I have to laugh to myself as I’m running through the sand dunes, feeling the traces of my new power, my bobcat kitty running beside me on a leash. How funny and strange I must look to the muggles… Look at that woman in her purple mexican shirt, pierced nose and gauged, tribal earrings….that (now) 50-year-old woman with her shaggy, silvering hair blowing in the wind. It’s very weird how her cat is so wild looking and well trained on that leash. They say she is a witch or a shaman or something… In fact, do you notice she has some kind of wild energy about her, too. They say she turns regular, russet potatoes into magical purple ones…wonder what else she does? Wonder who she is??
We shall see…
Just woke up, turned on the computer, popped in one of my new David Starfire CDs ( thanks Julie! ) and let the kitties out of the bathroom (they choose 4am to start getting active so this is this month’s lazy solution) and chuckled when I realized some people actually have fancy, electrical gizmos installed to heat bath towls. No need for that here, the 15 lb pixiebob (or whatever he is) does a great job and he eyed me, sleepily, from his perch on top of the towel stack high above my head. ….hmm, come to think of it they look nicely, ironed now, too. After I pee and pull my pj pants up, I must be diligent to tuck the little string tie thingies into the pants….otherwise I risk being clawed as they look just like tempting, dangling cat toys. Little, white claw-shaped scars on my legs are a reminder, lest I forget.
Behind the computer monitor, the windows face northwest. I’m up in the trees, here, and the hemlock and spruce branches are moving in the breeze. The morning sun has that golden light, reminding me that the fall equinox will soon be here. The trees are thick but I can see hints of the sky behind them (the ocean is that way) and the outline of the magical mountain, Neahkahnie…and it’s clear today. Usually a fog hangs around it reminding me of those stories of Avalon and the Lady of the Lake. I should go hike up Neahkahnie today…a sort of pilgrimage for my 50th. It’s been a few months since I’ve been up there. The energy is powerful and, although it’s only about a 40 minute hike to the top, it’s not a journey I take lightly or do often. I’ve learned that the native americans who lived here, the Tillamook Nehalem tribe, did their vision quests up there on the high, craggy view point. The shaman did other things up there. I’m still trying to learn what…those are the stories they do not “share.” There is a shrine created by the pagans who live here…it’s been on the mountain 18 years or so. The shrine stone sits in a hidden spot near the saddle of the mountain, where the trail first reaches the mountains spine. It’s a bit more of a hike up and around to the very top. The energy is very different in the two places. Many people, people who have been here a very long time, will not go all the way to the top. They don’t like the energy. It scares them. It feels very male and very powerful in a very ancient, deep, dangerous sort of way.
It’s that energy I’m ready to explore now.
A month ago, in a private meditation, I put my intention and energy out and said, “I am ready to take the next step. I want to learn who I really am and why I’ve been led here. I also need some more energy healing. Please help me to find these things.” It was the next morning that my new psychic friend showed up at my door with a powerful shaman healer. A woman who the intuitives around here call, “The queen woo woo of all the woo woo’s.” I would describe her as a shaman’s shaman…her healing wouldn’t even be appropriate for “mass consumption.” She showed up with my friend, both of them saying, “we felt Diana needed to meet you.”
As soon as Diana steps up on my porch she starts channeling and falls into a pose Maia explains is the “Mayan shaman.” She channels a number of ancient, shaman healer’s spirits…evidently, the Mayan shaman only comes out when she feels something damned powerful. When she finally comes in and sits down she says that the room is full of entities and protective spirits that are always around me and that they are asking her to help me. They tell her that they know my journey has been difficult and that they want her to make me more “comfortable” (I’ve at times suffered horrible pain from large amounts of energy becoming blocked…or unblocking.)
She starts speaking to me in an ancient language she is channeling and my soul and heart, somehow, understand her strange words….which sound kind of native american. she says it’s Star Language and that she was told by brazilian and american native shaman that the roots of native american lauguage came from the star people. It’s true, that I’ve read numerous places about these legends…most recently, reading the story of Manataka and Rainbow Woman .
Still, this idea is a pretty big leap for me, right now. Diana asked me several questions about my childhood and health: did I have a lot of allergies, did I always feel so different from my family, did I always pretty much rely on my own resources, etc. Then she said it was all completely understandable because I was a star seed and that many of us were in our last incarnation and were waking to our true selves. We were all being called and were gathering in a number of power spots all over the world. There were reasons for us to be there that would be revealed in their own time. (intriguing…)
Diana did this huge healing ceremony on me…rather, 4 or 5 of the shaman entities did the energy/sound healing…all singing and entonating in different, ancient languages. All’s I can say is that it was very strange, a little scary and very, very powerful. The most powerful thing I’ve ever experienced. Afterwards I felt completely different, lighter and clearer and I was channeling and high on energy for days…giddy on it. Diana also had special messages for me directly from my entities/guides…all of the messages were so loving and validating and comforting…that I’m doing the right thing, that everything is going to be wonderful, that I just need to hang in there and keep doing what I’m doing. It was like warm hugs from long-lost friends/relatives…I can’t explain it. Amazing.
I still feel different and in ways I have not even totally been able to absorb, yet. So, this has launched me full-on into another level of the spiritual journey. Every phase continues to be as wonderous and strange and challenging as the last.
Ahh, and lest I start questioning the validity or purpose of this whole experience I remind myself that I privately asked/prayed to my guides and the goddess for just what showed up at my door. It was unasked for and was given free. In fact, after the healing, Diana hugged me and thanked me for trusting her to do this for me. She said she was honored. This is not the first time someone has gifted me with healing and then thanked me for it. Interesting.
So, slowly, as I consciously integrate all these changes I’m seeing more of the direction my life needs to move in. I don’t think it means more computer work, either, even though I have had many intriguing projects this month. Actually, I was compelled to look into a part time job as one of the cartakers of a local woman who has Alzheimer’s. After I met her and interacted with her (Jaye) her daughter hired me almost instantly (surprise!)
I am learning (or re-learning?) that I’m actually very good at this kind of interaction…the subtle shifts needed to help keep things on an even keel. My friend, Lane told me that, “as a community, we need to start doing a better job of taking care of our own neighbors.” I totally agree. After just a few days spent with Jaye I cannot believe what an amazing woman she is and how good it makes me feel.
Double intriguing…
So, on to the next phase of my life. One that brings me closer to my purpose as an energy worker, teacher and artist.
People ask me over and over again, “what do you want for your birthday, Dawn? what can i give you??” I just tell them that I already have exactly what I’ve always wanted….a new life.
For my birthday I actually had a job interview in the morning. In the evening, all I wanted to do was gather at my favorite beach with some wine and friends and watch the sunset and splash around in the surf a bit.
Yesterday, I got up early and dug potatoes at the garden. Red, fingerling, gold and my favorite….the purple ones. They are like big, iridescent easter eggs and when I find one I have to clean off the sandy soil off and hold it up to admire it for a few minutes. They are so pretty. Two of my garden group showed up (one a founding member of the land trust and an herbalist) and we gathered calendula flowers and chamomile flowers to make medicinals.
Later, I took Calina for a picnic lunch underneath a special secret, ancient tree…we call her the grandmother tree. Then we went up into a meadow on the side of Neahkahnie and gathered wild mugwort, for smudge, and St. John’s Wort flowers to make an oil with.
On Thursday, when Calina came over, I was cleaning up a deer skeleton I had found in the sand dunes…I figured I could display the skull and use the rest of the bones for a wind chime or “cougar caller” as I call it or something
Talk about a witchy birthday….hahaha!
)
As a highly-intuitive person, I have lived a lot of my life feeling like I didn’t fit in with the “normal” groups of people. As a child, I ended up spending much time with the animals and out in nature. Sometimes I’d spend hours, high in the tops of my favorite climbing tree, just watching the birds and feeling the wind rock me in my perch. I’d watch and sometimes listen in on any people, adults and children, who wandered beneath the tree. They usually had no idea I was there, above, watching and listening to them. This really became a metaphor for my relationships with groups of people … living amongst them but, somehow, not on the same plane.
I’ve been having an intense fear of spiders since last spring. That’s when a spider bit me on the butt when I was sleeping. I’ve had that happen, before. I get an allergic reaction to certain spiders and the bite gets red and hot and itchy and very large. That happened the last time but I also felt unwell for about 4 days. I researched types of spiders and, based on my reaction and how the bite area looked came to the conclusion that it was probably a jumping spider that bit me.
I called my mother tonight and told her that I had thought of her on Hallomas. Mind you, I have not really explained to my mother what I believe in…part of it would make sense to her and part wouldn’t. I did tell her that I was, “resonating to the ancient beliefs. So, if Christianity was taking pagan holidays into its model…why fake it? Just go for the pagan thing…” But she is suffering from some dementia….so her perception is more finite and fleeting these days.
