Sweet Dreams in G

Up the scale

And down

Retracing steps

Refingering

Reaching G

One note held

One spot

Neither inhaling

Nor exhaling 

Blissfully between

Heart unscrewed

On an open G

Plodding off 

Away again

Coming home 

To G

Concentric circles

Where I dove 

Deeply downward

Reaching for G

version 1.0

Tripping the Light Suck-tastic

Came home from writing class full of energy.  An energy that has been kinda draining away the last couple weeks.  Reminding myself that life has many endings, but that it has way more beginnings and how much I am looking forward to them.

I have an inquisitive mind and will ask a thousand questions.  I can modulate that when I have to, but my default state is that of questions.  Means I can get along with most four year olds easily.  Sometimes adults are more challenging because they stop asking about how any of this really works.  A deplorable lack of curiosity abounds.    

When my nieces Tori and Becca come by they love hanging out in my spare oom and investigating what they find there.  They took to the drums, rattles, flute and tingshas.  Amazed that I not only let them touch these things and make noise with them but encourage it.  I mean hell - that's what they are for - right?  And I started to wonder as their parents gently chided them not to break anything, is this how that curiosity dies?  I loved the way they jumped in and wailed on the drums.  They were fearless and amazingly rhythmic for people who share part of my gene pool.  Fierce in a way that most adults can't be anymore - myself included.  They were not afraid of looking like a goober or making mistakes.  I wonder  -  When do we lose that and why?  

As adult we get caught up in the need to be perfect or to SEEM perfect.  That we all have some deep seeded need to look cool, all the while internally telling ourselves we are anything but and hoping no one calls us on it.  So, we give up that questing and settle for things we are good at, thereby denying ourselves the chance to discover new things.  Gonna let you in on a little secret here - we are all both Joe Cool and Poindexter all the time.  

I don't want to limit myself to things I am good at already.  I want to find new things that intrigue me, that excite me.  To that end I have encouraged myself to explore the place of SUCK, to look like a goober frequently, and to focus less on 'getting it right' than just getting it.  For instance - Last winter I bought a bass guitar.  My mom's immediate reaction was to ask what I was going to do with it.  Was I going to be in a band?  My inner critic, who sounds a lot like her, nodded her head in agreement and said 'Yeah what the hell are you gonna do with THAT?'  To me that question was so loaded with epic potential failure, that for a while I stopped playing.  My final answer is NO.  I am not going to be in a band.  Isn't it enough that it brings me joy?  For my mom and the inner critic that is not reason enough - there needs to be a purpose to it.  For me that joy is the sum total of enough-ness.  I want to explore strange new world both inner and outer.  I want to laugh at my own mistakes, because they are funny.  I won't mind if other people laugh too.   

Challenging myself to begin and to begin again and again and again.  I want to embrace the place of beginner, of beginning, with all that place implies.  Allowing myself to look like the goober I am and to be proud of it instead of trying to hide it.  I want to begin, right up to the moment they throw my ass into a coffin, ending as a complete beginner.  

NB - I may have creatively acquired (read - stole)  the word suck-tastic from my friend Fabeku who generates fun words like this all the time.  Just one of the many reasons I think he is da bomb.

The Icky. The Owie. The Absurd.

My friend Fabeku posted a blog (http://www.sankofasong.com/blog/31-things-i-never-dreamed-id-share-on-interwebs/) that is bugging the crap outta me.  That piece hit something inside me and has been pool balling off other chunky bits in my brain ever since and knocking stuff loose.  Yunno how it is sometimes.  You know what you want to write, but there's this other thing that comes roaring out whenever you sit down to get to it.  Maybe you would rather just not do this other thing.  But it gives you absolutely no peace.  And you get no writing done.  All I know is I want it OUT!  So it seems like I have some word vomit I need to get rid of before I can write anything else.  

HIGHLY CONTAGIOUS.

PROCEED AT YOUR OWN RISK.  

YOU HAVE BEEN WARNED.  

OK so the gist of his post is that you are supposed to conquer your fear of what's hidden inside you by revealing those things right out here in front of God and everybody.  And that by doing so lose whatever in there holds you back.  Course F said it way more funny than that.   There was also some kinda overarching structure about revealing as many items as you have made trips around the sun.  That is way too structured for me.  So just gonna hurl out what's there and hope for little moths of hope when it's all done.  

DEEP BREATH

1.  Let's start with the hardest and ickiest one.  I am a sexual abuse thriver.  Not a survivor.  A THRIVER!  Happened a long time ago, but set some serious crap ass patterns in play that have taken me years to unwind.  It took me 35 years to even speak about it.  But speaking about it is what changed my life and brought healing to those owie places.  Ultimately I have learned alot about forgiveness - which I did not do for anyone's sake but my own.  

2.  I have lost a 100 pounds.  Should be proud of that, but it embarrasses the tar outta me.  Have gained 25 pounds of that back in the last year which also embarrasses me (sensing a theme yet?)

3.  I am an adult child of an alcoholic.  Guess what.  Yup.  The apple didn't fall far from that tree.  Also an on-again-off-again smoker since I was 13.  Neither of those things filled that hole inside me.

4.  I am scary smart, but I like to hide it.  Learned to hide it to avoid ridicule and fit in.  FUCK THAT SHIT!  National Merit Scholar.  >98% on my GRE in biology.  Yaddayaddayadda....funny thing is that I am not very good at hiding it and everyone knows anyway.  So here's to embracing the inner nerd and letting her out to play.

5.  Total daddy's girl even though he was a ghost in my life.  (Not a literal ghost, just rarely around)  But even that tiny bit of parental love was better than the goose egg I got from the maternal unit (Love her.  But we are polar opposites).  I wish he had been around more and stuck around a bit longer.  The part of my life I have lived without him is now larger than the part I lived with him.  Best memory - Him flying home from a job in Florida and surprising me to take me to the Father-Daughter dance when I was 14.  Usually one of my brothers took me, so I quit going to those things.  Worst memory - Springsteen concert in Louisville 1985.  One week after my dad's funeral.  Springsteen played I'm On Fire in the first set.  Yunno.  'Hey little girl is your daddy home?  Did he go away and leave you all alone?'  Don't remember the rest of that concert because I spent it curled on the floor of the women's john.  That song still takes me right back to that exact moment of fluorescent lighting, tears and the smell of urine.

5.  I am a total word whore.  I can never have enough.  Unknown ones will send me flying to the dictionary (or more likely the computer) to find out what they mean.  Some of those stick, others like inchoate never do - despite many trips to the dictionary.  A guy with a big vocabulary - total turn on.  

6.  Speaking of words.....I love the sound of some words.  Will repeat them over and over because I like the way they sound in my head, or the way they make my lips go numb from the vibration (like buzz), or the way they make me feel good.  Icky feeling words get tossed out of the spoken vocab.   A similar thing happens when I play bass or guitar - I can get caught in the space of a single note.  

7.  Got caught with my hand in Art Vaughn's pants by the entire lab crew of mostly guys my first year on the job.  Potty brains!  I was fishing for his wallet for a Chip Wheelie run and his pants were TIGHT!

8.  I am a mimic.  Not in any good or productive way like acting or impersonation.  Just for my own shits and giggles.  I will often spend an entire day speaking in an accent.  My faves are Australian, British, and Pirate.  Yes - I know Pirate is not an officially recognized accent, but it should be.  Maybe it's genetic as Phil does the same thing.  In fact, Phil is the only living soul who has shared a day of dialect with me.  

9.  I prefer to date men of color.  Not for any reason you may be thinking, but simply because in many of their cultures a round woman is desirable over a stick shaped one.  They look at me in a way that ignites something inside me.  White men almost never do.  Pity really.  But it's their loss.  

10.  Speaking of dating.  I did a 15 year stint without dating (read: celibacy).  I just gave up on men entirely because the whole relationship thing was too confusing.  I kinda regret that and could never imagine doing that now.  I genuinely like most guys, but don't wanna date most of them.  Picky weird that way.  

11.  Cancer survivor - 10 years.  I consider this a blessing.  It completely changed the way I lived my life for the better.  I am one of the lucky ones.  Pretty much lucky in every aspect of my life.

12.  I dreamed of being Marlin Perkins and later Dian Fossey.  That dream persisted well into college.  I went so far as to apply to the University of Kenya.  Part of me wonders what THAT life would have been like had I followed thru on it.  

13.  Until I was 18, I had a hard time looking people in the face.  So I looked at my shoes alot.  I love Garrison Keillor for making me feel like less of a freak for that.  

14.  This year I had breast reduction surgery.  Had them made smaller by half.  BEST.DECISION.EVER!  

15.  I like tattoos.  Scratch that.  I LOVE tattoos.  Have for as long as I can remember.  Once caught myself leaning over to trace the lines of a complete stranger's ink on the city bus with my fingertips.  I finally got my first one at 45 to celebrate 5 years cancer-free.  Have been adding to the collection regularly ever since.  I would love a full sleeve.  But just one.

16.  I kissed Muhammed Ali.  He was/is/always will be The Greatest.

17.  I had a photo chosen to be one of National Geographic's Your Shot Daily Dozen.  Close enough for me.  Crossing being a NG photographer off the list.  

18.  Despite a lot of crap in my life, I have maintained a sense of innocence and joy.  Go Figure.  I have no idea how, but I'm glad that's the case.  

19.  I did not own a TV for 5 years.  I got so much more stuff done then.

20.  I really like who I am.  I am comfy with her in the quiet moments of which there are alot.  I couldn't imagine better company.  But I will always look.  

Hmmmmmm.  YUP!  That's it.  

FIN

 

Letterboxing Asana

I was out grabbing a few letterboxes with my friend Sno' the other day.  When she bent over to stamp in her logbook, I started to giggle, then guffaw and finally had to sit down because I was laughing so hard.  It had nothing to do with the view of Sno's backside (although convincing HER of that took a while once the giggling abated).  Just that suddenly I saw a series of Yoga Poses flash thru my brain - a sort of Letterboxing Asana.  Sno of course had just completed her 'Downward Facing Stamp' pose.  There was also the Logbook Salutation, the Blue Diamond Pose, Tree Pose (useful for limbering up to get those high boxes) and the Wind Releasing Pose (except for Bigpoppaduz who needs no assistance on that one - PSHEW!).   I did try to get her to pose for photos of these to illustrate my point, but she seemed less than enthused.  Maybe I shoulda waited until after I stopped laughing.

#14 Spiderweb

Seems I am always trying to catch the play of light in spiderwebs.  Not always so successful.  Maybe that's why I keep trying.  

This one I found on a bench on the Nature Trails as Highland Cemetery.  I liked its roundness, its seemingly circular perfection.  And the wind caught it in little puffs making it alternate between concave and convex like a little spider trampoline.

Journey Vision 9/12/10

I am frazzled, fried, a real fucking mess.  Too much boi energy.  Too little time with my peeps.  Too few days left of work and at the same time too many.  The surface shifting under my feet like a horse's ass trying to shudder off the fly that is me.  Stumbling.  Falling.  My arms braced to catch me.  'Til I am shuffling my feet like an old man in bedroom slippers unsure.  Just too tired to give a fuck about much of anything.  

The tank light telling me I need to refill NOW.  There is nothing for it, but to reschedule some things and sit and embrace the deep quiet.  

I am not met by one of the Grandmothers as I usually am, but by one of the Grandfathers.  He motions for me to walk beside him.  We move off into the open grassland.  Before I know it, I am in the here and now  thinking about Chris.  Focus.  Back to the grassland where he waits for me.  We walk a while without speaking.  I am thinking about how to make the ChIP work and impending interviews.  Re-focus.  Back to the grassland.  He is still waiting for me.  We walk on.  Then I am re-running my budget in my head.  Focus.  Back to the Grandfather.  He sighs and shakes his head.  Daughter, you have forgotten how to be still.  Come.  

The tall grass prairie give way to sandy shore and water.  We stop at the edge of the sea.  He gestures for me to wade in and I do.  I begin to swim easily.  He's right.  It is relaxing, that alternating of flexing and relaxing of muscles, of rotation and breathing.  He waves good-bye to me, turns to go and disappears into the grassland that rolls down to the sea.  

Now what - I wonder?   

A small orca about my size surfaces next to me.  It has a juvenile playfulness and energy that suggests it is a calf.  We swim about a bit, he rolls onto his back and motions with his fins for me to lie on him.  No idea what is coming.  I trust and embrace him like a lover.  He wraps his flippers about me.  I feel restful there heart to heart with this being.  

He does not swim, instead we sink below the surface.  I struggle to breathe at first but then remember this is the Dreamtime where I can breathe underwater if I want.  I stop flailing.  We sink lower and deeper into the water.  First turquoise, then a royal blue, finally a deep dark indigo that leeches color from my eyes and the world is reduced to blue and the cold dead greenish white of TV glow.  We stop sinking and float - an orb in the Galilean thermometer of the deep blue purple water.  I don't know how long we stayed there.  I thought of nothing in that void except being right where I was.  

The Grandfather who greeted me upon my return just smiled and nodded.  

Request Denied

I got a little reminder yesterday to keep my protection up.  It has a tendency to sag a bit when I get emotionally or physically weary.  I was too tired to ramp it up when I got home from my massage.  Wish I had though, because the Dreamtime was polluted with energies, people and thoughts that I am no longer used to.  

My Dreamtime has been a clean space for the last couple years or so.  A place where info is passed easily from my peeps to me, where solace is given, where deep and abiding rest happens.  I guess I should have recognized it sooner.  Lots of trouble staying asleep.  Getting up multiple times and wandering around almost like I am avoiding sleep.  A few nightmares and other strange happenings.  Waking in the morning so exhausted that all I want to do is crawl back in bed.  

Yesterday it came to my attention when I got a FB friend request from WWT.  I had him blocked for years, but decided last year that I was no longer going to live my life like that - always hiding.  So I unblocked everyone who was on my list.  Since FB now has user friendly security options, what did I care if any of those people knew I had a FB page or could read a post on a mutual friends page?  I would not live hidden or in fear.  

So yesterday I guess it came to his attention that I was on there and he tried to friend me.  I have no desire to share cyber space (or any space) with him.  I am not angry or afraid.  I just don't want or need the drama that swirls around him like a cloak.  Drama he creates maliciously and deliberately to his own ends.  I know because I spent a year hugged to his bony chest under that cloak.  He is who he is and I am who I am.  Those two energies are not compatible with one another.  So friend request denied and shields up.  

Burning the Quran

Sometimes people scare me.  Not just in their violence, but in their short-sightedness.  Case in point the plan to burn the Quran today (thankfully cancelled).  Aside from the fact that libricide to me is nothing short of a damnable offense, it is not a good way to get your point across.  Yes, they have to right to protest publicly - First Amendment and all.  

But.......

- We are a country founded on the concept of Freedom of Religion.  That encompasses all religion even the ones you don't understand or particularly like (which to my eyes would be anything that is not your own).

-Actions like this are the fodder for Al Jazeera.  It feeds right into the stereotype of Americans as spoiled, indulged, intolerant and hate filled.  We are not all like that.  Just as they are not all like what Rupert Murdoch's news shows us.  What if the majority of us are nothing like what the other sides news portrays us to be?  What if we could see pictures of kids playing soccer and tween girls shopping.  Of couples canoodling on benches.  Of families gathered together to share a meal.  What if they saw that too instead of Hollywood's version of America or short-sighted, intolerant, bozos who thing Quran burning is a good way to commemorate 9/11.

- Don't even try to couch this under the guise of patriotism.  The repercussions of seeing a Quran burning in Afghanistan would be renewed action against the ground forces stationed there.  Increased loss of life of soldiers that BOTH sides of this argument love.

Like I said people scare me......

Dream 9/9/10

I don't often dream about work (read never).  But last night I am dreaming about being in the lab.  Working as usual.  A clinical fellow I used to work with named Dave is there too.  I notice my face feels odd and when I touch it my fingers bring away blood.

I realize that Dave has carelessly flung sulfuric acid (I know it is sulfuric and not hydrochloric or any other acid) and a spray has landed across my face.  There is a stripe of acid burned skin extending from my forehead across the bridge of my nose and below my right eye.  It doesn't hurt or burn the way acid burns do in real life and if I had not touched it, I am not sure I would have known.  I try to rinse it off, but the damage is done.  The ugly raw wound carving across my face.  

So what does it mean?  I dunno.  I am interviewing for a job the next day - perhaps a cautionary dream about getting burned by someone else's carelessness.  Dave is an MD.  The person I am interviewing with also an MD.  

Credo

Yunno that scene in Bull Durham where Kevin Costner expounds on his beliefs? Just in case you don't, here is a link to it:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sBfdl6hNZ9k

It is a brilliant piece of screen writing delivered perfectly by Costner and reacted to equally perfect by Susan Sarandon. Anyone who has seen the movie remembers that part even if they remember nothing else.

I have been giving that scene a lot of thought and trying to imagine if I were to write it what it might look like.....

S: Well what do you believe in?

M: I believe in God, but that he/she is unknowable. I believe in the power of words to change the world. That story can either heal you or imprison you - your choice. That a loaf of homemade bread is the cure for everything.  I believe that there is help available is we ask for it and that sometimes the response that best gets us there is no. I believe in dark micro-brewed beer, Universal health care, personal accountability for your actions and that a good Brazilian will get your attention. I believe that an apology is the hardest and best gift to give. I believe that every woman is beautiful just as she is without makeup or hair extensions or plastic surgery. I think science, art and spirituality are all the same thing. I believe that Eric Clapton is a god, that Memphis is the perfect town. I believe in alternate realities to this one - lots of them. I think nerd is sexy, that Peyton Manning is the best QB ever, that getting old happens in your head and that BP execs should be fed a steady diet of high fructose corn syrup.

S:  Oh my.

Finish Strong

I have worked one job for the majority of my life. I have never been fired or quit. I have gotten up every morning without fail for 24 years and gone to work. Countless weekends interrupted to do some piddly thing. The longest time I have been off was 6 weeks after I was diagnosed with cancer and had major surgery. My longest vacation was 3 weeks I spent tooling around out west. But that was years ago. Now a week off is a blessing and even that is a rarity I haven't had in over a year.

Dealing with a host of 'personalities' over those 24 years - enough to write a book. Growing from my party girl days to my full adulthood. Discovering that my boss is probably also one of my best friends even if he does like baseball and the Cowboys. Learning better ways to resolve conflict because I had to to survive.

Always pushing to finish one more experiment for this paper or that grant submission. Always trying to keep one step ahead of the money. Always looking over my shoulder to see if the axe was coming. The last 3 years of waiting in limbo for that ax to fall. 3 years of grinding my teeth and Pepcid. 3 years spent in a windowless climate controlled room freezing my arse off mostly by myself. 3 years trying to accomplish enough to get a grant - and ultimately falling short. Hearing the whoosh and knowing the ax is coming for you. Innocent or guilty the ax does not care.

So now that it's done and my head is in the basket I have made myself certain promises:

- I will leave the tears out of it. I will just enjoy what there is until there is no more. Savor it.

- I will not slack off just because I am a lame duck. My dad would want me to lift my head up and finish strong. So I will.

- I will not look at this as a failure.

- I will see this as a reward for those 24 years of service to get 6 months of paid time to write.

- I will not become morose and sit in the goo. I WILL NOT become morose and sit in the goo (deserved to be said twice so that I heard it).

- I will be more frugal - not out of necessity but because I don't need any more crap.

I don't know what's coming next. I don't know what I will do that first day I don't have to get up and go to work. It's scary as shit to think about. All I can do is finish strong, just for today to not worry, and trust that the Universe knows.

Sankofa Bird

So this week I had a dream full of symbols, most of which I did not recognize. Yunno how dreams are good for weird shit like that. There are people in the dream, but I don't really remember them too well. Toward the end this bird flies by and when I ask what kind it is (yes, apparently I am even a nerd in my dreams), one of the elders tells me "Why that is Sankofa bird".

OK. I know Sankofa - the symbol from West Africa, but this bird doesn't look like that in any way. Once I remember that Sankofa is a symbol I recognize a few of the dream symbols as other Adinkira symbols as well. When I look on the internet, they are all Adinkira symbols - a few I swear I have never seen.

And if the isn't weirdly strange enough, just for shits and giggles I Google Sankofa bird.....and....you guessed it. There IS a sankofa bird. It is a mythical bird (which trips off a few sensors for me right there - since I have this whole story line about a water phoenix that is a parable for the loss of the divine feminine and women's power).

I scammed this from the internet. It speaks perfectly about where I am right now.

SANKOFA is expressed in the Akan language as "se wo were fi na wosan kofa a yenki." Literally translated it means "it is not taboo to go back and fetch what you forgot".

"Sankofa" teaches us that we must go back to our roots in order to move forward. That is, we should reach back and gather the best of what our past has to teach us, so that we can achieve our full potential as we move forward. Whatever we have lost, forgotten, forgone or been stripped of, can be reclaimed, revived, preserved and perpetuated.

Visually and symbolically "Sankofa" is expressed as a mythic bird that flies forward while looking backward with an egg (symbolizing the future) in its mouth.

Crazy how my own subconscious knows what to push out to get my attention.

Planting New Seeds

The medicine bag is gone. 5 months it hung in the tree on my favorite trail. I don't know how many times I walked by it. Countless loops through the woods where I remember it every time I reach that part of the hike. At first, feeling as if I had torn my heart out of my chest and just left it hanging there for the wildlife to consume. What a sad and bitter meal that would have been for them. I often felt an overwhelming desire to go and retrieve it no matter the cost to me. But to clutch the broken pieces to me would keep them forever broken. This was beyond me and I knew it.

For the first few months, I had to remind myself that this was no longer mine to worry about, that I have given it over to my ancestors. To trust that they would protect and heal what I could not. And that if I gave in and took it back that they might see that as a sign that I do not trust them. I trust them absolutely. So I began to train myself not to penetrate the glamour used to hide it from view. The ancestors did their part to help me by distracting me with deer, a fox, countless squirrels and a hawk or two. I see all kinds of wildlife on this trail. But for the 5 months that the magic took, I had close-up encounters with the wildlife near there. These were such luminous experiences for me that I forgot anything except what I was seeing. I mean what is my problem compared to the sweetness of watching a fawn nurse or having an owl swing low and silent near your head as the dusk turns to evening.

Over the last few months, I have felt the need to look for it become fainter. Not that I couldn't stir that back into a fulminating craziness in no time. But I hiked with more presence and less thinking. I enjoyed what there was more and more. Until finally I stopped looking altogether. One last sighting in the Dreamtime of the fate of that and it was gone.

In an ironic cosmic weirdness, during those same five months there has also been an overwhelming need to have a man in my life. Not a desire, a NEED. The kind I haven't experienced since high school where a cool boyfriend was entree into a world that excluded me - a world of cheerleaders, parties and popularity. I have managed most of my life without a man in it. So, this felt irrational as hell, but I couldn't seem to choose otherwise. Nor did I understand why. 4 short term relationships where the lesson seemed to be about saying - I don't want this. 4 nice guys, each suitable in some ways, but pegged out wrong in others. Forcing me over and over to say NO. Then BOOM it was over. That need suddenly vanishing as quickly as it came.

The boy crazyness ended almost coincident with the bag making its transition. So I know the two are linked. I just don't know how. I don't have to. I am glad that both are at an end though because that kinda crazy requires a lot of energy.

So these days I am self-caring and reclaiming what was lost. In order to honor the work they did on my behalf, I have added some letterboxes to my favorite trail to coax some others into this space where magic happens and the ancestors walk so clearly among us. Now I will look for those instead.

#13 McGlassons

My favorite local fruit and vegetable place on Rt 8 way past Ludlow. 4th generation on that land. The food tastes of their commitment to remain. They are the last of what used to be a thriving orchard area. I have many wonderful childhood memories of riding on the station wagon tailgate with bushels of apples and a sleepy and full belly of apples. Of being too frightened to climb up and dare the branches alone. Of being raised up high to get the ones missed by other hands such that the scent of fall apples still makes me smile and feel raised up.

#12 What is Right....

...and what is an illusion? - Moody Blues

I am the sometime Mistress of Light and Illusion, royal Consort to The Lord of Dark and Shadow and Heir Apparent to the place between.

I love reflections and had to try and capture the morning light thru my curtains as it reflected in my coffee. It was oddly compelling. Enough that I got up and got my camera and snapped off a half dozen photos just to capture it. I like that the cup is out of focus and only the reflection is clear as if the distinction between what is real and what is reflection is reversed. Or that the line that separates them is blurred.

Last Sighting

Rough day today that sent me scurrying to the woods to decompress. As I hiked the usual trail the sun set and evening crept in. I felt a bit depressed by my dating fiascoes and the pressures of finding a job or waiting it out. I couldn't help but look for the medicine bag and again saw no sight of it. I didn't really expect to.

As I began the climb I clearly saw a young male deer in my mind walking beneath the branches where it had been hung. The cord became looped around his antler and the bag parted from the tree and went with him wherever he is going. Pretty much a clear indication that the situation is now resolved (and that feels truth) and that the bag is no longer to be found. Knowing that, my steps became faster and lighter as my eyes stopped roving the trees for a glimpse.

Now I can walk this stretch of woods and be free of the looking.