today is 3 years since Callum died
There are times when your memory stitches experiences into your DNA
It's like time slows down and you take every single thing in because you know it's transformational
You remember details and feelings that you shouldn't
The chaos feels more like calm
I was laboring in a stock tank pool when we realized he died
Brandon randomly asked the last time I felt him move
A wave of peace rolled over me
I knew
It had been a while
I was distracted while getting deeper into labor
I couldn't feel his energy anymore
What used to be internal became external
I remember feeling a hand on my shoulder
Letting me know I was protected and had to let everything unfold the way it was going to
This was the start of the rest of our lives
I knew I wanted to be sharp and awake, to take in every detail
I kept telling myself to not go numb, to open my eyes to everything that I was being shown
I'm still not ready to share my labor story and all the things that unfolded through Callum's death
This is a story that keeps growing and changing and moving with his sweet spirit
His death brought me ambivalence
I used to sit here and feel a lot of anxiety not seeing the answers
Not being able to sit with all the discomfort and unending lack of answers
Now I have the ability, like those images of Ascended Beings, to hold many of my hands out to many Truths
Ambivalence is a beautiful balancing act
And I'm forever floating between anger and acceptance, gratitude and grief, rage and resentment
And guess what-- they're all there to teach me some lessons about love and loss and I'm okay with each one sticking around for a while
So my view is a little different today
Bea is playing (in a different stock tank pool) in the water at the edge of Callum's garden
Our little light, from the other side, is always shining down and bathing us in his love
Happy Death Day sweet boy 🌈❤ we love love love you and the changes you keep bringing to our lives
baking is the work of a magician
Baking is the work of a magician
Someone who is able to quiet themselves enough to let the ingredients guide them
Baking is shamanic practice
You open a space with intention
You have various ingredients, tools, and honed talents at your disposal
Each session is different
You're forced to work through your shit and your doubts and your mistakes-- which usually happens when you THINK instead of RESPOND
If you're in a receptive and intuitive space-- allowing all things to flow, from spirit to heart to hands-- your creations will be infused with power and life
It's a pleasure to watch this process
It's a pleasure to taste this process
I remember watching my mother and great grandmother moving in their shared kitchen-- their place of sustenance and story
Their place of truth
I remember the flavors
I remember the love
The kitchen is the core of our identity
When we're in the right frame it is a place where we fully express ourselves-- inhabiting our body in an aligned and magnified way that is most like a spiritual possession
Something bigger than us is moving through us
We quiet ourselves knowing the sacredness
We hear the whispers of our ancestors in our DNA-- today I feel it hard
They are telling me how much cumin or oregano to throw in a pot-- just enough, when is best, taste taste taste
I merely get out of the way and let them do the work
I'm not sure if you all have this experience but I was shown in ceremony, years ago, that Happy Belly had the potential to act as a vehicle to bring my family's lineage of radical rebellion to others in the sweetest way possible-- dessert
I hear my ancestors whisper: a spoonful of sugar helps the medicine go down
This might seem so small sometimes, what we do
But I feel like I'm riding the big waves today
Knowing that I have the vision and connection with my people to bring this insane dream into reality
Now that I'm 8 years deep, I have no idea how I got here. Just trying to listen again to what the next steps are
Anyway here's to the kitchens and farm land of my people: my favorite places to be myself and find myself
Truly hallowed ground
lake street mn
this is a couple blocks from the protests in Minneapolis
we spent some time roaming Lake St last summer
these neighborhoods, and Minneapolis and St Paul in general, are peppered with "all are welcome here" and ❤ signs to promote their openness and inclusivity
these signs felt hollow last year-- especially butting up against art made for the community by members of that community
they certainly feel hollow now
the intention is obvious but the truth sits just below the surface and it's convenient for (white) people to ignore the realities of life for MANY
legislatively Minneapolis is moving toward more progressive politics, but the SYSTEM is what will take forever to shift/dismantle/burn the fuck down
it takes VERY LITTLE PRESSURE for (white) people to revert to patterns of racist behavior-- no matter how self-proclaimed "progressive" they are
it takes SO MUCH EFFORT and education for (white) people to question the deep-rooted systems of oppression-- let alone a ton of effort to actually CARE, let alone even more effort to acknowledge what they believe might actually be WRONG
here's my request: white people born into racist families, please speak up
show everyone your family's dirty shit
teach other (white) people that this shift starts at home with massively awkward conversations-- and realize that if you're not taking a stand and speaking truth to assholes at home, you won't be doing it out in the world
we need you to step up because you have figured out how to do the hard work to change your brainwashing despite your reinforced conditioning
we can't keep relying on black people to do this work for us
what's happening on the street is a reflection of what's going on inside-- the rage is deep,the grief is deep, shit needs to change
mother's day
despite all the love, I really can't stand Mother's Day 🤷♀️ gonna be 💯 things get REALLY weird after your kid dies
There's this vast emptiness that you sit with pretty much everyday
It's totally uncomfortable, totally beautiful, totally yours, and totally reflected back to you when you look at your other kid
It's intimate and isolating
Nothing can possibly fill it-- certainly not other children or family or friends or work or hobbies or substance. They all help dull the sharpness of it, but it's still there
When celebrations come around each year that vastness tends to cozy up
I'm relatively new to this world of child loss. It'll take years to learn its terrain. But FUCK! this shit is really hard to sit with and TOTALLY different than losing a parent
The amount of contradictions I live with makes my head hurt some days
I remember how raw my first Mother's Day was-- undistilled rage. Screaming, crying, pleading while pregnant with Bea. Praying that she wouldn't die too
I though my second Mother's Day would feel like a relief because Bea was here. Instead I felt defeated and ashamed
No amount of distractions can make you stop feeling
Knowing what I was going to deal with this year👌😂 I decided to take a walk in the woods to figure out a better way to live with the big empty
Here's what came back:
Your grief is bigger than you
You can't control grief but you can control the way you process and surrender to it
Give the big empty a name
Feel out its shape and attributes (Does it have a sound, does it have a taste, etc)
So after the messages came I asked out loud (to whichever spirits were in attendance 😉): what do I call the BIG EMPTY?
I immediately hear: LOVE
Seriously? Really? Fuck you
After the initial rage, I sat with it and thought what calling it LOVE would actually do for me
It felt like little earthquakes under my feet. Like my world started to shift 🤏 like a bit of brightness on a real shit day
New story to tell this year: I made Callum's favorite cake (Sicilian blood orange almond), painted a sign for his garden (hostas, nettles, ferns), played with my loves in the dirt, and heard some voices in the woods speak some truth 😉😂👻
beltane
Beltane 🌿 Celebration
Yes, Bea is drumming some moss with a stick
Yes, that's a random bone behind her that she loved investigating
Yes, she was trying to tickle us with that pine needle cluster and eventually whacked us with it instead
We spent this day (Sunday) walking in the woods with @lindamariebunt ❤ showing Bea all the wonderful things to honor and celebrate-- all the abundance and love our area has to offer
We showed her trout lilies and periwinkle. Had her touch moss and lichen. We asked her to smell the sap from the pine trees and feel it's stickiness between her fingers. We broke some sticks for her to use as wands. We talked to her about the bears we saw that morning by the pond. We got quiet so we could listen to the woodland birds. Did it again once the peepers started their low sun song
Nothing better than spending the day in communion, while knowing that celebrating these Celtic rites is not a static practice
They stay with us everytime we walk in the woods-- everytime we take a deep breath of sweet cedar and feel it ease our bodies. Everytime we sit and observe (or play and engage!) It's alive all the time-- and it's comforting to know our place within the great wheel
Happy times