Mating rituals

Last night I stood at the checkout at my local co-op. I had timed my purchase so it would seem natural that I would choose the line that led to the clerk I've been trying to meet.

She looked in my bag at the mass of lettuce, and as she paused I said "There's two heads of lettuce in there" - she nodded silently and started tapping keys - I continued "I'm trying that on the theory that two heads are better than one". The tapping stopped, and she slowly turned and met my eyes, a big grin forming. "That's funny" she laughed and I happily joined in. Her eyes lit up a little "You remind me of my Dad!".

I groaned "Oh my god, no", and, with wings sheared off I crashed and burned. I kept the happy grin, even improvised something that caused her to laugh again.

But I don't think I'll work very hard to get in that line again.

I've posted bio's on date.com and citypages and gotten a half dozen people expressing interest. I've gone out on two first dates and both women have been interesting and fun to talk to. I didn't have any intense feelings for either of them, and I'm pretty sure they felt that way too. In a way it's a nice re-introduction to dating. I had thought I might become friends with either or both of them as they had both asked if I would be open to that, but there doesn't seem to be much of a follow through - the e-mails and phone calls that preceeded the dates largely have ground to a halt. I'll give each of them another call and then decide on what I might want to do. I'm OK if nothing more happens.

I've been exchanging e-mails with a third woman - she is much more intense about exploring the depths of me and my spirituality, luckily something I truly enjoy talking about. We may be headed for meeting on Monday for a walk, and I'm really looking forward to it. I have no expectations and a friendship would be fine.

It's funny reading what I'm writing because I am really missing lovemaking. Making love is a storytelling - the slow unveiling, the gradual exploration, the growing excitement. I love being naked, twined legs and chest to breasts. I love varying the details of the story - coming up with new creations of physical fantasy, and I adore being surprised in turn. As anyone who reads this blog knows I take my time telling a story, and that's how I like to make love. Give me a long lazy afternoon, or an evening as the candles burn brightly down to puddles of wax. I like to take my time, explore every inch, every position. Pause to talk or silently hold. I want that again, and soon.

I guess I'm a little conflicted as to the goals of my dating, but I don't feel too bad about that. I have been blessed over and over again with finding the things I need, and I have faith that something will happen that will work for me. I *am* curious as to when and how and just a little impatient...

So, I've been out of the dating world for about 10 years - anybody have any suggestions?

Interiors

I sit at the shell table, watch the leaves silhouette black on the suddenly red blinds. I laugh at yet another small miracle in this place, wonder what pigment in the beige blinds colors the afternoon sun bloody.

The place has become 'The Treehouse' for those who visit here. Leaf rich vista and filtered sun are my daytime companions, shadowy leaves from the landscape light paint my ceiling and my dreams as I lie so peacefully at night.

Summer is here and the windows are closed, but I know come fall the air will again swirl and play in my home.

Green, gold, and sandstone. I planned to build that but was instead gifted. Henry was the first to notice that one wall had a greenish tint that nicely set off the other walls and carpet. His comment came as he sat on my homemade couch.

At 20 years I was broke and the need for money drove me to a weekend job cleaning out a defunct furniture manufacturer. The place was a long abandoned basement and the furniture that remained was buried under sawdust and cobwebs and laced with mildew.

Everything had to be carried up a flight of irregular stairs and at the end of the 20 hours of weekend labor I was given my choice of a couple pieces of furniture and 75 dollars. I was ecstatic about the latter and a bit bemused by the former. I finally took two foldout bed mechanisms and an enormous solid oak table, round on a pedestal. I needed a table for the mobile home I'd bought, and I thought it would be nice to have a foldout bed to give me more floor space when company called.

The table fit but barely, and I was able to store one bed mechanism at my parents. The other mechanism sat on the bedroom floor, accomplishing the exact opposite of my initial intent. Following the logic of desperation I designed a couch in my head that I could make from scrap 2x8's that I had found, and over the course of several weeks I glued up random pieces and borrowed tools to make the frame. I spent four dollars on stain and lags and had a serviceable couch albeit with no cushions.

It served as my bed for a couple days. My parents, always a source of entertainment for my destitute loneliness, called me one night and invited me to Penneys outlet store - free transportation and something to do appealed and I found myself wandering around the store. I was drawn far to the back and a pile of dust covered plastic plucked at my attention - some blowing and sneezing cleared the dust enough to see it was a set of cushions, gold and cream. I found a clerk and negotiated a price I could afford - three dollars. Arriving home I found the cushions fit perfectly and matched the already applied stain.

I tell Henry this story from my perch in one of my matched gold easy chairs. A little farther along in my 20's and I no longer starved for cash. I felt rich, although my current self laughs at that notion. Kirk, my best friend from grade school had been slowly spiraling into a terrible life of alcoholism, and I offered him a place to stay and get well - I thought that a life free of the stress of working and providing for himself would allow him to focus on his problem, and in a way it did.

The spiral tightened dramatically and after 18 months of excess he finally was caught committing a felony and fled the state. The two gold easy chairs that he came with remained and I decided to keep them, both as a cautionary note for myself and because they so perfectly matched the gold threads and tint of the couch.

The brass bowl in the center of the shell table picks up the red from the blinds and draws my attention - memories of Henry fade as I touch the shells lying in the bowl.

On April Fools I wrote about some mysterious shells I had found, and though the end of the story was fabricated, the odd appearance of the shells halfway up a cliff was both real and confusing. Over time I've come to believe the shells fell from a limestone cliff that towers above the trail.

Two days before I moved into the apartment I was obsessing about how to get the enormous oak table relocated and I was dismayed at how much of the apartment space it would take up. I didn't feel I had any options because I didn't want to be spending money right then and what little I did have I was going to use to buy chairs - another issue that was niggling away at me.

My poison ivy was receding but somewhere in the scratching I'd managed to pick up an infection in my elbow which flared in the middle of the night to hot skin and the bone ache I've come to associate with dire threat. I couldn't find an open urgent care and didn't want to go to emergency and so I decided on an old home remedy.

I boiled up some water, laced it with tea trea oil, and slowly parboiled my arm. After the first few seconds I was delirious with the pain and managed some sort of meditation that allowed me to keep my elbow in the near boiling water for 45 minutes.

The bone ache went away and though the arm was bright red it no longer screamed, and I went to bed relieved. A few hours later I woke when my fever broke and I retained a vivid image of a chair I had been dreaming of. My only thought was "That would be perfect for the apartment", and then I fell back to sleep.

The morning dawned cool and breezy with the sun bright yellow in the dry air, and I rose early for a long walk in a park well outside the city. The park is an enormous oasis of trees in a region of endless prairie, and I walked for miles in silent appreciation. The trail topped a hill and I noticed a pool of sun in the midst of ferns swirling in the breeze. I stood in the sun, looked at the blue filtering through waving leaves, breathed the scent of wood and foliage, raised my arms and chanted a prayer of thanks and expressed a desire for ongoing joy. I sunk into the moment, then a long while later slowly lowered my arms and gaze.

Between my feet was a shell, exactly like the shell I'd found in April in a park over 100 miles away. This park has no cliffs, and the only water was well over a mile away. Again I had no explanation and as I picked up the shell I simply laughed with the wonder of it all and the happiness persisted as I finished my hike.

Later that day I brought my son to a gathering at a park, and when lunch arrived I found there was nothing green for me to eat, so I left my son with friends and took off on my bike to go pick up something. It took longer than I wanted and so I was riding back to the park at full speed when something plucked at my attention as I passed a hedge. I whipped my head around and was shaken to catch a glimpse through the hedge of the chair of my dreams of the night before. It was so unexpected and I was in such a hurry I rode on and rejoined my son.

Hours passed and the two of us were walking home and I realized we were near the hedge, so we detoured and I found that the chair along with three others and a small solid oak round pedestal table was being offered for sale for $225. I loved the table and chairs but didn't feel I could afford it as I already owned a table, so I half-heartedly made an offer of $150 and left them my phone number. They didn't seem interested.

Later they called and told me the set was mine and I went and picked it up. As I was carrying the table balanced on my head up the steep part of my driveway I heard my son who was following behind proclaim "Daddy, there's a shell in the driveway". I was a little shocked at the synchronicity of that but I couldn't look because my head was locked to my shoulders by the weight of the table, so I kept walking into the dark garage. I eased the table down and my son darted around me, did something and said "Daddy, your new table is the shell table!".

I turned on the garage light and found that my son had set the walnut shell he'd found dead in the center of the table - the table I sit at now, the table that matches the chairs and the couch and the room.

I'm on the right path.

Here's looking at you!

It's been a while since I've responded to comments on my posts. Frankly it is all I can do to even write the posts right now, but it is just simply wrong to not acknowledge all the generous and wonderful things that have been said.

Melody - there isn't a person more opposite from me in the entire world, but somehow we've formed a solid friendship. Thank you for the support and letting me be a guest blogger on your site. Of course my post seems to have tanked your blog for the day - something had to slow you down!

Nicky - your friendship, supportive comments, and excellent advice have helped me tremendously. Folks, if you like the photos on this blog, go see Nicky's pictures - she has an incredible eye for nature and art photography - absolutely wonderful work.

Minerva, I've had a bit of a time following your various incarnations but I think I can spot the writing style - you are unique! Your writing is poetic and pointed, and I've so appreciated your presence here.

Jay - I really liked your comment that souls were fragments of a larger single soul. There is a resonance to that thought and I will spend time on my walks thinking about the implications. A part of me believes that something so beautiful has to be true somewhere.

Lu - If I can ever stop orbiting my center and get back to occupying it, I plan on spending a lot more time visiting your site. I've really appreciated your comments and the fun things you've said. Thanks!

Pearl - thank you for taking the time to tell me your thinking. At the moment I'm opposed to any relationship that requires significant work, as your comment seems to imply, because the relationship I've just gotten out of was a more than full time job. I'm willing to work on my next one but I need to have something far more than just being in a relationship to motivate me. I do love the notion of exploring each other...

Leanne - Nature photographer and artist and almost my neighbor! Well, at least by blog standards. Thank you for your comments and stopping by...

kenju - you sound like you have a lot more to say on this subject, and I wish you would. Thanks for your comment!

Dani - Thank you for letting me know you are out there - I've been reading your blog and love what you have to say...

xtessa and Ally - Wow, I never expected anyone to actually offer some proof that my thoughts may be relevant... Thanks so much!

... I had thought to go right down the list and thank everyone but I don't think I'd realized how long it's been since I responded to comments. I think I'm going to need to focus more of my energy on that. I finally, finally, had a moment of centeredness yesterday so I'm hoping I will be able to communicate easily again sometime soon.

I want to end with this quote included in a comment from phoenix - this is so appropriate and parts of it are just beautiful. Thank you.

"Love therefore—the most beautiful phenomenon in the soul-filled creation, the omnipotent magnet in the spiritual world, the source of devotion and of the most sublime virtue—Love is only the reflection of this single original power, an attraction of the excellent, grounded upon an instantaneous exchange of the personality, a confusion of the beings.

When I hate, so take I something from myself; when I love, so become I so much the richer, by what I love. Forgiveness is the recovery of an alienated property - hatred of man a prolonged suicide; egoism the highest poverty of a created being."

--Friedrich von Schiller

Flying Free

I've been thinking a lot about relationships for the last several months. For a long time all that I wanted was to be single again. I believed I could never really be happy with anyone because the things that I believe and feel just didn't seem to make sense to anyone else.

Then I met TB, and found that there are other people like me, and more recently I noticed a couple I described way back in this post.

It's gotten me thinking about what I think relationships are really about, and what I would like to have if I ever find myself in a relationship again.

I think the glows and symbols I see floating around people are their essence - I think for my purposes I will call it a soul. I believe in most cases a soul needs to work through the body to form connections. I suspect that the souls attachment points or focal points are the chakras, and I wouldn't be surprised if the types of relationships that are possible correspond to the characteristics of chakras. I haven't really followed that line of thought much, but something about it rings true to me.

I think the notion that the soul is trying to make it's connections through the filter of the body explains a lot of the grief I see in relationships. The body has eons of evolutionary programming and often operates in survival mode. Part of what a real relationship is about is giving up some of yourself, and the body fights that notion.

It seems like many of the things I strive for, an orderly mind, greater sensitivity and connection to the deeper levels of the world around me, noble behavior - it seems like all these things could be construed as trying to let my soul have a more pure ability to connect to things.

I think the two couples I've seen with similar glows have somehow managed to join their souls. In the case of the red couple in the park, something about them tells me the connection is not the result of them working very hard to free their souls. The fact that their glows feel and look so similar to me leads me to guess that they are truly the same and somehow meant for each other. I'm guessing this sort of connection is extremely rare.

In the case of Gedda and Sylvia, their glows felt and looked a little different. Hers was a little smoother and more golden, his rougher and weathered toward gray. My sense is that when they were together their glows merged in a way that I can't really visualize anymore, although I dimly have a sense memory of the swirl and interplay. It felt like they were making slow love whenever they were near one another.

I think in their case they had done a lot of soul work. I didn't talk much to Sylvia, but Gedda had a lot of stories to tell of his life and it seemed to me that he had always been soulful but had had a long journey to become the peaceful and joyful person he was at the time I met him.

For the last several weeks I haven't been able to be centered in any meaningful way - it isn't that I'm off center, it's that I'm completely fragmented. In one way it's nice because I'm unable to sustain any long term negative feelings, but I miss my feelings of connected joy and celebration of nature.

On Monday I was walking out in Afton, a park an hours drive from my apartment. The sun was low on the horizon and had that extra tone that makes the greens in the grass look lush and rich and the shadows velvety deep. The butterflies played and birdsong was everywhere, yet the deer and rabbits ran from me long before I could get near them and while I appreciated the beauty I didn't feel a part of it.

I walked in this state for a while, then realized I'd been having a sense of warmth and connection with earlier times in my life. As I thought about it further I realized these memories of feelings were being evoked by the scents of the prairie and wood, and as I breathed more deeply I realized that I'd never smelled anything quite like what I was smelling. While the scent was nothing like vanilla, it had that wonderful warmth that vanilla communicates - something like the warmth of real butter melting on your tongue. It was incredible and my sense of what was happening was that I was being taken care of, therapied, by the trees and plants that I was walking through.

I had an incredible rush of love and affection - I felt wonderfully rewarded and grateful for the gift Afton was sharing with me. I guess I don't know why Afton takes care of me, but I feel the relationship is something mutual, and I think that it is a pure connection of souls.

I truly believe I am one of the lucky people that can have a soul to soul relationship. I don't necessarily need that to have the life of joy and inspiration that I desire, but I think it would add a lot.

I think the reason a soul joins a body is to have experiences the soul alone can't have. I think with a soul to soul connection each soul will have two bodies experiences to draw on - two sets of eyes, ears, and all.

I wrote that latter paragraph without any thought, but now that I read what I wrote I realize I have proof of being able to tap into another persons senses. The thing that held my wife and I together for so long was the physical connection, and at times of intense passion I'm able to very specifically feel what my wife is feeling and wanting. It's a source of great joy for me and I think it creates a lot of pleasure for my partner. I've always longed for the connection to flow more strongly the other way. I'd love for my partner to feel what I'm feeling. I can imagine that if both partners were experiencing each others feelings there would be a multiplying of feelings - not just an adding. Echoes of each other reflecting to infinity.

Whew! I need a moment...

I think I'll end this now - I know I need to wave my hands around and talk really loudly to make any of this work, but I think I may have stumbled on to something. What do you think?

Coming home

I look at my swollen hand, still throbbing from being smashed between moving trailer and garage. It looks a bit ominous and I wonder if I'll be centered enough to perform my clearing ceremony. Poison ivy, stubbed toe, smashed hand, the physical damage grows and I know that I'm far from harmony. I worry that it means I'm going the wrong direction but then think of all the small synchronicities in finding and furnishing the apartment, all the friends that have suddenly reappeared, and I know I am on the right path, strange though it may be.

I turn the knob on the stove and love the flame. Too long I've tried to cook with electric burners and I look forward to making my own food again. I hold the sage wand in the flame, admire the blue and red binding, colors I normally have little connection with. It's good symbolism for a new beginning, an opening of doors to new things.

Rich smoke curls up, swirls towards the cabinet and then dips and forms a circle. The apartment is breezy and the smoke takes full advantage of the live air. I've fallen into a profound meditative state, and my hands move of their own volition - right hand tracing the lines of the cabinets and walls, left hand holding a brass bowl inlaid with gold and red glaze, a gift from my grandma long ago.

I hold the thought of my grandma, remember how welcome everyone always felt in her presence. I try to bring that feeling to my ceremony and will the smoke throughout the room. I slowly spiral along the walls, getting to know the space and letting the space become comfortable with me.

I arrive back at the stove and with a final prayer I lay the wand in a vase, companion to the bowl I set beside it.

I pick up a sweet grass braid and push my desire for friends new and old to feel at home in my new dwelling, then with a flourish I tack it to the outside of my door.

This place, this airy space floating in the treetops, feels good. It isn't my home, but it is a place I can grow and open myself to new possibilities. And maybe, just maybe, the home I always have longed for will come to me.