earthstars & angels

recently i've been reminded of a great lesson by these not so little fungi that are sprouting up in the woods around here where I daily walk the dog.

apparently these fungi, called earthstars have existed all along, but for some unknown reason I have never noticed them before.. but then I never used to see armadillos or coyotes either, and now I see them from time to time.. so who knows..

but the earthstars have reminded me that when we find something strange and/or beautiful and become intrigued with it, we may be moved to analyze the thing in an effort to understand or possess it. like the butterfly collector who loves butterflies, but destroys them in order to preserve their beauty, or like the person who picks a fragrant bouquet of flowers only to dispose of their withered, rotting, carcasses a few days later..

as it happens, while I was walking in the wood, I came across these curious growths in the sandy ground. they were large cup-shaped stars that seemed to be full of something akin to a thick chocolate pudding. they were so dense and succulent in their being that they seemed more like fauna than flora.. but I did recognize them to be some kind of massive decadent fungi..

as I ran across more of the growths, my curiosity got the best of me and I used my stick to uproot the unfamiliar oddities. I was looking for a point of origin. trying to define the thing. after uprooting two of them and while ripping apart the flesh to study the consistency of the thick moussey middle, it suddenly dawned on me that I was destroying the life of the growth just for my own amusement & pleasure. it is not correct to say it suddenly dawned on me, as I had some awareness of the consequence of my actions all along.. but it did strike me that for the sake of my curiosity alone I was willing to sacrifice the life of these unknown entities.

even after acknowledging this realization, I proceeded to destroy another of the fungi telling myself that the spores would be distributed and propagate anyway, so the destruction was of no real consequence. and while it is true that life goes on, and destroying swamp fungi is probably not a cardinal sin in the eyes of most.. the experience did bring to mind a truly relevant lesson for my spirit which is that an attempt to possess (apprehend/comprehend/analyze/control) something when violently applied inevitably leads to the destruction of the very thing desired.

and violence is a tricky thing. it is not always the blood and guts that one might expect, but sometimes comes cloaked only as a simple, thoughtless, imposition of will.

retrograde

i have come to the point now where i can just sense what is happening in the sky above me, or at least more specifically, when mercury goes retrograde. it is only the tinyest of things that makes me question this small planet's orientation.

i can see when the most innocuous statements uttered in a moment of thoughtless oblivion are contorted to mean, G_d-only-knows-what in the mind of the listener. just today when the furnace man came out to replace some small & yet tremendously over-priced circular plastic part, subsequent to his question of "does she bite?" & seeing the fear in his eyes.. i said to him "don't worry, i won't let the dog bite you." he looked at me as if insulted and said, "you won't LET her bite me?!" at which point i could not help but wonder, what did he mean? what could have possibly been offensive in what i said?

then later this evening when responding in writing to a blog post, i realized the vast potential to misconstrue my comments. i saw the potential for coming off cold and cerebral when the intention was to present a spark or a seed of relief, which can probably only be nurtured in the fertile soil of a receptive soul. the seed itself bears no emotion, but has the potential to grow into some flowering or fruit-bearing tree.

well, this is all what prompted me to check and see if mercury was retrograde because it just all had that certain feel to it. lo and behold the little planet started spinning backwards earlier this week! it seems after a point, one just comes to know what it feels like when communication does not flow in the expected direction.

even now i may be lax to write this during such a precarious time for communicating.. but then again, what is the spirit behind this change of direction for the planet that rules communication? here is an opportunity to move in another direction & to try something new from a different perspective.

so now i am noticing that when mercury is retrograde i have the opportunity to think differently about whatever it is that presents itself. i can try not to offend anyone, but it seems kinda inevitable that someone will take offense. at least i can be aware of the myriad of possibilities available with the new direction.

if i were a boi

- Beyonce Knowles Lyrics
*ugh! no patience to figure out how to disable the ads..
maybe later! :P

time

Time In A Bottle

migraine

this excruciating, stabbing, nauseating pain in my head is nothing compared to the pain in my heart that comes from longing for you to love me the way that I love you.

I laugh at it's meager attempts to split open my skull when my heart was left broken and bleeding long ago by your indifference. swimming in a sea of agony is mere child's play after months of hopelessly loving you.. and still, I regret nothing.