January 08, 2008

11:45 p.m.

Feeding the Spider

Had a nice visit from Normandy, finally. She has been stripping wallpaper and moving furniture in preparation for selling her condo, to move on to a new and better life which hasn't yet manifested, and a job which is still a confused, misty twinkle in her eye. Or maybe that's just a tear, from all the guys on eHarmony who have "dumped" her (her word). They seem to lose interest after a couple of dates and a couple of weeks of intense emailing.

I wonder if she talks too much.

How can someone going through all this trouble NOT talk about it, at length, most of the time? She has a crabby, needy, picky daughter, an ex-husband who is in and out of commission depending on whether he's deciding to off himself this month or not and who, in either case, offers no emotional or child support, and a job she not only dislikes but which has humiliated her. Ouch.

I'd talk about that.

She starts the whole story with, "Well, I brought it on myself. I married someone I didn't love." It goes on from there and it's hard sometimes to get a word in.

We hiked in the 60 degree day, saw a couple of joyful dogs running up and down the path, had tea and lunch, and later I gave her a little Reiki and she was late leaving for home. I don't envy her with all that uncertainty ahead, changing her whole life and having to mind an uncomprehending daughter through it all. I do not know if I would have survived having children.

********

When she left I was unexpectedly uncomfortable, like after all this time talking I didn't know how to close the visit. I was suddenly concerned that she hadn't been satisfied with the Reiki, and realized I hadn't told her much about it beforehand. But by the time we were doing it she was already late to leave, so it was a short session. She asked me if I'd had any revelations about anything and I hadn't, only directed things according to what I knew she was going through. It tapped into a chink in my confidence. One of my tenets is not to be attached to any particular outcome of a session. I still want a wow thing to happen every time. Not because I need it to feel the energy is flowing, but because I still imagine it convinces other people who aren't familiar with it and want some evidence that something went into them. It doesn't always work like that. I need to know how to be confident and caring no matter what.

I envy my teacher, who can pass her hand above a person's body and know where the blockages are. I don't always feel that. I'm not sure where my intuition lies. Then I think I don't meditate enough; if I meditated more, if I did more Reiki exercises, had more clients, blah blah blah I'd be more sensitive. I am impatient and muddled at times.

********

There has been a series of Potato Incidents between Marc and me of late. He foisted a bag of potatoes on me a while back because there had been a big sale; I protested that I couldn't eat an entire bag of them, so he took a few out -- but ever since, has tried to slip me a potato every time I've been over there. Wrapped up as a Christmas gift. Hidden in my purse. Sending me pictures of potatoes via email. When I found a very small spud in my handbag yesterday morning that had been there for two days, I knew I had to retaliate.

So I took out my Sculpey and designed some facial features a la Mrs. Potato Head, baked them, and affixed them with toothpicks to the spherical tuber. I then typed a bogus note saying, "Congratulations! Your mail order bride has arrived," and signed it The Imo Tsuma company (Japanese for "potato wife"). I then carefully wrapped the tater in a box (the same one he used for my Christmas gift), covered it with brown paper and string and made a fake label, switching all the l's and r's in his name and address. I then left this little item by his back door this afternoon.

It almost fooled him, in spite of having no postage.

I took a picture of it with my phone, but it's too late to do what I have to do to get it onto this computer... so I'll post it next time. It was really magnificent. And a little scary.

********

Meanwhile a little spider has been living on my bathroom ceiling for several weeks and I got concerned that it wasn't eating anything, so when a little tiny plant-gnat landed near me while I was washing dishes tonight, I squished it and stuck it, with tweezers, onto the ceiling next to the spider. A little while later it was gone. I hope it didn't just fall off. I know the spider is a wild animal, but I can't help feeling a little den-motherish when it hangs around for so long. "Eat, eat. Your legs are so skinny."

********

Finally, does anyone have one of these?