Category Archives: movies

Jun12

work like a woman

Posted on by
Standard

Okay. New week, new rabbit hole. Same theme: what do fashion, storytelling and rest have in common? I’m going to be a social archeologist until I grok this equation thoroughly. I’m certain there is some pearl of useful wisdom in here that I can build my empire on. Or at least get inspired to get out of the chair…

Enter Mary Portas, Habitat Voyeur. The creator of the kindness economy, Queen of Shops, considered a conscious entrepreneur, and dare I add, wizardess extraordinaire? Let’s just say, she gets it. She came from the future back to rescue us from ourselves and walk us into a new paradigm. We need a new paradigm. Sustainable. Inclusive. And nothing if not hopeful.

Very few people know that my teenage years revolved around fashion. My parents indulged my obsession by letting me go to finishing school on Saturdays during junior high. In addition to the cost involved, it meant my Mother drove downtown, about 20 miles each way from our suburban home, to drop me off and then again to pick me up eight hours later. That’s where I learned fencing, among other (mostly useless) skills. I loved it.

Around this same time it happened that my sister’s piano teacher had a daughter who produced shows at the big network affiliate in Detroit. Mrs. Hanes suggested her daughter use me as a model for The Jackie Crampton Fashion Hour, which followed the mid-day news on ABC. I guess you could say I was “discovered” in my own home. It began a bit of a teenage dream career, and before long I was making better money than I’d ever earn again the rest of my life. I worked as a model and then as a dresser and fashion assistant for Saks Fifth Avenue, and then for Belle Jacob Wigs. At the time they were one of the largest wig manufacturers in the world. I fell in love with wigs. I found I could create an entirely new persona on a daily basis. They really are an art medium all their own.

My first semester of college was in fashion illustration at The Detroit School of Arts and Crafts (now the College for Creative Studies.) But long before that I got in trouble in grade school for making anatomically correct paper dolls. It hadn’t occurred to me not to draw them correctly. Duh. By high school in the 60’s, where the girls were required to wear dresses, I was shopping at St. Vincent de Paul and other charity shops and taking the clothes apart and reconfiguring them to make outrageous outfits – but they had skirts! I was born this way, apparently. I still design clothes in my dreams. I often get up and draw them so that I won’t forget them. I have designed entire lines of shoes – none of them brown. Decades ago I designed a line of attachable pockets that you could mix and match and move from garment to garment. And a series of baggy linen tops with subtle tarot symbols embroidered on them. I’d love to wear them all.

But it was a different era. And I was learning to survive in a chaotic and sometimes violent home. A career in fashion was not to be. Mary Portas exemplifies the business woman I would like to support. Well, second only to Estella, perhaps. I do love trouble…

Mary Portas, Work Like A Woman, A Manifesto For Change, https://amzn.to/4edEGkN

Jun9

Now You Know That You Are Real

Posted on by
Standard

This next week I wish to explore a new concept that I have just come across – yesterday, actually: the thin place. The thin place means a place in our environment where the veil between heaven and earth is thin. Decades ago I read a quote in an interior design book that profoundly impacted me: “Home is heaven for beginners.” I was a guest in someone else’s home at the time, long before cell phones existed. So, no camera or way to record it, I soon forgot who said it.

Around that same time I participated in a meditation retreat. Normally I hate guided meditations. My imagination needs little encouragement to take off, and by the time the person speaks I’m far off in my own world. They’ll start us down a path and seconds later suggest we are standing on a vast beach, when I’m already talking to a bird in a dense forest. Leave me alone.

But this time something remarkable happened. Tuning out the voice from across the room I continued walking further through that dense forest, and I came upon a castle. Tower and all. Big heavy door pushed aside I started up the circular stone stairway. It was lit with gemstones set in the outer wall, refracting rainbows of light to guide my way. When the meditation ended we were asked to describe what we saw. The woman nodded at me to go first, and when I described the castle, she said, “in dream or meditation work you were scouting heaven. That structure represented what you expect the afterlife to be like.” Ahhhh…yes. Yes, I do expect that. Beauty beyond my wildest imagination.

We’ve all experienced a thin place; we know how it feels, viscerally. Goosebumps and skin prickles and an otherworldly sense of wonder overwhelms us. To me, it speaks about the concept of environmental fit that contributes to self awareness. You have to be able to be present, to notice that something is happening. You have to be comfortable enough in your own skin to be just 10% more curious than scared.

Like Francois Halard, I, too was a shy and quiet child. My environment was anything but. It was constant chaos and noise and activity. I spent any and all available hours alone in my room, reading and thinking and drawing and painting and more reading and staring at things. I bonded with inanimate objects and the trees outside my window, my cat, and my own imaginings. Years later in high school when I first took LSD it would be as natural as breathing to walk through walls, to vibrate with the plants, to become the colors of the sky. I still believe it helped keep that portal open, the veil thin, and made for me a better life.

While I love the idea of heaven on earth, I’m taking it literally. I am entirely committed to living fully in my body. I’m not interested in spacing out, or fantasy, or in any way becoming less present. What if the thin place exists within us? Do we carry it always? Sometimes we happen into a place that reminds us to notice; sometimes we create that space. Any surreal experiences I’ve had (and there have been many) were solid. Not beyond my senses, but through them. They were not ethereal or “spiritual.” They did not take me to other worlds, they expanded my awareness of this one. That is The Hanged Man experience in the tarot. You know what you know, even if it is not shared. It cannot be described with the English language; we haven’t the framework.

I haven’t taken any recreational drugs since high school (and few prescribed medications if avoidable). The last time I drank too much I was 21 (I’m 70). I don’t want (or need) my state to be altered, unless it is the organic release from anxiety that allows a fuller experience of presence. Even if that means pain. I’m all in, having a look down life’s hallways…

May19

we all know this…and yet

Posted on by
Standard

The military has used visualization techniques since WW2. Olympic athletes practice them daily. Grief counselors know this works as well in reverse; they will tell you that having faced a life-threatening situation you must grieve as if everyone involved did, in fact, die. Your subconscious cannot tell the difference between the threat and the reality.

Einstein knew it. I posit that it was the truly valuable discovery he made – far more valuable than splitting atoms. He said, “imagination is the language of the divine.” In more recent scientific studies, since the ability to map the brain while neurons are firing, we now know that intuition and imagination are the same brain function. So, psychic ability can be taught, and it turns out daydreaming is one of the ways to learn it. (Hence the value of the tarot, of storytelling.) Being busy and “productive” all the time is the way to lose it. This brings us full circle around to “Rest As Resistance” – the only way to have freedom from oppression is to mentally remove yourself from the culture; to learn how to think freely again.

I’ve had it all my life. I suspect that being the eldest of five children in a chaotic, abusive household required my “Spidey senses” be hyper-vigilant. And so the natural sixth sense was not un-developed, but allowed to function. Maybe I’m not dysfunctional so much as I’m super-functional.

I remember watching the movie Brainstorm in the theater in 1983 and getting it. This was no longer science fiction. It made for a good screenplay; I knew better intuitively. It was what my son calls “soft disclosure,” meaning it is preemptive propaganda being presented to the masses as fiction so we will readily accept the reality in the near future. And we did. We’re living in someone else’s reality (or dystopia) now. Let’s take back our own.

So, why are each of us not experiencing absolute joy and prosperity? And the answer, as far as I can surmise, is that we don’t practice. We are scared out of our wits of our own power. The only truly meaningful question becomes: WHAT IF? What if time is NOT of the essence and money IS no object?!

What do YOU want? Have I got some stories for you…

May7

Snowbird from Hades

Posted on by
Standard

It was after midnight in the ICU when the alarms went off. My father’s nurse rang the alert for the crash cart, jumped up to straddle my Dad and began CPR. They managed to revive him a fifth time since his surgery a few days prior. It would only be a couple of hours, however, before a different nurse knew he was in trouble. The chest compressions had broken a rib and punctured his spleen; he was bleeding internally. Again, alarms and a 3am call to the surgeon as they prepped him for an emergency splenectomy. As the eldest of his five children I received the phone call to verbally authorize surgery. I wouldn’t make the hospital in time to see him before he went in.

We were in the second? third? week of this crisis. My siblings and I were exhausted. But I knew what had to be done. I wasn’t ready to lose my Dad. We had been estranged most of my adult life, and only recently reconnected. My father was a sociopath, the kind you hear about on those investigative shows where the neighbors swear that he was such a remarkable man. He was that, too, but that is a story for a different time. Meanwhile, I wasn’t about to let the S.O.B. go without a fight. I wasn’t done with him yet.

I knew where to find him in the spiritual realm, and I knew the angels couldn’t help with that. So I prepared myself to descend into hell and negotiate for his salvation. Don’t ask how I know this practice; I cannot answer. Some would explain it as past life work I guess. But I do know it, and I don’t have any need to understand how. I don’t care how. I put myself into a deep altered state and made the transition. It began with the heat. I suddenly had the thought that perhaps this is what the phenomenon of spontaneous combustion is! I concentrated on pulling my breath in and shallow so as not to jar my body out of the experience, hence failing at the goal.

I was walking down a slope, out of a creepy dark wood, and I began to sense and then see beings approaching my path on either side. I knew not to make eye contact. I had “called ahead” and was expected. This was the welcoming party. These creatures made the movie Alien look like a Disney princess…and they were huge, much larger than I would have expected. They were being restrained by an army of lesser demons I can only describe as resembling Orcs. I knew I had been granted passage and that as long as I kept moving along I would make it through. A grotto seemed to emerge from the smoldering desert floor and I entered, to be greeted again by two dark masses of energy. The stench turned my stomach and I had to concentrate not to wrench. If I had a strong physical reaction I risked waking my body from meditation and losing the opportunity.

These two dark beings escorted me through a tight opening to a waiting area barely large enough to stand. Something was breathing behind a wall? a curtain of heat? A deep gutturall breath. It seemed to be laughing at me. Was I a fool to try this?

I was not allowed to view this authority, nor did I want to. I communicated telepathically: “You know what I’m here for. What are your terms?” A scene appeared ahead of a weird cafe-like setting where many people waited to be served. They were waiting for something to quench their thirst, and I was to be their server today apparently. I had the disgusting sense that they had all come as I had, to petition for their own request, and that somehow who and what I was serving was like a lottery to determine who would be given audience. Not all of them would return home today. I had absolutely no fear. I understood the task and went about my business. And woke in my sweet little guest room, feet soaking in a pan of ice cold water. I will not share here all the details of my experience, but I knew it had worked.

There would be no more resuscitations necessary. My father would go from the hospital to assisted living while receiving outpatient rehab. He would live another seven years, and a great deal of healing would occur, for him, and for us adult children, There would be more astonishing spiritual experiences that would shake my understanding of how the world exists. I will share some of those (much more heartening!) events in the near future – but suffice it to say that I know – as in, KNOW – that the life experience you and I are having is a tiny tip of the iceberg of what is going on here. And we are truly blessed and highly favored.

Mar20

The Emperor’s Offer

Posted on by
Standard

Yesterday I drew the Emperor as the tarot card of the day. Specifically, I drew from the Emily Dickinson Tarot. The deck depicts the major arcana as insects, derived from her work as a botanist. The Walking Stick is our Emperor here. Always looking to take action as acknowledgement of the card, I went for a walk. And I asked the Emperor to talk to me, to show me something useful. What popped into my mind surprised me, as intuition often will. I imagined a movie character as The Emperor – Grace, from the movie Hope Gap. How on earth could Grace embody the Emperor? Grace is a hot mess.

Grace is faced with her marriage ending. But they didn’t grow apart after 29 years; he suddenly left for another woman. Not only is she facing her older years alone, but utterly rejected. Perhaps for the first time in her life, Grace is faced with herself. She becomes inconsolable, and intolerable. We’re not quite sure if she and her family will survive this.

This story is a memoir. It was written and directed by William Nicholson, and is the story of his parents divorce and the way it changed a family. The way each of them were transformed. The lives that came out differently than expected. And here is where the Emperor shows up.

The Emperor embodies all four kings of the minor arcana. He is the intellect king of swords, arrogant and haughty and absolutely devoted to the truth. Ultimately he is your best soldier once he matures to realize he isn’t always the smartest person in the room. He is the king of wands, intuitive and compassionate and fair – above all else, fair. In his younger self we saw his impulsive nature and his one-sided idealism get in his way, but he sees his place in history. The king of cups has learned to love the hard way. It isn’t what he thought it meant. It requires dedication and loving action even when he doesn’t feel it, even when anger seems to consume him. And the king of pentacles has learned to manage energy, because without his health he has no throne, no say. And without his wits about him his fortunes will be squandered, and he will be rendered powerless that way as well. He intends to stay in power and to use it effectively. They have all learned to stand their ground, to govern judiciously. And they have learned what power is for.

Grace is shaken to her core, and she must find a way to survive and flourish. And live her life, her way. In her transformation we are all healed. So, yeah, I can see Grace as an emperor. But as it happens, the emperor wasn’t finished with me yet…

The Emperor is my son’s archetype. My son is the most important person in my life. When he was going through cancer treatment in his early twenties I remember something funny he said one day. He said “I know I’m going to be alright no matter what happens, but what are we going to do about getting you some help?” That’s the emperor. These days I am watching him mid-life, struggling to re-invent himself, floundering. He would make the very best dad, but he is not likely to have children of his own. That is not the path of the emperor. They walk alone, the shamans, the way showers. And I need to let him go. I need to alchemize my own life and let him learn to survive and flourish. I need to be Grace. Embrace your own internal Emperor today and be compassionate with yourself. The world is waiting for you.

Dec30

“let’s just keep this between us…”

Posted on by
Standard

While we embrace the beauty of our shared humanity this week, let’s add some brevity to help decompress from the holidays. So, all you human (and also magical) beings struggling with life in the human world…who can’t seem to figure out the technology, and certainly don’t need any more cable…this is your reminder to find some humor and delight in the little things we all take for granted. In the coming weeks we will explore creative ways to corral your clutter. I have a few tricks up my sleeve that make it easier. Meanwhile, I don’t know about you, but I need to explore my inner Elizabeth Bigelow…

“There is no such thing as a mere mortal.” – C.S. Lewis

Jun3

A True Mirror; because “individuality REALLY IS all it’s cracked up to be…”

Posted on by
Standard

It’s a glorious morning. I’m completely socked in a cloud. It’s fifty-five degrees and breezy. The deep green treetops float above the mists like the Isles of Pandora. Heavenly.

Last night I watched the movie Avatar for the first time. A friend had used it as metaphor the other day, and I had to admit to being the last person in ‘Merica who had not seen it. I had not been interested when it was released, and to be honest, I was as disappointed as I expected to be. It was pedantic and oh so predictable. I wonder if James Cameron got a kick-back from the US military, because as a piece of recruitment propaganda it was outstanding. Let’s give the director the benefit of the doubt and assume that is exactly the result he was going for. Had the overly emphasized theme of good versus evil not been so blatantly pounded into us however, the beauty of the animation might not have made it to the big screen.

My friend’s heart was in the right place. It is a fabulous illustration of the out-of-body experience: the work we do while our body is sleeping is never to be taken lightly. The first thing I do when I wake in a strange place is to look down at my hands and feet to see what this body looks like. Next I regulate my breath, and quietly observe my surroundings as best as possible. But sometimes I’m in the middle of war or natural disaster or chaos of some sort. Then you just GO! and figure it out on the move. Quantum leaping is not for the faint of heart. Of course, I’ve never trained for this, or consciously asked for it in any way. God knows I’ve tried to resign. But on some level, in some reality, my soul signed up for this work. Some intelligence somewhere decided I was up to the challenge.

And that was my friend’s point – that sometimes we take a hit for the downtrodden or the oppressed, and it hurts here, when we wake in this time and place. The lifetime we live now is but the tip of the iceberg of our full soul’s experience. It’s hard to remember that when my heart is breaking.

This brings me to the idea I have tried to reconcile much of my adult life: the ongoing argument of PURPOSE. Many loved ones are struggling to “find” their purpose, to “live their purpose”, to fulfill their purpose.

Honestly, it makes me a bit crazy. My friend was right about the best scene in the film:

“We will see if your insanity can be cured,” says the wise leader.

My hope for curing the insanity of my culture is that we can give up this erroneous idea of purpose. I don’t have a purpose; I AM A PURPOSE. I breathe purpose. I embody purpose. WE ALL DO. It is not the pot of gold at the end of the rainbow. It is not a goal. It is not a job. There is nothing to find or figure out. You cannot miss it or fail at it. It is not your gift – YOU are the gift.

If we don’t SEE that, then we don’t SEE each other. And until we see each other there will always be an enemy without. There will always be a war. And Heaven will always be a fantasy.

This woman knows. She makes a business out of telling us:

“Who would not go on a little further were it given him to know the way is short and Heaven is the goal?” – ACIM

 

May23

you can do what you want…

Posted on by
Standard

Friends often hear me say, “On the road to enlightenment, I’m taking the local.” Recently I told someone that I was not interested in spirituality. Least of all in “spiritual” people. They’re so screwed up. Everyone wants to talk about listening to your intuition…living authentically…living your truth. News flash: we all hear our intuition all the time. I am so much happier when I’m not trying.

Pablo Picasso said “Artists live out loud.” They do. They really don’t have much choice. You ignore the direct line God put in place to communicate with you, you’re gonna get unhappy fast. Or dead. They live with their heart on their sleeve, raw, because the process of creativity requires being present…and it creates it…and it requires it…it’s a way of life. All artist’s are making a living. Some of them even make money in the process.

In The Artist’s Way, Julia Cameron recognizes that “going sane feels like going insane at first.” She is acknowledging that when we finally decide to honor our inner knowing, people react badly to our being less available to THIER needs.  This is all the same thing, folks: we are a culture so enmeshed in the HABIT of being co-dependent that we are driving ourselves nuts. We are people-pleasers. We make decisions out of fear and need. Damn we are needy! I’m right there, every day, asking myself what I really want. That’s the pivot point where the healing occurs, what A Course In Miracles calls the Holy Instant: split second, gut reaction, yes to this, no to that.

“I wanted only to try to live in accord with the promptings which came from my true self. Why was that so very difficult?” – Herman Hesse

God is not someone separate from you trying to lead you or guide you or trip you up if you don’t comply. That way of thinking will mess with your head, make you old before your time, or at least miserable today. It will keep you constantly dealing with poverty and disease. Stop asking to know God’s will. It’s hard-wired in. Really, stop trying to figure this out.

Just BE. Make mistakes. Rant and rave. Sob uncontrollably. Breathe deeply. Scream like a banshee. Play like a kid. Make art. Never mind if it’s good or bad – that’s none of your business. Just BE already. That is how we practice loving ourselves.

“God has no secrets. He does not lead you through a world of misery waiting to tell you at the the journey’s end why he did this to you.” – ACIM

Aug23

The Power of Not Knowing, or, how to Navigate the World with a Sense of Humor

Posted on by
Standard

Artist, author and American icon Maira Kalman says “I love my empty mind.” Meditate, let go, empty, repeat. Michael Strang writes about this practice in The Surrender Experiment. It’s a way of life that requires courage. It’s The Artist’s Way.

In the movie Trouble with the Curve baseball scout Gus Noble is losing his sight. But he can recognize great talent by hearing “the pure sound.” I’m not much for sports movies of any kind, but I loved this one and Million Dollar Arm. They’re as much about life as baseball.

May29

“It’s Space. It Doesn’t Cooperate.”

Posted on by
Standard

It seems that perhaps I do have a story to tell after all. And I am only now figuring that out for myself; perhaps beginning to glean some worth in the mess, some reason to tell it. All of my adult life people have said that I should write my story, and all of my adult life I have dismissed this suggestion as frivolous, egotistical, and frankly, boring.

Embarrassingly, I note that the most recent blog post here was September of last year, nearly ten months ago. Shortly thereafter I “went south” (sounds like I’m on vacation) – my personal term for sinking into depression and withdrawing from all but a few close soldiers. This recent willingness to risk sharing again was sparked by the funniest little thing…a photo in a magazine article about a cottage restoration. God works in mysterious ways. Actually, I think God works in any way available.

There I was, reading my favorite blog, drinking my morning coffee, looking at pretty pictures…the blog, Content In A Cottage, (wish I’d thought of that name!) is an almost daily hit of inspiration about life in a small space. Rosemary Beck is a middle aged woman like myself, and has shared the huge recent losses of her Mom and her beloved dog, Webster. But she has found a rhythm that suits her in posting often and briefly, sometimes by simply sharing what someone else has already written. Today it was a picture of a cute house with a link to an article in Gardens And Guns Magazine. First of all, I would never subscribe to a magazine with the word guns in the title. It made me laugh right off though, thinking of Will Thacker in Notting Hill, posing as a writer for Horse and Hound.

This article is so well written by Allison GLOCK (God has such a great sense of humor) that I want to read it again. I think it would have been delightful even if it hadn’t been about my favorite subject. The transformation of the house is inspiring, and the result altogether enchanting. But, frustrated and grief stricken now by over sixty years of not being true to myself, some of the photographs brought tears of sadness and disappointment. Everything that interests me seems bittersweet at this stage of my life. And there – in that split second where delight and discouragement co-exist – THERE is the crux of any meaningful story. There, for my son and all the others who live in that juxtaposition, is the gift I will continue to explore in my writing. Because only there do we have a choice to make – that can, and does, effect our future.

That photo showed “freshly cut olive branches” in a vase on a table. That was all it took. The tears could not be denied. My olive trees are gone. I still miss them. Years ago now, my husband and I drove up to a house we were looking at to buy, and five twisted old olive trees bowed noble along the drive, the stubborn sentinels of a long ago orchard. They were FULL of Cedar Waxwings. I knew immediately this was my next home. It was magic. I fell in love with those trees the longer I lived with them. The leaves were soft green on one side and silver underneath. Thomas Jefferson said “the olive tree is assuredly the richest gift of heaven.” That quote, cut from a magazine years prior, was glued into one of my notebooks. I had always wanted olive trees.

One day I drove home from work to find the olive trees gone, leveled by my husband and a chainsaw. Stumps. “Messy old junk trees,” he called them. I was devastated. I couldn’t talk, and went straight to bed. I had no inkling he didn’t like the trees; I never knew they were in danger. Never had a chance to defend them. I knew the Waxwings would not come again. But the real tragedy took hold slowly over time. To this day, my now former husband doesn’t know I loved those trees. I couldn’t tell him. I couldn’t trust him with my heart. I knew he would become defensive and angry, telling me how ridiculous and unreasonable I was being over stupid old trees. It was, of course, also about more than the loss of the trees. It was about not being considered in that decision. I knew then that they were never our trees. They were his. This wasn’t our home, it was his. It took a dozen more years, another move, and many more heartbreaks before I would leave. It took my greedy silence and selfish denial a lot longer to surface before I would come to realize this path of stoic silence was a death trap for my soul – and that I was worth saving.

In the movie The Martian, there is a scene when astronaut Mark Watney must launch himself into space without a ship or any safety mechanism, and soon he will either be rescued and go back to his wife and child, or he will die. Either way, he will never be the same man who left the earth on this adventure. After fighting for survival all this time, you watch the dawning of this realization move across his face – that this has all been immeasurably precious, each terrifying, hard and painful moment he has endured. Precious. And he cries. Seldom has a movie caused such a response in me. I experienced the moment with him, of despair and terror and elation and hope – all at once. The crux. The “bleed through” between life on earth, and the Kingdom of Heaven. The Holy Instant, A Course In Miracles calls it. Whatever you may call it, know that these exquisite moments will come again and again until we live in the “bleed through.” Because life, like space, does not cooperate.

For Faith.