Rocks in my head and elsewhere

(From Top to Bottom)

1. Banded Fluorite

2. Vanadinite

3. Obsidian (volcanic glass) faceted to look like a jewel

4. Skutterudite, from Skutterud, Norway

5. Nailhead calcite (looks like a big coffee-cake)

6. Herkimer Diamond

7. Golden Quartx, polished

8. Natural Aquamarine

9. Danburite

10. Chrysanthemum Stone from China

11. Malachite slice

12. Pyrite, fools gold, used in jewelry as Marcasite

13. Cobaltocalcite

I went a little crazy on eBay a few years back. In the space of three months until I made myself stop, I was in love with minerals and rocks. I specialized in quartz, in anything that had color or sparkle. Something in me said I needed these beautifule one-of-a-kind pieces. At the time nothing cost over five dollars, and the most expensive piece I kept bidding until I hit sixty five dollars. I don't regret doing this, and sometimes even today I can sneak over to my links and look at the offerings under rock and mineral specimens. Thirty or forty pages of listings a day and they all sold and the next day the same. I happened upon an obsession that coincided with my budget and my love of the unique.

The Trajectory of Belief

Recently I re-read The Celestine Prophecy. Remembering the first time I read it, I recall how hugely it affected me and how long after it stayed with me. I'm one of those people who pick up the right book at the right time to find answers in my life. Some people do this with the Bible, opening it randomly to find just the right passage for their current situation. There is a Buddhist saying, "When the Student is ready, the Teacher will come." We are all seekers.

This time, however, I read it with a certain irritation, possible leftovers from two interactions I've had recently with people who had completely different belief systems, or none, and who seemed to find fault with me.

One is what I call an "angry Christian." She wants me to attend her church, wants me to read the Bible daily as she says she does. But she is terribly dissatisfied with her life, is bored and unhappy most of the times I visit; even though I try to cheer her up, she seems waiting to die, has in fact told me, when asked what would make her happy, that she can't wait to be in the arms of Jesus. To listen to her rant about gays, welfare mothers and half the unnamed population she calls "them," is to hear uncomfortably name-calling in the name of virtue.

The other seemed aloof in the way that The Celestine Prophesy outlines, something from early family training, what the book calls a "core drama" and when I blundered in with my Karmic Car Wash Theory, closed up tight and I could see attention waning as I blathered on. Aha, you ask, what is this theory? Well, I am currently convinced that I chose this life, not only chose it, but that I am here to clean up some of my past-life's ill deeds, taking what comes with forebearance without paying back to those who ill treat me here and now. Because I noticed this as a pattern in my life, I coined the phrase. With some pride, I treated even the meanest person without rancor, finishing what I think of as old business. My one weapon has been escape. I leave.

I have wonderful books that have helped me deal with my life, and as I emerged once from a period of deep depression, my faith rebuilt in surprising ways. At one time I had a Fishbowl Theology - we were all swimming around helplessly waiting for some huge hand to feed us, to stir things up, to kill us. At another time I was as devout as I had been as a child, when I kept a rosary under my pillow, until my mother took it away from me, cautioning, "Stay away from the Catholics!."

At present I am still a searcher, a learner, and I listen to everybody. I spent my married life a reformed Anglican, then drifted again after divorce into either unbelief or too many beliefs. I watched the Bill Moyers interviews with Joseph Campbell with great interest. Deepak Chopra. Wayne Dyer, Poet Robert Bly, and many others. Anyone with great love for humanity, who teaches love and forgiveness, has great joy in living, I read, listen to or take to heart their words. I have decided to be content with my life. I am lucky, I am blessed, I am confident and can cope. When I read the bibliography at the back of The Celestine Prophesy I was surprised to note that I either own or have read almost every book listed.

Early on, while still on the bulletin boards of the old Prodigy before I got full Internet, I would discuss these new age books and authors, surprised to find that these real helpers of people who suffer had their detractors, sometimes virulent. I chalked it up to closed minds, to people being stuck in old ways. While I was enjoying my new found enlightenment, I realized the truth in the
adage that organized religion was a sure deterrant to ever having a religious experience.

I have believed many things at different times in my life, and I don't see my own spirituality as fixed. I will listen to you, walk with you in your faith for awhile, happily, and not try to change what you believe. I am able to assess the new and file it away with the old and adopt what suits my mind and heart. An accident of birth or I might have been Aztec, Druid, or something else. We all come to belief these days from experiences that are as different as the images at the top of this page, which I collectively call Mind Spark. Spirituality comes from that spark. So does poetry.

May you be as blessed as I am.

Signs of Spring

Is there anything more beautiful than the smell of the season's first rhubarb pie baking in the oven? Hand picked ruby red stems washed and cut into bits and then tossed with sugar, flour and a pinch of salt and then into a crust and lattice-topped, milk-brushed, and sugar-sprinkled . And then into a 400-degree oven for a half hour and 350-degrees for another half hour.

Now it's spring!

And though I can still see snow out my window in the corners under bushes, it's also time to take down the front door Christmas wreath and replace it with the spring one with Hydrangias and lavender ribbons.

Some years the wreath doesn't come down until Easter. Hard to thinkof spring when there's still snow on the ground. Many years the cutoff day is Valentine's.

Today there's even a few crocuses in bloom near the chimney where the ground warms up first.

I am so blessed.

Update Apr 12

My third Rhubarb Pie this year, mmm just came out of the oven. I found my crinkle-cut rotary lattice maker but it gets away from me, not easy to get them all the same width. Call it rustic? Tastes just as good.