Seattle Girl on Cape Cod: Collaborating with the Unknown

"By choosing your thoughts, and by selecting which emotional currents you will release and which you will reinforce, you determine the quality of your Light. You determine the effects that you will have on others, and the nature of the experience of your life."—Gary Zukov from Seat of the Soul.

 Dear fellow Humans,

There's lots to fear in the world we live in today. There's a pandemic and people are dying.

 Or is that the unreliable narrator playing its part? Or am I the unreliable narrator?

 It's hard to distinguish fact from fiction today and everyone will tell you that what THEY believe and  follow are the FACTS without a doubt. So then others are called to question their own beliefs and facts and, since we all influence each other, we begin to FOLLOW what we are told rather than what is intrinsically true for each one of us. I can't deny what's true for you. What's true for you IS what's true for you. I'm not going to try and convince you otherwise. You have a right to believe and follow what you want to believe and follow. 

Part of why we create a story to begin with is because we are AFRAID of the unknown. Humans don't do well with what they don't know. It's easier to have a story. A story makes us feel like we know what's going on. 

The funny thing is, we've never known what will happen. NEVER. It's always been a mystery. We can't control what others will do, say or be. We only have the power to decide what we will do, say or be in this world at this moment in time.

Rather than fight the unknown and demand answers, I've found a way to collaborate with it. In fact, working with the unknown has become second nature to me. The unknown is highly intelligent and intuitive. When you are open to the unknown, amazing things happen. There's a co-creation that occurs that most often defies logic. If you are closed to it, you will only see what's in front of you or what's dished up for you to see.

In my life, there have been so many clear signs of the unknown tapping me on the shoulder and saying, "Can you hear me? I'm here. Let's create!"

When I hold tight to my old ideas or beliefs, no other energy is allowed to enter. I've basically decided on THE STORY of my life. Period. Most of the story I've created comes from past trauma or old patterns and beliefs that are no longer true. 

Examples:

"I'm poor and don't have much money."

"I'll never find a partner."

"You have to work hard for your money."

"Work is unenjoyable."

"I'll never be a home owner."

"I am not healthy."

"This has been a very hard year with no brightness anywhere."

These are messages that end with a period. There's no room for anything else to enter. It's the END of the story. 

But how about trying these instead:

"All the abundance in the world is available to me."

"There are many possible partners out there just waiting to literally bump into me."

"Work that I love flows easily into my life."

"My work is enjoyable."

"The perfect home is waiting for me and I can feel I'll have it soon."

"I'm in optimal health. I've never felt better and everyday I give my body the attention and love it needs."

"This year has had some challenges, for sure, but I still see brightness and possibility everywhere I look."

I just rewrote the STORY. Am I the unreliable narrator or am I simply collaborating with the unknown? Did you notice that the second group of statements were not definitive. They didn't have a feeling of "absoluteness" to them. They were more open and free. And maybe, to an extent, unreliable. Why? Because our PAST HISTORY, patterns and beliefs have told us that they simply CAN'T be TRUE. 

Why not try on a different HAT for size? Go out on a limb and create a new story. Collaborate with the unknown and unwritten, just to see what happens. 

Well, here's my story for an example:

I was in WA state and for months had been trying to buy a home. There was NOTHING I could afford, or so I told myself. 

"I guess I'll just be poor forever and roam from rental to rental. I'm not meant to have a home." 

A big part of me believed this story. I am attached to the wandering part of myself and LOVE it dearly, to the point of not really wanting to change the story, I guess. One day, while searching for homes on Zillow, I saw a listing for an off-season rental on Cape Cod that was extremely affordable. I hadn't considered Cape Cod. It wasn't the story I had imagined for myself. I was set on living on the Olympic Peninsula in WA State. Strangely, this rental on Cape Cod started to pull me in. I let go and I could feel myself living there and entertaining there and really loving it. I was open to a new story. I was open to ease and a different direction. All the times I visited Cape Cod with my boyfriend (his 97-year old mother and cousin live here and he grew up here) I loved it. Due to the "pandemic," I found myself teaching online, so currently, I can live anywhere. 

"But you better not uproot yourself. You better hold steady. You don't know when you'll have to go back to the classroom. It's unsafe to travel by car across the country right now. Coronavirus numbers are rising. You could get it. BE SAFE out there. Don't go out. You need to batten down the hatches and draw the shades and...and...and..." 

Who's story was this? Was it coming from FEAR or OPENNESS? Was it my story? What was I afraid of? 

When I let go, the unknown was sitting in the passenger seat right next to me saying, 

"Alright, here we go! So glad you tuned IN. You've known all along what to do. So glad you listened to your intuition. This is going to be absolutely GREAT!" 

And the next thing I knew, my boyfriend and I had secured a beautiful home on the lower Cape through the end of November. It was August when we started packing up our stuff. I'd been living in Airbnbs for the summer and uncertain of my next move and he had a short-term rental in Seattle that was ending soon. They were going to demolish his home to widen the road. Many of his carpentry jobs were coming to an end. I was about to go on a month-long break from teaching. The time was right. We put our stuff into two storage units. I sold my car. He got a camper top for his truck and we drove across the country, from WA State to Cape Cod. We stopped at a friend's cabin in Idaho and had a glorious two days swimming, eating and enjoying and then headed on the Lewis and Clark Trail to Montana where we pitched our tent at the Rusty Nail Ranch on Flathead Lake Indian Reservation. We saw bison and pronghorns and other wild animals. And behind our ranch was a shrine with 1000 buddhas. We visited there and met a woman who used to work at Boeing and also packed up all her things to work at the gift shop there. 

"I was called to come here," she said, "It didn't logically make sense, but everything lined up for me to be here." 

That's what collaborating with the unknown feels like. It doesn't logically make sense, but everything FEELS right. It all lines up and flows almost effortlessly.

We got to our home about 15 days later, having driven all the way across the country. When we first arrived, we were lost. The Lower Cape has mazes of homes down sandy paths with unknown street names. Some roads went half-way through and then ended. We found ourselves on the right road on the wrong section of it. My body immediately went to an old story, "Oh, no! It's late. We are lost. We will never find it." Scott, on the other hand, stepped outside in early September and felt the balmy, sultry air of the Lower Cape and listened to the crickets and didn't give a shit that he was lost. We had arrived! We were in paradise. He called his buddy he'd be working for (another part of the story we didn't plan or couldn't make up) who said, rather nonchalantly, "Why don't you try a different GPS. Maybe that will get you there." Within seconds, we were at our 'Downton Abbey' home and it was beyond amazing. I couldn't believe we were here!

Now, right now, as I sit here typing this, seven of the most glorious months of my life have just passed. We planned to stay here until the end of November, but it's nearly April and we are still here. Cape Cod Bay is a five minute walk down a shell-path from out home. We've witnessed spectacular sunsets almost every single night. We've kayaked and hiked and biked all over this place. We made it through the wild snow storms and have seen meteor showers from our upper deck. I can't tell you in this short blog post what we've experienced, but it's been out of this world. A dream really.

On April 1st, we have to move out. Our rental sold. We will move 10 minutes down the street to another rental near First Encounter Beach until June 19th. I was determined to live here through the summer, but it seemed nearly impossible since rent prices go up 4-10 times on Cape Cod in the summer. 

"It's impossible!" I thought. And well, we all know what happens to that story. It's over!

But, since I've been in the habit of keeping the door open with the unknown and I know clearly now that I'm co-creating my reality with source/God/my higher-self, I knew on a very deep level that anything is possible. So, before I knew it, I was putting an offer on a condo near a beach in Dennis that was selling for an unbeatable price. The condo ticked all the boxes I dreamed of in a home: low mortgage, the ability to Airbnb the unit, a pool, huge storage, low HOA, close to amazing beaches, kayaking and bike paths, next to Cape Cod Center for the Arts and the oldest summer theater in the United States, coffee shops, yoga schools, and the only pet you can have is a cat. The only pet I've ever wanted is a cat and recently I've REALLY wanted one.

So, if all goes through smoothly, we close on our new condo on Cape Cod on May 3rd. We will fix it up while we are living in our rental and make it our own. We may Airbnb it in the summers? Who knows? But we will have a place to live in for a good price in the summer and beyond
on Cape Cod and it is OURS!!! 

I didn't make this story up. This is my life. The only thing I did was decide to open and collaborate with the unknown. Life is always an unreliable narrator, but you get to intend on where you want the story to go. What words are you telling yourself about YOUR LIFE and LIFE AROUND YOU. Is that an old story? Is that your story even, or one you've been fed? Just something to consider.

Seattle Girl on Cape Cod: Widening the Lens and Getting a Bigger Perspective

 

Hello fellow Earthlings,

I love taking photos on my walks. Sometimes I'm so overwhelmed with joy and delight in what I am seeing and witnessing that I want to capture it all, but it's too enormous.

While I can Zoom in on a tree's branches covered with white snow and capture how things look up close, I realize that this tree also holds many different kinds of birds in its branches. There are small berries and leaves and a big wide trunk with roots that go deep down into several layers of earth and then there's an entire underworld happening there that I can't capture or even begin to know about. So I'm just getting one small perspective of this tree.

Whatever I see is only part of the bigger picture. 

When I step outside into nature, I'm also part of this picture. I'm part of the bay with the tide receding, the bright sun overhead, the snow melting on the rocks, the razor clam shells, the bright green seaweed. 

I'm every little tiny grain of sand.

I'm that sun that lights up the entire sky. The same one that sinks below the horizon like a huge, orange liquid ball of fire.

From the micro to the macro, I'm part of it.

When I zoom my lens out far, I get the entire scene, but it still doesn't do justice to what I'm seeing, smelling, hearing, tasting, touching and feeling. 

I can't capture the sound of the waves or the taste of salt on my lips or the frozen feeling of my feet walking through soft snow or the smell of cedar burning in wood stoves in houses on the bluff.

These are all pieces of the picture. 

Out here on Cape Cod, the weather can change in an instant. We can go from a sunny 55 degree day in the winter to a frozen 28 degree day with wind gusts up to 70 miles per hour. You just never know out here. 

My emotions and feelings are a bit like the weather. Something can set me off and I feel myself reeling for a while. The funny thing is that when I witness the shift in weather on my walks, I'm able to recognize it simply as a change in weather.

Somehow emotions are bit trickier. It seems that everyone's emotions are on high these days. One little bit of information from a friend or loved one or a snippet of news from social media can set me off down a rabbit hole of confusion, anger or disbelief. 

Have you ever found yourself looking at one thing online and then next thing you know you've followed the information trail down into a hole that is a bottomless pit of information, opinions, ideas, thoughts, angry words or convincing arguments? It's pretty easy to do these days. 

Most of the information out there feels like it's meant to distract and divide people.

These days, when I feel that chaotic feeling creeping in from online information overload, I literally shut off every single device in the middle of whatever I'm doing and head out into nature. I'm able to walk away and leave my work for an hour or so because I work from home and I set the hours. This is one of the silver linings of my online job.

The other silver lining is being able to live out here on Cape Cod, out in the middle of the ocean, where nature literally calls me outside constantly. 

The bigger perspective is right out my front door right now. We don't have street lights out here, so millions of stars and the Milky Way are often visible on a clear night. Sometimes, while working, I hear an owl or a coyote and go up to the upper deck to listen. Sometimes the moon lights up our entire master bedroom on the second floor or the wind howls and shakes the windows in their frames or we wake up to snow gently falling all around us. 

The bigger perspective is always right there and it's not an accident that I've put myself  smack dab in the middle of Nature, where it's hard not to see it. 

The information highway comes to me through a tiny screen on either my phone or computer. It comes in pixels that join together to create this virtual reality.

Outside, the lens is wide. With each step I take outside my front door, I feel a release of all the heavy baggage that has somehow taken up space in my being. 

All of it leaves me instantly when I step outside. It's the one thing that is keeping me sane these days. A call and response conversation with a bright red cardinal high up on a tree branch is more real for me than talking into a computer with tiny squares of pixeled people.

I miss deep connections with people out here. I really do. I have my boyfriend and a few friends, but I miss face to face conversations and looking directly into people's eyes. I miss hugs and body language and laughter and sitting in the same room with people breathing. 

I get a sense of that when I walk outside amongst people, but it's not the same as sitting in a live circle with like-minded souls. 

Inside millions of rooms around the world people communicate with each other virtually. This is both amazing and disturbing at the same time. These quick, short words we type to each other don't tell the full story. The lens is too close. I can't see the full picture. 

I can't hear the inflection in your voice, 

Or see your eyes,

Or feel your touch,

Or really know what's going on inside. 

For now, nature will have to do until I can really experience YOU.

Seattle Girl on Cape Cod: Losing Sense of Time

 Hello fellow Earthlings,

It's Friday, but seriously, who is keeping track? Someone out there is, probably? I work from home (I'm a college teacher) and my schedule is muddled by the fact that there aren't any events anymore to punctuate my time. I hate to admit that I'm still in my pajamas at 2:41pm. There's no getting dressed up, defrosting the car, packing a lunch and driving through traffic to work anymore, so what's the point. In fact, I sold my car, so I only travel on foot or bicycle now. 

There aren't many stores near my house, so yesterday I walked to the post office and got my mail, and then wandered into a tiny convenience store next to the post office and bought Drano, toothpaste, spaghetti sauce and glue sticks (for an art project). This was huge. But it got even better...

Near the gas station, there's one and only ONE boutique/art shop near my house called ARTichoke. I love it. They have tarot cards, crystals, incense, art, soap, bath salts clothes, kombucha, chocolate, jewelry, etc. I wandered around looking at everything. The whole place felt like a fantasy world of delight. When there's not much to stimulate the senses anymore, it doesn't take much. 

I ended up leaving the shop with two crystals (rose quartz and aventurine), pomegranate lip balm, rose water from Italy, bath salts with essential oils, peppermint chocolate and a kombucha. Bliss!

I have to say, however, today wasn't quite as productive. It comes in waves for me. I always have great intentions when I start my day. Scott is the first to get up. He has to be at the job site at 9am. I usually wake up to the sound of him making coffee and singing. The smell of coffee and breakfast usually lures me downstairs. We try to eat together before he leaves and then the silence of the house sometimes leaves me yearning for connection. I don't have any friends here, so social media has become a substitute for social life. The problem with the internet is that I find myself being led down rabbit holes of information without realizing how much time has passed. In a normal world, I'd call up a friend to go on a walk or out to dinner. But we aren't living in a normal world anymore. Somehow I managed to save the day by doing four hours of work for my college job. I even squeezed in a tiny walk to the beach before the sun went down.

Truthfully, the long winter months on the East Coast are giving me a bit of cabin fever.  While everyone in Seattle is elated about the snow coming tonight, ours has been on the ground for a week. It was exciting at first, but I can see why people here don't do snow dances. It's a given there will be snow and most likely A LOT of it. 

On my walk yesterday, I felt so lonely that I started communicating with a male cardinal. It was call and response. He'd call and I'd respond. It went on for several minutes and finally I turned to continue my walk. I will say, it was a magical moment to actually be talking to an animal and have it hear me. It was a being besides Scott who I was communicating with in person. That does count for something. 

This post sounds a bit sad. But truthfully, the tuning in part has been very rewarding and I've gotten so much from all the quiet and inward focus.

That being said,  I do feel the need to have some kind of community here if we plan to stay on another year. Scott and I talked about starting a Meetup on Cape Cod in order to find like-minded friends. It's not easy to be in a new place without a network of friends and family already in place during a pandemic. A wild Saturday night is hanging out with Scott's 97-year-old mom in Sandwich. I actually love it. She really peps up when we arrive and I always appreciate the conversations we have over dinner when we visit once or twice a week.

We are social creatures who create our lives and the purposes of our lives through our interactions. It's really not easy to have that be almost non-existent. I can tell, as the winter starts to thaw and spring emerges, I'm going to have to venture out, with a mask of course, and find my tribe here. I have faith that I will and that the sense of time I've lost and the connections I've missed will be replaced by longer, warmer days and time outside with people I have yet to meet. I've sensed soon-to-be friends so close that I'm sure we've crossed paths on my walks. I also sense that summer will be about car-travel and camping and being active again.

Scott  just said, "Let's go for a drive up to Provincetown and get a cup smokey Haddock chowder and a drink." Why not, I think. It's one thing we can do here and the outing is sure to shake up these dark feelings and add a bit of flavor and excitement to an otherwise moonless night.

Seattle Girl on Cape Cod: It's all Smoke and Mirrors

It's All Smoke and Mirrors

It's all smoke and mirrors.

We've come to worship technology

And find our answers on screens.

Main-stream media has become our God.

How did you, who I love,

Become a bunch of pixels in a tiny square?

I can't feel your embrace,

Nor hear your heart beating.

So, without you here

I turn my face to the ocean

Where the wind whispers in my ear.

I don't hear words, but I understand.

When I step outside I'm home. 

A red cardinal in bamboo,

Or a woodpecker perched on a naked branch

Surrounded by red winter berries

Leads me further down the the path

Nature is my altar now. 

I come to the place where the land stops

And the sea begins

The sun fills me up from head to toe

As I sink down into the golden grains below me

My feet move without thought

My heart in my chest 

Is a compass

To the Unknown

Earth's sacred garden

Holds the key

In an oyster shell

Have you found the treasure yet?

Seattle Girl On Cape Cod: Blizzard on the Beach

 
"Lighten up while you still can, don't even try to understand, just find a place to make your stand and take it easy."—Jackson Browne

Well, I kinda understand why people head South for the winter. Today we had blizzard-like weather on the beach. I thought about going for a walk with Scott out in it. He hasn't worked for two days due to the weather. Most of his jobs in his friend's contracting business are outside. 

So, we put on 4-5 layers this afternoon—3 pairs of pants/long underwear, two shirts and a sweater, ski pants/jackets, gloves, hat(s), and face masks in preparation for heading out into the cold. In the end, my eyes were the only things you could see. 

The roads had been salted, so the snow hadn't accumulated on the streets as we drove to Nauset Beach on the Atlantic Ocean. I thought, We'll just go for a little walk down the beach.

With the temperatures dipping down into the low teens and 30-40 mile gusts of wind, that walk didn't last long. We tried to drive up to Wellfleet to see the town in white, but it was seriously getting blizzard-like out there so we went home. 

Well, we signed up for this. We decided we wanted A Year on Cape Cod. Well, almost a year. We are here at least until June 19th, if not longer. 

But today...well today I was not prepared for a blizzard on the beach.

How many people would choose that as a vacation destination?

This isn't a vacation, though. This is our life. We are Cape Codders, for now.

Somehow the snow and wind, which forced us to be inside, made me realize just how isolated I am out here. When I'm out in nature, I feel so connected. When I can't get out in it and am home-bound, it's hard to feel connected. 

I have NOT been following the news lately and have not been surfing the internet much. I have enjoyed lots of meditation, rest, writing, teaching, etc. I've enjoyed tuning in. But I do miss friends and family.

Given our current weather conditions today, I thought, just for a few moments, maybe I'll run away to Florida and see my family and friends down there. It's 70 degrees in the daytime. 

Maybe I will or maybe I won't go?

Yes, sometimes life can feel cold, lonely, and isolating. But that's life!

'Blizzard on the Beach' is the perfect backdrop for that. It's as good a backdrop as any and the wildness of it has its own intrigue.

After all, life has its seasons and truthfully, I am a girl who appreciates seasons. I love long summers that seem to hold on until late September, fall (oh, my favorite!) when the leaves start to turn and everything, especially in New England, turns to fiery oranges, reds and yellows. I love the first snow and decorating for the season and getting in the holiday spirit. 

But there's this time, between mid-January to March that seems like it will never end. In Seattle, it's WET and dreary with occasional sun breaks. Here in Massachusetts, the cold bites right through you. But on the Cape, we've been lucky. The weather dips down, but doesn't stay down thanks to the ocean which warms everything up. And man, I've soooo appreciated the SUN out here. I'm not use to all this sun, being a Seattle-girl and all. I could very-well become a sun worshiper. I could chase that sun around the globe. I need that light and warmth. I need to feel it in my bones, even if it's bitter cold outside. 

I shouldn't complain. In Bristol, Vermont, where we went to see the leaves change in the fall, it's 5 degrees Here on Cape Cod at 5:48pm on a Friday night, it's 21 degrees. I'll take 21 degrees over 5 degrees any day.

Today, after attempting our walk on Nauset Beach, we drove over to Thumpertown Beach on the bay side, near our house.  Scott and I sat in his truck staring out into the snow and icy waves. Seagulls flew sideways and the wind shook the car and blew the dry snow in swirls around the parking lot. Jackson Browne came on the radio singing his hit song, Take it Easy.

Take it easy, take it easy

Don't let the sound of your own wheels 

Drive you crazy

Lighten up while you still can

Don't even try to understand

Just find a place to make your stand

And take it easy....

In the spirit of taking it easy, Scott turned to me and said, "Maybe this would be a great day to take the kayak out!"

He was joking, of course, but it brought in a flood of memories of warm endless summer days when that now icy bay was flat, calm warm and inviting. I was reminded of a day late in September when it was in the 70s still and we took the kayak out and swam around until sundown. 

Ah, life, I'm not even trying to understand anymore. I'm just going with what my gut tells me to do. I'm not following anyone. What's the point of that? 

Each day is a gift, really. The rest...well... 

In the end, what matters? That I followed what everyone else told me to do or that I lived well? 

Everyone has got to make there own decisions in this life. Where you go and what you do is up to you. I'm not here to convince you of anything, except maybe to tell you that all the the answers you need, you've already got. It's just a matter of tuning in. And perhaps....taking it easy.

Seattle Girl on Cape Cod: Living Like a Gypsy in These Unprecedented Times. We are RAMBLING ON!

Hello fellow EARTHLINGS,

How are you on this fine Friday night?

 I'm living like a gypsy in these unprecedented times. It wasn't planned. It's the cards I was dealt, but I couldn't have asked for a better hand.

 I think I may have made lemonade out of lemons. Somehow I'm living my dream life out here on Cape Cod, 

 I've always been a wanderer. I've lived an entire life of adventure.

"One day you will settle down." I've heard these words over and over again as each decade has passed, and yet I'm still on the road.

And I'm so grateful where I've landed.

I'm grateful that I have always been open to "whatever is next." Life is unpredictable with many twists and turns. I think it becomes a lot more enjoyable when I LET GO of the reigns or at least loosen up on them a bit and see where this life wants to take me. Of course I have my own intentions, dreams and ideas, but flexibility has been a key ingredient in navigating this thing called life. 

 I'm not sure I've always sought out the gypsy life, perhaps it's sought out me? I have always been open to it. When the pandemic hit, I was living at my parents' house in Sequim while they were snow birding down in Arizona. Eventually they returned in May, and I needed to find a place to go. I had been looking for a place to buy on the Olympic Peninsula and nothing panned out. I made offers on houses, but it wasn't in my cards.  I'm now 51, and I still don't have a house of my own. I could curse the universe for giving me a gypsy life, but I've decided to embrace it. 

Truth be told, one part of me longs for a cat and a home that is all my own, but a bigger part of me LOVES, absolutely loves the life I have.

You know what's funny, just as I'm loving this life in front of me, I have a strange feeling, a premonition if you will, that I WILL find that house and cat. I see myself sharing this lovely home with my boyfriend Scott. It always happens that way, doesn't it?  When you let go and open, what wants to come in usually does. 

 We thought we'd have to move out of this house at the end of November. The owner had winter renters and we couldn't stay past December 1st, so we thought.

But the house sold in September while we were in the house, so we were meant to be the last renters. All the winter renters on the books had to find something else.

Then the deal fell through. The house didn't sell.

 Now the owner was without renters for the winter, so we asked if we could stay through the spring. The owner agreed.

But it JUST SOLD AGAIN! The new owners close on April 20th. 

WE LOVE THIS HOUSE! 

But I don't know if we've loved it enough to buy it and it was out of our price range anyway. 

However, we had a very good run here. We got to stay in a HUGE house right by the beach from mid-September to April.

We've loved the short walk down the shell path to the glorious bay where we've watched dozens of sunsets, swum in the warm waters, collected shells and rocks, kayaked, star-gazed, moon-gazed, kissed.

 We've loved our home and cooking up a storm in the huge kitchen or sitting out on the back deck on a sunny day with appetizers and a cool drink or gazing at a meteor shower from the upper deck. 

We've enjoyed crock-pot soups on fall nights, and our first snow here and decorating for Christmas. We've loved movies in the sweet living room and eating fresh Wellfleet oysters from down the street. We've loved everything about this place. I've loved teaching my college classes upstairs in my office nook and Scott's loved his contracting job on the Lower Cape. He's loved coming home, showering, grabbing a bite to eat and then wandering down the path to the beach for sunset. It's so peaceful here. There's no light pollution. There are so many stars. Nature is wild. There are foxes, and coyotes, and wild turkeys and old graveyards with pilgrims from the Mayflower in them and fish shacks and beach knick knacks. 

And now it's time to go.

But we aren't ready to leave. 

WE AREN'T READY TO LEAVE! 

There, I said it. 

So I found another house 10 minutes away. It is equal in size and charm and close to a swimming pond and First Encounter Beach. It's got a deck and lots of rooms and it's near the bike path. I'm EXCITED about this new adventure down the street. Yes, new adventures can even happen DOWN THE STREET!!! I'll be sad to leave this house, but we stayed longer than we expected to.

And so this new chapter starts on April 1 and ends on June 19. Summer on the Cape is outrageous. Prices go up 10 times. We don't know where we will go come June. We don't know.

But we have from January 22-June 20th. We have at least 5 more months....at least! We've bought ourselves more time here. We want to feel the spring come around the bend. Watch the flowers bloom. Take a dip in the pond down the road from our new abode. Watch the sky get lighter and lighter as the days get longer and longer. We aren't done with this beach town yet.

A year on Cape Cod. 

Give me a year on Cape Cod so I can taste every season. I want to feel it all. This gypsy is hanging out for awhile here. The winds of change have only blown us down the street. The Nor-easter didn't even drive us out. 

We are here to stay for now. Yes, this gypsy is staying put....and loving EVERY SECOND of it.

Seattle Girl on Cape Cod: Nature Vs. Technology

"Look deep into nature and then you will understand everything better."—Albert Einstein

 Today the sun was high when I woke up at 8:30am. I ate a breakfast of oatmeal and coffee, threw a load of laundry in the washing machine, cleaned up a bit and got dressed. All I could think about was getting OUTSIDE. 

Getting outside here on Cape Cod is actually how I get INSIDE. It's my REAL communion with the world. 

Today the clouds were puffy and white. I wandered down the shell path to the beach steps. The water was calm and clear and the clouds were smattered across the sky as if Bob Ross himself had joyfully brushed them in to being like the 'happy little clouds' he is known for. 

As soon as I take note of Nature, it takes note of me. This has been my experience. I'm no longer separate from it. It's as if a door opens and I'm ushered in where millions of miracles are happening all at once, me being one of the miracles. 

Of course we've seen everything in Nature before. Nothing is new, right? 

We've seen stars, clouds, the sun, the moon, trees. We've felt soft sand between our toes, tasted the sweet nectar of Nature in an apple picked fresh from a tree. We've smelled roses and lilacs. We've heard the waves lap at the shore. We've experienced it all, so why is Nature still so mesmerizing? Why do we need it and want to be out in it?

I don't know about you, but I'm constantly informed by Nature. The more I open the door and step in, REALLY STEP IN, the more I come out with a truer sense of who I am. 

It's as if all of the molecules in my body begin to dance with the sounds, sights, tastes, touches and feelings of Nature. 

Nature is very much a sensual experience. In witnessing it, I witness myself. We aren't separate. I long for that connection more than anything. It calls to me each day.

If Nature is feeling, Technology is THINKING.

The imagery I see, hear, or feel through technology is NOT THE SAME as what I experience with nature. Nature is REAL and tangible. It's light and bright, even when it is dark. 

 What I experience through technology is cold and metallic. Lately, the imagery feels dark and fear-producing. Technology has been created by humans as a way to bring the world closer to us, but are we meant to see the world all at once on a man-made screen? Could, perhaps, what we are currently experiencing through technology be completely man-made?  Is this the future of how we will interact? Will we all be staring at boxes feeling emotions that are happening to us through the INTERNET? Will we lose our connection to MOTHER NATURE herself and use her only as a means to an end rather than a way of connecting deeply to everything. 

Well, these thoughts come as I sit down at my computer. After all, this is how most of us are communicating these days. I feel that cold sensation again. It creeps in and leaves me with a buzzing in my ears, a tightness in my jaw and head and a soreness in my neck and back. Just as soon as I sit down, I want to get up and put my feet in the sand out in the driveway of this beach house—anything to unplug from technology and touch back down deep into the Earth's soft folds.

In my dreams, Nature visits me. I feel I'm being guided by merely opening to her. She tells me to keep tuning in. She tells me to rise above the noise and chaos—that BEING is just as important as DOING, if not more so—particularly NOW.

And it's not only the clouds that stood out today. While the clouds were large and lofty and begged to be noticed, tiny shells and grains of golden sand at my feet held just as much magic in them. My shoes sank into those soft grains on the beach and with every step I took I imagined all the darkness that's been swirling around on the Earth through technology get washed out by the salty water of Cape Cod Bay. Mother Nature is so much wiser than anything humans have created or destroyed on on this planet. She has so much compassion and patience for us. She only asks us to take notice of her.

Seattle Girl on Cape Cod: Finding the Light

"Hope is being able to see that there is light despite all the darkness."—Desmund Tutu

Have you ever stared at patterns on your walls or ceiling, the patterns the sun makes early in the morning as the light streams through the windows? Or listened to the sound of the rain on the roof? Or heard and even felt the wind howling outside shaking the windows in their frames? That wind is so loud that you can feel the air in the bedroom charged with its energy.

All of this energy pulls me out from the warmth of my house, right out into the raw elements. 

 Down the the road from me, here in Eastham, is First Encounter Beach, where Pilgrims encountered Natives of this land for the first time. When I walk around this area, I feel that even though this land is very narrow in its width, its deep in its history and there's so much to learn from it. I'm not talking about learning from books, although I'm finding those to be interesting, but more from the land itself.

When Scott goes off to his carpentry job each morning after a breakfast together of coffee and oatmeal, I immediately pull on my rubber boots if it's low tide or I slip on my tennis shoes if the tide is a bit higher. If the tide is low, I can walk way out on the flats, much like walking on the moon, I imagine. I like the ripples in the sand that the waves leave behind. Today, I saw intricate lines in smooth sand that left vein-like features that appeared to be tree branches with long, deep roots. 

The patterns the water leaves in the sand are so alive. They are the earth's symbols and they are everywhere. The sand reminds me that whatever I see today, won't be there tomorrow. When the tides come in, all of it gets washed away. 

This morning, before getting out of bed,  I did the mistake of checking in on the news. And then checking Facebook. I saw comments by people who were so angry, unhappy, and divided. People were calling each other names and were fighting for 'their side,' saying the other was wrong or at fault. I feel so removed from it all out here. I'm not ignorant of what is going on. But what do I accomplish by fighting on the computer with others? Or insisting that I have all the answers. Truthfully, I'm less and less inclined to even check and see what's going on because there's so much going on RIGHT HERE and what goes on in the news feels a bit overwhelming, out of my control and even quite surreal. Sometimes I entertain the idea of disappearing for a year into the wild, away from the need to connect by phone or computer. I wonder what would happen after a year of being away with no news? Would people still be fighting about politics? Would there be more hatred in the world? Or would people find a way to really witness each other, really hear each other? Well, as the old adage goes, 'There's nothing new under the sun.' The sun has, in fact, seen it all. Maybe that's why it was such a strong teacher for me today.

Today everything was about LIGHT: sunlight through my windows, sun patterns on my wall, sun on the beach, sunlight on my face. A worker smoking a cigarette behind Cumberland Farms said, "Hey, What a beautiful day, isn't it? It feels like spring!" I love the directness of people here. There's no hesitation in them telling you how they feel. I couldn't have agreed more. It was gorgeous.

I must have walked 5 miles today around my hood. I walked from my home to Thurmpertown Beach and then down Thumpertown Road to Brackett Road where I visited the tiny North Eastham Post Office to check my post box for mail. Then I walked from Campground Road to Bay Road and back to the house.

 

Always, at the start of my walk, my mind rehashes thoughts about this or that. My mind goes from the past to the future in an instant. Eventually my mind settles comfortably in on now.

What's happening now?

Now I'm feeling my feet in my shoes. Now the blue sky against the green of the pines on Thumpertown Road is so vivid. Now a woman in a white jacket with a white-patterned hat with ear flaps just passed me on the other side of the road and waved. Now I see green grass poking through the pine-needled sides of the road. Is spring already on its way? Now a red cardinal just fluttered past me onto an oak branch. Now I must cross the street, are there any cars? Wow, it feels like a ghost town around here, I like it. Now the sun is beating on my face as I change direction. Now I close my eyes and feel the sun fill me up from head to toe. Now I move at a steady pace, my legs working without me needing to tell them to move. How miraculous this body is! How amazing this earth is!

These are my thoughts as I move into the now. And most of the time these thoughts fall away and all I feel are sensations. In those moments, I am connected to, not separate from, everything. 

And this is why I followed the light outside today. It's also why I've opened a window to feel the wind on my face or sat up on my upper balcony to watch a meteor shower. 

I won't stop doing this. In a world that currently feels out of control with humans in charge, the sun said, "Don't worry, we've seen this all before. Stay in the light."

Join me for a 5-week Intuitive Writing journey called Living a Life with Intention starting on January 21st. I'd love to see you there.