Over the Broom, Under the Sun
For the first time this summer, Ross and I actually managed to get out of town together for an entire weekend, solely to have fun. This entails making sure the noisy, diabetic, incontinent (did I mention blind and unpleasant?) miniature toy poodle that belonged to Rosses late mother has someone to give her insulin shots 2x a day (did I mention she bites nearly everyone who tries?). Also someone to look after Bill, Rosses father who lives with us and needs to take meds (but doesn’t bite) and eat meals a few times a day. Fortunately, all these roles were exercised by Rosses sister Barbara, who also has had Jojo staying with her for a couple weeks. So thanks to Barbara’s largesse we hightailed it up to Portland for Dawn and Jim’s wedding weekend.
We stayed with Kate and Yorck, who have two adorable boys 4-1/2 and 1 year old. It was like time traveling a bit to stay with them — fun to try to make friends with the little guys, nostalgic in the way an inconsolable one-year-old can be for past parents of one-year-olds, and also kind of like a rent-before-you-buy experience for prospective grandparents (which we are). Ross on these occasions often surprises me with how well he remembers the solutions we applied to baby problems in our day. My memory of events and his are different and complimentary. I consider this one of the top five reasons to cultivate and sustain long-term partnerships in life.
Anyway, the wedding was excellent. My dear friend Donald Engstrom officiated, and insisted that both Dawn and Jim undergo a cleansing ritual Saturday morning. As part of Dawn’s “team” in that ritual, I was deeply moved by both her willingness to be open through the process, and by how the work of shedding the energetic patterns of old relationships affected us all. By the end she was fully present, fully herself and full of joy, ready for whatever the next day brought. The rest of us felt the shift, and felt ourselves moving more fully into ritual space as well.
Afterwards, while Ross went out with some of his friends from the Process Work community, I got the unimaginable luxury of a couple hours walking through Southeast Portland by myself — I ambled down SE Hawthorne, had a wonderful breakfast (though it was the middle of the day), bought a couple books at Powell’s, and then ambled back to Kate’s in time to go to the rehearsal/dinner over at Edgefield that evening.
Truly what is special for me about Reclaiming are my many deep and fruitful friendships with so many deep and talented people. Myself, Oak, Donald, Todd, Ravyn, Miles, Clark, Nicole, Brook, Cypress, Lilith, Scott, Kate, Mark (Donald’s betrothed), River, Alphonsus…it was just a stellar group of witches, and ones with whom weaving magic is effortless and sublime. So we had effortless and sublime covered, and could pay attention to all the minute details of the day. I definitely felt like I had my “dragon” cap on, scanning the circle all the time for any blips in the energy field that could result in something less than auspicious happening. We were all anti-omen that day, I think especially because of Oak’s traumatic wedding event of the weekend before.
Brook and Cypress cast the most beautiful double-circle I have ever seen — it was like water ballet, except on solid ground — and neatly raised the bar of beauty, balance and delight for the rest of us, which I am happy to say we all met. Dawn and Jim said wonderful words to each other, rings were exchanged, a broom was jumped, glasses were raised, and both Dawn’s son Zack and one of Jim’s sons delivered very touching toasts to their new constellation of parents. After such an event, the two of them deserve a lovely honeymoon far from the family dramas that surely await them on their return.
As for Ross and I, we were having so much fun that we misjudged how long a trip to Rooster Rock beach would take (who could resist a jump in the Columbia River to cap off a trip?) and missed our flight home on Sunday night. After a few minutes of just being stunned at how we could fuck up so badly, we decided to just go with it, rented a car, and set out back for Edgefield for another night hanging out with friends. I don’t think we’ve done anything that irresponsible since we were in our early 20s, and once the annoyance, worry, and embarrassment wore off, it was really fun.
One more thing: I was telling Todd this story as we walked to the field Sunday noon, as I think of it every time I attend a wedding. Once when I was pretty young, 20 or 21, something like that, I took a medicine wheel class with Beth Beurkens in Santa Cruz, and her teacher Grandmother Mahad’yuni (Evelyn Eaton) attended a couple of our classes. She was a lovely older woman, half Scots and half Paiute as I recall, and on the last day we each got to ask her one question. Because Ross and I at that time were seriously considering getting married, I asked her what she thought about marriage. Her response went something like this:
“Oh you know, whenever I attend funerals, I am always so happy. They made it! They completed their tasks and a lifetime of work, and they are off to rest for a while. But weddings, you know… I think the Lords of Karma got together one day to figure out how to get us lazy humans to work through the greatest amount of our own karma in the shortest amount of time, and they came up with the idea of marriage. So that’s what I think of marriage.”
This obviously made a great impression on me, even though I had absolutely no idea what she was talking about. We were so very much in love, and we knew that that was stronger and ultimately more important than any challenges we might face in the future. Now, I really understand what she was talking about, and I still think that we chose right. I think Dawn and Jim did, too.