concerns and questions… but those paled in the light of raw desire and soul-knowing inside him.  And when we conceived, his joy was pure and naked as a child’s. This in itself was deeply healing for me.

So now, here I am, in my hella greeeeen pasture…. And still I ache!  Oh, blessed hormones. They are profound. And gorgeous in some way.  My bodhichitta heart is throbbing, full tilt. Anything and everything moves me to the core.  

I feel lonely a lot.  Except now… I’m never lonely when I write, because I love hanging out with myself in such a deep, intimate space. Communicating is orgasmic!  But just existing day to day… Gosh, it gets old not to have people around me physically, who feel like hOMe (Thank GOD for my smart-assed phone… My connection to some of the most exquisite people on the planet!).  But this has been the story of my life since I gave birth… I guess my soul is practicing some sort of potent, rigorous austerity. Like Saint Francis. I think about him, when I’m out walking sometimes… The mountains and bright, fluffy hillsides of Umbria have such a majestic Presence.  Which teases my majestic Presence to the surface. They speak. I feel awed to silence and riveted stillness.

Mamas out there?  I have a question for you… How do you integrate motherhood with all your other Selves, Dreams, Desires?   I see so many women “doing it all”… with such grace and mastery. Over here it looks like such a daunting journey.  To be and hold ALL OF IT. I don’t know what elements of my Self and Life to hold onto, fight for… and what to release into the honeyed sky of pure BEing.  Not that this inquiry is anything new for me. Haha. It just gets louder as I stand at the precipice of early motherhood once more.

I want to be so much more than just a Mom.  I want to be a Source of inspiration and endless faith in Love, for all the world.  I want to be a role model of courageous, unbridled authenticity. I want to dream new dreams and build new systems, informed by Unity Consciousness to evolve and transform this World.  I guess a huge part of my Desire can live through how I raise and educate my children (and how I hold and care for myself, as their mother). I feel fierce to hold space for them to develop and blossom in alignment with their essence and purpose, rather than sleeping at the wheel while society mashes and grinds them in confining boxes, just because I’m too lazy to take initiative.  This calling lives as a daunting responsibility in me. What I need to feel empowered in this domain is to be in conversation and co-creation with other parents who share this mission. The Lone Wolf archetype is a total ball krusher!

Anyway, I’m here inside myself, feeling for a new alignment.  And longing for masculine holding. And wondering if it’s just my lot in life to learn how to hold my own damn self.  Couldn’t hurt I guess.

But I’m happy.

Premarital Bliss.

Gosh, I was so scared to publish my last blog.  Though I poured my heart out in a comprehensive fashion, ONE single facet stuck me like a poison dart: The confession that I probably wouldn’t marry Giordano if I had money.  I felt so vulnerable offering that shard of my inner life up.

 

Then came the near-erotic thrill, the loss of control that is clicking “publish”.  Then Giordano’s eyes imbibing said confession.  He made his way deeper into this heart when he replied, smirking,  “So you’re marrying me for money?… I don’t have money!  Just one house from my family, who crush the ball every day.”

 

We both had a good laugh.

 

It’s true… If I was marrying a man “for money”, I made the worst possible choice.  Money has been so scarce lately, since Giordano has started engaging in the all-consuming task of picking olives.  It wasn’t until a few days ago that he found the time and money to purchase a cheap silver wedding band.  My adventures at the grocery store have been to the tune of “how much nutrient dense juice can I squeeze out of a twenty euro bill?”….

 

I am marveling at the power of raw, unfiltered honesty.  Saying the stuff that I am most scared to say… and POOF!, I am free. (Sometimes.  Other times I just get myself into relational trouble…)  It no longer festers inside me.  Like a thick fog, it silently screams as it sucks, hopeless, into the blazing Source of light.  I swear, after I posted my last blog, I softened deeper in love with Giordano.

 

Listen to this!….

 

I actually feel delighted to be marrying him.  Marriage feels like an unprecedented adventure.  One of those passages that must be lived through, fully felt and tasted.  Not just read about in a book, or heard tell of around a campfire.  (Or sipping coffee in mismatched reclining chairs with my Ma, as she recounted snippets of her two emotionally unsatisfying marriages, during what I didn’t realize then was the tail-end of her life…)

 

Am I just hella in love with him because I barely see him these days?… I have so much time to miss him..  And then he comes home like a sunkissed war hero, smelling of utterly tantalizing incense.  Seriously.  He’s the most deliciously scented creature I’ve ever encountered.  From the heat of his strong, active body, wafts a hypnotic synthesis of pheromones, pine and earth, fire and pristine alpine spring water, spilling from the heart of creation.

 

It always tickles when he says, “I can’t wait to hug in the bed.”  An american man would never say anything so charming.  It’s totally not an innuendo.  He just cherishes the simple pleasure of our warm, naked bodies entwined at bedtime.  I don’t think I’ll ever tire of his adorable italian translations.  Nor his innocent relishing of fundamental existence.

 

Giordano’s unwavering, rarefied, devotional love is healing me.  I didn’t realize how war-ravaged I was, after a five year affair with a married man, to whom I gave my whole self… and had a child with. (Three cheers for raw, unfiltered Life Experience!) The trauma of settling for Ed’s pathetic crumbs became a normalized experience in me.  Which of course stemmed from the glories of a having an emotionally immature father who prioritized world travel and eventually another family, over precious little me.  I am still discovering forsaken and shy territories of my heart I boarded shut in order to endure the pain of it all.  Slowly, they melt open in the sunlight of Giordano’s wildly imperfect, though incredibly sincere and miraculously steady love.

 

I’m also becoming a whiz at navigating his wounded little boy, (It is still hard work though!!!) which would indicate that I am loving myself pretty well…. Plus, learning/practicing emotional restraint.  I still go up in flames on the inside when he goes off the deep end emotionally, over what occurs for me as the pettiest shit.  I’m learning to breathe more and speak less.  And attune to his deeper needs and more subtle communication.  Hooray for me.  Seriously.  Though it will be heavenly when he graduates to the level of being able to advocate for himself with maturity and consciousness…. The fuckin Italians…. So damn emotional… and not a lot of personal growth courses over here….

 

One of Giordano’s strengths is bringing humor and lightness to otherwise suffocatingly dense moments.  My work is to soften into his invitation to laugh and let go.  Of course I reserve the right to hold on, punish and drive my point home when I feel like he hasn’t gotten the message or the medicine…. But mostly this hurts me more than him.  We ARE pretty comical in our heated moments.  Two giant babies flailing our fat little arms and stomping our squishy little feet.  Utterly riveted by our emotions and points of view.

 

Yeah, I’m really jazzed to be married!  I wanna see what this wife business is all about.

 

“GETTING” married on the other hand…. This is not such a thrilling facet of the jewel for me.  The Big Event goes down in three days.  I don’t have a dress.  I might just pull some halfway decent garment from my closet.  Giordano’s story is the same.  It’s supposed to rain.  We haven’t had the luxury of time to synch up and create meaningful vows together.  99.999% of my friends are far, far away.  I mean I managed to shake loose from the fever dream of my perfect fairytale wedding years ago… but THIS… my wedding day is shaping up to be the polar opposite.  Hopefully the event will make for a good story.  This is what matters most to me deep down.

 

I dedicated that last paragraph to self-pity!  It felt awesome.  But I DO want you to know that of ALL people in my world, my Cosmic Dad will be in attendance.  He will “give me away”.  An insatiable Sagittarius type, he just happened to be traveling through Europe, and swung our way to imbibe in the Hella Holy Matrimony. So I guess in reality, my glass is actually half full.  The man who has seen me through the course of my entire “adulthood” will be with me for this substantial rite of passage.  Whoopie.

 

I can’t wait to report back to you and divulge the dirty deets of my hella special day.  May it be an ecstatic, messy, perfectly imperfect Unfolding, colored by outrageous characters, intriguing nuance and mind-blowing realness.  Yee-haw!