Parting With Sweet Sorrow

 

http://sorrow11.wordpress.com/2008/12/27/farewell-my-friends/

For someone who pulls the “hermit card and holds it with great fondness”, I’m sure glad you decided to walk the labyrinth of the blogosphere and grace us with your generous heart for the past year and a half. 

You have taken blogging, and with your creative spirit, you’ve succeeded in extracting from your readers their own generous hearts, showing them that with a little reflection, some creativity, a lot of patience, and a heartful of love, we accomplish much as human beings. 

Thank you for your stories, your reflections, your comments here and at other bloggers’ homes.   Thank you for sharing your gift of gathering people together.   Thank you for your wisdom.    But most of all, thank you for your example, for walking the talk, for showing that no matter how full one’s life is, it is never too full to offer and receive Love. 

You are cherished, dear Sorrow.  I wish you many blessings to you and your family.  And I say, farewell to you…

…….but not farewell
To all my fondest thoughts of thee:
Within my heart they still shall dwell;
And they shall cheer and comfort me.
O, beautiful, and full of grace!
If thou hadst never met mine eye,
I had not dreamed a living face
Could fancied charms so far outvie.

(Anne Brontë)

You posted a  quote once,  by Richard Bach, which inspired me to read his books: 

Don’t be dismayed by good-byes. A farewell is necessary before you can meet again. And meeting again, after moments or lifetimes, is certain for those who are friends.

Here’s to meeting again, Mama Bear, over tea…..

Love, Chantal xoxoxox

None Shall Sleep Tonight

I know my dreams may be of interest only to myself, but I had to write about something soon before I completely lost my courage to write. 

On the night before Christmas Eve, I dreamt I gave birth to a baby, in a strange house, with a midwife.  In my real life, I actually did give birth to my children at home with midwives.  But in my dream, I was at the age I am now (almost 42), re-married like I am now, and I was telling the midwife that this experience of giving birth was different from my other two (yeah, no kidding).  First, I told her, I didn’t have the people there that I wanted; I was alone with the midwife, no children, no husband….I didn’t dream  the actual giving birth part,  just afterwards.  I didn’t see my baby, it was taken somewhere, and I was waiting for it, in the room I gave birth in.  I was straightening out the bed, the things on the dresser….the midwife seemed distracted, worried about getting back to her family in time, she was mostly packing up her gear, not really taking care of me.  At one point, there was a woman from my work who was there, then she left.   Then alot of drunk people were in my room,  and I was shooing them away, they were trying to sit on my bed and I was moving them out the patio doors into the early evening, telling them I couldn’t have them being here, drunk and lighting up cigarettes, when my baby was going to be brought back any minute.  I found myself walking outside, with the idea of going to get my baby, but there was water water water everywhere, as if there had just been a flood or a huge rainstorm.  I was acutely aware of the colour yellow, as if everything was yellow.   A woman with short blond hair told me to wait, she was going to get her car and help me.  But I didn’t wait, I turned back and returned to the room, where the midwife was.  I didn’t know why I was waiting for my baby, why I didn’t have it with me.   When I returned, my son, P was sitting there with his father (my ex-husband), and apparently they had seen the baby and spent time with it.  I thought it would have been a girl, and I wanted to name her Maria, but they said it was a boy, and I was glad, but couldn’t think up a name for him. 

Throughout the dream, I was waiting for my baby, who wasn’t coming….I never saw the baby.  I don’t know what this means.  I was disturbed when I woke, I didn’t tell my husband (who loves to hear about my dreams, as he seems to think I have such vivid recollections), and I felt strange all morning, until I got home on Christmas Eve day after work, and my husband  and I spent the afternoon preparing to welcome the kids for Christmas Eve.

I know the obvious reasons for dreaming this dream right before  Christmas Eve, on the night we celebrate Christ’s birth.  Also, I know how sometimes, things that happen during the day serve as triggers for what you dream about at night.  On the day before Christmas Eve, I was driving around, doing last-minute errands, and was overcome with these strong feelings of  wanting to have a child with my husband, and burst into this weird, hormonal tear-fest in the car.    Before you jump to any conclusions, I am very happy with my two children, and will not be having any more.  I know that these are normal feelings to have for someone you love, to want to create a life with them.  Except holy mack, in that moment, I REALLY felt this surge of complete & pure love, it was this primal need and deep desire to have a child with this wonderful, generous man who has fearlessly taken me on to be his true companion. 

So it’s no wonder I dreamed what I did….except it’s the baby part I’m not getting, why was the baby taken away, why didn’t I get to see it, why was I waiting waiting waiting, why wasn’t it returned to me?   Maybe the baby was a symbol for something else in my life, something that’s gone now, some vulnerability that I’ve lost.    If you lose your vulnerability, it stands to reason that you gain strength of some sort.  Being vulnerable like a baby is being unprotected, open to being wounded and hurt, physically or emotionally.   It’s interesting that the verb vuln comes from vulnerable, and means to wound oneself by biting at the breast, and that the pelican (of whom it was believed to  feed its young with its blood by vulning itself) is a symbol of Christ. 

This is not making alot of sense, I know, but the more I think, the more I reflect, the more these ideas take shape in my heart….in my faith….. in my attempts at trying to translate my love into actions…. in trying to capture or re-capture my essence, which I feel has been knocked off its kilter.   

The past few months, I’ve been adjusting  to life with my new husband, to life with my children with my new husband, to parenting a pre-teen-going-on-25,  to finding the confidence I need to fit into this world once I’ve figured out where I fit into this world.

None Shall Sleep Tonight is the English translation of  Nessun Dorma, (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O0Sx5lbVlQA),  Puccini’s aria in Turandot, which is my favourite.  It never fails to thrill  and inspire me everytime I hear it.  (For more inspiration and making dreams come true, see this: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1k08yxu57NA&feature=related ).  As I’m writing this, I have my iTunes on shuffle, and Chris Botti is playing a beautiful rendition of Nessun Dorma on his trumpet (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=exfNMsUm7Nk).  I reflect on my baby dream and these lyrics from an opera written nearly 80 years ago, a reminder that nighttime thoughts and dreams are revealed at daybreak, when the light shines.

 

Love,

Chantal xoxox

Dear Little Blog

I’m sorry.  I’ve been neglecting you.  I HAVE been thinking about you, but that doesn’t quite cut it, does it?  So what if I’m thinking of you?  Thoughts are not the same as giving attention, nurturing, loving, caring.  So what if I have a gazillion thoughts and ideas in my head, a myriad of things I want to fill you up with, dear little Blog?  They mean nothing if I can’t find the wherewithal to even come into your house with my special pass key.   I sometimes feel so neglectful of you, that I can’t even face the screen that asks for my user name and password.  What if you spurn me, what if you pout and don’t ever want to open yourself up to me again?  What if I let this go so long that I can’t find the passion that I felt initially?  Or the courage to even come and say hello?

It’s kind of been like a crisis, trying to regain my momentum and write again.  Never mind the momentum…it’s balance that I’m seeking.   Equilibrium.  I know where the answer lies…..I know I just have to let it be and it will come.  That the more I look to be balanced, the more it eludes me. 

http://fc69.deviantart.com/fs32/f/2008/231/7/4/Rotational_Equilibrium_by_xentek.jpg

In my defence, I do want to let you know, dear little Blog, that I have had reasons for not visiting you, let alone spending a few hours with you where you gladly take in my musings.  You know my family life has changed a little now,  my husband is by my side, my son is now living with us full time while my daughter continues alternating between our home and her father’s home.  There are MANY things that require one’s attention when one becomes a blended family, and although every night my husband and I remark that despite the struggles we feel that things are going much better than we expected, there are still alot of emotions and personalities to consider. 

And at work, lots of changes there, too, that need some getting used to.    And my faith, I sometimes struggle, sometimes not….And I’m not sleeping so good.  And I need to exercise more but don’t feel like it because I’m not sleeping so good.  And I’d like to not be so darn sensitive and cry at the drop of a hat.   And children need their mother, even when they act like they don’t, even when they cause you worries and tender moments, sometimes back-to-back.    I seem to be whining, dear little Blog, as if I’m finding excuses and justifications to ignore you, but I’m not.  I have everything to be thankful for, and  so much to write about, but these things that form the core of my life are all-consuming at the moment. 

So here’ s my olive branch, I ask you just to be patient a little while longer, dear little Blog, while I try to find the center, knowing that I get such pleasure and satisfaction, and deep personal gratification from sitting down and filling you up with my thoughts. 

 

Love,

Chantal xoxoxoxo