It appears that there is a large gap in my journal. In actuality, my work and expressions have been more physical in nature: handwritten passages and soul-searching, art projects, graphic displays of emotion. These will all fit in in the big journal.
August 15, 2005
Time…. I must write about Time this morning, as it’s in my face the way the Universe puts some things in your face when you don’t pay enough attention the first time. I am at my first Goddard residency. It is the start of day 4.5. I say .5 because I arrived in the early evening on Friday and feel I must count that even though it wasn’t a full day. So here are my Universe pokes….
As I prepared a piece for the Faculty/Student reading, I got stuck on my use of the word “Time”. It was capitalized and I wasn’t sure if it should be or not. Was it an entity in this situation? No not really. But the capitalization seemed the only correct way for it to be. I decided to leave it with it’s personifying capital letter without quite knowing why. As I am writing this, I understand now that the capitalization fits because, my use of that on word implies so much to me. The chunk of Time I refer to is so full that it has being, it’s own identity, depth beyond just a passing of time. It holds the contents of the journey I am touching on without going into details. But the untouched details have so much meaning I MUST capitalize that word to indicate that.
Taking a Sunday nap and needing to set the alarm clock, it was an hour fast. 4:15 it said. Odd since I had used it in the morning and it was fine. Then at the end of the same day when I returned to my room, the watch I had been accurately using all day was 2 hours slow. 9:15 it said. When this happens the second time, I consider the discussions of the ghosts that haunt this campus. I just earlier that evening heard a couple of stories and someone asked why they didn’t help that person cross over. I wondered too. I am waiting to see what happens next as an experiment in my sanity.
A side story here about SPIDER.
I have had cause to take notice - alarmed notice in a couple of instances - of spiders. A rather larger spider of the yucky-to-me variety fell out of the laundry as I put it into the washing machine. I must have ridden in on the blanket Mom and I used at the Mozart concert the other night. Rob was kind enough to eliminate it for me. The next day I notice one already dead and curled on the kitchen floor. The same variety and I wonder if we will have an infestation of some sort. That morning I vacuum VERY well getting all the corners up and down. I think nothing more about my spider visitors.
At my Goddard residency, I am considering whether or not to read a piece at the Faculty/Student reading and am waffling considerably. I’ve never read aloud before. My piece is very personal. My topic is facing death and I wonder if that is too heavy for this occasion. I am leaning towards the comfortable safe place of observing this time and maybe reading next time. “That” I think, “Is the old me speaking. The new me would embrace this chance to do something new - ESPECIALLY because it scares her a little bit”. Still I teeter towards not reading. I see a Daddy long legs crawling on the couch in the downstairs lounge where the door is open. I recall that I’ve seen a lot of them this summer and here at Goddard the last couple of days. Daddy long-legs have sentimental significance for me. As child, my father introduced us many times and we always welcomed them as visitors and friends, letting their tickly long legs crawl on our hands and arms and placing them gently aside when our visit was over. Enjoying the memory I move on through the evening, still contemplating my reading decision. When I brush my teeth before bed, I find, at the sink, a Daddy long legs, so seemingly out-of-place there. This time the light bulb goes off and I realize there is a message in the SPIDERS. “Darn” I think. “ I don’t want spider as a totem. I don’t like spiders.” I decide to look at the totem information for spiders anyhow, just out of curiosity. Once you know there is a message for you it‘s hard not to check it out. Lo and behold SPIDER is a messenger of creativity. Spider’s message includes encouragement to express that creativity and honor it and get it out into the world. “DAMN” I think, “Looks like I am reading tonight.”
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