Delicious Distraction

Let me assure you, my absence here is all good.  My time is consumed with spaceman.  The more I seek him, the more he offers.  This is a bottomless pit of exploration... a bit of inner earth of our own.  

How can I possibly catch you up now?  Yes, still coming to live with us.  Yes, still showering me with love and sweet vigilant attention.  I'm blessed as I see no other.  I'm enthralled as I cannot begin to convey properly.  How can one simply slap some words together and recreate the magic, second-hand?  Maybe a movie can do that, maybe a book can come close, but really... the reality is that most people don't want to hear the gooshy entrails of love.  At least not in a public setting, online, it's too deep.  People don't have the tolerance for deep, because their attention has been trained to the surface.  At least on my blog, I can gush if I wanna. :]

It's sweet sticky hot cinnamon roll yummy, when I can't really eat such things (grain intolerance).  Many subjects have been touched upon, some deeper than others yet, but the big ones are broaching.  How can they not?  Soon, he will show up on my doorstep as a guest for the very last time.  The next time will be as family.  We, he and I, will be together-together.  That's what I call it.  No longer together-apart, but together-together.  There is much excitement in the air.  And, I love that everyone is taking this seriously.  They know.

In a week and a half, I will be arriving at his childhood home, meeting his parents, exploring his world, his roots.  I cannot wait.  We are building a future together and it's sweet.  We connect on so, so many fronts.  I feel incredibly blessed by something somewhere, as if the universe conspired for us to connect like this.  And, I believe that it somehow did.  How lucky can a girl be?  I can't seem to find the end of that.  Such delights in his words, such utter love purposefully and spontaneously directed at me.  He describes these things in great detail, until he's sure that I am sure of his love.  It leaves me a puddle on the ground and I rise again, reformed.  Gentle hammers like mallets banging out my imperfections, my setbacks, my ill-conceived notions.  Who could be luckier? <3

The Plan Moving Forward

When writing (typing it anyway), I just let the words come through... the sentences form from thoughts that mix with feelings.  There's a certain "floatiness" of state that, when it happens, I want to run to the keyboard and type.  It's not something I practice to improve so much as just endeavor to honor, recording to keepsake my thoughts and to share and have as further material for future writing.  Sometimes I like to talk about things from the past, and having written so much down, I have the ability to search through my computer for when I first wrote about it.  I must be weird, I know.  But this is the person spaceman is getting to know.  And honestly, I'm getting to know me even better because I seem to be going through some kind of flowering.  

This flowering feels like just the beginning... so early on that too many variables are yet to happen and so the future is not settled in any one direction just yet.  That future feels ever-increasingly intertwined with spaceman's.  The possibilities that are in our escrows (Abraham-Hicks reference)... well, I'm not just wowed by the future, but enthralled with the present.  Every time spaceman and I peel off a layer of ourselves and expose more to one another, he throws me for a loop with his perspectives on how best to nurture relationships... and... how much he cares to honor ours.  Sometimes that is taking leaps at just the right moment, sometimes it's enduring a freak out, sometimes it's adjusting a schedule to help another's day go more smoothly, sometimes...  sometimes it's being willing to postpone your own dreams to join up with someone you would like to have along for it all...

This is what spaceman is doing for me, for the third time in his life, he is doing something he did not see himself ever doing again, picking up his life and moving to live with a girlfriend in a state other than home.  I'm very keenly aware of the dream he had, instead of that.  He told it to me 6 months to a year ago.  That was before he and I became a we.  At the time, we both imagined that playing out as he described.  I hold that dream for him, as long as he does and beyond if need be.  Right now though, I can't be anywhere but here... for 2 or more years probably.  And that is the rub.  The rub that when I want to say goodnight, I want to close my eyes and be held by him.  When I want to watch cosmic disclosure, I want to watch it with him, pausing to discuss as we devour it.  There are other things I would like to explore with him, soooo much more than we have been able.  

This week I have been really feeling the frustration.  I've felt it all along, mind you, but it's been especially hard to keep my frustrations tempered.  So when spaceman told me, yet again, the same things we have been saying to ourselves and one another for so long now... "we will work it out.  when the time is right, we'll know."  ~that kind of thing.  Well, that just wasn't cutting it for me in that instant.  So I bounced back that don't want us to fall in the trap of always assuming it will work out but then nothing changes.  To that he responded saying he knows things don't just happen without a little planning and he would like to talk about it some more, soon, and over the phone (we were chatting).  When a cancer is ready, they will move mountains for you.

I'm blown away with having someone who senses my frustrations, recognizes them for what they are, takes them seriously, and responds compassionately and timely.  Having two very similarly-matched individuals opens up a vast array of possibilities... possibilities not even imagined yet.  

I believe we have a choice.  We can choose to go all in and see where this magical intimacy takes us.  And I believe spaceman and I have both decided, we are each all in with one another.  What remains is making it happen, for real, by living together and starting our life together-together... no more of this long-distance stuff.  And now, that plan is filling out.  And it's scary and exciting all at once.  

Yesterday, the morning after we made these big plans, I was relieved to wake up with such a joy in my heart.  No matter the possible worries, my heart just could not be bothered by it. That's a really good sign.  And... it happened again this morning!  How many days of joy will I wake up to, feeling like this???  

You know that state when your dreams for something come true and then you have to think up more new dreams???   Yeah, that's me.  Pretty amazing, isn't it? <3  But I'm not just talking about "moving in plans" now.  I'm talking about being loved and cared for so attentively.  I'm talking about the things I LOVE to talk about are the SAME things he loves to talk about.  I'm talking about sublime, soul-melding sexual connections.  I'm talking about the similar ways in which we each study the world and people around us, draw & employ life lessons to grow as spiritual beings.  I'm talking about a reverence for the Earth, an insatiable curiosity about the real nature of things and events, and a level of understanding of others' motivations and emotional needs that transcends the ordinary.  

But most of all, and it's the biggest, because I didn't even know I needed it... a meeting up of who I am and who he is that ebs and flows and still somehow magnetizes and dances through our boundaries.  Opposites that compliment... all that, too.  

Let me just say this!  He knows astrology and I don't have to explain it... I can just rattle on and he gets it and comes back at me with his own interpretations!  And because we have been cherishing one another for 11+ years, through emails and chats, we really do know one another on a level that has probably been the REAL reason why we "didn't work out" the first time... a serendipitous supposed ending that was really just part of our beginning.  How else does one develop so much intimacy of this kind?  It's a beautiful love story, this story that is ours, one we both agree, could make a great book.  If only I knew how to craft the telling of it into that form!  I would love to tell the world, I would.  But... that story is still unfolding.  I'm sure there are junctions in our futures, for no matter how close you feel with another, you are still yourself and you still have choice.  I am committed to spaceman.  When I think about him moving in with us (timeline is approx. 6 mos, but flexible), I see him joining my family of three, not just co-habitating. Our life together will become the new normal.  And then when the nest is empty and our finances sorted, we will fly the coup! :D

And that's where I stand... knowing clearly that a conversation needs to happen with my kids, and soon.  This post will be out there in cyberspace, free and open to be stumbled upon, and that's not how I want that to go down.  Most likely I will approach them separately, because in practical terms, it's hard to get us all together at once these days.  It will work out better that way, anyway.  My kids seem to love coming into my room to chat, frequently.  

And then there is my brother... I will be handing down his marching orders, asap.  It won't be a surprise, because I have already started that conversation topic - whether he responds or not, I know he is listening, because I know him. 

And since it's still a warm day, I'm going to get off this computer and go take a walk around my gardens.  There is much to plan.

He's Both of That

On the way home from my older sister house this evening, I was really appreciating the music from Xavier Rudd.  Low tech digeridoo music first got my attention when I was big time into the band Gaelic Storm.  I had a little crush on the guy who played it, too.  Somewhere there's of picture of him posing for the camera while offering a kiss on my cheek.  Later I heard he had quit the band.  I think he was really missing his family life back home.  But I digress.  I also have the cutest picture of the lead singer and I.  He's got such puppy dog eyes. (double digress?  let's triple it...) It's funny to think of people touring like that, becoming a surrogate family.  I bet that could be really difficult to get used to, to constantly wander even when you eventually feel like putting down roots.  Roots can be so good.  They can also suck ass like my [family member] does right now.  (No, not my brother.)  But that may be a blog for another day.

This digeridoo music, you have to hear it...  Seriously, give it a minute or two, put headphones on if you can.  Go for it. I'll wait:




Like it?  I have many such non-lyrical songs I used to buy in my CD-buying years.  I still use CDs in my 2001 car, but those I burn myself.  It used to be every few months I go through the top 200 songs of the day and create a CD to listen to during my long drives to and from work each workday.   Music is one of my great joys, just to listen and let the music play me.  Low tech, kind of techno, add some spiritual elements and lyrics... I love that.
And so it was, I was enjoying my tunes and yet thinking back across my day, a stressful day... one I will remember for the rest of my life... but also one in which spaceman was there to hear me fumble while dealing with a super strong physical-emotional gut-instinct kind of 180-degree decison-rendering day.  Yeah, I didn't really know how else to write that sentence and still get close to describing how I felt.  You have to say it with stress and with a cadence.  
Do you ever get an instinctual feeling that overtakes you physically?  I've had plenty of instinctual feelings that have affected me to varying degrees emotionally (empathetic), but it's been rare when I have been over-taken in a physical response that elicits the emotion like an electromagnetical current seeking it's matching end... pulling from the inside out.  Those happen out of sheer force of emotion.  And today, for the first time, I woke up like that... and even though I had been fighting the flu the day before, I instantly knew this did not stem from any flu.  
I was not happy with my decision on how to handle a certain family situation.  I felt like I had made the wrong decision, but the other stance was also not a viable option and I just couldn't remain as status quo.  I could not find the wise answer; the wisdom in me kept finding giant gaping worries in my decisions.  And since I had woken up early after having slept so much the day before, I decided to do a tarot reading on it before work... the second one before work this week, on the same subject.  It's been a looong week, trying to figure this one out.  And today my gut told me I had better rethink it, only I couldn't figure out the message that was being conveyed to me.  As an empath, the messages come in the form of feelings.  Normally, they are more assurances than a blazing fire alarm.  Today was a 5-alarm fire.
The reading didn't tell me enough, not enough to know what my gut was trying to tell me.  Some clues, yes, but other cards just were far more positive than I could relate with...  so either I misinterpreted something vital in the reading, or there is some direct good that is going to come out of this.  I'm having a hard time believing the intended good will grow like a seed into a tree.  My decision was one of lifetime-long significance, no matter the outcome.  I was declaring my side, forced into making a decision by my own conscience.  And because my conscience was so severely bothering me, I did eventually understand the content of my emotion.  It had chimed up once before earlier in the week... in fact, that was why I was contemplating this all week.  But I had to make sure I wasn't being coerced, from any direction.  I needed to look within for my own answers.  
Tarot reading tossed aside, I made it off to work, in a gloomy mood.  About an hour after I arrived, spaceman chimed through messenger.  He is also an empath, and knowing he feels in a similiar kind of way at times, well... we have always told each other our feelings, always.  So, I let loose, trying to explain my morning.  We had talked about it at least once earlier in the week, I'm sure.  Only now I was in serious distress.  He listens to everything I say and digests it as food.  He tells me how much it means to him that I share with him so intimately.  It's the kind of connection he's craved.  And I have craved it, too.  I'm just being myself, and him his-self, and together we support one another, as we have each dreamed of having in a relationship.
He did not tell me what to do.  That would have been easy, I'm sure.  No.  He wants to support me in whatever I decide.  But boy did he listen!  Sometimes I worry if I should feel bad for him, dealing with me. lol  It was one such thought that came to me as I was driving home in the car tonight, mingling emotional rides on Xavier Rudd music with thoughts of today's craziness.
Do you really like listening to my crazy day or are you just being supportive?  You do both actually... you do both. So sweet <3
He was there for me...  again.   I love this man; I truly do.  

Spacman Visit (photo blog)

I've had to turn off the cellular device and get the kids settled for the evening, which entailed skipping the gym (again) to work late and go to the grocery with my 16 year old daughter... a Leo whose demands grow in intensity when stressed.  She's a good kid, don't get me wrong.  I'm just tired and frazzled, myself.  That's why I did what needed done tonight, cut what could be cut, and am doing what *I* need for myself right now... writing.

Last night had that goal, too.  And although I did write, it was not finished in that I have photos to add to it.  Those were on my cell phone, and transferring them to the PC and finishing off that blog was going to take more attention and energy than I had left for it.  But tonight, I have the time, if not the privacy ...as my daughter trudges through my bedroom to the back way of the house for the umpteenth time.  Writing is difficult when there isn't enough focus allowed to dig deep and listen to what wants to bubble up to the surface.  There's a story my daughter has just finished telling me, about her boyfriend's mother starting chemo today.  It kinda helps keep things in proper perspective, doesn't it? Anything could happen at any moment.  What you next hear may change your life forever.  It's that kind of thing that her boyfriend's mother is living right now.  Of course, I want to hear how she's doing, what's going on with her treatment, how she's faring, how her kids (she's a single mom) are faring.  So many aspects to being mother, a single mother.  You're everything to them, and therefore you have less to give to yourself.  I'm feeling that burn a lot lately.  But... that's mostly because I am also feeling the urge to build into the next phase of my life... a life where I choose for me.  One of those choices... is spaceman.  And that brings me to his visit this weekend... a much cheerier subject, I promise. :)

I bring you... *drum roll*
last night's Spaceman Visit blog!!! :P

I have been awaiting my chance to do so... but also giving it time to percolate a bit, to come into a post-merridian-and-spaceman-weekend perspective.  It's gelled enough to finally write.

But where to start???

Spending time with spaceman this weekend was like flowering trees having sensed spring and begun to bud.  A fuller picture of a man's life and personality (at least as equally nervous as your own soul) is standing before you, looking in  your eyes, noticing everything.... as I return the same gaze.  

This trip was "the next step" for us.  And please don't ask us yet what the next, next-step is... we are still feeling our way around to that... while comfortable with not knowing, and watching for synchronicities.  So, his visiting me was our most recent next step.  And what a freaking awesome weekend, too!

The "shed garden".  It was fallow and full of dead plants. But now it's full of seeds.

Did you feel the weather this past weekend???  We were BAREFOOT in my backyard, for a couple hours. We cleared out a fallow garden and planted the first seeds of the spring pre-season (planted cold-hardy varieties).  This guy gardens like a pro and, like me, enjoys it.  

I had on a tank top and shorts at other times while standing out on the back deck.  I wore my flip flops out gallivanting around the area for the day.  It was beautiful weather.  And to think, a month out the forecast already predicted to be warm, but super rainy.  But somehow by the actual weekend, it turned out to be the most decidedly mid-spring feeling day, incredible.

And no clouds, no clouds for two days... and when I remembered that I'd put on my "Things to Do with Bob" list: Look at stars with telescope...  well, I snagged it from the garage and pulled spaceman out back... O.M.G. 

spaceman sighting up.. was it the gas giant or Orion's belt?  No. Sirius.  We also looked at the Seven Sisters, with the Pleiades.  Oh! and Jupiter and it's moons! I'm sure I'm forgetting more.

 Immediately he went into "work the telescope" mode, all the while telling me stories of what's where in the sky and tying planets and stars to alien races... he became this little kid in a grown man's body, totally comfortable and enthralled.  Spaceman really is spaceman, still.  I fell in love with him back then and I am in love with him now.  So, so many years between... never lost, just percolating.  

Headed home again, westward

    I took him around town, way around, hours at a time... pulling over, taking pictures, showing him many of the places I have been out taking photos for months and months now. 

"The Dam Parking Lot" ~Taylorsville Dam

Thinking we missed the grand sunset at the dam, stopping by anyway, getting lost in discussion, and then finding rays striving to shine at the last possible stretch in the dregs of the sunset.  

Along the Great Miami River in Downtown Dayton

One rendezvous took us through a few historical home sections of the greater city, parts I had never seen (and didn't get any pictures of).  The next day we found ourselves in a nearly celebratory town with street musicians and impromptu drummers... every store bustling.  He bought me the deepest blue lapis lazuli to add to my larger stone collection.  (I want a large stone for each chakra.) 

Clifton Mill

Impromptu ideas found us near river rapids beneath a large historical mill house... a covered bridge over a bike path... tiny mailboxes all in a row... the sun streaking across the the grass in giant ever-widening stripes.  

a fence at Clifton Mill

We watched the latest episode of Cosmic Disclosure together, a show we both follow closely.  On our long escapades around town, I sang (Nahko of course).  I sang because I wanted him to remember me like this when he goes back home.... because it's me, and because of all the times I had imagined doing just that, wishing he was there with me in all those leading-up moments.  

He brought along his fishing lures in their see-through tacklebox, each hand-tied, tiny rows of various colored, progressively larger flies.  He ties them himself and knows exactly when it's best to use each one.  One day, he's going to teach me to fly fish in the streams of Virginia.

A little park near Clifton

He met my kids.
They got along.

Very cool.

And... spaceman and I understand and know much more about each other than we ever have before.  We are watching how our growing relationship affects one another's growth-seeking-being, and are in awe of it.

It's good.  It's not perfect, nothing ever is.  Accepting someone thoroughly means you will find bits of one another that trigger.  But allowing the other to be as they are... and working through the ones that trigger... that is real caring.  It's a real relationship built on respect and that sweet summer-feeling love.

at Clifton Mill

And yowzers, boy did I ever prepare for this visit!  And then... I got sick 2 days before he was due to arrive.  But I did all the things I know can kick a cold's butt to the curb, and did.  It was mostly gone by the time he got here and finished healing up after the next day.  

My cold, the weather, it all just cleared up in time, like the universe was conspiring just for us.

Almost Time!

It’s almost time.  In four days’ time, spaceman will be knocking on my front door.  We have been conversing over the phone quite a bit lately.  Every time we talk I’m initially nervous, but it just takes off.  Last night we spoke for 3 hours.  That’s how it is with us.  We talk and talk and talk, and, well you know… we talk a LOT. 

It’s got to be incredibly sappy for me to say this, but I love this man with all my heart and soul.  He’s incredibly dreamy to me, and I cannot wait to have him on my doorstep Friday. 

A friend tagged me on an article on Facebook, and I just have to share here, because sharing on FB… well, people don’t care to hear how incredibly in love you are.  Why are people uncomfortable with declarations of affection???  (a topic for a different day)

The Goddess Spoke of Love
by Ara

“My daughter, love someone that longs to be open with you to you in all the ways you deserve to be opened wide, not just purely physically.” The Goddess said. “Someone who opens your mind, body, soul and heart right into the depths of your being and opens theirs to flow right back with yours.

http://thegoddesscircle.net/the-goddess-spoke-of-love/

That’s exactly what we have and so much more.  The words that flow out of his mouth and into my ears delight me.  How can this be, this man who reflects so much of me?  How did we get so lucky to have met and met again?  Just look at all the potential we had in the beginning, which was somehow untimely and yet, looking back, planted the most wonderful seed in both our lives. 

Growing up, my parents had a tulip tree in our back yard.  It was just another tree, one that leaned dangerously in towards the house.  When I looked at it, I wondered when a storm might blow it down and crash through the roof.  But it never did.  Year after year that tree just existed there in its everyday lush green show.  Years went by and my siblings and I grew older.  Then one spring, tulip flowers began to appear in the canopy, just a few the first year, then ever more each season.  When they first came, my mom was elated!  She pointed them out and told us how long she had been waiting for those flowers.  It turns out it takes 10 years for a tulip tree to bloom, 10 whole years from seed to maturity.  That’s how spaceman and I have been. 

In December of 2004, we met on an online dating site.  Like it is now, it was in the beginning… we could not get enough of one another.  We connected on so many levels and both slipped into that precious state we call love.  It was long distance then, as it is now.  Our first visit in person was just incredible, a melding I cannot describe with words.  The whole weekend was like that.  And home again he went, back to Virginia to his Appalachian home.  And although the next visit we had with one another saw our demise as a couple, it was never due to lack of love, never.  I still have the charcoal drawing he made me that day, such love in that parting gift, such tenderness, acceptance and vision.  We parted then, but we never lost touch.  In many ways, we continued cherishing one another through the years, through emails filled with the most loving of friendships. We held each other in the highest esteem, allowing whoever and whatever came into and out of each of our lives to be without need to shape it.  Neither one of us had any idea that there was yet a future for us in exactly the way we had once dreamed.  We thought that particular ship had sailed.  Our love caramelized into the sweetest of friendships, held dear year after year, and that was enough.

And yet here we are again!  In four days he will be on my doorstep for the second time, and I cannot wait to feel his embrace.  I cannot wait to look him in the eyes and tell him all over again, I love you, I love you, I love you. 

I joked with him once, I said, “I don’t know how we are ever going to pick an anniversary date.  We’ve never had any particular day that was ‘the’ day ‘we’ started.”  But if I had to pick one, this go-round, I would say Halloween.  Halloween weekend was when things turned definitively into a chosen choice, for the both of us, each our own way.  So, if I use that date, we are 3 ½ months into the mush, the gush, the love goo.  Which means… we are still in the “honeymoon period”… good timing, very good timing. :D  Friday is only 4 days away!

Sweetness all over

I have come to the conclusion that my kids really do love me.  Seriously, I just had to shoo one away just so I could write this blog.  And...... she's back, telling me about how she "accidentally started bawling" during this one Parenthood episode.  Yes, we talk about it all.  My kids even ask for life advice from time to time.  But mostly, and I mean RELENTLESSLY (no exaggeration) they annoy me to tears of laughter.  And they enjoy it, gang up on me, gang up on one another... sometimes I gang up on them in an epic out-smart.  Yes, I love those. :D  

Anyway, I think they love me.  At a time in a teenager's life when they are most likely to rebel and certainly not seek out a parents advice and confidance.... yes, I am very lucky.  I don't know how I did it, but these two are funny, annoying, honest, and increasingly self-aware.  I love them with every piece of me.  But yes... yes I look forward to exploring a life of my own in my empty nest years.  

But that's not here nor there at the moment.  I will take life as it comes and live it to the best of my ability until the universe orchestrates the most succinct syncronicities so that I know with my heart where to place my next step.  

Of course I do have some preferences... I'll call them "preferences" but in all reality they are choices.  Through trial and error I have come to know myself.  While that is not always easy to convey (it's super hard and super easy at the same time), I do know in my own heart the kind of person I really am and aim to be.  Only I know myself best.  Only you know yourself best.  And recently I made a decision and I chose spaceman.  I said, no matter what the universe can throw at us, we still have the option of decidedly deciding something and manifesting it.  And I chose spaceman.  Granted, we were already in frequent contact by then, but he wasn't exactly in the best place to receive that kind of attention.  We all go through some serious shit when we experience true loss.  He lost his brother, suddenly and intensely.  I came on the scene again while he was admid that loss.  I can't imagine that kind of loss and it scares the begeebees out of me thinking of my own siblings.  It's one of those emotions that can overwhelm me almost every time if I think of it.  I can't imagine his suffering.  But we reconnected in a much stronger way anyway.  Sometimes timing can be a god-send.  Sometimes it can feel, an antagonist.  

Right now things feel worrisomeless (a new word, just for you).  I feel calm and connected and peaceful and desiring and optimistic.  This is so unlike me when I'm in a relationship.  And yet, it's not.  It's me and how I relate to myself.  It might not be me and how I relate with other as much, but it's still me.  And has certainly been more and more my modus operande for a few years now.  Lately, it's all of it.  I feel all kinds of soul growth and spaceman is a big part of that.  That's the kind of relationship we want.  We are both capable otf going with the flow, and yet we are both strong enough to say what we really want or need... honesty.  Plus we have a bunch of other stuff in common...... 

Anyway, life feels in a certain range of flux lately.  I have kids with increasingly adult problems to discuss and learn to manage, a brother who I need to deal with to get him off and back out on his own again, and a relationship founded in long-term cherishing and admiration.  And yet, he's there and I'm here... and so there is a state of flux that has settled in, into comfort.  It wasn't what I would have preferred, but it is what it needs to be for now.  I had been worried about these things in the beginning.  I worried how I would handle a long-term long-distance relationship.... anything over a year feels like long-term to me.  And I don't even know if that is short-sighted as well.  I really do not know anything for sure except that I want to be with him.  And I have no problem saying that here, publicly, where anyone, including him, can read it.  He knows all this already.  I have made my decision clear at every stage since.  At one point, that even meant accepting defeat and a sub-par dream.  But I couldn't stay away and when I sought him out again, he had had a change of heart.  It's been falling up all over again.  

An Almost-Empty Nest

Yes, I'm the completely Caucasian chick that prefers to eat with chopsticks.  And I love that I'm getting so much better at it.  Tonight's dinner is the same as the past 2 nights, a Greek salad: 50/50 spring mix lettuces, an intense balsamic vinaigrette, feta cheese, and Kalamata olives (the saltiest and tenderest black olives).... with chopsticks.  *shrugs*  Dare I mention... in the candlelit dark in my jammies, in bed already.  

...I shouldn't be eating the feta, but every once in a while... mmmmmhmm.

Today was my physical.  I would say "annual physical" but I haven't had one in... well I can only recall one other in my adult life (outside of my army days).  In fact, before I had my leg pain in early December, I hadn't been to the doctor for even a sick visit in at least two years.  But I decided to make one after my leg pain issue.  A vessel in my right thigh, the main one, swelled up near bedtime and became really painful.  Not even moving around it was still painful.  I had an ultrasound, which found absolutely nothing (of course).  Doctors never find anything wrong with me when I complain of anything.  I guess I'm too sensitive to the slightest of changes.  I don't know.  How can a person have that much pain and it just go away and can no longer be detected like that?  That can't bode well.  

I had already decided to start working out and eating better before that happened.  For all I know, that's what brought it on.  In late November I had edema of the lower calves.  That's when I started working out, eating more cleanly, and quit the mtn dew again.  I've only lost a measley 6 lbs.  But hey, it was over the holidays and the numbers are going in the right direction, if ever so slowly.  I'm currently trying to break my second plateau.  Gawd, I can remember when I could lose 10 lbs in the first week. *smh*  The 40's suck in that regard.

In other ways, 41 (nearly 42) isn't so bad.  I was done having kids at 25.  That means my oldest is 19 and my youngest is 16.  She will be 17 when she graduates high school.  An empty nest is just around the corner.  And boy do I have plans for it! My poor kids, they won't be coddled.  They have been reminded from time to time, while growing up, that mom intends to pursue her own dreams once they're grown, which could including living anywhere, stateside or not.  Mom may not be one of those always-around grandmas for their kids.  

And it's really getting close.  I mean, I've already gone through the stage when, after wanting the years to speed up, I started wishing they would really slow down - it was going too fast, they were growing up too quickly, I wasn't sure I wanted to let go of this period of my life any time too soon.  Now... well now there are plans forming.... nebulous plans, but directions and desires swirling about in more and more specific ways.  

It's just that I need to polish off the edges where my multi-year depression had alchemically changed my spirit and body.  It's not just the coming empty nest.  No.  It's spaceman.  Of course, it's also spaceman.  This man is the love of my life.  I swear to it.  Every time I'm having a bad or not so great day and I think about our coming conversation and might not be as up for it as usual... just feeling blah, you know?  Once we are chatting or talking, a certain cadence kicks in and my heart lifts.  He brings life to my light.  And I'm sure that if you could see auras, ours would glow a little brighter while we are "together".  

Of course, we aren't really together-together in the sense that we live 6 hours apart.  In fact, I have not laid eyes on this man in over 10 years.  Scary, eh?  Kind of, but kind of not.  Like I told him last night, this sweet, sweet flavor of romantic love that we have going on in recent months is all wonderful, but it is not the basis of our love.  The basis of our love is the 10 years worth of cherishing one another through frequent letter exchanging.  Our romantic reconnection may bring us closer, but "we" have always been.  There's going to be a lot of dreams coming true.  I can just feel it.  And, so can he.

That brings me back to these nebulous plans that are developing.  Oh so many hopes and dreams, co-mingling, forming in thought first and later in actuality.  What exactly that will be, we do not know yet.  I like to watch things unfold in real time, and so does he.  It's a living in the moment balancing act that is far more difficult to achieve than conceive. Yet somehow, with him, I feel calm and patient.  I feel confident and truly loved.  I am liberated in a way I cannot describe.  

And so, I'm making progress towards what I want.  After all, just because you yearn for something doesn't mean it will come about.  You have to meet it in the middle.  You walk towards what you prefer and expect wonderful outcomes without being attached to any, but welcoming whatever the universe forms to deliver.  Positive intention is key here... an intention with open-endedness.  Don't focus on the hows.  Just focus on the feelings you want to have.

Right now, I'm having the feeling that I would like to eat something yummy!  It just needs to be healthy, too.  

hmmm... it cannot be that awesome cottage cheese and homemade strawberry jelly I have sitting in the fridge.  I've already had too much dairy (feta; lactose intolerant).  A fuji apple then... with peanut butter... better yet cashew or almond butter if I can find some.

Leaning In

Last night's story had an alternate ending that was, what feels like to me, thankfully and miraculously avoided.  There's no amount of writing it out here that could possibly convey how grateful I am to spaceman for what he did for me last night.  I'm in uncharted waters, this relationship navigation stuff, and he is beyond incredible with his support and understanding.  

Last night I was delivered some news that sent me into a panic... a familiar panic mode because it has happened twice before and I thought I was done with that period of my life.  I'm being purposefully cryptic here, but please suffice it to say that I knew I had to get a grip on my reaction before it ran away with itself... and I was losing the battle.  

I was at a friend's house when the news came and I told them what was going on, that I needed to leave, and added that I didn't know how I was going to keep my freak-out from spaceman because I didn't want him to see me this way.  Their advice?  Don't hide it.  If you want more intimacy with him, be completely open about it.  It was sage advice.  

As open as I can be with people, it isn't easy to be open when your worst fears are triggering.  It's definitely complete vulnerability to allow someone to see such things for the first time, live in action.  It was terrifying, the situation, more than spilling my beans to him, though.  So I went home and asked him to please call me.  Mind you, we have spoken on the phone all of 4 times in the past year, once over Christmas and once New Year's Eve and again yesterday earlier in the day.  We message one another, email, etc., usually... all hours of the night and wee hours of the morning, but not usually voice-to-voice.  It's something I have been wanting for a long time, and spaceman being the self-described hermit that he is, well let's just say he has been slow to warming up. :)  But it doesn't really matter to me over all.  We have such a great relationship already that I have nothing but patience for him.  Anyway, after I got home last night I messaged him and told him I got some really bad news and I really just needed to talk to him. I couldn't type it out this time.

And he did.  He actually said that when we said our good byes while voice chatting earlier in the day that when he said he would like to talk again later in the evening that he had been hoping to talk over the phone and not in chat anyway - which was a huge delight for me to hear that.  I've so wanted to move into this phase and it seems we may just be doing that. <3

So, I put my blue-tooth in and went for a drive around my neighborhood to warm the car up ("feels like" temp was 18F) while spilling my beans.  He listened and spoke and listen and spoke.  The whole experience was new territory for me... to be able to admit when I'm feeling at my worst is one major thing by itself, but to tie so many pieces of my life together in a more coherent narrative for him...  well, it took SO MUCH weight off my shoulders, AND shifted the outcome of my "freakout"... to the point of... well, although I still had this uneasy raging energy flowing inside me, it was subdued, wrangled if I may use that word... It's exactly like, by having shared all this with him, somehow all the additional anxiety I would have felt if I had kept it all in for an indefinite period of time... well not only was that mitigated, I felt lighter and closer to him, having him in such an intimate inner circle with me.  

I have never had this much love and support from any man.  

We made more specific plans for his trip out here in February, half the time in a hotel (for privacy) and half the time here in my home with my kids.  I've told my brother he needs to make himself scarce for the weekend.  We'll see how scarce he actually becomes.  I also told my brother recently that he needed to start thinking about moving out.  I need my home back, for my own sanity, for my own health, for my family.  We need to get the "home" back in this "house". 

The more immediate feeling I have this morning is one of relief.  I know just how badly my emotional state would have been had spaceman not been there to hear me out and be my support last night.  I'm sure it wasn't the conversation he had been anticipating, but he's quite flexible in nature and always wonderful to me.  He, being 11 years older than I am, was able to pull from his own past experiences to help me gain needed perspective.  And where my circumstances have never been his, he was the gentle voice of reason and love that brought me back towards my own center.  And... just being there, voice-to-voice, letting me ramble on in needed distraction, gawd, I just love this man so much.  He's a mirror into myself, and I into him.  Instead of laying awake in an insomniac-stress event last night... after a long very good and important talk with my 16 year old daughter about the fiasco (and about my relationship with spaceman), I, with relative ease, fell asleep.  It wasn't an entirely peaceful sleep, but there was much sleep, the most important feature of... sleep. ;)

This morning I don't feel panic.  I feel a little emptied out, which is good.  Actually, it's no longer "morning" lol - it's 1:45 pm already.  I would like to make it to the gym at some point.  I'll have to look up what time they close and try to make it.  I also want to borrow my son's truck and go to Sears and buy a new humidifier (ours broke).  We are all complaining of dry nasal passages - this being the season of nose-bleeds for my kids who are prone to those sorts of things.  Other than that, I have no plans other than the hope to choose a small project or two around the house and tackle them.  I think I'll marinade some salmon, too.  Yum.

Being Tested

"You're being tested," she said.  "What?" I thought maybe I didn't hear what she'd said over the hum of the brewery chatter.  

"It's a test.  These guys are tests for you."  Yeah, that's what I was thinking she'd said.  And she continued on in earnest curiosity, "Why do you even respond to them?"  

"Should I just ignore them?  That's rude.  There's no reason to be rude.  Besides, it just blows me away."  So I start to tell my sister the story of who this guy is who is messaging me tonight.  

I haven't heard from him literally since high school.  He's still good friends with another high school friend of ours whom I had been chatting with, more than I really wanted to, up until recently.  That guy (I'll call him HikerGuy) I had already set straight, a month or so ago.  I had told him, point blank, that "texting from sun up until late at night was something lovers do, which we are not."  He slowly but gradually cooled off after that.  But this guy who was messaging me tonight?  He was apparently a little miffed at spaceman and I having announced our relationship publicly on Facebook to all our friends and family.  I do not make this shit up, this is what he said to me:

"Weren't you just talking to HikerGuy? Damn...I missed the deadline again with you! Ugh!"

I am sure that HikerGuy left any assumptions his friends had about he and I very open ended and probably never used the word "platonic" in any of those conversations.  When the guy from last night asked me again about HikerGuy my reply was simply,

"Um we were talking about Hiking. And he's an awesome guy. But there was nothing you could consider not platonic. And I was not committed then.I told HikerGuy when I made [my own] decision. Only fair"

And yet you would not believe the detail in which he went into expressing his thoughts about me.  Basically, he reminisced in detail about how I looked in high school.  Having taken me to a dance, he had pictures he said he has kept and admired all this time.  Seriously, can a girl be flattered any more than that from a high school friend?  I am 41 years old now, fergodssakes.  I am just like any other 41 year old with sagging unmentionables and bulging curves.  How is it wrong, I think to myself, to allow myself to listen to a guy say such things to me?  That's not acting on it.  It's a one-time conversation.  In fact, I woke up this morning to another "hello" from him and that one DID get ignored.  He's also obviously way into looks and I'm not.  I was polite the other night, but that's enough warning.  In fact, that night he asked me for my phone number and I refused.  I am not playing the field anymore.  That's key.  

There is one person whom I was having a wonderful time hanging out with, also platonically... and he hasn't said so, but I know him... He's probably hurt, and that's partly my karma.  We had plans to hang out last night (which the universe was apparently conspiring to have cancelled because I came down sick yesterday afternoon), but he politely cancelled our plans (before I came down sick) and that actually brought me selfish relief.  Normally I would be more inquisitive of his feelings, try to foster understanding.  But this time, I let him go.  I simply asked him to please not be a stranger.  He didn't contest what that implied - that I knew he was hurting and why.  He just said, "Thanks".  His possible pain bothers me.  Steven has been in my life longer than spaceman has (just not with the same connection).  We have worked long and hard at being just friends.  I sincerely thought we had achieved it years ago.

It's not a one-way street, these admirers.  Spaceman has his own, and rightfully so.  He, too, has lost an ex-turned-friendship over our announcement.  We spoke about it at some length, if not what words transpired, but about his relationship with her.  He asked me, and I am paraphrasing here because it was days ago and if you only knew the needle in a haystack effort trying to dig up that one line would be... he asked, "this doesn't bother you... talking about her with you?"  Of course it doesn't... I want to know everything he's willing to share with me, at all times, with any subject.  He affords me so much more than that.  For instance, this writing here... he has granted me permission to write without asking further permission about anything we discuss or anything about him.  How trusting is that?  How open is that?  And after 10 years of conversing with him (he gave me permission back then as well as again recently when I re-asked him), I know he can handle anything I throw at him.  

Except infidelity.  I never assume anyone can handle that.  He never said he couldn't handle it; it's implied in our commitment with one another.  It's not even possible; it's not how I operate.  It's not who I am.  I have had a married man surprisingly kiss and seduce me while I was young and single (a fling I quickly ended), but that was a one time thing I swore I'd never do again and is the extent to which I have ever been a "cheater".  I am however, oftentimes a flirt.  This has gotten me into some sticky situations before, and I have many stories, too many stories... all of which I will, in time, spill to spaceman.  He knows I have a wild side.  He's seen it.  We laugh often over it, too. :)  

Every time a memory of some crazy thing I've done crosses my mind when we are chatting, my immediate reaction inside myself is to savor it but crush it into the secret corners of my past... and then I realize, like the million other little realizations that course through me when we are together, that he would want to know the whole me.  By not sharing, I am deceiving him into a false sense of who I really am.  So, I tell him.  I tell him the whole of it. The fun, the stupid, the dangerous, the insecure, the immature, the slutty even.  I am not afraid to be my whole self with him.  And the fact that he receives everything about me with such grace and hunger for more... well, I am on this fisherman's hook, blissfully caught up into his net.  I don't ever want to be with anyone else.  When I tell him who I really am by recounting who I have been, it shows him the range and capacity I have within me and that is yummy to him.  He tells me so in a million different ways and, in turn, demonstrates to me in unfathomable tenderness or shocking, sexual command, he loves me, he wants me, he will pour his everything out with me as well.

And so, these "tests"... *I roll my eyes*... they have NOTHING on spaceman.  It may have been that, around Halloween, we were not yet committed, but something changed that weekend... and although I was still chatting with others, I kept it platonic and was watching to see what spaceman would or would not do.  I wanted him more than I was saying at the time and he leapt, more than once to catch up, and now we are on fire.  

From spaceman to merridian:



There's a need for rain when the rivers dry When the earth's alone and the angels cry Like water I need you to fall on me I've run out of reasons to stay out at sea   I wanna get you to you In a serious way We got so much to do In a serious way I'll give you love so true Cause I wanna wake up with you everyday

The Future?

Synchronicities abound.

Spaceman accidentally added a link to our chat window last night, it was an article "Inside the Tiny Home Movement".  I didn't actually read it, because he immediately told me it was an accidental link. 

spaceman: oh DAMN...it is actually about the tiny home movement!...now that is freakin wierd

But I did click over and see the title, which reminded me... I started a list of "Things to Do with [spaceman] in February".  On the top of that list is, drum roll....

Watch "Life Off Grid" together https://vimeo.com/ondemand/lifeoffgrid/139603120

After watching the trailer, he said to me 

THIS gets my blood pumping....this is exactly what I have envisioned for some time now...exaactly

we NEED to watch that one together....I am just so blown away that my vision hasn't scared you off

I mean....to me...living simply...doesn't mean living in "poverty"...it means self-sustainability...and that can include a rich...ornate...lovely home....one that doesn't have to suck the life out of us by worrying about paying for it all of the time!

see I am not talking about a shack...I am talking....rich wood....granite countertops....state of the art appliances...solar power...hey I am a cancerian....I rich beautiful home os important to me 

I know you are a city girl....but I love you....and I can adopt some of your ways...and you could adopt some of mine? 

Yessss, a sustainable home is both our dreams.  We have so much in common, all over again. <3  And me being a city girl?  That's more like a suburbanite, although I do traipse all over the greater city to "play".  Seriously, all I need is internet, at least occasional internet.  I LOVE the country.  My younger sister lives on a farm and that place is just heaven to me.  

spaceman: I am not a died in the wool country music buff,,,some of it is so twangy and just stupid....but some of it resonates with me...I thought you might like this one

spaceman: think you and I could make roots somewhere like that some day?

Swimming

“To know Death, to be able to leverage mortality as an impetus to taste life profoundly, is the purpose of life.” 

~A Book On Death

In a way, I am doing this.  All this happiness, all these “finally coming true” happenings are making me hyper aware of my mortality.  It could all be ripped away in a tragic moment, yes?  

I can’t seem to forget that.

Driving down the highway, hyper vigilant and carefree at the same time...  Considering my health, wanting to be in tip top condition so that I last.  Understanding I am beyond the point of no return with him.  If either one of us keels over… there’s a dark potential there and I want to make sure every second is worth every ounce of pain that death will someday bring, because death is inevitable for us all.

“It is only in the awareness of the inevitable nature of Death that you will bite deeper into the fruit of life.” 

~same link as above

That’s just one of the many ways in which the sweetness of the deliverance of my joy is feeding upon itself.  This fire is fuel for my soul.  I’m on fire and smoldering at the same time.  I want to go dance under the fullness of the moon and swim in the sheets, completely lost to the outside world.  This passion I have, it’s wild and free and he will not contain it – instead he fans my flames greedily.  And I, I turn it back towards him, drenching what is already saturated.  I love him and he returns my call.  

Our sweetness will be my undoing.

The Return

How is it possible that this man has returned to me? 

In all reality, he never truly left. 

In May of 2005, we combusted, we broke up.  Or rather, I crashed and burned us to the ground.  We had been flying high together and I took a nose dive andcould not recover.  He, like the gentle angel he is, let me leave.  Let them go, right?  …and all that jazz.  After an incredibly, indelible deep dive into our wildest dreams, we parted ways.

I’m not sure how long it was before we picked communications back up.  I know that I had practically dove right back into the dating life with a friend (and next-door neighbor).  My neighbor (and confidant at time) and I made a go of it after some reluctance on my part.  Yet another patient man, wanting to pick up my pieces.  But in the end, I wanted more and he played the “I do but I don’t game” with me and I cut him off, too.  As wonderful as he was, I came to the depth of his ability to love me at the time and was left wanting.  After that, I was… let’s just say “stale” for a long while. 

And Spaceman was busy jumping into another relationship, too.  His lasted far longer, for 5 years, if I’m not mistaken.  It was a serious relationship full of the kind of love he craved and deserved.  His girlfriend was dreamy and capable and I admired their relationship greatly.

But sometime shortly after my neighbor and I ended it (late 2006?), spaceman and I were again communicating.  We found it in our hearts to try to forgive one another – mostly he forgave me (for I felt I had nothing to forgive him for) and I tried with all my might to figure out why I reacted so poorly in Sedona and be sincere in my apologies.  But mostly, our breakup matured into a wonderful, cherished friendship that lasted, get this… 10 full years! 

And I needed that 10 years, apparently, to undo the misconceptions within myself that caused me to take that nose-dive from him in 2005.  Without getting into the details of that, suffice it to say that I have dealt and continue to deal with my insecurities.

Through the years there were ebbs and flows of his interest in me and mine in him, never really meeting up in time together.  But we wrote, and wrote and wrote.  Boy did we write!  I’m sure I have all the emails to this day, which is pretty amazing.  Sometimes I go back and read through periods of them.  It’s insightful, delightful even.  This man is magical.  He’s a being of light that shines directly at the center of my soul, adding fuel to my higher consciousness.  I am sure there is no other being on this earth who sees me as clearly as he does.  Even just as a friend, he has always been that for me, always. 

This year I got happy.  I mean seriously happy!  It wasn’t even spaceman who did it.  Oh he’s a major source at the moment, but I somehow found this silly joy from music.  The first time I heard Nahko and Medicine for the People, I fell in love with their infectious, spirit-filled music.  I didn’t even know I was consuming medicine when it became the only music I could bare to listen to for months and months and months.  I just knew that by the second or third song, on my long drive to or from work, that I was dependably, raucously happy!  Weeks into it, I began to understand it was something unique, this new found,consistent joy that had invaded all parts of my life.  Things started to go right for once, twice, and a multitude of times.  A couple months into it I woke up in the middle of the night one night, and realized that I had breached the point of no return some time ago – so much so that I knew with all my being that I could NEVER go back to the emotional set-point of life-disappointment and deep depression that had ravaged me for 3-4 years prior (layoff/bankruptcy/anger at the world/lost hope of hope)... I laid there realizing my drastic and effortless return of passion, glory and bliss and promptly broke into deeply healing, racking sobs. 

Somewhere around that time, I also realized my love for spaceman was indelibly more than friendly and supportive.  We began chatting online more and more frequently, growing closer and closer again.  Out of my joy, I found him still standing there, turned toward me, but in his own puddle of a mess.

To be continued…