A New Decade

There is no way to fill in all the gaps between then and now.  I feel like these long years since i wrote were a time when life was happening so much i had no time to think about it, let alone write about it.  Now... some 5 years later, there is a husband, a baby, a new home country, a new song.

When i left Los Angeles on my travels, i truly had no idea where they would take me.  Through many steps of pure TRUST in the Divine i found myself in many most exquisite places and situations.  Then things tooks some even wilder turns and i ended up with my sweetheart living in England with our Gorgeous son.  The journey has been long and the road covered with brambles and stinging nettles, but now the sun in shining again and i am remembering a lesson i set out to learn so many years ago.... Trust is the crux of life.  Without trust in my Self, in The World, in The Divine, it all falls apart.  and so i am remembering....  Trust.  this is all part of the plan.  this is all in divine order.  i can still taste my own Divine Essence, just enough to pick up the trail and carry on.

Here I Am.

I'm learning more of what it's like to be a cat. i sleep more than i have since i was a growing, even in the middle of the day. Mr T (to the left here) and Smidge are teaching me well. There's much to be learned about the balance of work and play. They don't seem to have any issues of concern if the day only holds sleep and play. There is some strange mix of biting and loving that takes place, keeps one on the toes! and it's amazing how much more you get touched when you're either furry, or you speak up a lot. I really don't like when they whack the tails off the lizards, but i do like it that the lizards get away. And i discovered that those nasty lizard poops are made up of cockroach bits. kinda gross, but cool too. don't ask how i found this out. and cockroaches seem to make excellent kitty entertainment, but i feel the need to rescue them too. hunting as a form of engagement is great, though i don't like the kill and abandon technique (suppose that's what happens when dinner is served every day at 8 and 7)the kitties prefer to be out in the rain screaming to be let in with the people than to go alone to the outside room that is dry with a bed. i understand this. i too have learned to do a song and dance at dinner time. and napping seems to be much more fun with one paw draped over another warm body in the sunshine.

17 September 08

Ever since i left New England, i’ve loved the rain. since i’ve known dry alpine air, and chaffed desert plains i’ve loved the rain. On this hot, caribbean island, where the land is hard and impenetrable from months of baking sun, i’ve longed for the heavy clouds that bring the sound of rain to my rooftop.

It came this morning, first as little patters, slowly building into a great crescendo of thunderous drops all around. Now the rain has receded into slow drip-drops so i can hear the kerplunk of each heavy fall on the giant jungle leaves.

Then i think about the folks in Haiti and i am sad. my pleasure, their pain.

And still i will enjoy the rain. and love the people all the same.

29 August 2008

have you ever seen a mangrove?? they are these amazing cool trees that can survive in both fresh and salt water. they have these amazing roots that grow up really high out of the water. they live by the ocean side and are an integral part of the coral reef ecosystem. Roatan, the little island i'm living on just north of Honduras, is along the MesoAmerican Barrier Reef, second only to Australia's Great Barrier Reef in size. the mangrove passes are soo cool, and they are nurseries for the baby fish and home to crocodiles and such, and they are like filters for the coral from all the crap that come sliding from the mainland. very cool and very special trees. envision them staying put on the edges of the water while sustainable development occurs around them!

it finally rained today and this made me very happy. it's been freakin' hot, like hot, hot. and finally there were storms starting late last night that thundered through the day. i am happy for the sunshine, and that makes the storms even more delicious!!

we have a lot of trees, jungly type trees, around our house. we are in a community that is part resort, part private homes. we are in a private home with the kitties, housesitting. we have a peek-a-boo to the ocean, which is about 60 seconds away. i like climbing in this tree which is very high up off the ground, but occasionally i freeze and get really scared- i don't know where it comes from, and it's not very convenient. if i was just always scared that might be better for me. then i would not get stuck mid branch.

21 July, 2008

My GoD! is it really 8 1/2 months since i last wrote. geesh- i swear i had good intentions. now i don't know where to start! to go all the way back to november, 2007, or to just give it to ya from here. well....progress is fun. i guess we'll go with the short version with lots of pictures.

ahh...november- it was delicious being in Flagstaff. i had NO idea how much fun a hostel could be. it was just really sweet to have a cozy bed and a shower. THEN there were all the amazing people...Maria from the Czech Republic was riding from Alaska to Texas. uh, got me there! she's soo cool. and lovely little Sara from Switzerland- traveling her way to her self via the world. so i played music in the dining room, which brought lots of people out of their rooms and we had such a fine fine evening laughing and story telling and all things wandering travelers. so i HAD to stay another night to enjoy these delicious people, and thank HeaVen and EaRtH i did because i met Sarah Emberson from Sheffield, England, and that's a treat of a lifetime. we ended up traveling with Sara and Jimmy on a little camping trip to monument valley, and we wandered our way there convoying with Roger and his Spaniards, who had to get to moab by midnight. we found winslow arizona for him (i liked it too :)
then on to the Petrified Forest, cause little Sara had to see it, and then to Canyon De Chelly (pronounced inexplicably De Shay) where i parted with my camera for a while in Roger's car. it was eventually reunited with me in LA where roger left it with paolina. how fun is that? anyway....did i say i would keep it short? i don't mean to lie. it just happened.

so these folks becamee my immediate new best friends and i cried when every single one of them left. and then of course when one leaves a new one comes, and i kept asking, is it time for ME to leave? and my heart kept telling me to be patient. so more new friends, lovely evenings with music and days with delight and then met a couple of chaps to hike up Mount Humphries (12,000 feet +/- ) and then one of them, lovely bloke, Jacob, was staying on a few days as well, so more hiking. turns out he was looking for a travelmate with a car to do a lovely route in southern utah he had laid out. so after a quick thanksgiving meeting Sarah from Sheffield and Oistein from Norway back in Santa Barbara while Jacob did a whirlwind week in mexico, we were OFF! oh my MyNess! it was all so incredible. the first time i can remember not feeling the need to fix something. it was PERFECT. our travels took us to gorgeous glen canyon (we 4X4ed over some old golf course), antelope canyon, which was closed, then to navajo national monument, which we didn't feel like discovering, because really i just wanted to get to my beloved Monument Valley. wOw. it was a lot colder than last time...a LOT colder. so next to the fire with guitar and gorgeous starry sky, and when we woke in the morning, it was so cold we couldn't even break down camp (like -8 degrees celcius) so we wandered about the valley...and so delightful sunrise tromping. packed up and headed up the ways to have a yummy navajo bread with breakfast in mexican hat at that sweet little restaurant at the big bend, over the river- you can't miss it! onward to Muley Point. ok- that drive is nearly unbelievable. you HAVE to do it! and out to the end of the road to the point, where we wandered our way down to ..... (to be continued)

Monday, November 5, 2007

who am i in this sunset? who is this girl/woman/child watching the train pass on this busy flagstaff road? who is this that is thinking about the freedom of riding that train across the land? who is this that dreams and then thinks there is no sense in dreaming? the pessimist and the optimist all in one little package. love is here.

whoa. ok. so have asked more than a time or two lately, "um, 'scuse me...what am i DOING here again?" and remembering the questions in my new song..."who am i if i just sit and breathe? and "who am i if noone needs me?" huh. it's like an experiment. people seem a little uncomfortable when i don't have a definite answer to their question "where to next?" " what now?" i say, dunno and they look at me like, oh, poor dear. and that just inspires more in the questioning, wandering, wondering. i suppose it makes sense that the new song requires new experiences and that may not always be so comfortable or predictable. do people really know what direction to go, or are they just faking it? they don't seem any happier. maybe we are just happy or not. comfortable or not. loving or not. sometimes all, sometimes none. this is only my moment.

ok, so the where-i've-been. i started out saying "i'm going here, i'm getting this westfalia, blah blah, and it's not what happens and since i am not forcing these things, i thought, better to write in the already-did-it-tense.

After the 10 days trip with the French Family, i got to stay for a bunch of days at the Refugio House, and what a refuge it is!! finished a couple of songs. happy happy. do i really leave? Fred and i went to Jalama on his motorcycle....Giddy UP and Yippee! so beautiful. big ocean yum.

left LA on the 30th. stopped at Sati and Jesse's. they got a new doggy named Boddhi, who, with your prayers, wishes, visioning is getting stronger every day, eating plenty, and wagging his tail tons on long walks ! thanks! i also met a mama puppy, a teenage mom at that, with her 8week? old babies. i fell in love. shit. and again, with your prayers, she and all her babies are in yummy homes, feeling much love and playing with their people, and getting good food and exercise and love love love (especially Mom!) then i made it to a spot just outside of Prescott, turned off a dirt road, walked to the coolio railroad overpass, one of those pretty wood ones. thought, could i stay here? uh, no. movin' on. next turn off, it was last light of dusk now, so pulled over on the national forest service road and promptly fell asleep with my head under the open sunroof and stars aplenty overhead. then had a gnarly dream and awoke feeling like i had to get out of there. freaky. and it was only 8:30 p.m. (i fell asleep at 6:30!) so with a friend's guidance, made it to a safe spot in the woods outside Prescott. in the a.m. Dan pulled up with his dogs and after his hike, invited me to hike with him if i stayed in town. cute town, but just got some supplies and headed to Mingus Mountain. the lady at the forest service said she didn't THinK that it was hunting season there, but be careful just the same. i was so excited driving up the mountain (around 7,800 feet).

sweet drive, the campground was closed but there's open camping up there (no i didn't stay at the methodists' camp but i sure love that sign). beautiful lookout at the end of the road. sweet! just in time to make camp along the road where others had left campfire pits, and broken bottles, and cigarette butts. i cleaned up, set up my tent in a sweet spot under Tree to watch sunset. sweet. gathered wood. made a great dinner- thanks Paolina, those campfood things you just add water to are GREAT!! soon as dark fell, i made a fire. i was amazed how beautifully it started. i AM capable of making a great fire with the right supplies (dry leaves and pine needles, little twigs, medium branches, bigger branches, big chunkers! it went for a while and i sang songs for Dia de Los Muertos and took out my pretty pics of Cassidy and Mingus and some doggy treats (like they do for Day of the Dead in Mexico) and sat with the loneliness of not having them with me, and felt joy in feeling like they ARE with me, and not restricted by old, achy legs. um, then i started thinking about all the scary movies and stories anyone has mentioned. the worst are those billboards in LA that have huge pictures for Saw movies and The Hill Have Eyes. don't need to see them, or Blair Witch Project, or Deliverance, to have a my imagination run freak out. so, i didn't stay in the tent. i threw my blankets in Dora and tried to sleep. but still wondered what hunter freaks might be hiding in the woods. Jean Paul was so sweet, sending Big Guy energy out to the woods for me. i sorta slept for a little bit then BAM- a huge light flashed into the car and i woke up totally frozen. it just stayed there, me frozen, adrenals thumping, trying to breathe without moving. it never moved or made a sound, then i ever so slowly turned, barely peaking out the back to see...the Moon. it had just come over the crest of the mountain and was shining full blown into the window. i could almost laugh, but not REALLY laugh until the next day when i made it to my gorgeous Birthday Sunrise looking down at the Verde Valley

with my tea and birthday cake (bought a piece just for this special occasion!) then moved my tent and met a very nice tarantula, she seemed interested in what i was doing there, then wandered away (did you know they don't actually bite, they shed hairs off their bellies and fling them with their feet, this creating very uncomfortable experience for anyone bothering one, but not lethal...comforting, yes?) i thought the slight change of venue, which made me more invisible from the main street, and next to a fence would make me feel better for that night's sleep, but the gunshots ringing throughout the day had my heart racing, and my fight or flight instincts on edge. ah...relief, pack it up and go to the state park down in cottonwood. my birthday present to self- two whole nights in the campground with hot showers, open desert, big, dark night skies, and sunrising hiking. lovely. hiked off-trail down to a little canyon thing with a dry riverbed on the bottom. very cool and dry and hot and delicious and red. good place to bleed in moontime. i lost my camera, freaked for a minute cause i thought there was no way to find it---couldn't remember which way i came down since it wasn't a path. then i heard Debi...change it! :) stillness. up the hill, no not quite it, turned left, nothing looked familiar. oh my god, there it is. i laughed and cried with gratitude. not for the camera so much, it's just a thing. it was, you know, all the rest.

back at my tent saw Miss Black Widow hanging upside down under my picnic table with her pretty red tattooed belly (did you know only the males wander- and they aren't poisonous. and the ladies only bite if startled or threatened. and you may not even feel it, just later you get sick to your stomach and muscle pains and stuff, but there's anti-venom, or you can take herbs to help the symptoms. but there have only been a very very few deaths by them, it's just mostly uncomfortable- only if you are a baby or really sick is it dangerous). then the quail came with their sweet song and dance, and two walking sticks made an appearance just before i left!

met Matthew at Arcosanti, cool bells, and a visit to the Buddhist Retreat Center in Chino Valley. awesome. quiet. God, time with a friend i hadn't seen in years...warm, warm heart. if you have yet to meet Matthew, he's an amazing counselor/therapist person, among other coolio things, and he sees the world through amazing eyes. i love getting to hear what he sees- you know those people?

then last night up here to flagstaff. and all day talking to people i love, Cousin Michelle, the Lovely Miss Therrien, Matteo. as i write all this, i am seeing that from the external it may not seem like so much for a week out. there doesn't seem to be such a measure for the internal terrain covered. Amy said to remember that as the light shines brighter, it will shine brighter on the dark places too. oh, goodie.

i continue to ask for clarity, for love, for surrender. for surrender. this is what is happening. i am here. this is it. every breath. Annabelle sent me an old writing i did a few years ago when i gave mouth to mouth to the motorcyclist that died. i was thinking to include it soon. the reminder just now was intense...every breath, every breath. this is enough. this is enough.

i. am. still. here.

also read an old email to a friend about a dream i had. "the butterflies turned into dolphins. the man came out of the water and said 'it's time to sing the people out of sad'."

a new song is on the horizon. at sunrise or sunset, i don't know. from which shores i cannot tell. if anyone will be sitting next to me when i sing it, i cannot be sure. but it is a song that must be sung. by me. i am here to sing this song...let me sing it well.

all my love and a huge open heart beating for you. kiki

Friday, October 19, 2007

WOW! just got back last night from the trip around the southwest. i'm in love...with LiFe! and with the Navajo country around Monument Valley. how fast can i get back there?? we'll see. it was all so beautiful, and painful at times to pass through so quickly. Jean-Paul took me on an amazing whirlwind tour that really gave me a taste of longing for more...the open expanse into...everywhere. but here i am again, barely able to write. sleepy. full day. got to sing with Amy Therrian tonight- she is such an angel, goddess, gorgeous woman, sister. the music we make, she makes, i make, is ecstacy. i record with Dvorah next friday and then...? to Navajo country? we'll see. there is DEFINITELY a song there, new, ready for me to learn. who AM i??

my laptop finally blew it, so no way to download my photos to share just yet. anyway, if i get out into the out i won't have much use anyway. hard sayin' not knowin'. it is just wild to follow this feeling...well, to get ready to follow this feeling. it's all laying out beautifully.

human interaction- tell the truth- it's never easy, except when it is! what is expectation? what is right to receive? when is it time to give. does anyone ever really give without expecting something in return. am i naive to take people at their word? life really is a gift.

i think i babble now. goodnight lovely.

me