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Light cloud cover screened the intensity of the sun today, creating a temperature veil that made it a most perfect day to work outside. I was out there for hours, digging and hauling dirt, sifting for gravel that’s getting moved to the front of the house’s walkway. I made 15 grand adobe blocks today and have dirt ready for tomorrow if the temperature stays cooler. (More ‘modern’ people would be able to ‘make hay’ with a power cement mixer — it is WORK mixing in the 10% cement evenly and the WATER!)
My vision of the back yard is taking form. I want to tear down what’s left of that old, raggedy shed. I’ll save the wood, clear the cement pad, and build a little adobe chapel! There might not be another chapel so close to the Mexican-American border line anywhere in America! How sweet that will be!
I will dedicate the little place as a prayer chapel for peace and tranquility. Somehow I will include within it a very simple plaque with my most favorite words in the whole world on it (in English and in Spanish):
“Never sadden anyone, no matter whom, for no matter what.”
by The Bab
(This was on page 31 of the edition – not sure of the year – I found this in when I wrote it into my prayer book nearly 40 years ago – in Release the Sun: An Early History of the Baha’i Faith by William Sears)
I am beginning to see more clearly what isn’t here yet. Let the fair winds continue to blow, I’ve got work to do! Give this woman a shovel, a pair of gloves, a plastic bucket — some dirt and water — and WATCH OUT! There is nothing better for my healing and well-being I could be doing right now – absolutely nothing.
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Stop the Storm 
I didn’t know that about our brains. Have you thought about doing balancing rituals (or whatever) such as feminine/masculine, yin/yang, etc. to help with healing? Even exercises like writing/drawing with your non-dominant hand can help stimulate growth and healing from what I’ve read.
In college I was a physical anthropology major and I loved learning about the Neanderthals, so thank you very much for that!
Ah….fun with dissociation….. Hubby and I are redoing the kitchen and as we were ripping up the rug this morning we found evidence of work I had done last year but have no memory of. He’s used to it, though, and it doesn’t seem to bother him too much. Many of our daily conversations start with “Remember when you said/did/saw/went….”.
I’m sorry about your cancer and chemo, and good for you for feeling so inspired by your brother and doing such beautiful work.
Lisa
About 25 years ago I was able to go to a Tai Chi Cha (SP?) class – way before I ever knew what I know now – but loved it. No classes here, but I’ve thought about that as a ‘balancing’ technique.
I am also hoping the piano playing helps –
I’m working on a dissociation post —
Also yesterday thinking about the flip side of “It’s always been this way” as being “THAT (whatever else painful that could be eliminated from ongoing memory) NEVER HAPPENED.” More in a bit….
Your bricks are beautiful!! In my mind and can see your yard as ‘it will be’ and Lisa’s right- it looks so much better now than when you moved there. I am very happy you are getting outside and enjoying the great weather. Happy Mudding!!
Thanks! It’s noon and have to stop for awhile – it’s too hot and I sweat like it’s pouring outside!
Awesome adobe bricks! There was a really funny SNL skit about 20 years ago about the new Mexican car – The Adobe! Just thought of that.
Are you building upper body strength with all of that mixing?
Were you ever frightened when illegals went through your yard?
Do you realize all of the work you’ve done recently in your yard? It’s totally transformed since your first pictures. That’s amazing. It looks beautiful so far.
Lisa
Good Morning there, Lisa
I’d love to have seen that skit – certainly can imagine — square wheels and all, I bet!
I went into labor laughing so hard with my first born watching “Laugh In” — yup, that dates both of us! Laughed her into the world — or tried to! (Things were tough for me, pregnant at 18!)
I had dreamed of an adobe project, but until my brother came and inspired me about the fence, I didn’t have the personal privacy I need for this! I have worked (in Taos – ’94-’96) building with adobe, so I KNOW how sculptural working with it can be! It’s a delight!
I guess I take pictures because of my ‘dissociation-time’ thing. There’s no way I can actually remember something well that involves a physical process of change. Once something has happened, once something has changed, it has ALWAYS been that way to me. Last summer when I helped my daughter in Fargo decorate her work cubicle with cloth, after the 3 hours it took to do the transformation, I absolutely could NOT remember what it looked like before.
It’s a very disorienting and disorganizing experience for me – the pictures help – as do your words! If I jumped off the shore of a lake and swam across it, I would remember in some way climbing out on the far shore but not the start or the duration – I can faintly intellectually THINK about the whole, but I can’t REMEMBER it as a connected experience in my body……. Hence, loving the digital camera – free pics!!! Otherwise my sense of life is “It’s always been this way.”
Oh, and never frightened of illegals – they are a sad, sad, sad, sad lot. Pitifully difficult lives, more than I can ever imagine. And the sacrifices and suffering they go through to get across is beyond belief. They exercise hope, perseverance and endurance – risking their very lives – because they have needs that are not met. I only wish we on this side could help them without suffering legal consequences. Border Patrol and Sheriff officers’ vehicles – drug enforcement choppers – unmanned airborne drone things – like a war zone here – thus, prayers required.
The drug war in Mexico is escalating and unbelievably violent. As long as stupid Americans are over here consuming those drugs — well…….. But the drugs are being crossed somewhere other than in my yard —
And — I need to lose my cancer treatment weight – mostly from the steroids — my trauma body cannot tolerate steroids – and I want my strength back – my body has always been my power
This makes me think of a (perhaps strangely) connected topic – body-brain lateralization. Both breast cancers and lymph node involvement were on the left side of my body. I am COMPLETELY right-handed. As hard as I try to balance out the different aspects of the physical work I am doing to re-strengthen my body equally on both sides, I simply cannot do it.
I have wondered if this is related to the cancers because my left side is under-worked and slacks terribly because I have such a body-physical orientation.
It also makes me think of the theory I believe about our poor Neanderthal relatives and their extinction. As climate changed and the thick forests began to disappear that the N’s used to hunt in, they could not adapt because their bodies (too) were so one-sidedly powerful.
Skeletal remains show that the side of their body they used to throw their massive and weighty spears at large game were highly developed. But when the forests disappeared they could not adapt to the fast hunt. They were slow and awkward and could not run. They did not have light-weight weapons designed for hunting on the run.
In came our human ancestors, having traveled out of Africa knowing how to track game, make and use lightweight weapons, and with balanced bodies that could run fast. Out went the lopsided heavyweights.
Lateralization of body-brain is always implicated in trauma-related disorders because the brain has to be able to work side-to-side. Traumatized infants whose brains don’t develop the hemispheres ‘right’ or the connection between them (and those who are left-handed and/or ambidextrous) are always at highest risk for trauma-related disorders. Kind of ironical to me that being left-handed and/or ambidextrous is such a risk factor, considering our N relations — but certainly leaves me thinking about how critical being BALANCED is wherever possible.