live my one wild and precious life

I am not living small and safe ever again.

on Saturday, my husband walked in and told me he had just lost his job. Since we live ON his job, this was devastating. I didn’t show up here on 43T because we were in a state of turmoil and shock. After 17 years of working ranch jobs, I think we are finished and ready for something new. Because of some synchronicity and some brainstorming and thinking outside the box, it looks like I am going to get to accomplish several of my goals, much faster than I thought. We are probably headed to the Sierra Nevadas to a seasonal job with a packing outfit. So… this morning… I am going to write about those goals I will probably get to accomplish this summer… while feeding our family and letting my husband finally have some fun… after 17 years of non-stop work.

to teaching the poetry workshops. It would have compromised my ability to do my art, compromised my job at Cecil’s, and compromised my opportunity to take the trip to Crazy Woman Creek. Compromise without reward… because I am not passionate about teaching poetry.

sitting on the porch in the warm sunshine (absent today), listening to the frog song, with my books and journals, drinking water, and hoping for a hummingbird.

The storms swept over the panhandled last night. Dark, angry, full-of energy, painted red on the radar screen, electric, electrifying. And I am full of their energy this morning. I drove home from work, the wheels of the car sweeping through banks of hailstones on the farm-to-market road, throwing up sheets of water in the low-water crossings. I woke at 3am to let the dogs out and stood in awe at the open screen door. A sound like wind in the tops of pines filled the air on the open pine-free prairie. What was it? It was frog song. The toads washed up out of the dirt, called forth from a long winter of silence, serenaded the night sky. This morning the dam in front of the house is full and the wind carries more frog song to my ears. And I wrote in bed, wrote for two hours in the trailer. And I have two new Julia Cameron books. And my pencil flew. And I cracked open my new books. And I played the piano when I couldn’t keep the joyous tears from breaking over their own dams.

...is where the wild and the precious comes in.

Staying connected to the land is both wild and precious for me.

Knowing the phases of the moon keeps me centered in the heavens and on the dirt.

Listening to the tides swish in my bloodstream even though I am far removed from the sea keeps my heartbeat from being over domesticated.

The precious things in my life are not things… they are clay and greengrowing and audible clucks and howls. They are cold and hot and hard and soft and inner and outer.

I like how on 43T we all get wrapped up in each other, reading through the threads and finding new and unexpected people and eventually finding our way back to someone we know and can smile at in glee before following yet another thread to a new picture, a new entry, a new goal.

Dreamed last night of forbidden lovers or the archetype of the Secret Love (strong male with whom I am thwarted from making love). The disapproval came from the family/society around me. Always being careful not to get caught by those that would judge me. Thwarted even by The Lover himself as he cares about the boundaries and disapproval, sometimes out of protectiveness for me, sometimes because he has his own image to uphold.

Thwarted from falling into the center of my longing by public opinion. Always sneaking around for delicious contact. Would it be just as delicious if it weren’t forbidden? What within me is thwarting my true longings and dreams?

Ok… if I were to take my dream trip, I would drive off with a tent, a box of books, a sleeping bag, camp stove, cooler, and a duffle bag of clothes. Oh, and a camp chair. And I would be gone for 12 weeks.
Week 1: Big Bend National Park
Week 2: Guadalupe NP
Week 3: Gila Wilderness
Week 4: Southern AZ
Week 5: Northern AZ, including the Grand Canyon
Week 6: Zion NP
Week 7: camping along the way up through eastern UT
Week 8: Grand Tetons NP
Week 9: Glacier NP
Week 10: Bighorn Mts, Sheridan, and Buffalo, WY
Week 11: camping along the way down through western CO
Week 12: Weminuche Wilderness and Taos/Santa Fe area

This trip would include LOTS of hiking, one train ride, one whitewater rafting trip, and one mule trip up into the mountains. It would include sleeping beside running water, reading books, writing in my journal, and eating very little meat but lots of fruits and vegetables.

Would I want a companion? I am not sure…

Last night we went to Bennigan’s for beer and crab cakes. Then we went to Scott’s Oyster Bar where I had my first raw oysters on the half-shell. LOVELY! I could have eaten a dozen! Then we went to Burberry’s for their Cajun BBQ shrimp and beer. Then we went into Zen 721 (not my type of place unless I am going there specifically to eat sushi). We just drank a beer. Then we went to Acapulco for quesadillas and beer. Then we wound up at Cecil’s for awhile.

I needed a night out. The highlight, for me, was Scott’s and the oysters. Next time I want to go with a whole group.