the goddess is alive and stepping on my foot

it's the end of a long lonely winter. not physically or emotionally lonely, but spiritually lonely, in that place where spirit and core identity are one...

every so often in one's life the Divine is truly immanent, and then the rest of the time, "i got nothin'." and this winter, i got nothin', coming up empty, nothing but boredom and discontent - again, not physically or emotionally, but spiritually, in that place where spirit and core identity abide...




aftershocks. we moved away from home - the family left the nest, we sold what we could and threw away the rest - relocated, bought (into) new houses, filled new rooms, reconfigured - poorly, from my perspective. because the last of the children left and now it's just me and jpw and two cats, rattling around a big family house full of rooms closed up for the winter, unused, so we don't have to heat them, nothing lives in them...

and in the quiet house, the strange city, it's been a winter of work and work and work and work and no play.

but the work was supposed to be the play! i loved the story of the toymaker who had a motto hanging over his workbench, "never worked and never will." play is the work of children, it is their laboratory science, their edification; work should be the play of grown-ups - or at least, in the case of artists and agitators with day-jobs, it should at least finance the playtime...

well, my winter has been work and work and work some more. a pile of creative projects - knitting, collage, embroidery, clay - started and set aside, literally gathering dust.




all work and no pray. no play. no pray.

no real pray - just words - no grace, only law. and i'm okay with law. but i remember grace.

over all hangs the pervasive question, what happens after this? we're never going back; there's nothing to go back to. we are homeless. what happens after this?

i drew up lists and researched and weighed options and calculated relative risks. work, money, a tolerable life. meanwhile, my spouse furrowed his brow and added "mrs. henry's mental health" to the list. our little ship of state really needs me to not collapse, to keep on doctoring - but the doctoring is driving me to collapse. collapse of spirit! of identity! i must continue. keep calm, carry on.




but - what happens after this? homeless, there's nowhere we can move to that will bring us all back together; we can't stay, it's too sad and lonely here. proximity? to where home used to be? vs. earning power: those jobs in the middle of north dakota sure pay a lot - could we do that for five or ten years, make a heap of money, finance the kids' launches into the world?

that's what other doctors do. but my number one fear all along was selling out. giving up the real project for the superficial activity.

finally i just started yearning for a Sign.

my daughter asked me, well, what kind of a place do you think you'd be happiest in? i said, i'm waiting for a Sign.

preceptors asked me, are you staying? are you going to try to get a job here in the system? i replied noncommittally, but inside i repeated, i can't decide anything, because i'm waiting for a Sign.

jpw said, i'll go anywhere you want to go, and i said, i won't know where we should go until we get a Sign.

so the months went by.




then one day on a whim, over the phone, first wife's tarot reading:

covering me: the queen of wands. well, she is me, after all.

crossing me: the hanged man. first wife disregards the whole upright-reversed thing - i do not, because of the way i shuffle - but anyway, just the hanged man, his essential nature, without spin.

behind me: the judgement day, the slumbering souls all rising out of their coffins to the sound of trumpets. before me: the empress.

the empress! the empress!

the empress!




above me: the ace of pentacles.

below me: the three of swords.

within me: nine of pentacles.

without me: six of cups.

i should note here that first wife uses a different deck than i do, and it doesn't have pentacles, and the face cards are different, and so on, but i was translating it all into the idiom i was most familiar with.

hopes and fears: eight of cups.

all and everything: ten of cups - and i'll be damned if that's not what anyone in their right mind would call a full-fledged, genuine Sign.




i've always seen the nine of pentacles as a kind of junior empress - an empress in training? as little girls bake tiny tiny loaves under the dim bulb of their easy-bake ovens, while their grandmothers toss the well-known ingredients into the biggest bowl to make some new kind of cake imagined into reality, not planning so much as enabling, half by magic - so the nine-of-pentacles lady has cultivated her pretty garden, and it's growing - but it's not the jungle of abundance the empress rules.

i'm just saying.




the six - well, of course, "a card of goodness that encourages kindness," as one interpreter said - sweet, nostalgic... but also a new solution.

then with the eight of cups a pilgrim goes on a mission to find the missing cup. it's a leap of faith - possibly a foolish one - and note the pilgrim can't take the cups along with him. or her. how else, though, to complete the set?

apparently the ten of cups lies at the end of the trail. the trial. the trail. so many cups! the queen of wands is somewhat taken aback -

but jpw isn't. he has asserted more and more firmly that if we don't find a place to live where the social environment is supportive, rather than destructive, of my way of thinking/acting/believing, of my path - i may crack up.

cognitive dissonance is making me sick and he will not permit that to happen, if he can stop it. because if i get sick, all that remains of our big life falls apart, and then we're really screwed. so - no high-paying hamster wheel in north dakota.

instead, out of the blue i made a connection with someone who practices the way i want to practice, who lives in the kind of place i'd want to live, and then she invited me to come and stay, she offered to help me get started, she knows the ropes, she has the resources, and her number one message is, "every doctor should feel happy and inspired practicing medicine."

it sounds so elementary, but you don't usually see it in action. it's like the toymaker: never worked, never will.

so there's what happened next: the empress.

who would have ever guessed that the angle of incidence could equal the angle of reflection?

i



got



nothing.

like i was telling mittens, sometimes you touch the universe and the universe touches you back, and other times you touch the universe and it's like there's nothing there.


there's the story - jesus told this story to his friends when they asked him, "teach us how to pray," - the story about the person who goes to his neighbor's house in the middle of the night and hammers on the door and says, "can you give me some bread, because some houseguests just showed up and i don't have anything to offer them right now," and even though the neighbor says, "go away, can't you see we're all in bed," eventually, even if the neighbor won't give him the bread because of their friendship, he'll give it to him because of his persistence.

and there's the shaker song i admire so much:
i hunger and thirst, i hunger and thirst after true righteousness.
in what i've obtained, in what i've obtained my soul can not rest.
an ocean i see without boundary or shore,
oh, feed me, i'm hungry, enrich me, i'm poor.
but here's the hook:
i will cry unto god, i never will cease
til my soul's filled with love,
perfect love and sweet peace.
don't you think "god," supposing there is a god, rolls "his" figurative eyes, hearing that, and sighs, oh all RIGHT. i mean, what an extravagant demand, to never cease crying out until your soul's filled with perfect love and sweet peace? my goodness. i'm impressed.

unfortunately i am a lazy person and i can't muster up that much persistence. i'm more like, "oh, i'm sorry, of course you're all asleep - i'll come back later..." but thinking, "dang, what am i going to feed my guests?"

must be my inner lake-wobegonian.

then there's the song from church last week, which had our marching orders in it - "we are called to love tenderly." yes, i know it is corny. it struck me though because in my daily work, at least a couple times every hour, i check for tenderness. you come to see me because your back hurts, and i will poke on it and see if it's tender - because a back that has "midline tenderness" is different than a back that doesn't. you tell me you think your toe is infected, i will squeeze it and see if it is tender.

"tender" has this specific meaning in medicine - there's pain, which hurts by itself, and then there's tenderness, which only hurts with help. so i was struck by the true fact that in this racket, the religion-and-spirituality racket - well, the christian racket - there, i said it - it's, you know, supposed to be a love cult. and we are called to love tenderly.

in my estimation, the song says we are supposed to feel that love as a tenderness. we will know we have a heart, because when others poke it and squeeze it, we will feel it acutely, and do something about it, rather than just theoretically saying, of course i have a heart, i'm still walking around aren't i.



my point is that i'm not afraid of work, i'm willing and able "to love tenderly," i'm cool with that practice, i've been a lifelong subscriber. but when i reach out to the universe and it's like there's nothing there, where once there was something there, i have no persistence and am suspicious, kind of, of the whole persistence enterprise, even though himself said that is specifically how you are supposed to pray.

this happens every so often. i would be concerned that i had "lost my faith" if i hadn't been through this repeatedly before. fortunately i have the wise advice of stephen gaskin to follow, which has been so helpful so many times:

There's grace, and then there's law. Grace works best, but law works good if you happen to be temporarily out of grace. You can figure out by the rules how to get back again."

so that's what i'll do.

turn then

eia ergo advocata nostra illos tuos
misericordes oculos ad nos converte
et benedictum fructum ventris tui nobis ostende.

road rules

do not follow her to her seat, trying to make eye contact, pretending you just want to give her a church bulletin.

do not walk all the way across the church to give her the "sign of peace" - especially since you're not giving anyone else the "sign of peace."



don't wink while holding out the communion cup to her. how can you wink and say, "the blood of christ," at the same time?

no matter how cute she looks in the sunshine, walking home from church by herself, do not pull your car up alongside asking her if she wants a ride.

and do not yell, "have a good day, gorgeous!" as you drive away. this is not what church is for.

love is here and oh my darling now now you're gone

you persuaded me to love you and i did
but instead of tenderness i found heartache instead
into your arms I fell so unaware
of the loneliness that was waiting there



you closed the door to your heart
and you turned the key
locked your love away from me



look at me
see what loving you has done to me
look at my face
see how crying has left its trace



love is here
and oh my darling now you're gone
love is here
and oh my darling now you're gone



you made me love you
and oh my darling now you're gone
you made me love you
and oh my darling now now you're gone



today is the feast day of blandina.

water and holes in his hands

so i'm thinking of buddhas and humming the song "sons and daughters of hungry ghosts," and just then i run across the ida b. wells memorial sutra library - sometimes it just slams on the synchronizer and comes all together at once.

this is where i found the Ghost-King Sutra: it's part of the [very long] Sutra Of Bodhisattva Ksitigarbha's Fundamental Vows.

This is how Buddha instructed the bodhisattva
Ksitigarbha about a Ghost King.


a real place, ksitigarbha's temple, in taiwan.
i say his name "kitsa-garbo."

At one time, many ghost kings came to Heaven, to the heaven where Buddha was teaching the Bodhisattva named Ksitigarbha. Those who came included
Evil Poison Ghost King,
Evil Doing Ghost King, Dispute Ghost King,
White Tiger Ghost King, Blood Tiger Ghost King,
Red Tiger Contagious Ghost King,
Disaster Ghost King, Flying Body Ghost King,
Lightning Flash Ghost King, Wolf Teeth Ghost King,
Thousand Eyes Ghost King, Eating Beast Ghost King,
Rock-Carrying Ghost King, Exhaustion Ghost King,
Calamity Ghost King,
Food Ghost King, Wealth Ghost King,
Domestic Animal Ghost King,
Mountain Spirit Ghost King,
Birth Ghost King, Life Ghost King,
Disease Ghost King, Danger Ghost King,
Three Eyes Ghost King, Four Eyes Ghost King,
Five Eyes Ghost King,
the Fire Spirit King, the Dharma Protector King, and so on.
There were major and minor ghost kings who live in all the worlds and rule over specific areas. These ghost kings all came to the Buddha's assembly, and reverently stood beside the Bodhisattva.

A Ghost King named Life addressed Buddha, saying, "World-Honored One, I am in charge of humans' lives. Fundamentally, I am willing to help them. But they have little happiness and peace when dying. Why should this be?

"I vow to help those who are about to die, regardless of whether they are good or evil. World-Honored One, when men or women are going to die, they are incapable of clear thinking, they cannot tell good from bad, their eyes are unable to see and their ears are unable to hear.

"If only their relatives will pray for them and recite scriptures, then the dead people will be turned away from evil, and all devils and ghosts will retreat from them. World-Honored One, if anyone who is about to die hears a Buddha's or a Bodhisattva's name, these people can be preserved from all evils immediately."

Buddha said to Life Ghost King, "You have great benevolence to make such a great vow to protect all beings, both dying and dead. In future generations whenever anyone faces death, do not forget the vow you have made, and release all the beings from hardships, and allow them to observe happiness and peace."

The ghost king replied to Buddha, "Do not be concerned. I shall do my best to protect all the beings in all the worlds."

And Buddha told the Bodhisattva, "This Ghost King has already supported and protected all beings at death. At this time, he is a Ghost King named Life, but eons from now, in an eon named Tranquility, he will be a Buddha named No-Appearance-Thus-I-Come. The world he lives in will be called Pure Dwelling. Ksitigarbha, everything about this ghost king is unimaginable: the people he is saving, in all the worlds and all the heavens, are innumerable."


sons and daughters of hungry ghosts
i got water and i got holes
so, la la la la la la...

...and now you know something you didn't before.