My Glad/Mad/Sad Year

Last year at this time the burrowing owls stood guard at the condo grounds.  Visions of a new job,  after a 3 year ordeal trying, and hopes for finding a house danced in my head.  Like everything I decide to do, I mixed up a potent dose of naive optimism, idealism, manic excitement and frustration at the pace of change.  I drank that  kool-aid right down,  drooling over the prospect of salvation from condo life- the sad chapters lived there-  to an upgraded version of 'freedom':  financial,  land to play with,  creating the office/studio space for all things right brain.  I believed all my sacrifices would count, and the struggle would merit a validation;  life would finally deliver my well-earned rewards for doing the 'right thing',  staying my course and not giving up.

This is partly a piece about New Age tyranny (everything must be 'positive').  And to differ from my profound and lifelong connection with Mother Nature,  I cannot explain this year by 'spiritual' means.  I can't blame myself anymore for believing in an impossible love.  Or exposing the entrenched dysfunctions at work only to find greater hostility.  For wandering the rooms of my new house in heartache,

when it was me that believed it was all possible, in a package,  complete with dog...true love in the oasis of creativity and peace- at last.
The move was a purge, a repackaging, and a revision of the old Barn Days if only to find that patch of ground to grow something, anything that would allow me to watch Mother Gaia do Her thing.
Working towards a professional space of counseling and workshops was simply embedded in the notion that anyone would like time away in a Garden,  to heal through Nature and wise counsel the many conflicts within.  

So it was especially poignant to find Kenny dog, and with that, M unloading himself into the house,  ready to train and mow and fix.  It seemed the past had taken the intervening 20 years and brought me to a kind of second chance, morphed into day job and house-owning and partnering with someone.  And on the surface it all looked so good.....my denial was so deep.

It only took a series of MIAs to bust that denial wide open,  and with it,  my determined idealism that all SHOULD work out well.
Kenny was the 'dog in the middle' of estranged humans who still live in the same house;  heartbreaking to watch waiting by doors,  and sad eyes, and no explanation possible. 

At work,  hostility becomes shunning,  while coping with the pressures of learning altogether new skills and authority. 
The Aries girl who loves a challenge is silently celebrating my victory.  The schlubby little jewish girl who never quite knows how to 'fit in' soon realizes I will never be understood,  accepted or appreciated by .... M,  staff, family.... By the happy New Agers,  the super Jews...   The lonely road at work meets lonely road at home. 

While Kenny grows and grows,  my owner-anxieties flourish over all the time he stays in the house alone,  the training disasters, chewed shoes, and running,  dealing with M coming and going, and never enough emotional space to settle in and find the rhythm of this life,  nurture my artistic self around the co-opting of artistic space.  M takes his time.   I wallow deep in seasonal depression not relieved by southern sun.  In an age of civil and cosmic unrest,  there is no space not otherwise occupied by the clamoring forces of change....just when I thought I'd be celebrating I seem left behind in a room 'of my own choosing', alone.

Depression stole my heart, my voice and my hope.  I didn't want to write and try to pump myself up,  or explain the 'cosmic rationale' behind everything anymore.  I felt deeply wounded and betrayed by shiny promises I wanted desperately to believe;  I wanted that chance to have that full package again;  I wanted to feel wanted.

I was awake before sunrise today, and despite overcast skies,  was determined to get Kenny to the beach finally, since he's never been.  After a quick pre-dawn walk I loaded him up and parked off A1A,  jogging down the quiet side streets until we came onto the open beach.  Kenny could smell something different and was excited, then nervous as the beach and the wide expanse of water opened up before us...he trotted around the beach until finally realized the water was coming in and out,  nervous to avoid the surf until I started throwing sticks.  Then it seemed to click.  We took our time, down then back up the water front,  chasing sticks.  He frolicked and got wet and full of sand- and seemed to love it all!

Doing something for Kenny satisfies the mother in me....and makes me feel needed.  I needed to walk this long empty beach today and see my dog happy in the sand and know I gave that moment to him.  I also need to mother myself, and accept the broken heartedness that my childish naive, idealistic self is struggling to outgrow,  while appreciating that all in all,  I landed in a pretty sweet spot.  It is still possible,  everything I dream.   I am not hardened,  only silent.  I am not gone,  just stepped to the side.  Something wants to emerge and its not just the dreams of my past anymore.  It wants to be Something Brand New.