"Death of a beloved flattens and dulls everything. Mountains and skyscrapers and grand ideas are brought down to eye level or below. Great loves and large hates no longer cast such huge shadows or span so broad a distance. Connections do not adhere so closely, and important events lose some of their glow. Everywhere I turned, life was repeating itself. The photograph of Coretta Scott King, veiled and standing with her children, reminded me of the picture of Jacqueline Kennedy with her children. Both women were under the probing, curious and often sympathetic eye of the world. Yet each stood as if she and her children and her memories lived together in an unknowable dimension. On radio and in newspapers, Martin King’s name was linked again and again with the name Malcolm X. As if the life and death of one confirmed the life and death of the other."
Maya Angelou
Thursday, May 29, 2014
Sunday, May 25, 2014
Saturday, May 17, 2014
*a thorough or dramatic change in form or appearance. *a metamorphosis during the life cycle of an animal. *a marked change, as in appearance or character, usually for the better.
Some people spend their entire lives in the act of transformation. I, myself have experienced many a metamorphosis. Others simply live the lives they believe they are saddled with.
My most recent metamorphosis actually began in March. I looked in the mirror and decided I needed to chop off my hair. So I did. It felt so good. For a minute.
My need for transformation had been nagging at me for some time. I had gotten myself wrapped up in yet another addiction. This time, however, my addiction was a person. Now, I'm not much of an addiction kinda gal. I'm very strong and smart to pay attention to the signs as one gets closer to crossing the line between pleasure and pain. I have been addicted to something only once before and that was the pain medicine given to me by my osteopath for the damage my father caused when he broke my back when I was twelve.
Looking back at my blog entries, I actually defined what I was feeling for my person as possible addiction, even then. I knew what I was getting into, I told him he would be the death of me, I knew I was in for a very bumpy ride. I didn't care. I just handed the ride operator my ticket and boarded gleefully. I stayed on the ride for a year. I knew that when it would subsequently end, I would feel that great, dark void in my soul, the way I did when I kicked the pills. I knew exactly what to expect and chose to go through with it anyway. What I did not anticipate, however, was the human factor. What I was partaking of was not an inanimate object. It was a person, with emotion, desire, passion, breath. His kisses consumed my very soul. He was far more powerful than my restraint and when I attempted to walk away, he stopped me in my tracks and asked me if I really wanted to do so, knowing the answer long before he ever asked the question. Drugs don't do that. They don't literally speak to you and physically grab you by the arm, embrace you so hard that you're lost in the space and your ears are ringing because your heart is racing so fast, and you can't let go, because if you do, you'll fall to the floor, knees weakened by the passion. Drugs don't slam you up against a wall and pull your hair and kiss you so deep your whole being is filled with some sort of electricity you've never, ever felt before. Drugs don't whisper your name in your ear when they're releasing all that pent up passion all over you. Drugs don't espouse emotionality. When I was done with the pills, I was done. I was not concerned with how THEY felt about it. I never made a promise to the pills that I would always be there for them, and no matter what you think about addiction, the pills never promised they would always be there for me. Walking away from a person is a hell of allot different. There is a considerable amount of emotion involved.
I came to a place where I really had no other choice than to completely let go of my addiction. The pain of broken promises and the longing for just one more moment, one more kiss, the truth that I will never see him again, I had crossed the line of addiction. It has become a life and it is a life that must die. I have come to terms with the fact that I must face the end of this dance as a death, therefor bringing forth the five stages of grief. Here in lies the act of transformation.
My grandson has a tarantula named Fred. Once a year or so, Fred sheds his skin. During this process, Fred is angry and uncomfortable and will not eat. He hides under his rock, semmingly wishing to be left alone. He is depressed and it is a process he knows he must go thru to get to the other side.
When my dog died five years ago, I was having a very difficult time "getting over it". I actually sought help with this from a minister. A minister. That's how I desperate I was. The minister said to me, "You don't get over something like this, Dee. You have to get THROUGH it." He provided me a book on how to deal with the necessary stages associated with death. Our friend, Fred had to go through the transformation, painful as it was.
In the zodiac, Scorpio is associated with death, rebirth and transformation. While I have begun my five stages of grief, I had the privilege of spending a long time atop a mountain in Oregon lying under a Full Moon in Scorpio. Under that moon, I prayed for the strength to go through the transformation without giving in to the temptation that is my human addiction. I prayed for the wisdom to learn everything I can as I go through all five stages of grief. I prayed for a little ease in the pain associated with shedding my skin and transforming into the person I have become in the process of loving someone like my boy. In fact, my Chinese sign is a snake. Snakes shed their skin all the time and while it is a painful process, the snake always comes thru it, more beautiful than before.
Many a time, in my blog, I have written about this man I loved for a year. This post is not about him. It's about me. The only thing I will say about him is that he, too is a Scorpio, zodiac sign of death, rebirth and transformation. I thank him for the transformation I have made in my life. I am certainly not the same person I was before. That's the good thing about getting involved with a Scorpio. Everyone of them I've let in has, in some major way, changed my life. And that is what is good about the Scorpio Full moon. I will, once again change my life. I will go through each and every step of the grieving process and I will move forward. My faith will not be shaken. I will emerge the strong and intelligent woman I am, and I will regain the control I so freely gave away.
When I was a kid, I used to watch Dark Shadows. One of the characters was David Collins. His mother was a Phoenix. She was a cyclical entity and could rise from the ashes, periodically. I have heard that the Phoenix is associated with the Scorpio. I can only pray that Scorpio Moon helps me rise from the ashes of my broken soul...
-Deannalynn Arzola
Saturday, May 10, 2014
Friday, May 9, 2014
You are me, in disguise, and you bring to me the terror of my true self. And as far as the crossing of paths we have discussed...you have been doing so for a million years...
Just an existential thought by Deannalynn Arzola
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