Laundry Line Divine

What about you? Will it take a crisis to inspire you to live an authentic life? Or are you doing it already? What inspires you to live more authentically? What impetus in your life has woken you up to the person you really are? Do you feel like you’re living your truth? Are you letting your freak flag fly? If not, what’s holding you back? What next steps could you take to being more YOU?

This writing prompt is from Lissa Rankin, MD and Sister Goddess Extraordinaire. Lissa’s blog Owning Pink is a great resource for women. And, we are both members of shewrites, a gathering place for women writers, where Lissa posed the questions you read above. What about you? Here is what I wrote. Bare naked truth.

Lissa, I love that you are asking this question just now. I read your blog on “Owning Pink” last night and fell asleep with the question of what I could ask for, what unspoken ache seeks fulfilling. Then, this morning, you appear here on shewrites to jog me another time. Thank you Sister for flying your flag so high above the chaos of mothering, work and holidays to be seen by me.

Gratitude to Owning Pink and shewrites.

I do both. Own Pink and write.

Yet, over and over again, I trip as if there are logs rolling in my path and I am not a born burler. Simple things like snow on the steps barring the way of the longed for mail man or laundry, which I love to do, pull me from my studio and all the sudden it is 5 pm and I have not taken a bath- which I started out to do at 9 am. I make lists, all very well intentioned, but, the pile that stands before me captures a few hours, then time to fetch kids, make dinner, wade through homework assistance and evening things, then, I am tired…but not tired enough to be on Facebook which led me to Owning Pink last night, which leads me here.
Right now.
And so, I guess, the next move is to gratitude because without all of that, I would not be here. Would I?

The person I really am is one who lives the lush life of a fortunate woman, whatever the conditions are- the woman I really am is happy. I am the generator of all those logs in my path- whether it is my overflowing knitting basket, emails for committees I will not sit on, phone calls, writing ideas on chits of paper strewn from apron pockets to my purse, art art art everywhere- in stages of creation, glue, sparkles and postcards just waiting for that mailman…. the work of a domestic woman, full time Mom and full time Artist- where each role shortens the hours for the other- I created this and I am grateful.

I could be without inspiration or passion.
I could be apathetic about the house, the kids, or our community.
I could be at a job where I am torn away from these rhythms, but I am not. I am here, at home, studio and kitchen, poised for the logs and the love.

My freak flag is the flag of a fortunate woman. I have chosen to be a stay at home Mom and in this role; I have unfurled the wonder of my artwork and writing. It started when I had small pockets of time to create, then spread in to everything I do. Gardening led to a backyard orchard led to preserving the harvest led to seed saving and being the volunteer garden teacher at my kids’ school.
Needlework led me to knitting and a circle I have met with weekly for 13 years and a web of community I could not otherwise have created. The journal writing I started at 14 has led me to a daily practice for 38 years and to my first book, a blog and dreams of much more. Sustaining and nurturing my inner world through yoga and relational work has led me to being a certified TriYoga teacher and a 3 time graduate of the School of the Womanly Arts and to The Seven Sacred Steps.Collaging begun in scrapbooks when I was 4 years old has led me to a passion for image and texture, a 4-year mail art collaboration and the beginnings of a career as an exhibiting artist and teacher of transformation through art.
Hunger to grow my marriage of 17 years has led to many, many wonderful days of adventure with my husband, in daily life and our morning check-ins to travels abroad alone or with the kids, swing dance classes, ice skating on black ice together in the winter wind and swimming in the Great Lakes. There are many facets of my life I have not mentioned here but I hope you see the pattern, like ripples on water, one thing leads to another and I choose to consider them blessings.

I am a fortunate woman. I have turned challenges in to gifts because of my appetite for joy. A terrifying prospect of uterine imbalance led to a hysterectomy that I called my Sacred Release. The weeks before the surgery were shifted from panic to celebration because I knew if I had to make it through, I had to lean in to the things that bring me joy- and the way through was gratitude. Same for my Mother’s dying, just 2 months gone now. Gratitude. My husband and I sat with her for her last breathes.
Gratitude. Sorrow, surely, but gratitude allowed us to celebrate her to her very last moment of life and fueled the days after as we gathered family to remember Mom.

So, in answer to your question Lissa, it is gratitude that has woken me up. The things I once thought hindered me, actually fuel me. I learned this practice first in Al-Anon, as I recovered my ability for healthy relationships with people who have alcohol issues. Then, at the School of the Womanly Arts, I learned to give thanks for every small and big thing and to party where I am. I make gratitude lists when I feel low or not enough. I write thank you notes, sincerely felt and carefully composed. I teach my kids to write them to, because I think it is important to acknowledge what we have been given. We say a grace of thanks before each meal, no matter how many eyes are rolling. We say thank you.

And, I suffer pangs of doubt, oceans of grief, tangles of sorrow that my book will never come in to being, that my kids will become slackers, or that my work will dissolve in to passing wind.

But, I go on. I am pulled by love. An insatiable appetite for beauty and joy pulls me forward. I am pulled on and out because I want to share my stories in hopes that someone else will find their candle lit and burning brightly.

Thank you for asking Lissa.
Love, Suzi

This may startle you a bit. I have been keeping a journal since I was 14. I am 51, about to be 52 in September. That means the heavy selves of spiral bound notebooks that take up a bit of real estate here in my studio contain pages and pages of my scratchy handwriting.

I began keeping a journal steadily in Mr. Dedic’s Junior English class. He was just one of the many fine teachers I had at Escanaba Area Public High School. I have the notebook right here. We wrote on Edgar Lee Masters’ Spoonriver Anthology, he allowed us to write ‘tho’ instead of ‘though’ and assigned us to make daily entries. That was all the impetus I needed. As a jumpstart for those early pages, I started keeping lists. I was years away from encountering Julia Cameron’s “The Artist’s Way” with her perspective on journal keeping.

I just plowed through several stacks of journals to find the page you see below. This list was written in the year of my 21st birthday. I was still working at Bay Cliff in the summer and in the heart of my years at Northern Michigan University, doing theatre, dance and working with kids doing both of those activities. Judging from what I wrote, I had a sense of the world ahead.

On the facing page to this journal entry are cellophane taped-in magazine pictures of fresh fruits, pasta with basil, kefir in clear pitchers and beautifully arranged vegetables. This particular notebook is full of stuff I stuck in-poems by friends, church bulletins, newspaper clippings, notes from my college boyfriend who I was madly and a bit sadly in love with at the time, photos and letters. I wrote lots of lists- food I’d like to try, places to go, music I’d like to hear, presents I’d love to have which included things like a diamond ring, new tennies, and to swim in a river. The “we” I allude to in this list must mean me and BZ, that boyfriend. Hmm. I have long lost him, but gained so many other gifts. There are many things I have accomplished in these 30 years.

Over at my pal Jennifer Gandin Le’s website, she posted her “Mighty Life List”. You will find her in my blogroll. Jennifer’s writing is what got me thinking about the miles and miles of lists I have kept. I am going to post a new “Mighty Life” list here on the Laundry Line. But before I do that, I want to take a moment to value and offer gratitude for what I have attained.

This is what jumps off the page today:

We- and here I mean me and my husband- have a hammock that swings under tall trees, namely a linden and an oak.
I have a sewing room that is also an ironing room, yarn storage and closet for winter clothing and Jonathan’s hanging clothes.
Just this year I bought a pair of Frye boots. Nice timing.
I live in New England and don’t really hanker after brown bread anymore.
I went to a mountain spa in Steamboat Springs this winter- Strawberry Hot Springs, which is heaven.
I have sat under and sketched many palm trees in many different locations.

There are many things I have done, but mainly, I brag I do have kids- I love many kids more than the 2 who call me Mom. We do own our own home and it has a big, clean kitchen, though I share it freely with the rest of my family!

My life is filled with so many blessings. Today most of all, a year after a tumultous health passage for me and just 2 days after a smaller but traumatic moment for Jonathan, I can say we are all blessed with good health. And the finest of friends all over the world. Looking at this list reminds me of all I have lived in these 30 years. Offering gratitude for this cornucopia of blessings, experiences, challenges and joy keeps me in touch with the Sacred with every breath. Thank you Goddess, I will take more.

As I write this I got a notification from Tammy McLeod’s blog “AgriGirl”- she is writing about journalling today too. You can link to her over in my blogroll.

Jennifer posted a photo of herself as a young girl as a reminder to be gentle on herself as she scribes her desires for the future. This is a photo of me from the month I wrote that list 30 years ago. Pretty hopeful bundle of hair I had there.

In light of all the earthly events making the news this week, of losses my friends are having like dear Martha Burkes dying on Wednesday, of Haiti, of all that oil…I cannot stop living the life I have here today. I send my love to each of those hearts of need, all over the planet. And as a pledge to the Divine, I will live this one Mighty Life, right here in the shade of the Laundry Line.

I am heading out to the garden to ponder my Mighty Life List. I will fill the bird baths and sing a song of gratitude for all I have done since I wrote that list of ‘Temptations’ back in Big Bay.

How about you? Got a Mighty Life List to share?
I’d love to read it.
Yours, S

Retreat.
4 days of yoga and art at Kripalu- just up the road from my desk here in Great Barrington, but hundreds of miles away. “Vibrant Visionary Collage” with Karen Arp Sandel and 11 other delicious women was a huge gift I received this week.

My roster of gratitudes would make a mile long list here, but I am going to share some with you all the same. At this Portal to this Mysterious Female, gratitude is the entrance fee. With it, you can enter your own garden of lush creativity and grace, finding all that you have been blessed with on any simple day.
I am so grateful for the time away at Kripalu.
IAG for the support of my fine husband for covering all he did this week with the kids, his work, our family, track practice and radio plans, meals and laundry.
IAG for my husband picking me up today.
IAG for the sun in my bedroom where I just took a nap to prepare for the homecoming of kids from school.
IAG for color.
IAG for the underside of the red tail hawk, it’s soft colors against the brilliant blue sky today at lunch.
IAG for the labyrinth at Kripalu.
IAG for the women I met this week and the collaboration we enjoyed.
IAG for our trip to see “Fe-Mail”.
IAG for my appetite for yoga.
IAG for my teacher Kaliji at Kripalu over the weekend.
IAG for my friend Martha’s alignments.
IAG for the bounty in my life on every level- support, abundance, safety, friendships, women and men, kids, community, color, texture, garden projects surfacing from under the snow, snowdrops, clean laundry and all the meals I enjoyed this week with my new friends.
IAG for my kid’s health.
IAG for my health.
IAG for all my desires floating out in the Universe, singing to me from across the pages of art that flow out of me.
IAG for breath.
IAG for time.
IAG for you reading these words.
IAG for the gratitudes you hold in your heart and the courage to share a few with me here.

I will share more of the art from my week here.
So glad you stopped by the Line.
Love and thanks, S