Building a bridge.

I am building a bridge. It might be a bridge across hell. But there is also a kind of hell behind me, and when I finish this bridge and find myself on the other side, there may be a hell waiting for me just because I built it.

I am building a bridge because it feels Asked of me, because it needs to be built, and it must be crossed, if only by me.

I do not know how to build a bridge.
I do not know the physics. I am bad at math and uncomfortable with engineering, and the earth is round enough that if I build a bridge long enough, I may just find myself back where I started.

But I will build it anyway. And I am told that it will not be a smooth and easy shortcut but will still be a glorious drive with a wonderful view and the air will be lovely to breathe.

And this bridge that I build shall have no toll. No burning of holes nor playing with souls. The blueprint has never been in my hand yet here, from the tips of my fingers, it will start to stand.

It will stand true, and it will be free, this bridge, and you, and me.

A something of dragonflies

A flock? A herd? A swarm? I stood among them, and they buzzed inches above and around me, each with their own little Pause button. It was unreal and magical to lift my head up to the sky and become part of this buzzing and moving, for suddenly that was all there was. For a moment, that was the whole world.

He stops, shocked -- recalls
a time when he breathed fire -- then
Dragonfly flies on.

 In Native American story, Dragonfly was once Dragon, before Coyote tricked him into losing his magic, by playing on his pride. Dragonfly symbolises a change, moving away from illusion toward reality. When Dragonfly comes to me, he's saying, "Something needs to change."

I first noticed the dragonflies seven years ago, which is when I wrote that haiku. At times, I look back on a flamboyant and somewhat delinquent past, and my present seems stodgy and dull in comparison:  middle-aged. And then I'm reassured when I remember that there's a reason why dragons are extinct - or more realistically, just a myth - and that the earth needs her dragonflies.

Wish brainstorming

Much of my life I've been wary of making wishes: I've always had this secret fear that they'll be granted in horrible ways. Once I even wrote an Enid-Blyton-styled school story with a horrific twist where the girls make wishes and then suffer gory consequences as their wishes come true!

Needless to say, I very rarely wish for anything just in case that happens to me. So on my birthdays, when I'm blowing out those candles, I simply wish for world peace, and can then go about the rest of the year carefree in the knowledge that whether or not my wish comes true, my life will be pretty much the same.

Wait a minute. It just struck me. What if my birthday wishes are what keep alive all these ridiculous wars-to-bring-peace and peace-keeping-forces??!!

Oh well. Maybe this year I'll forego the candles altogether. Or just wish for the largest slice of cake. That should be harmless. I hope.

But let me get to the point: I've just discovered it's not always a bad idea to make a wish. Or even hundreds of wishes. That whole "be careful what you wish for" doesn't always have to be applied.

Just last week, having got a new eye (well a new lens in the same old eye), I've been able to get back to one of my favourite pastimes - googling random stuff. And I came across a website that introduced me to WISH BRAINSTORMING.

Of late, I'd been feeling that my life was stagnating, no sense of direction or fulfilment, just plodding from one day into another as best as I could. So I decided to give it a shot. I got out my notebook and started religiously answering all the questions in the wish brainstorming exercise. I did it over and over, for various areas of my life: career, friends, family, home, health and fitness, financial, fun, relaxation, personal development, spiritual, community/legacy, work, children, romance.

Answering the questions wasn't as easy as I thought, even though all my answers simply had to be wishes. Some made me uncomfortable or sad or angry or regretful. But I decided to stick with it and I'm glad I did because I discovered that the more wishes I scribbled and then prioritised, the clearer my vision got.

I don't know if it was the simple act of getting all my jumbled thoughts about umpteen things down onto paper, or if it was specifically the wish brainstorming exercise. But as I wrote, I began to find myself feeling lighter and clearer. I was decluttering my head! Solutions and understandings were popping into my head to replace the stuff I was pouring out.

After a week of writing and wishing, none of my "problems" have been magically whisked away, but they've been shrunk down to size from the hugely inflated disasters I'd been carrying around in my head. I've been able to let go of some, put others on the back burners, and focus on simple and easy (well, relatively easy) ways to improve my life.

Do I sound like an ad for a self-help book? I can't help it - I'm eating better, feeling better, doing better. And I'm writing again.

So here I am to tell you about my happy find, and share the link with you (click on the highlit words in paragraph 6), so that you can try it out if you feel like it. I'd love to hear how it went for you. I wish you well!

And now I must go explore the possibilities of what horrors might lurk within the largest slice of birthday cake .. and the story that might come out of that.


(edited 15 April 2014)