Conversations, karma calls, creating art ... and making Juk

Draco, with Ursa Minor or the Little Dipper, as depicted in Urania’s Mirror, a set of constellation cards published in London c. 1825.

I sit to write after waking just before (or was it after) midnight. It is newly 2020, two days old, a baby year. There was a dream needing to be washed with light, different images and nourishment; a bowl of nettles and oatmeal porridge with butter and maple syrup did the trick. And a new post makes the magic happen.

2019 was cleared and unplugged for us here in the Pacific Northwest with unexpected snow in Seattle; and wind, rain and power outages on Whidbey Island. Metaphoric and mythically, New Year's Eve was for us a necessary conclusion to a very intense year. Pete and I fled a year of betrayals, shuns and sadness at the start of 2019, and though we were blessed with kind welcomes, as an antidote, a final, and elemental cleanse was necessary ... and Lono the elemental god of Earth's atmosphere, did his work.

As metaphor, unplugged from electricity we experience 'powerlessness.' Mythically, the story that is more than science and logic pulls on the meanings, the kaona (the multiple levels of meaning), and the karma of needing to set things right across all-time, all ways. I have just finished reading James A. Owen's The First Dragon, the last of seven novels in The Chronicles of the Imaginarium Geographica. Reading the last book first could have been a real spoiler. But, the complexity and the rich new language and definitions of 'seemingly' familiar characters made the read a new world applicable without knowing the beginning.

"Limitations[.] When you use science, you by definition put things in boxes. You create limits. And thus it follows you would be bound by those limits. But doing what these young'uns do ...that is, literally and in every other sense of the word, art. And art has no limitation." - The First Dragon, by James A. Owen

A long time friend wrote me email the other day after I sent her an early release of  the tale, White Chocolate and a Yama Bell:

"It seems you have been fighting demons on the outside and the inside for a year or so and are wrestling some of them into a corner. I may be totally wrong. I may be projecting."

She was right, and if she projected it was a true image she saw. The details of my demons are too personal to lay out here, but it is important I think to acknowledge the demons have been trounced; I have cut my losses; Pete and I have had new conversations about old topics; and I have climbed aboard my dragon with a renewed definition of what it means to be 'dragon.' In literal ways I have walked out and away from my personal demons of being boxed in!

That same friend also said, "sometimes I think I get all the nuances in your stories and sometimes I fail." The wonderful thing, and the gift of this virtual conversation with my old friend is just that. We had the conversation!

Another email in response to that same post, supports how important conversation (whether in person, or through personal email) can be in the creation of Story. Story that holds us together; stories that are the recipes for growing a healthy tale bone. In that email, M wrote (in edited form):

"Mahalo for the honesty with which you share your " life at the edge”. When I can step back and look at the difference in resources between our friends who are “well-off”... with our friends who do not have a heated kitchen space, I am astounded. And I find it often difficult to not judge the friends who have so much, and still love them... I see the shift [we]are making about how much is enough….and the political stance of taking up much less space in the world, using far fewer resources, it is more exciting and challenging to me. It starts to feel less like a material beating and more like a choice.

Anyway, thanks for your bravery in a time of so many cowardices."

Again from The First Dragon,

" The reason I wanted to share that story, is so that you understand that all our choices are cumulative--and we must always keep the bigger picture in mind. Sometimes ... sometimes the stakes that are more personal can distract us from the goals that are more necessary to achieve. And that's -- that's when you must be resolute..."

The demons that needed to be challenged had to do with me finding and owning the value of my worth living within me; which is different than looking outward to Others who would proclaim me fit. Or successful. Or beautiful. Or ... They, the demons show themselves differently (how many names do we/they wear?) and so often my personal choices have distracted me. By reading a well-crafted myth like Owens's First Dragon, I have a way through the opened window of fairy tales -- my own trauma mirrored in that of imagined time travel; names given or stolen; karma being prison or gateway.

To commit to my value as a elder woman who was born purple means I write my way through each new day, night, and distraction like a double headed, or double tailed comet. Splitting my writing as I do here. Using blogger for all its worth, and make heART to keep my heart beating. Here on this 'virtual page' I imagine a world, include the real and truly-happening conversations and create art. This version of art is contemporary and what gratitude I have for being able to ride the tip of that iceberg.

Here is the latest installment of White Chocolate and a Yama Bell. Thank you to my readers and friends who feed me conversation, inspiration, engagement and financial support to keep growing the tale. I believe it matters that we create the story, and the world, we imagine.

 If you're hunger after all that reading, linking and considerations ...

Here's something wonderful to look forward to on a cool and rainy January

The recipe to make Juk is from one of my favorite cookbooks, Extra Helping Recipes for Caring, Connecting and Building Community One Dish At a Time by Janet Reich Elsberg

Click on the recipe to see them up close, and with your keyboard press the "+" key to enlarge.