WILD Dreams and Happy Spring- but don't read all of this!

The American Robin has made an appearance at my house and the learning center. As far as I am concerned, spring is here. I have shaved off my beard and am keeping the mustache for March. (only two days so far, but maybe it will come off today!) I wore a Hawaiian shirt today to emphasize the Magnum PI inclination I have.

The moon is new. I have been speaking with and listening to many of my colleagues. Emotions have been running high in all of our heads for different reasons. All of us have challenges.

My cluster headaches came back two weeks ago and they have knocked me out for a while. I had one yesterday but some medication helped me through it. Mom brought that up on her visit last weekend.

Mom came up last weekend and we enjoyed three days together in the Cascades. Lots of talking, eating, tea-ing, and some hiking and snowshoeing to boot. It was nice to have her stay with me and to introduce her to my life (and all of the people) up here.

I haven't worked out in three weeks and feel weak. I have no appetite and wake up nauseous often.

The workload is daunting. I have a ton of things to do in a particular order and no motivation to do them. The headaches, food consumption, emotional attachment and jealousy, lack of physical...

All leads in a downward cycle to down. Down and down it goes. Down and down I go.

Reminds me of a dream from last night. I just finished a book which took me four years to read. Jung's Man and his Symbols. It is a hard read- a psychoanalysis book of sorts. Though lots of it went through my eyes at late night hours and was promptly forgotten, some it stuck with me. And those vivid guides help me consider the events from last night.

I was nervous writing down anything. It seems weird and I thought I could sleep off any dreams. Wrong. I refused to acknowledge the unconscious and it came back with lucid visuals.

Please stop reading. But I can't stop writing.






The dream I have involves a group of us hanging out and having a good time. I was jealous of a good-looking guy who was with a woman I wanted to be with but I was making the most of the event. Eventually we wanted to slide down a steep muddy hill in the rain. This guy went for it first and we all cheered him on. He picked up a lot of speed, but didn't stop as expected. He went under a picnic table and slid underneath it before stopping on the other side of a small burm. He stood up with his hands held high and yelled. Then, he looked down as I realized that his neck was marked with three horizontal crimson stripes. He looked down in horror and pulled out some cables out of his neck. I had noticed those thin wire supports under the picnic table and feared for the worse. Then, he collapsed.

I yelled at some friends to call for help, it was instinctual. We got around him, ready to help medically. I started to get flustered because everyone was helping and we weren't safeguarding his needs. I looked into the face of a friend who was seemingly out of place and then into the face of the dying man. I knew then that my efforts were in vain because the outcome was sealed. The dream faded off with folks determining how to start CPR and the clearness to me that it was best to step away.

I haven't ever been a witness to a death. So, to see one in my dream was unforgetable. I thought about my role as the observer and helper. I tried to look at the dream from a me-centered perspective. But, after reading that book and writing this out, I have another viewpoint. It coincides perfectly with the newness of this time and space in my life. I tried to help the man and relieve his pain. But it was his time to die. It is time for "me" to die. For my ego to let go of me. That was not me helping another man; it was my watching my ego die.

I have been caught up in a difficult mental capacity. It is the same one that I have had for years, but upon arriving back to the US I jumped right into things. I adjusted to living here functionally, as I have done with other countries. Then I built up an ego based on a defensive stance, to hold onto the history and past that I have understood, to keep me grounded. I have held onto an ego that helped me stay rooted.

But that same ego has kept me and from moving on. And, with the fresh outlook on life that all of these signs are forcing me to recognize, I can't help but go with the flow of it all. My ego has been struggling to stay in the limelight and I have been afraid of going on without it. I have become way too serious for my own good. And I watched it die.

I don't mean to say that I don't have an ego. It is still there and will always be there. In fact, my life would be empty without it. But the extent to which I have been holding it in place will be changing. I can't allow my inner workings to wind themselves up as they had for months. I have to let it all flow. That is the second mention of it... flow like Stetattle Creek behind my house, flow like the mighty Skagit... water moves onward and fighting the current only creates rapids on one's own being.

I have to go watch some presentations of the students who will graduate next week. But I wanted to get this out of my head. You should have stopped reading a long time ago. But I can't stop writing. And that is another story... throwing out the notes of the past and stepping into the present. I may be burning years of notes in my fireplace as a way to get to the essence of it all again. Cathartic indeed... not closure but the important debrief process in life that I must do.

Cheers