This is My Body, This is My Blood

Like a Virgin

I've run the gamut of belief systems in my lifetime, from a fundamental Christian upbringing to my Jesus Freak years to New Age Woo-Woo to Earth-Based Spirituality to my current status: Devout Agnostic. Despite not having any clear cut faith, I really, really, want to believe in something bigger than all of us, but then maybe all of us is the thing I most believe in.

However, there have been at least three unsolved mysteries in my life over the years, unexplainable events. Like the time  in massage class I asked the teacher who the young girl was on the table a couple rows over while we were practicing cranial sacral therapy. Turns out it wasn't a young girl, but a fifty-ish student I knew well. It turned out was having a memory of being abused when she was younger at the exact time I'd asked about her. Weird, huh? Then, during my Seeker years, I visited a psychic who told me  my "totem animal" was a white crane. I've always liked cranes, but I didn't for a minute believe in spirit guides and all that hookey-do. Okay, maybe for a minute I did, but then I got real.

Shortly after my "reading" with the psychic, I was hired by a woman to visit her mother--an Alzheimer's patient--at a local nursing home. Every week I'd massage the old woman's hands, feet, face, and head. She was often really crabby and yelled at me, but over time,  began to trust me.  A couple months after I'd worked with the woman, her daughter told me that lately when she visited, her mother would  ignore her and ask, "Where's that blond girl?"

Usually I'd end up crawling in bed with my patient  in order to get in a good enough position to massage her. More often than not, she fell asleep in my hands. In the middle of the summer, she took a turn for the worse. On the last night I visited, I knew right away she wasn't long for this world. Her breathing was labored and she was very weak. When I approached the bed, she cupped her hands and held them out toward me.

"What is it?" I asked.

"Seed," she whispered.

"Seed?"

She pointed with one finger, being careful not to spill the contents of her frail
hands. "For that big white bird behind you."

My hands trembled as she carefully emptied her "gift" into them. There was nothing there, of course, but I went along with the ruse, pretending to put those imaginary seeds in my pocket. "I'll feed it later, " I assured her.

That night she told me she was going dancing with her lover, so I needed to make her face really soft. She fell asleep shortly after that and I turned over her cassette tape music before quietly leaving the room. I got a call from her daughter the next day, telling me he mom had died during the night.

This brings me to my third mystical experience, as illustrated by the photograph in this post. I took the picture during the winter of 1995-96 with a Canon 35 mm SLR (pre-digital era) camera in Grand Haven, MI. At the time I was divorced and living in a big old 5-bedroom house with my 3 children. There had been a lot of snow the previous day and I was captivated by a little chickadee outside my window and decided to take a picture of him.

I didn't think much more about it until I got the pictures back from the developer. As soon as I looked at this photograph I saw the woman's face in the background. My mother had died a few years prior so my first thought was that maybe she was still watching over me, or that maybe it was an angel. But the more I looked at it the more it looked like the pictures of the decoupage Madonna  plaque on my wall that I got at a yard sale and always loved--lugged it from house to house every time I moved. Whatever she/it was, for some reason I took comfort in her presence, even if it was just  a result of the way the shadows fell behind the bird. Because everything in this life is a fragile illusion, so what harm is there in wanting to hold onto those that make you feel good? 

Beats the hell out of a grilled cheese sandwich if you ask me.

 

One Hot Minute

You know how it is when you're feeling ugly or you just don't want to have to interact with anyone, so you put on sunglasses--as if darkening your own world will prevent others from seeing you? It's weird, huh, how our minds work (or don't work) to defy logic?

Here's another example.

Yesterday my roommate made a delicious meal of enchiladas and frijoles completely from scratch, then shared her culinary delights with Yours Truly. I ate heartily, despite the fact my intestines are no friend to Mexican food,and knowing I would eventually pay for my temporary lack of willpower. I say eventually, because with a digestive system as slow as mine, it could be days before the fallout occurs.

Well, last night I was feeling energetic enough to hit the gym, figuring I could make it back in time to catch American Idol (The only show I watch besides Six Feet Under--even though this year's contestants are a bore compared to Fantasia and The Diva's from last season). Anyway, I was feeling fugly from water retention due to the above-mentioned splurge. And no--I did not wear my sunglasses to the gym. Okay, to the gym I did. But not in the gym. However, having finally figured out how to download songs to my mp3 thingy, I did take headphones and the player along to keep me moving through the machines, as I am not one to watch TV while working out any more than I am prone to watching the tube at home (exceptions noted).

I did my time on the StairMaster, worked through all the upper body machines, and had just begun the butt/thigh circuit when the molested beans kicked in. Now keep in mind I've got Red Hot Chile Peppers (rather synchronistic, wouldn't you say?) rocking between my ears and I am totally grooving on the tunes when this little internal bubble moves to the exit and waits for permission to be excused from the premises. And because the music's so loud, I'm just about to grant the request when somewhere in my brain a  warning light flashes, followed by a message like one of those road construction signs: THEY. CAN'T. HEAR. THE. MUSIC. YOU. IDIOT.

At the last possible second, I slam the door shut, forcing the angry little pocket of air to hang out in the waiting room before I introduce it to the world in the privacy of the restroom. The problem is, there is no way I can leg-press 150 pounds without also pressing other things into the environment, so basically, the workout is over.

On the way home one of my dogs farts, then turns to look behind her as if she has no idea who or what is responsible for the sound. This, my friends, is why dogs do not need sunglasses or headphones to hide from themselves, nor do they need to spend hours trying to look like the animals they see on the covers of magazines. However, I happen to know for a fact they like watching American Idol and if they had opposable thumbs, would be voting for Nadia.

Photo by Jamin London

Blond: The Early Years

ch
I'm four years old and I'm trapped in the bathroom of our house above Peach Plains Baptist Church. It's where my family and I live, at least for as long as my dad keeps preaching there. I had to pee all through Sunday School, danced through the last hymn then ran as fast as my skinny little legs would carry me up the stairs, through the kitchen--filled with the aroma of pot roast and applesauce--to the tiny bathroom shared by our family of nine.

 

The seat is cold beneath my goose-bumped thighs, and my scuffed patent-leather shoes dangle several inches from the linoleum floor as I finally relieve the pressure from my bursting bladder.

I flush the toilet and wonder if people can hear my pee running through the pipes below where all the rural folks my dad has talked into coming to our church stand around talking and buttoning up their winter coats. Dink-Dink-Donk! Someone pounds on the ivory keys of the old out-of-tune piano as they race by. I want to be back down there among the hulabaloo where kids run in and out between their fathers' legs as they slip shiny black rubbers over Sunday shoes.

But I can't, because the door won't open. I'm stuck up here by myself and they've all forgotten me. I try kicking the door. Nothing. I jump up and down, hoping someone will hear me and come to my rescue. No response. I'm left with my last defense, a set of practiced lungs strong enough to blow the stakes out from under a revival tent, which I empty full barrel against the echoing walls.

A few minutes later, there's a knock on the other side of the door, followed by my oldest sister's voice. "Ellie, are you in there?"

 

"Get me OUUUUUUTTTTT!"

 

"Is it locked?"

 

(Sobbing) "Uh huh."

 

"Push the button."

 

"It won't go. I can't." More crying.

 

"Okay, I'll be right back."

 

Sniffle. Snort.

 

The next voice I know. It's Harry Mason, the deacon who built the cement block church from the ground up after my father led him to the Lord. I'm too young to understand how funny his name is, considering his profession.

 

Harry tries to comfort me. "Hang on, Honey. I'm going to get you out."

 

I sit on the damp rug on the floor in front of the bathtub and watch  the rods in the hinges slide up and out when Harry bangs on them. Within minutes he's yanked the door out of the frame. Upon seeing me, he bends down on one knee and strokes my head. Behind him, a crowd of curious parishioners are watching the drama unfold.

I wipe my nose on my sleeve, still whimpering.

 

Harry picks me up with his big old hands and balances me on his hip. "The door wasn't even locked, Ellie. Why couldn't you open it?"

 

"Because," I whimper. "I had my mittens on!"

 

True story. My first blond moment in all its glory.