Blog
A Year of Leaning In
A couple of weeks ago Orionne and I celebrated our one year anniversary! What a meaningful threshold for us to cross. And what a profound year of leaning in it has been. We met (re-met) one year ago in July and immediately bowed in to a most extraordinary love. We...
Reporting From The Heart of Fire Season
What a particularly challenging and poignantly vulnerable life experience it is to be living through another fire season in the Pacific Northwest. Each year it seems to come earlier and more ferociously than the last. Experiencing these blatant repercussions of severe...
So Many Thresholds
This past weekend Ezra (9.5) and I drove the 6 hour trek alone together to Lake Tahoe, CA, delivering him to his first ever week of overnight camp, at Camp Woodward! He will be scootering, skateboarding, swimming, (possibly snowboarding!) and being initiated in all...
“Free of Mom”~ Attachment & Surrender
The other morning I was sitting at my desk writing, when suddenly my son Ezra was beside me, tapping me on the shoulder in his fluffy red bathrobe. As I turned to greet his morning brightness, he surprised me by tumbling completely into my arms, so I had to move fast...
“But either way, isn’t Love always the answer?”
“But any way you look at it, isn’t Love always the answer?” That’s what my beloved partner said to me yesterday with fierce truth pouring from moist eyes, devotedly calling me back, in a moment when defense had gotten the better of me, to the common ground of our...
In Praise of The Glimpse
The other morning I was on my way to make a cup of tea, and just as I moved to turn on the kettle, I caught a sudden glimpse of my children (aged 13 and 9), where they sat talking nearby. Seemingly unaware of my presence, they were just conversing in that mundane...
“Setting Herself Free”~ Arayla Grace: Jumper!
One of the most fulfilling and rewarding fruits of our move back to Ashland has been the way in which it has allowed me to support our beautiful daughter Arayla (12.5) in truly devoting and committing herself even more fully to her longtime Equestrian passion. At Westport Stables in Talent, Oregon, a Hunter/Jumper training facility, Arayla has been given an incredible riding teacher, Wendy Krohn, who nurtures our girl’s growing confidence and mastery, tracking her carefully with skillful […]
“With My Own Two Hands” ~ A Music Teaching Story
A few weeks ago I found myself sitting in the audience of my son Ezra’s Winter Assembly, a beautiful all-school event held in a big, festively decorated auditorium. Every class, 1st through 8th grades, had prepared an adorable and/or poignant presentation~ a dance, a song, or a poem.When it was time for the 3rd grade, I watched Ezra (9) march onto stage with his classmates, sweetly self-conscious as he found his spot in line. As the class began to recite their Winter poem, I noticed the s […]
Notes from an Ordinary Morning
It’s 46 degrees outside this morning, and my son has dressed himself for school in his normal chosen attire~ athletic shorts and a t-shirt. As I watch him sitting on the floor in his skimpy outfit tying his shoes, I make my routine protest: “Ezra, it’s cold outside now. It’s not Summer anymore. You have to dress warmly. Put on some pants and a long-sleeve shirt please.” Ezra (8) looks up at me, makes direct eye contact, and says with strong, clear assertion: &l […]
The Hardest Blessings are Always the Most Beautiful to Give
The other night I stood before two friends I love dearly, took their hands in mine, and with genuine tears of joy in my eyes, gave them my deepest heart’s blessings, for their gorgeously blossoming love and union.
What made this a particularly powerful and exquisitely challenging blessing for my heart to extend, was that this man was one of my previous beloved lovers, and the woman, a cherished beloved sister of mine, with whom he had fallen in love while he and I were still inside our committed exploration of partnership. It had been I, in fact, in enthusiastic love for them both, who had introduced them to one another, and then stood witness to the exposed pulse of undeniable attraction between them.
It was a sticky unfolding when it all went down a while back, and at the time definitely triggered a core wound within me, of feeling betrayed inside a moment of feeling deeply open, trusting and receptive to love. In the end it served as deep medicine: instigating a profound and essential healing process, resolving a very young place of distrust and sense of victimhood within me. The medicine […]