River Garden

A contemplative week in July and we're staying outside Joseph, Oregon at Wallowa Lake Camp. Wallowa Lake is nestled in some pretty dramatic mountains, one particularly large peak rising majestically at the end of the lake and East of the camp. To arrive here on time, we left at six in the morning from Bellingham. We had a few minor setbacks: we got lost on Seattle trying to get onto I-90; we were pulled over for exceeding the speed limit (and let go, phew) and I left my cell phone at home. The cell mystery (I'm never without it) sent me into a tizzy for at least half an hour. Honestly, I felt naked without my modern day connection tool. Once we both recovered, we enjoyed the drive through central Washington and on into Oregon, soaking in the mix of landscape, some more barren and sagey, some lush with orchards and grapes, and some rolling patchwork fields that perhaps influenced the Pendleton textile designs.

As you already know, my garden in Fairhaven is being lovingly tended by my garden neighbor, Peggy, whose garden is looking terrific, I must say. Mike will be back from his trip to California, so he'll be managing the section he's caretaking. He's going to plant beets—did I already say that? I haven't finished my garden room, nor have I strung string for the pole beans. But alas, the garden will be there when I get back. I need a break and a change of heart.

Fishtrap, where I'm not a participant, is a popular conference. Folks sign up before they leave for the following year. Since I'm here as a guest, I'll spend my mornings working on a revision of my novel, "Celia's Heaven". And since I need a vacation—not the sun and tanning and drinking and dining type of vacation, but more of the vision quest "vacation." Perhaps that's not a vacation but rather a vacating of my busy life so I can dive deeper into inhabiting myself. That's what I want, especially after all the disruption of divorce, the dickering with the ex, the meeting with the lawyer, and then the drawing up papers and show-me-the-money-meetings. And now what? That's my question. What do I want to make of my life during the next however many years I'm alive? What laws do I want to lay down for myself?

The tarot card "Command" from the Medicine Woman Deck proclaims me the lawmaker of my life. This is an interesting concept, me being the lawmaker for me. As a woman, I've been taught to think that others are the makers of my life and I'm to wait on them for decisions; I'm to wait to see what is needed of me, what is expected. But I can have a life that I make for myself—this is astounding in some ways. And freeing. I can decide when to sleep, when to eat, when to play, whom to love. I'm not on call 24-7. Sigh.

Back to Fishtrap http://www.fishtrap.org/. Brenda and I are staying next to a river here at Wallowa Lake Camp. It's not a large river, but it is definitely galloping past. I wouldn't want to fall into it, of course, but it a good reminder of what "Command" teaches. The flow is always there, always available for us to join with—or we can step aside and think we're doing this life on our own. Once I was told something similar by a spiritually astute person. "You cannot stop the flow," she said. If I cannot block it, then there is no writers' block, no artist block, no block to the abundance I can experience—and I believe this is apparent in the garden. Everything grows, dies, sprouts and grows again. There is a continuous cyclic pattern to life that never ceases. The secret to happiness then is joining the flow.

The opening talk to the conference included a quote by Rumi. Something about truth, and how only the telling of it will bring joy to one's life. Ah—there is relief in this quote.

Best wishes, Nancy (aka Flower)