Childhood Stories

Once upon a time, there lived a little girl. She lived in a big city. She had a brother, mother, father, and grandfather, and maybe even a grandmother. They didn’t live altogether at all. Mostly they all lived in their own little worlds. The little girl was only aware of them when she was physically in contact with them. She could sense them. She could sense their emotions. She lived in a world of intuition and never made much contact – not even eye contact, because eye contact could make you vulnerable to being overpowered by the other person. So if you had to look, you had to leave your eyes empty. Physical contact could hurt and be uncomfortable especially in this little girl’s family because the people had such powerfully negative emotions – well, not really negative, but such sadness, desperation, need, anger, and vengefulness, and especially fear. Being in those kinds of energy fields is hard to not metamorphose into the auric shape of what they were and then become them. Like that. They didn’t seem to have much purpose, much intent except to assuage their own fears and such. Always yelling at each other as if saying things louder made it easier to understand – which of course it didn’t. They had certain expectations of behavior from me, my brother, the world. Lots of these didn’t make any sense – they weren’t logical. Not that there was a choice, of course. There were no choices. But it was a certainty that if you didn’t behave according to these expectations you would be punished, hurt, raped, beat – whatever. There’s a lot of anger because of all the fear and because of all the things that didn’t make sense so they didn’t seem fair. The little girl thought everybody understood things the way she did – perceived things the same, interacted (or not) for the same reasons as she did. She thought that they could read her thoughts and secrets and hidden anger, and so she perceived she was being punished for these things. She made that connection. But she couldn’t seem to help having some not-good thoughts once in a while, even though she tried really hard. She tried to bury some very deep, but still she would get punished and so she just didn’t know what to do. Things changed but nothing changed. Then one day the little girl woke up and she was almost 8 years old. She still didn’t understand expectations and they seemed to differ from one person to the next. All the little girl knew was that it is very important to know expectations to avoid punishment. She tried to do stuff she liked but she didn’t fit in with others like her. And their expectations were not at all like the ones inside her. And she didn’t like being like them. She just didn’t fit. She didn’t know who she was or what she was or what she should do to be “right”. Nothing fit. She was confused. And it was hard to fit in and be accepted because for some reason she was not reacting like most kids her age.

There was a morning, and it had a bird. It was a pretty bird because it had lots of colors. It spoke in a sing-songy way. A tiny voice, kind of high, but not like the hysterical high of the mother. Just a way that was right for the bird. And it just talked of its visit here near me because it didn’t live here really. She said it was too dusty and moldy and hard to breathe. And she knew her home had a blue sky and this sky was yellowish-gray even though, if you lived here and was told that was blue, you didn’t know any better. She said one day I could come see for myself. But I could see the bluer sky in her mind and green leafy trees and moisture that was clean that glistened off stuff and was good to breathe. She said she would meet me there someday when I went there, and left Los Angeles.

III

One day, the un-noise level was so solid you couldn’t breathe. They called that “tension”. It was un-said fears that coagulated like jello and you could have walked on it because you certainly couldn’t breathe in it. It was hard to walk on because you were immersed in it and to get out of it and get on top was too hard. But if I could have done that, I could have walked on it. And if I could have walked on it, it would have been like the smog, so that on top of it was blue sky and breathing space and clouds and peace. But it wasn’t what I could do, because if I did that then I wouldn’t be paying attention to my body parts and then what happens is I trip or stumble or bump into things or trip on a cord and the lamp falls and breaks and then the mother goes hysterical and yells at a level they can hear on Draconia 5 in the Lyra system so many light years away. So you can see that it’s very hard on my ears being right next to her. Even if I go to Draconia 5, I still hear her, you know. But see, if I go somewhere like on top of the smog or tension web, then they call me clumsy and stupid and bad and irresponsible. And I know that that is what it looks like to your eyes, but it’s only because sometimes I just can’t be all here because it hurts my ears and eyes and nose and skin and insides, but MOSTLY of all, it hurts my heart to feel all the fear and anger and sadness and loneliness. So I just walk somewhere else.

Once, you know, there was this box. And inside the box, it was quieter. I liked that box. And the closet that is here (Merritt Center) at this quiet place is cool. It is quiet, too. And even in the place out of the box, all you hear is quiet waves of conversation like a morning ocean and it is made of birds and trees and wind and sun and some quiet people (and those are hard to come by). And we are all wishing for some quiet rains to come and play with us. But it is reluctant to come because it wasn’t welcomed too nicely before and isn’t invited except just a few people do invite it. I hope it will come play with me. I like the puddles it leaves.

There was an oil slick in grandfather’s tension-world. Maybe more like naptha; maybe the whole tension-world. It could explode into flames. It was dark and tar-ry: like the La Brea Tar Pits. I saw some animals stuck in that for eternity. I knew that feeling, that kind of beingness, because whenever I was with the grandfather then I was in his tar pit and there was no escape from his world for my most self. I was immersed in it and swallowed it and swallowed in it and it was in my blood and mind and every cell was encapsulated by it and it held my heart in its tar-ry fist, but all it could do was hold it tighter and tighter like a piece of charcoal, like carbon. Now it is a diamond. Kind of ironic, huh, grampa?

It’s a sometime thing. Being here. Being there. Who is me? Who is you? Somebody needs to care. I went to the ocean. A scary thing. So big and wild. For a little child. The ocean said, “I’m not like father, mother, grandfather. I’m more like you. And not. Well, not a lot. Your eyes see a difference when you look with your Earth eyes; not when you’re looking with your Star eyes, and most of all, looking with your Ocean eyes. Okay?” -- So I let the words float on the top of my stream and kind of filter down slowly til the words danced between the water molecules and became part of the stream. I know how to do that. But when I do that sometimes and become the stream, I forget how to get back to being me. The Ocean and the beach sand are so different – like different galaxies, but two different galaxies that are so close only the truth of Spirit breathes between them. And then with me, too. There is dialogue, interaction, without enmeshment which feels like a dolphin caught in the fisherman’s net whose careless intent for tuna disrespected the intent of dolphin and tuna, and even the ocean – silly fisherman. Mesh is sticky. But the universal dance between me and not-me is smooth. If I have a remembering and keep that remembering then it is smooth for me. If I get into fearing, then there is stickiness and friction causing sparks and land mines and trip wires and tar pits. And suddenly there is a whispering in my heart – “Shhh! Child… breathe… breathe…let go and flow on a smooth sea with a calm breeze in your sails; a gentle journey westward – going Home.