Enchanted

There was a time when I would sit in front of the laptop with a feeling of joy and exuberance.  Finally!  My escape was waiting.  The day would begin and end with writing.  I recall sitting and not thinking about what topic I would get to, and not worrying about it either because it would just come to me, like a snappy comeback that I didn’t even know was funny until everyone who heard it, laughed.

Today, I took the day off from work.  Drove to a quiet cottage in the mountains, in the middle of nowhere to find the snappy comeback, because I no longer feel joy and exuberance when I sit down to write.  I feel dread, and guilt, and fat and ugly and stupid.  I feel like a wannabe, a has-been-who-never-was, a failure and a cheat - - - not at all like the girl who often wrote without judgment, and with the sole purpose of maybe, just maybe, making someone laugh or cry, think or get angry. 

The cottage sits a half mile off the main road, at the end of a dirt road.  It sits nestled on a plateau in the lower part of the mountain.  The furniture on the front porch is made of untouched wood - - - thin and thick branches, and twisted limbs, measured and corded together to form the porch, the rails and railing, the chairs, the tables. The worn chair cushions are the only parts that God didn’t create on the first or second day.

Upon entering the premises, the air is saturated with the resonating sound of a waterfall that fills a pond filled with Koi fish, built into the side of a steep hill that is brandished with flowers.  There is no perfection in the structure of the hillside, which makes it perfect for the senses - - the dreams, the hopes, the wishes, the truth and the purity of what is real.  It touches those other senses too.

The stone chimney, built up the entire wall of the cottage stands over a fully living roof - - 3 ½ tons of living sod, growing wild flowers and various plants indigenous to the mountain.  The flies are leaving me alone; and I haven’t seen the bear that is known to make its appearance around these parts.

Jackson Browne begins one of his songs with these lines:  “What with all my expectations long abandoned and a future I no longer saw my hand in, how I found you is beyond my understanding. . .”

This cottage makes me think of those lines; and it makes me smile when I think of my companion on this trip.  For the past year and a half, he is the closest I’ve had to a best friend in quite a long time.  Though he doesn’t quite understand my need to be writing in the mountains, he has a sense of how it makes me part whole.  He has a sense that if I write, even that sucky, crappy writing I envision myself writing lately, I will somehow find another piece of myself that will send me back into a motion that propels me forward, toward a more mature growth and understanding of whatever it is I need to understand. 

Sometimes I get the sense that those who love me the most, know me better than even I know myself.

They pull me out of myself too; like pulling a rabbit out of a hat.  The rabbit often stares in awe after being drawn into the light.    The rabbit remembers being a baby, entertaining glee and giddiness, facing challenges, trapping hope, enduring pain.  The rabbit stares and remembers, and sometimes chooses to jump back into the hat until he his pulled out again and again and again.

I feel like that rabbit.  Lately, my uniqueness will become fastened to the hand of a loved one, and sadly, with the first hint of light, it often retreats back inside.

Despite the constant breeze rolling from the mountain, the sun, unaccompanied by the bank of gray clouds that sits on the horizon line, radiates a sweltering heat as it hangs high above me.

I’ve decided to retreat back inside.

There is a scent of a recent fire in the chimney that brings to mind a dying campfire, red embers that look soft enough to touch.  The sound of the waterfall resonates through the pine walls of the cottage, and through the headphones I have in my ears.  I just noticed, and I have no idea how it took me so long to see it, but a brown bear rug is lying across a worn leather sofa.

And I sense it again - - that feeling of knowing myself even less than others know me.

 During the week, I told everyone who would listen that I wouldn’t be available on Friday.  I told them that I was taking the day off, and that I would not be checking email or answering my phone, or returning texts.  I told them that I was off to write.

“What do you write?”  One person asked.

“Nothing.”  I answered.

Imagine the curious look.

“That’s why I’m going.”  I left it at that.

Others didn’t believe it.  Generally, a day off for me equals at least four hours of work anyway.  So, of course, I was invited to join meetings and conference calls - - - my cell phone alerting me to every invitation.  About halfway through the trip, I went to my settings and turned off my alert status.

Even if it’s just for this weekend, I want to be a rabbit that hops with glee and pain, hope and fear, tenderness and regret.  The rabbit that decides to glow in the senses - - - the dreams, the hopes, the wishes, the truth and the purity of what is real.

The rabbit who appreciates that she is loved.

The rabbit who finds gratitude that she is truly known by those she loves in return.