Fall Festival and Hunters Moon

Worm Moon 2021

The moon is just gorgeous tonight, as bright as a spotlight, making shadow puppets of the trees.

 

Pink Moon

The bad news: You're falling through the air with no parachute. The good news: There's no ground.

     — Chögyam Trungpa

Gym day

Something in my Spirit has shifted, though I'm not certain what. I know that the Wolf Moon Eclipse is supposed to be a big deal, releasing our wild side, but I feel calmer instead. More centered. Not sure what is up with that, but I'll take it.

I went to meeting Monday and asked for a volunteer to take me more often. Yesterday I texted one of the volunteers and it worked out (fourth time is the charm!!). At the meeting, I asked someone if I could start calling every day. Ever since I buried my sponsor last year, I d missed the visibility and connection. We talked last night, and then again while I walked to the gym this morning.

This week I texted an old friend that had been important but become alienated through bad communication and fear on both our parts. I thanked them for being in my life. We're talking again. It's nice. We could get hurt again, but even so it wouldn't be the end of the world. Living in isolation needlessly would be tragic though.

I can feel micro spasms -- around my eyes or near my temples -- and this is totally neurological. The headaches are mostly diminished, so even though I'm wiped out by ten in the morning, I can make the most of resting.

I walked to the gym. This is mild defiance on my part, since I'm not supposed to walk alone. But it's a managed rebellion, since I had someone on the phone the whole time. #AchievementUnlocked.

I swam 300 yards.

The plan these days is about doing it. Doing it fast is not the goal -- bonus points are for consistency and duration, but overdoing it is still bad. Right now the achievement range is 220-440 yards (1/8-1/4 mile). This is up from August (110-220), which was a step up from April (NotDeadYayMe!!)

Then steam room (to kill flue) and sauna meditation (blood pressure) and shower (clean is good). I love having a permanent locker at the gym.

On the walk home, I gave serious thought to the living situation. I might move, might stay where I am but in any case I need to purge My Land of a bunch of possessions which no longer fit my abilities (or lack thereof. It's kind of delusional to have scads of cooking supplies and equipment when I'm at the point of leftovers and takeout being onerously difficult.

So I took a deep breath and owned a situation that I don't like and that is getting worse by ignoring it. I texted a friend to get a crew together. Move everything out of the attic, haul away furniture etc. that I don't use, take donations to Goodwill.

Also I've asked for help with housework. It will either materialize or it won't. I keep sending out the call.

I heard from my thesis advisor. We've been talking about structure and assembly of the final draft. I'm hoping to get something to him before I leave for New York at the end of the month (#NightOfPhilosophyAndIdeas).

White tea and naps.

Love and peace ❣️

May the Light of the Full Moon

The full moon in May has many names:
Colonial America: Milk Moon
Cherokee: Planting Moon
Choctaw: Panther Moon
Celtic: Bright Moon
Medieval England: Hare Moon
Neo-Pagan: Grass Moon
Wiccan: Hare Moon
Algonquian: Flower Moon
English: Milk Moon
Siouan (Assiniboines) Tribe, Montana: Idle Moon
Inuit of Northern Canada: Goose Moon
Chinese: Dragon Moon


Flower Moon Folklore
Clothes washed for the first time in the Full Moon will not last long.
The Full Moon is an ideal time to accept a proposal of marriage.

yes, i read the almanac

Thanks to Nate for sending along the picture of the lunar elcipse from the other side; pretty, isn't it? While David and i were driving home Saturday evening (after a much-needed trip to Sam's Club), I pointed out the emerging crescent. The boys and David and I watched the eclipse finish its path across the moon as we made our way up the mountain. My face pressed against the cool glass of the passenger window, I confessed: "The full moon in March is called the Worm moon. I meant to look it up, but I didn't." David asked me how it was that i knew the eclipse was coming up, and that it was a full moon that night. "Uh, i read it in the Farmer's Almanac?" I felt like a dork, but it's true -- the almanac provides a lot of my random farm-based information, and it's not really more sophisticated than that. I'm a weird-information junkie, and i like knowing stuff about the world in which i live; the two come together to produce a fascination of named things. In the case of the names of the full moon, i found a list online. For the latest on what is going on, i tend to visit more authorative sources. and while i was visiting, i found what i'd like to get Tiger for his birthday in July. my mind has an endless capacity for useless information.

Cool things this weekend:

• On Saturday morning we went out and rode Nitro (the Freesian). Everyone got a turn except David, who was doing the lead-around-the-field thing. We meant to ride longer and share more, but Nitro was slipping in the still-wet grass, so it was a brief outing. Satisfying though. Note: Nitro is one heck of a lot of horse. At 17 hands and over a ton-and-a-half, it seriously changed my approach to riding when i was in the saddle. He got a little frisky, jumping and swishing a bit, and it was noticable in a way it simply isn't in smaller horses. I felt small and insignificant, but in a nice way.
• After riding, we went to town and looked at furniture. We need a new dining table and the boys need height-appropriate dressers. We were more of the get-ideas-and-go-home-and-make-it mindset, and i think we might have figured out a solution to the boys' organization at long last (yes, it involves the woodshop and not a credit card).
• David introduced us to the age-old board game Careers and we had a ball. The game he has is so old that all the little score sheets are used up and have been erased and re-erased into onion skin. I hopped on the computer and made a new set, which we tested on Sunday night while the clothes finished washing and the boys fell asleep. David won, but i was only a hunderd dollars from victory. [A hunnerd!]
• The Sam's trip did my heart good in a way that i simply find difficult to describe. We have twelve pounds of rice and a big honking case of Charmin. We are beginning the Pantry Stock, and such are the things that calm me, especially as i haven't found a contract yet. (Yes, they keep saying there are tons of things out there for me. None of them comes through, though. It's that overeducated, overqualified thing again.)
• We had dinner on Friday night with Michael, which was a treat for us all. As he came in, Tiger looked at him and said "Did i mention that I think of you as a brother?" Michael was telling him yes, and that it was cool when Tiger then informed him that he could now join him in playing The Mime Game.
• Sunday was mostly calm and quiet, with house chores and movies and tree removal (when the axe broke, David got to show off the chainsaw before literally man-handling the tree into submission. My own personal superhero.)

this morning was a comedy of near-errors, but that's another story for another time. Hopefully, the day is on track once again.