I drove South with tears in my eyes, Lorde crooning loudly as the drops fell. I cried for a loss of love, a loss of control. I cried out of fear, of being such a tiny girl in this big old world. & when my eyes couldn't continue, the sky took up the task. a soul cleansing. what a release, to let go.
this past year has been a huge lesson in desire vs action. because, baby, I've had dreams. grand beautiful dreams of mountainsides & farmlands, of Portland, & holding one man's hand 'til the end. but a dream isn't enough, no, a dream is just a pretty thing. there has to be action.
it all came undone. one after another those pretty little dreams fell to the ground like moths with over-beaten wings. how it hurt, how I felt felled. & still, the world seemed achingly bright & clear, like a North Carolina springtime early in the day, after a fresh rain. so startlingly vivid, so alive.
I left swimming sea turtle blue walls & the home we had built filled with all those memories, all that love & all that ache. or, more, I was a baby bird, fallen fresh from the nest. & I was welcomed with open arms by Ian & Maggs to a house on the lake, way out in the country. I can't explain my gratitude, it is endless. because there, in their warm embrace, on the silence of the lake, with the pottery wheel, & all those deer, & the wind whispering & howling, & the music always playing, & my limbs wildly dancing, I was healed.
see, I've been dancing the dance of the grouse & talking with the wind. I quit my job. I sought solace in the medicinal powers of music. I went to every live show that presented itself. I was cleansed in mud at Shakori Hills, song after song beating through my bones, rain falling down. & I was warm, fire burning inside my soul despite the outside cold. & in Asheville, Moses Sumney made the crowd go "shhhh" & our breath looped & looped & chills crept over my body, my heart bared on my chest for when Local Natives took the stage & wooed me. then in Greensboro, Yo Mama's Big Fat Booty Band taught my limbs to dance in a way I never knew I could. see, through music, I've been freed.
today I am in Florida, learning to be present, to live in the moment. when the sun sets, I sit in the grass with the pup, watch the trees, listen to the breeze.
I don't know where I'm going, I don't have a plan. one of my current mantras is "I think of the trees & how easily they let go" & I am trying hard to follow it, to hand over the reins & trust that if I follow my love, this magical universe will guide me.
