Change

My fortune cookie said, "You will make many changes before happily settling." Change, yes. Settling, probably never.

Today, a Realtor came to the door at 9:30 on a Saturday morning. I hadn't yet finished my second cup of coffee, hadn't brushed my teeth when I had to accept that 8 years of privacy was disappearing. Apparently, when a prospective buyer drops by, one must be willing to take a walk and leave them be to discover the house on his own. So I walked along my path, the Ellen Davis Trail, the place of blackberries in August and leaning trees for all seasons. A few berries were ripe enough to melt between my finger tips...sweet subtle relief. I'm getting cold feet. I don't want to share a house that isn't mine, to be a visitor in the suburbs, to have no path to walk every day, even if I choose not to walk. I huff up the hill, lined with figure eight cement bricks, infinity. I test blackberries on the vine and smile at the Queen Anne's Lace (it is my favorite weed because it reminds me of Anne Walters, the mother of my best friend in elementary school. I was in love with Anne Walters and wanted to be just like her). I could walk this path with my eyes closed, knowing each twist and turn. I rest among the circle of cedar, crying, trying to say thank you for all the times I've been returned to wholeness here. The circle of cedar saved my life, more than once. When I was longing for a child, I tied two pastel ribbons, one yellow and one blue, to low branches. The ribbons stayed there for six months. No child for me, but someone, somewhere, found her child because of the ritual. I buried bleeding sorrow in the soil of that circle and today I try to say good-bye. My feet aren't cold, but I have cold feet. I don't want to leave this cocoon of comfort. I wish there was another way. But I can't go back. I must inch forward into new passions and new directions with courage and trust, with what is next still out of sight.

Mary Oliver reassures me, once again, with her prose poem, West Wind #2

"You are young. So you know everything. You leap into the boat and begin rowing. But listen to me. Without fanfare, without embarrassment, without any doubt, I talk directly to your soul. Listen to me. Lift the oars from the water, let your arms rest, and your heart, and heart's little intelligence, and listen to me. There is life without love, It is not worth a bent penny, or a scuffed shoe. It is not worth the body of a dead dog nine days unburied. When you hear, a mile away and still out of sight, the churn of the water as it begins to swirl and roil, fretting around the sharp rocks -- when you hear that unmistakable pounding--when you feel the mist on your mouth and sense ahead the embattlement, the long falls plunging and steaming -- then row, row for your life toward it."

I always thought this would be a great graduation speech poem. I found out last night that I was the first choice for graduation speaker this June at the art school where I used to teach, the school I helped design and build, and run for eight years. The current principal, the woman who had no courage and trust, no vision, who was threatened by those of us who created the school and spoke the truth, the principal who basically forced me out of the place I loved, my home, away from my family -- she refused to allow me to speak at graduation. She said I wasn't welcome in the building. By whom? Apparently the students wanted me. The remaining staff who still knew me wanted me. I would have been gracious and appropriate and would have read Mary Oliver. Ironically, last night, after hearing this bit of information, I received a postcard in the mail announcing the 10th anniversary of the school I helped build. The destructive principal won't be there next year so I will be welcome again. I can go home and enjoy my family and friends of another time. So in some ways, I can go back.

What would I say to a graduating class about Oliver's poem? I would encourage them to stop long enough to listen to the voice of passion, the voice of love in their lives. It is what I have been doing in this little house for sale, in the circle of cedar, at the art school, listening to my direction, my call, tasting the mist on my mouth, the churn and swirl, and unmistakable pounding that leads to my path. I would encourage the young to trust, to have courage to pursue what is right for them even if it sounds crazy, impractical, follow the pull of their unique ebb and flow, the heart within the heart, their soul song. Live without regret.