MsTiara’s Thoughts

On Sunday mornings I like to have breakfast at a wonderful Greek café that has the smoothest coffee and makes its biscuits from scratch. The café’s clientele is in the 70 and above age range and is an interesting mix to watch, listen to and observe. Some come in as group, 4 or 5 people with a mix of male and females. They are the ones who in their younger days were always part of some social network and as they aged they traveled together as packs around the word always planning their next adventure.

Then you have the couples, husband and wives. Some, when you watch them, bring a welling of emotion to your throat. The love that has lasted 50 years and is still as strong and fresh as the day they met. A respect for each other, an attentiveness, a caring that seems to bind them whether they are chatting together or each reading a section of paper or waiting as one steps away to freshen up. I wish I could put my finger on what defines them, that moment. But, I can’t as it just is a love that binds them together.

There are many other type of couples, the ones who have only a couple years together, filling each others life with companionship, not wanting to be alone. But, the other one who stands out in my mind from this morning is the one who has been married for 50 or so years who are cold to each other. I don’t know if it is something lacking in each of them, but they talk or hold a conversation but there is no emotion between the two. Sentences are short, no heat, nothing. A long pause between the return sentences from the other. Talking to talk but no connection.

The thing about all of the couples is that none were ‘making the other laugh’, the requirement everyone seems to have in today’s society for their mate. Instead the one that seemed successful to me was the one where the other made them content.

Today is dark and grey, a storm is rolling through the city, but I am nice and cozy in the office with the fake yellow lights seeming surreal against the darkness of the day. My true joy would be, to be home at my house in the mountains, watching the storm from the comfort of my bed.

I read an amazing quote from Neil Gaiman today about writing, that the true secret is to just write. Keep on writing and slowly it will all come together and you will have your style solidify, that your voice will start to come.

I have a book of writing exercises for when I am home, but I still think I need to try other things, like tell the story from each pet’s perspective, where each one writes something, kind of like the Tao of Pooh where each one has a distinctive voice and personality.

Getting all dressed up, trying to make sure that my clothes looked sexy, innocent and pleasing. I had bought a pair of red heals just for you. My girlfriend and I played with my makeup till it was perfect, giggling all the while. We kept on making cute comments back and forth about you. I was so excited, giggly, acting like I was 13 and you were my first date.

But you didn’t call when you said you would.

I walked the apartment fidgeting. I took off my shoes, looked at the clock, and pretended to my friend that I was okay, that a part of my child wasn’t dying inside. But she knew.

An hour went by, I took off my stocking, removed my skirt, put of my pajamas. How many times did I check the clock, read my email, tried to see if you were online?

Two hours pas the time you said, its midnight now. I feel very small, my heart is bleeding, my child is crying. I say nothing. My friend comes and sits next to me, she pets my hair. What can she say?

I make excuses for you. I lie down on the bed, she sits at the computer. As I start off into space, trying not to think, you call. I kindle my enthusiasm, I brighten up, excited again. Yet a part of that feeling of sexiness, power, joy is extinguished. From that moment on, every time I am due to see you, I wonder, “Will he kill another part of me off again?” Can I ever let my child hope? Wish? Play? Or do I have to keep her in her glass shell, afraid to let her out around you because you have the power to do so much damage, so carelessly.

Days, months, years go by and you still treat my child so carelessly, even after all this time.

Is it no wonder I am reserved around you?

The threads that connect the souls of people are a variety of colors, slender, translucent energy that stretches from one part of your soul to the corresponding part of the other.

There are the common ones, love, hate, friendship, laughter, romance, trust; One after another. Sometimes they are share experiences and others are so fragile to start out with. Love, such a fine thread, thinner than a single piece of hair, so easily destroyed with but a misplaced breath, to build its thickness takes hundreds of moments of nurturing and belief, but still can be killed with but one thought.

The strongest is hate. Its thick and a sickly greenish red color, pulsing and spewing, the energy seems to be able to move between the other soul bonds, so easily cutting them away like acid. Hate is the hardest bond to cut between two people.

Then there are the bonds of the past, bonds of former life times. These bonds are shared memories and they glow so brightly when you first re-connect. But, if you don’t cherish them and the lessons they have to share, then they slowly deteriorate away until they are but shadows.

You can create new bonds in a life time, but to do so you need to believe and cherish them and not allow them to grow grey and weaken.

The sadness is that in this lifetime, people would rather live in shallowness than look at the soul bonds of a lifetime.

So, I am in Europe right now and it is very strange how as you go through life you fall into situations and they affect you and you just move forward and process those situations without realizing how much damage was done until several years later. Then you are forced to deal with the aftermath of the junk that happened so very long ago. Hopefully, I am a smart enough person that I deal with them as soon as I realize how they are affecting me rather than after they have destroyed me.

At the beginning of this year, I had to deal with the realization that a friendship had died and it was time for me to decide whether or not I was going to keep it around or clean it out of my life. Rather than holding onto it and letting it affect me and the rest of my life any longer, I dealt with it with compassion and moved forward. But, I didn’t realize that the moment of the actual ‘death’ was still affecting me and affecting how I dealt with so many things. I think in every situation where there is a death, it changes you, sometimes good and sometimes bad. In this death it emphasized something that I have inside me all the time and that is my personal since of introversion.

The death of the friendship was a moment, in a restaurant. It was an Italian restaurant in Milwaukee. The restaurant sits on one of the canals/river and was enclosed in glass. I was facing towards the outside, the other two people were facing towards me. I was eating veal scaloppini. I sat there with two other people, a boy and a girl. One was the friend and was my roommate on the road for almost 10 years. The other person was a boy, who I thought was also a friend. But, as you learn in life, friendship means different things to different people. I sat in the restaurant with these two other people that I know so very well. But, I sat alone. They talked, they laughed, it was if I was just a bag thrown on the chair. I had never felt so alone in my life. It took several more years before the death finally occurred and a full year after the final realization of the death until the healing was able to occur.

I guess that is where I am now, in the healing portion of the death. I just wish it didn’t have to happen while I am in Europe and should be laughing and enjoying myself. Instead, I just want to sit in café’s in the middle of market squares by myself and eat delicious food and write out my thoughts and feelings.

See, I guess the lesson I learned is that I would rather be by myself and alone than surrounded by a group of people and alone. I cannot think of a more soul destroying thing than sitting surrounded by people and being all alone.

As life goes on its merry and hectic way we get lost in the noise and clutter. Who we are, what we are, how we feel and how the other people around us feel.

It is all noise. The sky is always shaded by the color of your thoughts at that moment in time. The wind does not touch your skin anymore where you can feel it resonate through your soul.

But, every now and then you are with a person for a moment that you can find that intense internal quietness.

Where you can just be.

In that moment.

You can feel the sunshine sink into your soul and heal as it penetrates to the heart.

You can feel the wind caress you as a lovers hand as your only focus is on that touch rather then anything else in the world.

As all the food and kisses that touch your lips taste of passion and peace.

And the smell of the world is centered on life, love, living, being.

A Jonathan Carroll quote from his new novel (unnamed on his website):

“The thing that kept him standing still was the sudden realization that he felt no curiosity about where she was going now, none. He had not been curious about her life for a long time. What she did with her days, what she thought about things, what mattered or distressed her– he was indifferent. It was ambient sound to him. Granted, some was louder and some softer. Generally though it was mostly background noise, or the soft tune playing in an elevator as you ascend to your floor. Familiar and trivial, the most effect it had was to stay in your mind a few seconds after you left the elevator. Perhaps you whistled some notes of it before moving on to what mattered, but no more. For years she had been one of the most important parts of his life. But in recent times what she did, what she thought, where she went, or what left her lips was like hearing the song ‘Raindrops Keep Falling on My Head’ for the 1,000th time.”

from the new novel

I have been fascinated by the Polyamory blogs that deal so much with something called New Relationship Energy (NRE). NRE is the feeling you get when you first meet someone, that fascination of the person, the need to know what they are thinking and who they are. You learn about their interests and they slowly become yours. You wait with bated breath for the ding of the email and you watch with fascination their movements. They make you smile, everything is special. But, NRE is not something that lasts, no matter how much you love someone, it fades away… In the world we live in today, we don’t like those things that feel familiar anymore, instead of exploring with each other all of a sudden it is boring and sedate and you know longer have those moments of wanting to go out and experience. Then you see someone else and they have new thoughts and we don’t know their patterns and they find you fascinating, so you throw away the old and pick up the new.

I find this sad, true but sad. We live in a world where we have instant gratification and if we make a mistake it is as easy as the back key or the delete button. So, in a relationship as they are surfing through life, if they get bored they just click the channel button or cause drama in the relationship to keep them entertained, at least for a little while.

In the Celtic tradition, there is a beautiful understanding of love and friendship. One of the fascinating ideas here is the idea of soul love; “Anam Cara” may sound like some new French perfume, but it actually refers to the Celtic spiritual belief of souls connecting and bonding .

In Celtic Spiritual tradition, it is believed that the soul radiates all about the physical body what some refer to as an aura. When you connect with another person and become completely open and trusting with that individual, your two souls begin to flow together.

Should such a deep bond be formed, it is said you have found your “Anam Cara” or soul friend.

Your “Anam Cara” always accepts you as you truly are, holding you in beauty and light. In order to appreciate this relationship, you must first recognize your own inner light and beauty. This is not always easy to do. The Celts believed that forming an “Anam Cara” friendship would help you to awaken your awareness of your own nature and experience the joys of others.

The “Anam Cara” was originally someone to whom you confessed, revealing the hidden intimacies of your life. With the “Anam Cara”, you could share your innermost self, your mind and your heart. This friendship was an act of recognition and belonging. When you had an “Anam Cara”, your friendship cut across all convention, morality and category. You were joined in an ancient and eternal way with the “friend of your soul”. The Celtic understanding did not set limitations of space or time on the soul. There is no cage for the soul. The soul is a divine light that flows into you and into your Other.

This art of belonging awakened and fostered a deep and special companionship. When you love, you open your life to an Other. All your barriers are down. Your protective distances collapse. This person is given absolute permission to come into the deepest temple of your spirit. Your presence and life can become their ground. It takes great courage to let someone so close. Where a friendship recognizes itself as a gift, it will remain open to its own ground of blessing….. When you are blessed with an “Anam Cara”, the Irish believe, you have arrived at that most sacred place: home. This bond between friends is indissoluble: “This, I say, is what is broken by no chances, what no interval of time or space can sever or destroy, and what even death itself cannot part”. (from “Anam Cara…Wisdom from the Celtic World”, by John O’Donohue)

I hadn’t seen Dragon since he had gone on his last adventure. I was stuck at the castle learning to be a proper princess (whatever that means). Today was my day of play and I had decided to go out to the garden to work on my ability to create things with my thoughts. As I sat there working on the creation of a butterfly to flit through the flowers, I felt a shadow cross my face as Dragon landed next to me and turned into a boy.

I was so excited to see him, I through my arms around him and gave him a big hug before we pulled back with blushes.

“So, tell me all about your adventures.” I asked, as we walked to sit on one of the benches scattered around the garden.

“It was wonderful, I went to the dungeons in Kalazaar and explored.” He said. “How was your time here working?”

“It was boring as always. I know it is what you do if you want to rule wisely. But I would have had more fun exploring the dungeons. Did you meet anyone fun?” I asked the question so that he would tell me all about the human female he met which the wind had been whispering in my ear for the last couple of weeks.

“No, there aren’t very many people to meet when you are exploring dungeons.” He said casually but I could see the color around him turn purplish black with his lie.

“You are saying there wasn’t anyone with you while you explored? No one?” I asked again, hoping that he was just holding back.

“No.”

“But, the wind tells me of the human you found while in the caves that you rescued and have been spending time exploring the islands with. Are you saying the wind is wrong?”

“You mean My Girl? The wind told you about it?”

“Yes, the wind comes and visits and tells me of the world beyond this castle. Are you saying there was someone?”

“Well, yes I guess there was.” He said

I just stared at him, how was it possible that a Dragon could lie? The Dragon code of ethics is about Honor and Integrity. They are not allowed to lie to continue with their existence.

“You lied to me?” I asked with tears choking my voice.

“I didn’t think it was important to mention so it wasn’t really a lie.” He tried to walk around it.

“But, you can’t lie, you can’t manipulate the truth. You cease to exist if you do.” I continued to look at him with despair. My friend the person I have seen the world with. He wasn’t who I thought he was. Is it possible he wasn’t really a Dragon at all? Something else entirely, something that wasn’t real? A lie from the beginning to the end?

“You are making this out to be more than it really is Etoile. I am still here so it can’t be that big of an issue.”

“You don’t understand, you are still here because I believe in you. You are a dragon, if no one believes then you disappear. Those are the rules for all creatures that are greater than mere existence.” As I continued to look at him, he started to waiver as the tears clouded my eyes and as a single tear drop fell against my cheek he was no longer there.

The tear turned to a star sapphire as it tumbled down my cheek to land on the ground next to the diamond which once was Dragon. And Dragon was no more.

As I cried my broken heart out to the skies sitting in the garden Cyn, my protector dragon, flew up and curled around my arm and laid his head against my shoulder.

“Don’t cry Etoile, he wasn’t really a dragon, just someone masquerading as one. One day, a real dragon will come and he will be worth your tears.”

“You don’t understand, he was my friend.”

“No, you don’t understand. A true friend would never lie to you.”

And the sun set around the castle and darkness fell.

I arrive back at the castle more saddened than when I left. As I land safely on the grounds where I am protected by the very essence of the earth, Cyn starts to take form again and peals away from my skin till he is once again in solid form.

“Why are you still so sad?” Cyn asks.

“Because I don’t want to be another person wandering around lost, missing a part of my soul.” I answer.

Cyn gives an exasperated grumble, “Have you tried to connect with him or have you been wandering around all day pouting and acting hurt?”

“Cyn, you are supposed to be on my side.” I protest

“When you withdraw your energy you hurt him as much as you hurt yourself. He flew away, you didn’t ask him why. Did you think he needs to take care of his own things, his own life?”

“In this world, each of you has your own paths to take and your own lessons to learn. Just because you are bonded through out space and time doesn’t mean that life ceases to exist for one or the other, it means that you need to learn to co-exist and you can’t be self-indulgent because what hurts one, hurts the other.”

“Now stop pouting and connect with your Dragon and make sure you didn’t take away his strength at a time when he needed it.”

As I opened up the wall I had built so I wouldn’t fee Dragon so he couldn’t hurt me anymore, I felt this huge wave of tiredness wash over me and I got light headed from it as it started to overwhelm me. I also felt his grief, his sadness and his pain at causing me hurt and being unable to connect to me either. I cried out wanting to do anything to make it better, if I only could see through his eyes and know what he was going through I would be able to help him out.

“Dragon, show me what you see, maybe I can help.” I cry out into the darkness.

As I close my eyes I start to see flashes or snapshots of Dragon’s world. Negotiations between people, dealing with someone he cares about who is in pain and lashing out at him but they continue to bring pain upon themselves and others and he sits there helpless. He is trying to put together a campaign of so many people but he is tired of them all trying to soothe their egos by being in the spotlight and trying to take control. There is hope and joy and fear as his mind touches upon the new woman in his life, but he is afraid he is making the wrong choice, but she makes him happy. He doesn’t want to cause anymore pain.

So many thoughts and emotions, all washing over me until I am able to harness my calm, cooling energy that allows me to bond to Dragons so that they don’t consume me and I absorb the heat and confusion of the Dragon fire and I return the energy back to Dragon pure and consumable for him to use.

“I love you.” I whisper into the darkness as Dragon flies on with his life and I continue with mine, touching minds with him so that we both know we aren’t alone.