Avalanche of Ambition

I think my computer makes me shy. For days I have these moments, insights, realizations that I think I must write about, insights into the secrets of the universe. But the minute I even think about opening my computer to capture any of them on paper, they flit away. Something jiggles the vibrations of the universe when I think about writing and the vibrations tell the thoughts in my mind to scramble and distort and they are lost.

The vibrations of creativity combined with action also jiggle my infant’s sleeping brain, telling her to wake up and call out. If she has taken a long nap and I have accomplished chore after chore after chore and suddenly realize that this is a good time for writing, she wakes up to correct me. Indeed if she has taken only ten minutes of a nap and I think, now I will catch my opportunity to write, the universe vibrates with my anticipation in such a way that she must wake up, realizing that it was not the right time to sleep, after all.

So the arduous task of balance and pushing forward on the career path of writing continues. And so does the heat wave in Minnesota. Hundred degree heat with high humidity these past four days makes Minnesotans feel more like it is July than May.

The cottonwood tree has been raining cotton this past week. Like a strangely magical snow storm, the giant plumes of white cotton glide slowly to the ground where they accumulate in the grass like mounds of snow. I used to call cottonwood puffs, Logohomes and pretend they were little creatures. I created houses and hospitals for them in their tiny communities. I don’t know why. I imagine it is for the same reason my daughter finds friends wherever she goes like Kia looking for rocks in our garden.

In moments of chaos and ferocious frustration I do my best to draw on the amazing, the beautiful moments like these. It was raining cottonwood in our yard and Twila was outside in it, in a stream of sunlight looking like some kind of ethereal angel with stage snow falling on her bare shoulders. There as the moment came unfrozen, she turned to me, a sudden smile spreading across her face like she had just found a gift with a bow in our woods and said, “Mom this is Kia—do you want to meet her?”

And I smiled and said I would. “Where is she?” I asked knowing that Twila knew.

“She’s right here, looking for rocks in our garden.

And suddenly I could see her quite clearly, tall and slender, stooping low over willowy legs, picking through smooth stones next to Twila, looking for just the right one.

“What does she look like?” I asked because this is not the first time that Twila has shown me someone who I can’t see. And I want to see her more clearly.

“She has very blond hair,” she smiled, “and brownish skin.”

It was near one o’clock and very hot and Twila was beginning to glow a bright pink on her cheeks and shoulders.

“Would Kia like to come into the hammock in the shade with us?”

Twila turned and quietly consulted with Kia in the rock garden and reported back that she would.

We piled into the hammock looking out over the grassy shoreline, where steam rose from the humid foliage as the sun streamed onto the water. Sometimes Twila stepped out to push our heavy load in the hammock and sometimes we were too heavy and she had to ask Kia for help.

That night we sat looking out over the black lawn as I combed out her wet hair. She yawned and asked where Kia was sleeping and I said I didn’t know. Twila mused that maybe she was with Sola, which made Twila think about her oldest friend and she launched into a story about one of their many adventures.

Twila and Sola have been everywhere together. They have traveled the world, seen great sights and overcome great adversity. Sola was the one who took Twila to the hospital when she needed stitches. Sola and Twila have been parents together and even given birth to each other. I relish her stories about Sola because she gets the most endearing smile on her face as she speaks about her dear old friend. I don’t often tell people about Sola because she is sacred and belongs to Twila alone. She doesn’t like to be questioned about Sola and simply gets a look of indignation on her face if I prompt her to tell me about her. Stories about Sola must be spontaneous and authentic, from the source of Twila’s memory and not to be produced or fabricated.

When I am patient and listen, I am rewarded by Twila’s wisdom, her passionate story-telling abilities, the way she delights to live in the moment, to play as if nothing else in the world will ever interfere. When I slow down and let go of need-to’s and have-to’s and shoulds, then I become worthy of receiving the secrets of life. They are all contained in my small children. We are born knowing all of them, I think. Perhaps that is why we are born unable to communicate with adults, because they are not worthy to hear them.

As we grow older and become more effective communicators the world distills our pure knowledge of truth and we lose the memory of those secrets. The meaning of life is hidden deep in our cellular knowledge but is buried too deep to access as long as we are distracted by our drives and desires. There is only that small window of time when the very young can communicate clearly enough to share what they still remember about existence. Soon we effectively quiet them, teach them how to distract themselves with television and homework and need-to’s. Soon they stop seeing the angels all around.

But the memories of them are buried deep in our cells and when I allow myself to be distracted by my daughter and her friends, her rock hunting expeditions and stories and games, they come closer to the surface and I can almost recall what it was like to see behind the veil.

But then I try to capture it, to bring it to the surface, to examine and talk about it, to write it down, and the universe vibrates and trembles with my rebellion and it falls away, hidden in an avalanche of my ambition.