{"id":57973,"date":"2012-06-09T15:00:59","date_gmt":"2012-06-09T19:00:59","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/planetwaves.net\/news\/?p=57973"},"modified":"2012-06-08T12:41:19","modified_gmt":"2012-06-08T16:41:19","slug":"notes-in-transit","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/planetwaves.net\/news\/polyamory\/notes-in-transit\/","title":{"rendered":"Notes In Transit"},"content":{"rendered":"

By Maria Padhila<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

Each month at the New Moon, I put a different pendant on my silver chain to bring in that Moon\u2019s energy. This past New Moon, I put three charms on the chain: an ouroboros, a milagro of a woman\u2019s form, and a puffy silver heart, that last item from the handfuls of costume jewelry I got from Isaac\u2019s grandmother. She bought jewelry everywhere she traveled; much of it she would sell and then donate the profits to her favorite charities, but she was also never without perfectly coordinated accessories, and her granddaughters, in-laws and great-granddaughters benefited from that. <\/p>\n

\"Poly
Poly Paradise at Burning Man. Photo by Eric.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

When I run, the three clink and jingle together. I sound like my old cat with his collar full of tags — he was a big, mean marmalade and very proud of his bling. I put three on there because one is not enough. There was so much happening between New Moons — the eclipse that kicked it off, the Full Moon eclipse, the transit of Venus, planets changing signs, planets going in and out of retrograde — I\u2019m fairly much beside myself. The confusion and exhaustion has me in a constant struggle to not give in. <\/p>\n

If I were ‘only’ a mother with a job and a husband, I would still be on the edge of being overwhelmed. Why not? Most of the women I know who are ‘only’ doing that are. But I make the mistake of thinking, of creating, and worst of all, of having more love. Isaac, with resigned humor and a slight bitterness, points to an easy solution — give up the boyfriend. But he knows that would hurt me, and he loves me, and that means he doesn\u2019t want me to hurt. It is a little bitter, the places we get ourselves into. <\/p>\n

Today I\u2019ve cheated a little bit and driven to a park a little ways up the trail where I usually run while my daughter is in her hours-long dance classes. I just couldn\u2019t stand running out as far as I had time to go — about 40 minutes — and then having to turn around and come back. I needed to see what was down the line on that trail. <\/p>\n

I\u2019m finally at the place again, after all the lying around and not being able to run, where five miles feels normal again, a baseline. It\u2019s not making a lot of difference to my body yet, though it feels good to be sore in the way you get when you\u2019re training. I need to lose eight pounds, and Chris needs to gain eight. With his disability, it is a constant struggle to keep him calibrated. It\u2019s the kind of thing people don\u2019t see unless they know him very well. I wish I could give him my weight. <\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

Often when I run, I do magic. I choose a compass direction, I pay attention to the magnetic lines of the paths and trails and roads I\u2019m passing along and the Earth energy I\u2019m passing over. I recite spells and mantras; I treat each footfall like a prayer wheel; I watch for birds and plants that might have messages. Even the mundane and man-made can be a message. I\u2019ve found playing cards, broken CDs, bits of paper with cryptic words to learn from. I pick up trash on some runs; other times I just keep on going. There\u2019s surprisingly little trash in the woods.<\/p>\n

I also ‘play’ music in my head. I never use earphones. Stupid move, not to be able to hear a bike or a car or another person coming up behind you; foolish move to cut yourself off from all that information and the sounds of the world around you. Because I\u2019m losing my hearing (as well as my eyes being a bit off; I\u2019m in a slow slide to becoming Helen Keller, though with a lot less graciousness and compassion), I have more appreciation, I think, for what I can hear. Today I\u2019m hearing Radiohead. Isaac took me to their concert last weekend as an anniversary present. I could feel that as a turn of the knife if I chose. I\u2019m a woman who doesn\u2019t remember, doesn\u2019t care, doesn\u2019t deal with anniversaries, birthdays, holidays. They\u2019re interesting bits of information astrologically, but beyond that, come on. I also don\u2019t like big arena shows. I also don\u2019t like spending large amounts of money for spectator experiences. <\/p>\n

This is what it\u2019s like for the people who love me. I\u2019ll tell them all the reasons why I can\u2019t get behind what they want to give. I\u2019ll tell them all the reasons why loving me and offering me anything at all is ridiculous. But if they persist, I\u2019m in. It was a great show.<\/p>\n

It\u2019s the same with writing. If it\u2019s for hire, OK, that\u2019s a craft and I struggle. But the rest doesn\u2019t have a whole hell of a lot to do with me. You sit down, and let the gods do their thing. They write it. This, I realize in crossing and recrossing a creek, is probably why I can\u2019t manage to get paid for any of what I have termed, for lack of a better word, my ‘real’ writing. Make the fucking check out to Esu, to Mercury, any number of the messengers who are my totems, to Thor or Pallas, to Eros or Eris, you tell me, because they rarely do. Tell me their names, I mean. They just tell me what they want to appear, and there it is. Thank you, thank you, thank you, I pray with each step. <\/p>\n

Don\u2019t think I\u2019m not thankful for this gift, even if I don\u2019t seem to know what the hell to do with it, and haven\u2019t figured out what the hell to do with it in what is now more than a quarter century of getting it, over and over. They could stop this minute if they chose. Is it an offering of love? Or am I being used, for some purpose of theirs I could divine if I had the time? Or both?<\/p>\n

I hear Thom Yorke\u2019s postmodern, Celtic hill-country reedy wail trail off in my head, like a passing train. In an interstellar burst… I\u2019m back to change the uuuuuu-niv-verse…<\/em> But the words aren\u2019t right. It\u2019s \u201csave the universe,\u201d not \u201cchange.\u201d Same thing?<\/p>\n

Since that first eclipse, I kept hearing that this is the day, this is the time, this is the point where the planets will click into a certain configuration, and everything will change. Did it, and I just can\u2019t see it yet?<\/p>\n

What do I want to change? The question is sounding with every footfall, here in the third mile. What do I want? What. Do. I. Want. I want to get paid for ‘real’ writing for the gods so I don\u2019t have to write evil shit for demons for money anymore. I want to love who I want, to accept them fully, without seeking to change them. I want the same for myself — I want to be loved not despite my flaws but in full recognition of them.<\/p>\n

The story of all this Gemini action — I\u2019m Gemini ascendant and identify most strongly with that sign — is that I will become more self-aware. But all the action, frustratingly, is still in my 12th house, not in the degrees in the 1st, where it would all be plain. I remember a long retrograde with Mars in my first house; running was so easy then. Powerful. Not with these configurations. Confusion, questioning, feeling like everything I want to be true is self-delusion. <\/p>\n

It\u2019s true that I have more awareness of all kinds. I am seeing auras like big billboards over people\u2019s heads, seeing the meaning behind everything they are doing and saying, seeing how they\u2019re shoring themselves up, bringing me and others down, deluding themselves and trying to fool me. I am in a continual game with both Isaac and Chris, catching them in what I see as unconscious — unaware — expressions of hostility and control. <\/p>\n

I say things to Chris like: \u201cI ask you what you would like to eat, and you inevitably name the one thing I don\u2019t have and can\u2019t give you. You do this so you can deny me the pleasure of satisfying you and so you can deny yourself satisfaction. You do this so you can say: I will not get what I want, I don\u2019t deserve to get what I want. I will be denied what I want even from the ones who love me. You do this so it will be easy to say someday that I\u2019m not good enough, that I don\u2019t really love you, and I will be easy to leave.\u201d<\/p>\n

I say things to Isaac like: \u201cYou call and ask me to do things around the house, and you give me minute instructions on when and how to do them, and you lie to yourself that you\u2019re doing this because you care about our home life. The reality is that you are trying to control me, to herd me, like a dog would, pushing me a little this way, a little that, back to the barn, because you are afraid I will graze my way into the woods and be lost forever — or worse, that I would survive. You do this because you want to rescue me, because you need to see yourself as a rescuer.\u201d <\/p>\n

This is not the way you endear yourself to the people you love. It might not even be the way to treat anyone. The boundaries of my awareness are as nebulous as everything else; I want everyone else to be ‘aware’ along with me. I\u2019m insulted, hurt, at the refusal of others to notice this acute perceptual ability I have. It\u2019s so amazing, and it\u2019s just pissing you off! How dare you! I seem to have no sense for how hurtful and invasive this demand of mine is. Realize that you are both my lover and my enemy, I am demanding, every day, not only realize it but love it, love what you are doing, the tragedy of our human inability to love without resentment, without jealousy, without wanting to hurt the same person for whom desire makes us ache. <\/p>\n

And I want them to love me for doing it, too. I don\u2019t know if this kind of love is possible.<\/p>\n

A messenger is not at ease in the 12th house. A messenger gets lost. There\u2019s no path, no taverns, no fresh horses waiting at each leg of the journey. You make the delivery to a hut overgrown with weeds, a place whose inhabitants, the ones who are supposed to receive the message, have long gone. So you break the wax seal and read the message, break the trust that is your only value as a messenger. The message is: Thank you, thank you, thank you.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

By Maria Padhila Each month at the New Moon, I put a different pendant on my silver chain to bring in that Moon\u2019s energy. This past New Moon, I put three charms on the chain: an ouroboros, a milagro of a woman\u2019s form, and a puffy silver heart, that last item from the handfuls of … Read more<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":7221,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"generate_page_header":""},"categories":[207],"tags":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/planetwaves.net\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/57973"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/planetwaves.net\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/planetwaves.net\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/planetwaves.net\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/7221"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/planetwaves.net\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=57973"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/planetwaves.net\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/57973\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/planetwaves.net\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=57973"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/planetwaves.net\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=57973"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/planetwaves.net\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=57973"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}