Beloved friends,
We're a few weeks past the autumn equinox now and the energies of the life of the Earth are shifting. The nights are now palpably longer than the days. Most of the birds have begun their southward migrations. The leaves on the trees are changing or falling in different places. We can see nature tucking up for the winter ahead, and yet the thing that was said to me most often this week during check-ins has been, "I'm so tired and I just don't know why!" I was having the same experience myself until the zillionth person said this to me and I realized, "Oh! It's just autumn!" Like all the rest of the life of the Earth, we are growing a little slower and turning a little more toward rest.
At my house we're savoring the final weeks of sleeping with the bedroom open to the forest. It's in the 40s at night, so the bed is piled deep with blankets so that we can dream with the owls and coyotes and wake with the chickadees and nuthatches, the spotted towhees and the robins. Come morning we close up the house and turn the heat on. We're bustling around with projects to prepare the house for winter. A second autumn here is such a sweetness, feeling into the pattern of home.
I looked at the altar this week and felt like it was time for change. I've been cutting up bright slips of origami paper to make prayer flags for a long time now, and my heart on Monday said it was time to move on. I got out the watercolor paper and paints that a precious person sent me as a gift after they worked with me for support in a difficult season of their life, and I played. The result is at the top of this page: little white squares with golden luminosity, each name now written in a little glowing orb. They are warming my heart and call me to the altar with fresh joy in this turning season. You are always welcome to ask me to hang a prayer flag for you or your loves ones, and I will sing to the trees and the sky of my care for you.
Did you see the Northern Lights on that magical night? We did, our first time doing so at home, and oh! The sense of cosmic grounding in that: feeling the solar storm wash past us. The autumn rains and rainbows have begun here, too. I'm leaning deeply into the beauty of the cosmos for comfort and connection while awaiting the turning of this election.
Resources
A Story of Autonomy
The Tree That Owns Itself is a beautiful and inspiring being.
Mental Health Support
One of the most painful kinds of crisis is mental health crisis. It's good to be aware of resources before you need them, because it can be hard to remember them in an emergency. 988 is national, across the United States, a suicide and crisis lifeline. There are now many Warm Lines, which aim to offer emotional support in less of a crisis situation. And for psychosis, there is the LEAP method, "a communication program to help you create relationships with people who are unable to understand they are ill, with the goal of helping them accept treatment." I am recommending all of these based on recent community experience. I hope that you do not need them, and I encourage you to be aware of them and to spread awareness of them.
The Best Medicine: Still Laughter
"Robert Adolph Boehm, in accordance with his lifelong dedication to his own personal brand of decorum, muttered his last unintelligible and likely unnecessary curse on October 6, 2024, shortly before tripping backward over "some stupid mother****ing thing" and hitting his head on the floor." is the beginning of an absolutely hysterical and deeply loving obituary.
Giving
With all that is afoot in the world, hurricane damage doesn't hold the news for long, but I know from our family in North Carolina that there is a long, long road ahead for many people. Our family is safe, but many of their close neighbors have lost their homes. Here is a great vetted list of places to donate in support of Hurricanes Helene and Milton.
Oh, That Moon!
This photographic atlas of the moon looks absolutely gorgeous, and calls itself "a comprehensive guide for the amateur astronomer." HUBBA.
This is a Hole
Yup. It's just a hole. A heart-shaped hole in a giant hunk of driftwood that I climbed over on the beach. May it make your heart sing like it did mine.
