Innocence

When I lost mine, I'm not sure.  My innocence, that is.  I didn't have a childhood to speak of, growing up in a conservative, fundamentalist preacher's home.  There were 8 of us kids, not allowed to do many "normal" things because of what people would think.  No card playing on Sunday ("they" might think we were playing Bridge!), no school fundraisers of chocolate bars ("they" might feel obligated to buy from us because they were Dad's parishoners).  Serious.

Add to that not believing in Santa Claus or the Easter Bunny.  No recollections of any Christmas or birthday presents, though surely I must have had them?  No doll memories.  Nothing personal just for me.  We had adjustable strap-on, skate-key roller skates that we shared and an over-sized tricycle.  We took turns.  And Grandpa gave us a gigantic, sturdy swing set that our grandchildren still use to this day at the family cottage.

Oh, and did I mention that I was the sickly one of the bunch.  A therapist once told me I was so scrawny-looking I had an invisible sign across my chest that said "FRAGILE:  DO NOT TOUCH." I had my 9th birthday in the hospital when diagnosed with mild, non-paralytic polio.  That was all I knew. That was what life was like.  Serious.

Nor did I know about Ash Wednesday or Lent or giving up anything.  The mystery of Easter was simple for me, summed up in the Easter weekend of death and resurrection.  Nothing more and nothing less.

So if I tell you I had no clue whatsoever about Mardi Gras or Carnival, you know I'm telling the truth!  Right now on my photoblog I'm posting a series of children at our Carnival here in the small city where we live in Holland.  It happened on Saturday, February 13, just 2 blocks from our apartment.  I couldn't stay away.  What would I see?  Total debauchery and licentiousness??  HA!  What were "they" afraid of?  Those voices in my head.

What I saw took my breath away.  I can't tell you anything about the floats or costumes of the adults.  Just the faces of innocent children, expectant and full of pure delight.  Dressed up on the sidelines like kids at Halloween, they waited for confetti and candies tossed to them.  Totally innocent.  Totally children.

Please tell me that when we capture our Visions we regain whatever we've lost or thought we never had.  Please tell me it's within us and we just get those lucky moments to see who we really are...and maybe always have been? 

It's About Time

For one thing, we know it flies.  Especially when you're having fun!

In my last post, I mentioned that Astrid and I were getting married here in Holland on February 5, a week ago.  Can I believe it's already a week later?  NO.  See?  That's what I mean.  Time does that.  It plays tricks on you.

The above image is the one I posted on my Shutterchance blog the day of our wedding.  It's the sundial on the side of the Grote Kerk (Big Church) two blocks from our apartment.  Astrid and I were photo hunting on January 1 after a delightful New Year's Eve celebration here at our senior-living complex.  We woke up to a bright, sunshiny day, the beginning of a new year...and walked around our citadel city with our cameras in hand, doing what we love to do.

Now, look at the time.  Can you read a sundial?  I always laugh when I see a sundial like this on the side of a church, thinking of all those people who had no excuse for not getting to church on time (remember, my dad was a preacher!).  I "collect" sundials (as I do windmills and clock towers and construction cranes and weathervanes) and then I laugh because...I have no clue how to tell sundial time, especially if the sun isn't shining (guess that's why it's a SUN dial!).  Most of it never makes sense to me.  Nor have I ever Googled to figure it out.  But if I'm not mistaken, it's 2 o'clock, right?

Guess when Astrid and I got married last Friday!  Yup.  2 o'clock in the afternoon.  Did we know on January 1, 2010, we were going to be married on February 5, 2010, at 2 o'clock?  NO.

Call it coinky-dink.  Call it serendipity.  But don't you just love it when you get to a certain age and have all these experiences under your belt that make you smile.  They're AHA! moments in time.

By the way, it was the best day of our lives together thus far!  And YOU helped to make it that way by all your fabulous best wishes.  THANK YOU.  You made Time stand still for us.  It was an "eternalized moment."  THANK YOU.

(If you wish to see our online wedding album, just let me know.)

No One Can Teach You To See

You're right.  This is not a photo...but it's Vision and a place to start my Verb.

This is a scan of a felt-tip drawing I did in high-school art class c. 1962.  Maybe I was 16?  Felt-tipped pens had just come on the market and were like dying and going to heaven for us artists, even though they had not yet been finessed into the fine tips we use today.

But here's the thing.  Where did this drawing come from?  I was a gay girl trapped in a conservative, fundamentalist body...the daughter of a Baptist preacher in Podunk City, Michigan, in the age when "gay" buzzwords did not yet exist.  I knew I was different, not like the other girls, but I didn't know there was a word for me.  All I knew was that I was trapped in a silence that equalled death.  I could not speak my Truth.  I was alone.  I was not a free girl running with abandon under the Tree of Life.

Segue now to the current movie, Avatar, where at one point is the incredible line by Neytiri, "No one can teach you to see."  Does that mean we are all born with Vision but have to find it within us?  Maybe it's the Eyes we have to find!  How many times do we look at something and don't see it.  How many times do we hear something and don't get it.  Then one day, seemingly out of the blue, it's there in plain view.  We find our Eyes.

When I started blogging 5 years ago, I was not ready to use a portrait of myself in my profile.  Dear sister Ruth encouraged me to use the above drawing, which I called my Soul Girl.  Recently she called it my avatar.

Do you sometimes write a Verb or see a Vision and wonder "Where did that come from!"  When did my avatar become me; when did I become her?  Today I am free, running with abandon, and will marry my Dutch partner on February 5, a week from today, here in the Netherlands.  So, was this avatar Prophetic Vision?  Was she answering me before I called?  Did she help me find my Eyes?

I have a feeling this will become a frequent "conversation" here at V&V:
Neytiri:  I see you.
Jake Sully:  I see you.