At first I felt resistance to the idea. Who would want someone who was broken? We throw away the broken things. They are unwanted, unloved, undeserving.

I decided to take my resistance as an invitation. Go deeper, it whispered.  Okay, broken. What is broken about me?

Every step for the past seven months has brought pain. Literal steps bringing literal pain. The cartilage in my hip joints is not what it once was. I am a young woman for this to be happening, but it is. I suspect there is little cartilage left. Hip degeneration is in my family. When I began a deep martial arts practice seven months ago, I had no idea there was anything wrong with my hips. I had no pain. I had no idea about being broken in this way. I quickly found out, when my hips were asked to move in ways that they hadn’t in a long time, that I was not in the condition I had thought I was. Broken.

My practice will rebuild the broken parts inside me, but it will take time. Perseverance. Acceptance. Pain. Love. Compassion.

Connected to this broken part of me, the part that connects the upper me to the lower me and binds me to the earth, is my idea of beingness. My femininity. My sexuality. Those things are broken too.

This week on Facebook, a video made the rounds. Orgasmic childbirth. I remember rolling my eyes about this years ago. Me, squatting in a warm pool of water in a darkened room with a midwife, at one with the experience of exquisite deep pain and fighting for control in an uncontrollable process. Giving birth. I had heard about orgasmic women and thought they must be broken.

Now I know it was me.

I have been fighting my body a long time.

I know I created protection for it. I have deep compassion and love for the small child who was so successful at hiding herself so she would not be hurt. The hurts were many. Deep. Insidious. I am trying to have compassion for the young woman who was sexually abused, raped, used. For the mother caught in an emotionally abusive marriage. For all the ick ever experienced around being a woman. Being a sexual creature.

The walls I built around me as protection made me fight. Resist. They helped me think of myself as broken. In my desire to not feel pain, just like with my hips, I denied the fact that I was broken.

I am so very, very sad. I did this. And I can get out of it again.

Today in martial arts we practiced a Dragon form. Coiling, sinuous movements that engage the hips and lower back. Twisting, coiling, striking. I have come a long way in my practice in seven months but am still a beginner, seeing my lacks, feeling the way my body should move but does not. Broken. I cried in class as energy rose through my pelvis. Hot anger, cold fear. If I opened this part of me, I heard, I would be hurt. It was my walls talking. I heard them. The Dragon could not surmount these strong walls that had been in place for so long, thinking they were protecting me. After all, I let the walls be there. I did this.

Tonight as I shared some of what emerged for me with the Dragon today my dear friend Rebecca suggested I do a moving meditation connected with Golden Tara. She could not describe exactly what she had in mind for me, but it connected to the pose that Golden Tara holds. Hips open. Wide. Birthing something, perhaps, or in closeness to the earth. Hands strong. This is a powerful position. The moving meditation also connected, Rebecca said, to the gurung, a traditional ghatu dance in tribal Nepal. I watched the dance, entranced. Two women, moving slowly, deliberately, sinuously, beautifully. I would do this. I could do this. I sensed what I needed to do.

I took the Golden Tara pose, made it mine. Then my body began to move. Side to side, slowly. My stance deepened. I was one year old, just learning to walk and wanting so deeply to dance free, but tied down so that I could not. I would be toilet trained if it killed me, my mother said. One year old. My sighs became wails, releasing energy through breath and sound. My child self wept, wanted to walk free, to dance. I danced her pain for her, her anger.

Broken things fly, too.

There is irony here. My beloved adores me. As I am. I ponder this when I see his eyes smiling his heart into mine as he sits across the room, laptop in hand, having just clicked “Like” on my Facebook status update. My beloved loves me. Broken. Wanted. Loved. And oh so deserving of this amazing brilliant man who lights up my heart.

This

O my father

guardian of this watery green

and low bluegray

on weary feet.

O my father

this, this blink

this gasp

this wonder.

This is why we come

and sing our dreams

into the graycloud skies.

Once I drove through Illinois under a spreading wide field of fluffy white that extended into infinity, cottony sheep drifting gallantly and with amused authority over the highways through a sky-blue background.

Then, for a year, I watched purple merge with golden pink over the jagged silhouette of the Front Range, lost in Chief Niwot’s curse of the Flatirons. When the year was over I could still glimpse pinkgold over jutting mountains in my rear view mirror as I turned for east again.

Then for a brief time I saw gold in the brilliant dusk mirrors of the tall crystal buildings along False Creek in Vancouver, sighing every time I biked past the Burrard Street Bridge, glimpsing silvergold on acres of glass standing tall along the water’s edge. I sighed at the beauty of this city that wasn’t mine.

For two years now I have had the bay at my side, looking across gently lapping waters to the bluegrey low shapes of the San Juans beyond. One red building in my living room view lights up near dusk and I have often felt I could sit and look at that magic light against red brick for hours.

I have known now for six months that this home by Bellingham Bay would not be mine by the time the year is out. For a little while I did not know where or perhaps why this would be, why I would leave my home between the bay and the mountains, but I blame Picasso.

Picasso. There is a Ray Bradbury story that I read a million years ago about a small boy meeting an old man on the beach, an old man who wore a striped French fisherman’s sweater and drew amazing figures in the sand only for the sea to wash them away. People in the story whispered, “It’s him. Pablo,” and were devastated that the great man’s art could be so fleeting, that the ocean could come and take away the marvelous figures dancing on the sand and that no one could save them. I wondered what was the big deal. Picasso, an old guy who drew women with two eyes on one side of their face. No, Picasso I would save for later. I would allow Picasso to be a blank spot in my awareness, a door that would open at the right time, if the right time ever came.

On Black Friday I found myself sharing Picasso in a way I never thought art could be shared. A dance. Coming together and moving apart, then together again, words spoken but never said, glances, whispers, wonder. On Black Friday I glimpsed what life could be like, if only I let it. The dance, the wonder, the electricity, the aliveness, the shared experience of total beauty and something far bigger than two can create alone.

And so the dance unfolded.

Yesterday I merged onto I-5 as the sun waned, heading to the place where much of the unfolding has occurred. I glanced in the mirror over the lake and saw Seattle lit up, shining, hopeful, expectant. It was the same light that has lit so much beauty and joy, and this time Seattle was lighted for me, for the us we are creating, for the place that in a few days will be my new shared home, the place behind the door that Picasso opened. I saw all this in a glance and smiled, two eyes on one side of my face, and fell a little more in love with the Self who feels joy in a quality of light, who adores and is nurtured by the blue grays of the waters, the many-colored grays of the sky and the contrast of color against gray, and who loves loving and being loved by her man.

Every day now I will turn the corner and see the lake that lies below and across it the shining city standing beyond, and feel joy in the magic of creation so sweet that I will not mind if the waves come and take it every day, because I will know that it can be created yet again the next day and the next and the next.

Come live with me and be my love,
And we will all the pleasures prove…

In the morning I am awakened by warmth seeping in close to me, a breath, a heartbeat. I move slowly from dream into being, your heart-filled eyes inviting me into another day. Twin mugs stand by, steaming coffee’d warmth and life with each sip, feet on lap, talking of the day to come. The sun streams in through a wall of panes, inviting us to catch a scent of summer blossom through half-open door; or rain streams over, pattering, rivulets, and we two are snug inside with logs blazing into heartwarmed embers. Twin names on the mailbox, a testament that we walk this path in tandem, hands held, joining.

The day unfolds. I write. A painting emerges from my soul. I sing love into being. You inspire, inquire, clarify, evolve. We taste, we create, we experience, we harvest the richness of being loved and loving.

We dance separate dances, now touching again, now moving apart, always connected, always aware.

Wine glasses clinking, voices, music, shared conversation and laughter. Or reading far into the night. Or drumming, smoky fires, ancestral visions. Or sensual delights, a candy store. Our tandem dance continues. Finally darkness settles in like the purring cat between us, comfortably, contentedly. The world stills around us and we sleep, breathing, joined.

[Note: I count on my fingers beginning with the thumb. How many people do that? I would wager not many. Not many Americans anyway.]

One. Hawk. The messenger. Visionary power and guardianship. Paying attention to what might otherwise be overlooked.

Two. Eagle. Bald eagle, off to the west of I-5 somewhere around Stanwood. Ability to see highest truth or viewpoint. Spiritual energy. Connection from earth to sky, symbolizing balance.

Three. Ants. LOTS of ants. Many more than I am comfortable with. The warm spring winds awakened them and they scuttled inside looking for solace. Attending to one’s foundation. Community. Perseverance. Accomplishment through discipline and structure.

[Ant note: Edward O. Wilson says, "Give ants nuclear weapons and the world would be destroyed in a week." I can attest that they are relentless. A neverending stream of them has invaded my house. I am both violated and entranced. Last night after the army retreated I saw stragglers carrying off parts of the dead. I fight them with tea tree oil, cinnamon, and Black Flag ant traps. This may be a losing battle. I am larger but they have numbers.]

Four. Crow. A few days ago there was a sporadic stream of debris trickling down my front window. I went out and confronted Crow, who hopped from my roof over to his compatriot on the electrical wire nearby where they both regarded me with bright humorous eyes. “Fine,” I muttered as I closed the door again, “Have your fun.” Crow has odd ways of making friends. Integrity. Bringing magic into your life.  Seeing the magic that is already present around you.

Five. Deer, alongside Lakeway Drive today. Standing, watching the traffic. I am pretty sure that the cars following me too-close did not see Deer. Gentleness. Grace. Peacefulness. Spirituality. Love.

Mmm. Love.

New hand. Six. Lizard, on the trail today in the Magic Forest, where I went to Be after walking through a doorway and closing another. Lizard stood very still on the path, unblinking, unmoving. Dreams. Imagining different futures and creating them.

Hawk, Eagle, Ant, Crow, Deer, Lizard.

Like connecting dots, I can draw a line from last week to Now through all the animals who have visited my path and see where I have been. I think it points also to where I am going.

I alluded earlier to doorways opening and closing. I was surprised to close a door — we are taught that closing doors limits choice — but also received the message at the time that closing that particular door actually allows many other doors to open. And one did. I have never felt quite this human before. Not frail and vulnerable, as I imagined being human might feel like all these years I have resisted through a brick wall of trying-to-be-perfection, but warm. Soft. Yielding yet strong. Supple, lithe, determined. Alive.

Yes, alive. That is what this feeling is.

It’s as if I have suddenly turned from black and white into full glorious color, like when Dorothy lands in Oz.

I feel compelled to DO something with this difference, this aliveness, but mostly the message is to BE. I am anxious to prove its reality to myself, and also anxious to begin crossing off the debts I incurred by being less than human all these years, as if each relationship, each interaction, each momentary eye contact was made less than it could have been because I was trying to be more than I was.

What would Crow say to that?

Animals simply are as they are, and do not attempt to be more than they are unless it is for a very specific reason. The cat becomes larger, fluffing fur and tail, to intimidate an enemy. I became not larger but smaller, removing myself from the equation until there was little of me there at all.

All I can do now is to go on from here. Start from where you are.

You. You know who you are. I will start with you. Bring it.

Seven. Manta ray. This one exists for me as an idea, a symbol, but its effects have been exponential. Flow. Letting things come to you.

I know a place in a forest where there is a gateway to other times and other places. Step through the invisible shimmering curtain and the tall trees feel 10,000 years older, transported suddenly across the globe to somewhen. I’ve been to this place several times. Each time it felt nearly the same. Magic.

Time is a funny thing. I observed nearly two months ago (!) that time had slowed down, stretching into exquisitely endless golden hours. It hasn’t changed since then. Time still moves luxuriously. Languidly. Taking its own sweet time. Seconds drip into hours. Worlds are created in a breath. There is always enough, yet I always want more.

Distance is a funny thing. There is physical separation, but … is there? Isn’t distance simply an illusion? I could take one giant step northwestward and be standing among giant redwoods or on a rocky pine-kissed beach. And even if I chose to accept that a mile is a mile and 1112 crow miles is 1112 crow miles, the sense of proximity could still be there. If I close my eyes and feel with my heart, I feel warmth. A presence. A heartbeat. It is enough, and yet I want more.

Things I love: perspective, the unexpected, golden afternoon light, lush wetness, the way colors pop on a muted overcast day.

Seattle Arboretum view brought to you by serendipity, a romantic sensibility, and Hipstamatic, the second coolest app on my iPhone.

He was ten that year. The cello was a natural instrument, but they weren’t friends at first. Not long before Christmas, something clicked into place. He sat taller, straighter. The instrument became part of him, an extension of him. Notes flowed from his fingertips into the warm golden-brown wood, and the house sang. A room at the front of the house became the music room, and every night we were bathed in golden brown.

I always liked Pachelbel’s Canon in D from the first time I heard it while driving to ballet class one Pittsburgh Christmas season. How had I missed this? I wondered, and turned the radio up louder. Now Pachelbel sang in the music room, the deep bass notes and the dulcet golden middle tones combining in joyful abandon. He taught me the bass line, and I felt a little body recognition in the way I held the cello, fingers curling around on the left, a taut bent arm bowing on the right. It felt familiar. No wonder he had become a natural. One day he’d play professionally, maybe.

Six months later, the sunsets dwindled in the rear view mirror and my bright dreams turned to ash. Colorado became a bitter memory of loss and defeat. The worlds I was creating, of cello players and horse girls, fell away into dust. The cello went back to the music store, forever a part of that one sun-washed year.

I heard my Christmas gift over the phone this year. It’s five years later and he’s bringing music back into his life. He picked out the notes of all the parts of Pachelbel on a keyboard nearly as old as he is, and played a hip hop version for me while I wept silently on the other end of the phone, remembering the tall boy who sat taller when he held his cello, regally coaxing notes from the golden brown wood and sending them off into the ethers, a blessing to the universe.

Nineteen. I count backwards, eighteen, seventeen, sixteen, until I reach the touchstone that began my realization that I have become a Time Sorceress. And with every moment hanging in stillness, if I choose for it to be so, I have infinite time to use the power of deep desire to create my every What Comes Next. There are no limits, and there is no end, for every new breath brings a new limitless world to populate from that same deep place, if I should so choose.

Worlds are created from my lips. From my heart. From the scent of my skin. They spin off into the light beyond and shatter into millions of gleaming shards, each tiny bright light an entire new world of its own.

I drove off an island ferry tonight onto an oft-traveled road that led to my home and bed. In the darkness, or in the silly-putty stretchness of time bending, I felt like I had driven onto a new planet, an only partly familiar world that stretched into foreverness at the end of my headlights. I sped past mountains and lakes. I breathed and counted backwards again. I created one more world from the scent of home, a world that grants me limitless new worlds ever-spinning from each breath, ever moving into shards of light, ever asking for more, more, more.

Once I thought that living that way meant I had to allow myself to become immersed in the low-lows when they moved in and covered me with inky blackness, taking me to the depths of my inescapable inner cave. Now I’ve figured out how to ride the wave, moving from high-high to less-high and then back up again. The cave is filled with light, and when I want to explore the dark recesses still there, I know I have the choice to move outward into the light again.

I still feel the shift in contrast, though, but no longer does it take me to the depths. I don’t feel a lack when the high-highs move away, only a change. This past week has been filled with contrast, and I’ve been riding an undulating wave of movement from one crest to another. The intensity of some of those moments has been exquisite, almost-but-not-quite painfully so, multiple bright orange-red explosions of juicy in-the-moment sensation, the rightness and perfection of the moment becoming crystal clear. In the flow. The universe has lined up.

It’s the contrast from these moments of near-perfection to the ordinariness of all the other moments that brings it all into sharp focus. Today I made coffee. Danced. Read my email. Looked out the window at the wind’s effects on the tree across the street. Texted some friends to check in with their day. Breathed in and out.