feed the beast in me and give her room to roam

I and the beast are very glad that Mr. Yes lets his beast roam and howl and that our beasts have such complementary tastes in pleasure and pain.

As part of the mentorship I’m doing, a bunch of us and my teacher went to her mentor’s house in the hills of Anderson Valley on Saturday. It was an amazing day. We walked along the hills and then sketched with charcoal. When Sue Sellars was giving us a demonstration of finding patterns in nature and then ‘writing’ them onto the page, it was clear how much she loves the land and everything on it. She spoke about the clump of sedges as if they were a beloved sibling. It meant so much to me. I may not have the technical elements down and still need to work on drawing what I see, not what I think I see, but I have what I need to start: the ability to fall in love. My sketch was not great, but it was me and the affection was there. For just a moment, as I was listening and watching Sue, I saw how everything that is alive is signing its name constantly on the earth. I saw that the sedges are signatures. Sue is a trip. At one point she went and got a chainsaw and took down a big branch that was bothering her, as casually as I might brush a stray hair off my face. She’s 75 and could kick all of our asses, I’m sure.

At the end of the day, one of the women who is a pipe holder in a Native American tradition did a pipe ceremony with us. At the end, we were in a circle facing in and I felt my grandmothers behind me, arching over my head like a constellation: Ethel Minnie Mary Adah Mary Ruth. It was amazing.

The beast likes being part of a matriarchal tribe.

I just wrote this while prepping for a conference call tomorrow in which I’ll be the featured artist/cowgirl

“The Legendary Living mentorship has changed me. I’m not trying to become the person I always wanted to be. I’m spending time with the person I actually am right now and finding out that she’s more than I ever hoped to be. I’m already an artist, poet, writer. I had caught glimpses of all those parts of me, but having two paintings in my bedroom and one in the studio, having a set of poems and writing a Chronicle of Legendary Tiisi makes it real and tangible. But the best part, for me, is seeing that what I took for granted – my natural affection for people, the way I approach people and see their beauty so clearly that they can’t help but see it themselves – is a huge and needed gift to the world. I’ve also learned how being in community is a big part of creating transformations that endure, that last beyond the workshop or the weekend. These women I’m with in the mentorship – I’m in love with each and every one of them. I feel fierce about their self-care and self-talk. I feel protective and protected.

I can see how being an active Cosmic Cowgirl will ripple into my interactions with every person I encounter and how it will keep me on track and moving forward, using my gifts. I’m serious about an adoration revolution. I want every woman I know to adore herself. ADORE. And it’s rooted in adoring that which we are born with, freely given by Divinity (however you define that). I can see how my gift of finding and creating the ridiculous is needed, the same way we need serious, thoughtful dialogue and quiet contemplation. We need a sense of whiskey wolf wildness! By being who I am, I can be a gift of bright thread in our quilt. Someone else may be the strong stitching around the edge that keeps us together. Who we are right now is exactly who we are needed to be and we are all legends.

The beast likes living among compassionate mirrors that show me that all I have to do is be me and that’s extraordinary.

I’ve been keeping a one sentence journal on facebook. Yesterday, I considered writing about wanting or being destined to have a life that is legendary. Yesterday morning, tromping through the mud to get the car and rescue my laptop, I had a sense that it was time for my next transformation.

This morning, I got an email from a wonderful artist named Shiloh Sophia McCloud, inviting me to a six month mentoring with her in Healdsburg, which is in the wine country, about 90 miles from where I live. It would be six 10-hour Saturdays and would feature painting, writing, intentional creativity and sacred innovation, community and art. I bought some prints of hers last weekend. The cost of the program is exactly the amount that I had saved for another workshop in which I lost interest. I had forgotten about that money. The name of the program? Leading a Legendary Life Mentoring.

The course practices and principles are:
Vision: Activate and strengthen the gifts of right and left brain imagination
Gather: Create a culture of transformation in community with other women.
Create: Develop the Practice of Creativity. Paint a big beautiful painting.
Innovate: Learn to apply visionary principles to meaningful LifeWork
Think: Design and write the chronicles of your own legendary journey.
Work: Experience the Art and Wellness Weekly Disciplines
Love: Awaken your heart and work together to create a project of giving.

As if that wasn’t enough to convince me, the company that this artist created is called Cosmic Cowgirl Ink. The artist friend who recently died was part of a guerilla love/art duo called the Renegade Cowgirls. Not only that, but when I put up a very vague facebook status asking if I was going to do this, my friends jumped into the fray before I could even say what it was, telling me to go for it. Mr. Yes, with no idea what I was talking about, said he had my back.

The beast likes synchronicities, support and new adventures.

The beast was wrapped in the arms and legs of a beautiful woman who sung to and howled with me as we watched the lights on the water, whispering secrets and loving confessions. Then we travelled on to a house party, where I had to cuddle against a fuzzy-sweatered man for warmth until Mr. Yes and the owner got home. Then I danced with a crazy animal of a man, the beautiful woman and Mr. Yes. A few hours of Mr. Yes and I breaking taboos and a few hours sleep and we were ready for a good breakfast, a shower and a long nap so we could begin all over again Saturday night, when I had some sort of fever and ended up dancing outside in the chilly air wearing just jeans and bra, singing to the fish and the stars. Good deep sleep, sweetness, coffee, a trip to a nearby park to walk a stone labyrinth and walk the ridgeline trail with Mr. Yes, then curl up on a bench in the sun like satisfied cats, too lazy to chase the fat ground squirrels.

The beast likes formless spiraling weekends and starlit dancing.

The moon was at its perigee (was perigee?) on Saturday and it was gorgeous, huge and bright at the horizon. This month’s moon has been called Cold Moon and Wolf Moon. Wolves have been showing up in my life lately, so clearly I had to howl at it. I had forgotten how invigorating it is to howl at the moon. Then, at Mr. Yes’s house, he and I watched bats fly from the eaves as Little Yes ran around screaming his happy little head off. Even the dogs got into the act, with the wolf mix creating some amazing vocalizations.

The beast likes howling at the moon with her tribe.

Some sort of energy has unlocked itself and is curling through my body. Ecstatic energy that finds its release in sex and wordless grinning appreciation of beauty. It’s as if a new pulse has joined my heartbeat and breathing. Pure energy pulse.

The beast loves erased edges and whole soul shudders.

The beast devised a menu for Mr. Yes, one designed to delight both of us. He’s placed his order.

The beast likes playful, trustworthy partners.

I rearranged my room, cleaned out some clutter and brought in my full-length mirror. It’s a beautiful piece, freestanding, with a curved top and frame of reddish wood.

Since it’s in front of my closets, I see my naked body more now. I like that. The beast likes that. It’s a lovely body and I’d forgotten how much joy I get in seeing it without clothing. I enjoy flirting with the hot woman in the mirror.

The beast likes flesh and flirting.

Last night two yearlings walked by us in the yard. The baby skunks are still rambling at night. The bird feeders are loaded up with finches, wrens, junkos, and the doves clean up what they drop. Squirrels jump and fly across the patio. We see evidence of coyotes, though I haven’t spotted one yet. Two nights ago an owl ruffled my ear with its hooting. Hawks know this is a good feeding ground and wait patiently in the trees.

The trees. So many, so healthy, green in a million shades. Oak, maple, apricot, conifer, and a dozen others I can’t identify. Flowers all over, including three prolific orchids and bright yellow lilies. All of this feeds me.

The beast likes beasts and birds and buds and branched beings.