life is all of this

i found out yesterday that
my mother's brother is dying.
the last man in the tribe.

my mother left me a message
as she flew to his side.

i am in some shock.
i never expected the next to be him.

his wife died three months ago.
she couldn't bear cancer anymore.
i don't think he can bear to fight this alone.

i feel like this has opened a well of sadness in me.
this isn't just grief for him,
it is the grief for everyone who has gone before him
my grandad, my uncle, my brother, my step-grandad, my grandmother.
last night i fell asleep in pain and tears.

grief is a funny thing.
i said to chris as he held me softly:
the thing with grief is, you can't change the situation,
and you can't "work through it" like any other sadness.
you just have to sit with it, let it swill through you, and sift back into the ocean again in time.
the insights and blessings will come in time, but for now it is sometimes sadness and sometimes gladness.

last night i went to womens circle and i wept as i smudged myself with burning sage.
i painted a soft picture of my uterus.
i shared about my cyclone dream from the night before:
how a storm raged through my life, fused with extraordinary and strange happenings,
and i realised that it was the other strings of reality becoming visible and interwoven.
at the circle, i was given a small gift of a tiny copper laughing buddha. it reminds me so much of my uncle, ruddy man that he is, except he is smiling much more and saying to me: i'm going home leonie. and i realised that my uncle is buddha. we all are buddha. but soon, he will remember it and know it.

i talked to my sister tonight. she said:
you know, yesterday i cleaned my car for the first time since i bought it. and it felt so good just to do that, feeling the way i did.
i laughed. my sister and i, how connected we are.
i told her how yesterday i washed the dishes for the first time in a long time. and it felt so good, just to do that, feeling the way i did.

there is duality in my seeing,
i am living both in the spirit world of knowing it will be and is okay,
and in the human world of feeling sadness and grief.

i have crystals around me,
a copper buddha laughing with me,
a cyclone blows gently through me,
a grief well,
and a growing knowing.


i love you uncle alan. blessed be your journey.


love always, love is where i came, and how i journey, and where i return,
leonie





The little things?
The little moments?
They aren't little
~ Jon Kabat-Zinn