This is How I Roll 10.23.07

with my fists gripping tightly
to the mossy green of Mama
as I roll over her
she gasps and deepens
as I give her luscious mane a friendly tug
and I gasp and deepen
as she collects me for a hug

like a Japanese Maple in the height of
Autumnal October
I stand in bright bursting beauty
as I deepen into
inside
as I breathe even
deeper
give a sigh
and let go

and what is it exactly
that leaves me then
Not that I need to know
the details of why and when
I think I need to care
my mind stops short and blinks
and that's when my heart
takes over and gives my brain a wink
then she takes in deep sips of sunshine
a breath of fresh air
and realigns the punchline
then she laughingly submits
this idiot to the divine

and I am held so precious
and when I stop this to think
patiently I am waited on
as I take another drink
of intoxicating logic
and addictive demands
occasionally I recall the option
of giving it up to better hands

in reverence and respect
I am decidedly allowed
to make this living thing
much harder than avowed
and when I shake my tiny fist
they simply shake their heads
and grin
Baby girl, you and your knack
for desparate situations
keeps us entertained, but
does it keep you satisfied?
I drop my head into my hands,
give a nod and a sigh

its easier to flip off resentment
and celebrate joyfulness
but I was reminded the other day
that they both have equal importance

so they roughhouse and tumble around
knocking shit down
inside of me
as I trip over my feet
'cuz I can barely see
'cuz I'm hardly here
when I'm distracted that way
'cuz I'm hardly here
when the archetypes are at play

and I roll on like thunder
in a sound-proof cave
it leaks out the opening
in the front of my face

and it's exquisitly beautiful
despite the funny looks
with a wink and nod
from my heart, I shook

up the planet each moment
one person at a time
I have humbly been
blessed as a bridge
of earth and divine

at least that what they told me
and why should I doubt?
I've run out of reasons for
seeking the backdoor out

I love you, I said
I love you, and I hope
you hear me
this time
with your deepest of hearts

I hope you can feel
deep
deep
deep as you can
You are Light
You are Love
It is with you
I stand

My sacred beloved
intimate kin
What a blessing to
have you in this
world I live in

Renewal

I found this book the other day that I had started reading well over two years ago. It's called, "The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Nighttime." It's written in first-person narrative by a fifteen-year-old boy who is highly functioning with autism. As a teacher of such fascinating folk in my past life, I am finding this read totally captivating and pretty insightful into the workings of an autistic mind.

However, the first intriguing thing about this book has nothing to do with the book at all. When I started reading it years ago, I had marked my place with a slip of paper, upon which this quote was written:

"This is the miracle of creation, which in every second is one thing:

life and death joined in the same eternal dance.

It would be a catastrophe to exclude death from the dance.

That would guarantee a universe with no chance for renewal."

- from a book entitled Life After Death, author unknown.

I found this quote seredipitously appropriate: appropriate for autumn and the shedding time of the cycle, appropriate for the book I am reading, appropriate for acknowledging the three deaths of fellow colleagues this year, appropriate to the dead squirrel I found my cat munching on outside my front stoop.

In every death, there is hope of new life. Renewal.

What I did with my Friday...

1) Continued to fall in love with Homeopathy.

2) Discovered that Belladonna is probably not my constitutional remedy. I dosed, and essentially proved Belladonna for the next three hours, complete with irrational rising rage, a right-sided headache, and sensitivity to the sun and the cold air on my head. I remedied myself with a pint of Ben and Jerry's Chocolate Fudge Brownie and a nap. At least I didn't bite anyone.

3) Went out in the forest with the 'Shrooms class and picked a fat wad of Shaggy Parasol Mushrooms. Sweet little Sofia snapped this pic of me just after I crawled out from under a Western Red Cedar.

4) Volunteer Organization meeting for the Washington Physicians for Social Responsibility (WPSR) Annual Dinner next week.

...and now, sitting up and waiting til 11pm to run over the the Capitol Hill Arts Center to get Manos to sign the forms I didn't have for him to sign when he played at school a few weeks ago.

So.

It's all good, a little speedy and exhausting right now...perhaps the Belladonna hasn't worn off yet. I hope it actually will. Dr. Mann was saying that if you take a rememdy too often, it can graft its being onto you, and then you're essentially permanently fucked. Or poisoned. Or whatever. I'll just hope for the best.

But if I suddenly reach out and smack you, you'll know where it came from.

Ponies

Yes, this morning has been that surreal.

After waking at 2am for no apparent reason, I wrote out my birth story for Normal Maternity, made chili for breakfast and lunch, got my period a whopping 10 days early, puttered off to class nearly falling asleep the entire way there.

No sooner do I stumble into Phys/Clin than I decide I'd much rather do this 8am class thing with a steaming hot cup of chai. I wander back out of class and down to the caf for a pick-me-up. Back in class, Kelsey and I are sitting back there fucking off when out of nowhere, Dr. Anderson says that you'll get into trouble if you saddle up your patients and ride them off into health. He was talking about letting symptoms pidgeon-hole you into thinking a patient has a certain kind of disease when in fact they have something much more serious going on. But Kels and I share the same perverted kink brain, and totally burst into fits of hysterics. The giggles don't let up, especially when the Doc goes on to say that the zebras and the gazelles don't like getting saddled, and they start to buck and kick and bite if you try. (The zebras and gazelles, in this metaphor, refer to all the wierd cancers and blood diseases that docs have a 1 in 5000 chance of seeing, as opposed to the pyelonephritis horses that a doc will see at least once a week).

So, remember kids: Don't put a saddle on your patients, unless they ask you very very nicely.

...and, back to our regularly scheduled programming: Pleurotus!!!

Rubbin'...

Today is just too good.

I have spent most of the day getting rubbed, stretched, kneaded and loved from my colleagues all day. And all in the name of higher learning, from Manip class to a little lunchtime review to donating my time and body for an up-and-coming LMP to practice.

How can I complain? While I do get the chance to get out of head and relax into my body, it is also vital that one stays present enough to give feedback. You have to know what hurts, what's uncomfortable, what just isn't right...and then be able to tell your practitioner how it is without fear of judgment. Being part of this program has made me aware of my physical, emotional and spiritual boundaries (or lack thereof) as well as those of other people. I've also developed the responsibility to myself to protect myself: something I wasn't willing to do before I got here. Pretty awesome.

Stay tuned for a full report on the research report regarding the HIV reverse-transcriptase inhibition activity of Pleurotus ostreatus, aka the Oyster mushroom.

Until then...

The Enlightenment of Starbucks

There are two camps in Seattle when it comes to Starbucks. The first category is stereotyped as the latte-sipping yuppified hipster who can prattle off a good deal of coffee-related Franco-Italian lingo without ever taking a language class.

The second group are those who might post this on their car.

Me? Firmly planted in the second group.

My soapbox of Starbucks is mainly about the lack of fair-trade and equal exchange purchasing of their coffee beans, as well as the general nauseating addiction to twiddle the consumer's money-spot. Starbucks sells everything under the sun, from corny mugs to CDs to board games to toxic-doused stuffed animals, all majorly overpriced and made in China. To boot, they are probably the only coffee chain in the entire city of Seattle that doesn't carry rice milk. Didn't they get the memo that soy milk causes man-boobs?

But the one thing I can truly dig about Starbucks is their uncanny ability to inspire the masses by placing quotes on their 10%post-consumer recycled cups. Here's a few that I picked up today:

"In a world where celebrity equals talent, and where make-believe is called reality, it is most important to have real love, truth, and stability in your life." -- Bernie Brillstein

"Be the example; spread hope." -- Cat Cora

"In the end, we're all the same." -- Ben Kweller

I particularly dig the last one: it reminds me of a realization I made in the cadaver lab over the last two years. It's in the third quarter that we take the skin off the face and examine the facial muscles and nerves. And it was during these times, both as a student and as a teaching assistant, I traversed the lab and pondered the skinned faces of the bodies with a profound sense of awe and wonder.

Every body looks the same underneath the skin. Once the skin is off, you can no longer tell what the person's gender or ethnicity or race might have been. They become elegantly and satisfying human, linked to all humans, alive and deceased. We are all following the exact same developmental plan of life creation and death manifestation; we have the same blueprints and body layouts. We are one, and indeed, in the end, we are all the same.

Contemporary Violence

"There is a pervasive form of contemporary violence to which we most easily succumb:

Activism and Overwork.

The rush and pressure of modern life are a form, perhaps the most common form, of its innate violence. To allow oneself to be carried away by a multitude of conflicting concerns, to surrender to too many demands, to commit oneself to too many projects, to want to help everyone in everything is to succumb to violence.

More than that, it is cooperation in violence.

Our frenzy neutralizes our work for peace.

It destroys our own inner capacity for peace. It destroys the fruitfulness of our own work, because it kills the root of inner wisdom, which makes work fruitful."

~ Thomas Merton ~