Harvest Gifts Bring the Cops
Well, actually, it's the half-a-block long Mayflower semitruck sloppily parked outside my apartment door that brings the cops, but still.. *grin*
I had Actual Plans for this year's Autumn Equinox holiday. After four years of living out of a suitcase and in other people's spaces, I wanted to scrap togther a temporary altar and have a little welcome home party for my gods, thank them for their gifts, and just generally step back onto my spiritual path...but then the night before I got a call from the movers. They were going to be delivering All My Things several days earlier than expected. Well. Okay, then!
So Autumn Equinox was spent instead doing several other things: first, it was standing at the window for an hour like a little shaggy puppy, watching traffic and growling at everyone who had the temerity to pull into the parking spaces in front of my building; second, it was watching two increasingly sweaty men haul all my boxes and books and furniture up two flights of stairs (and wishing I had scraped togther more tip money for them because holy moly they really deserved more than I had on hand!); and third, it was resisting the urge to start peeking into boxes right away since I was already an hour late for the closing shift I was scheduled.
But though there was no altar and no incense and no official welcome, there was gratitude in plenty, loads of it, giddy handfuls of it, as I realized that finally, for the first time since I boxed everything up in March of 2008 and hit the road, I was in my very own place, with all my belongings around me.
I'm opening up the boxes now. I know I just repacked everything this past summer, but it feels like I'm seeing everything for the first time. I open them not to inventory them and repack them, but to put them away. My kitchen shelves have dishes and my living room has bookshelves, and there's a desk in the bedroom waiting for an afternoon of writing, and quilts ready for winter.
Four years ago, in spring, I left everything in storage and, like The Fool card from the Tarot, stepped off the cliff to follow My Chem. I was going to come back to Seattle, but the road lead me in a whole different direction, and there was no There and Back Again for this particular Hobbit.
But this autumn, the road lead me home, at last, and every newly opened box says "welcome home."
I had Actual Plans for this year's Autumn Equinox holiday. After four years of living out of a suitcase and in other people's spaces, I wanted to scrap togther a temporary altar and have a little welcome home party for my gods, thank them for their gifts, and just generally step back onto my spiritual path...but then the night before I got a call from the movers. They were going to be delivering All My Things several days earlier than expected. Well. Okay, then!
So Autumn Equinox was spent instead doing several other things: first, it was standing at the window for an hour like a little shaggy puppy, watching traffic and growling at everyone who had the temerity to pull into the parking spaces in front of my building; second, it was watching two increasingly sweaty men haul all my boxes and books and furniture up two flights of stairs (and wishing I had scraped togther more tip money for them because holy moly they really deserved more than I had on hand!); and third, it was resisting the urge to start peeking into boxes right away since I was already an hour late for the closing shift I was scheduled.
But though there was no altar and no incense and no official welcome, there was gratitude in plenty, loads of it, giddy handfuls of it, as I realized that finally, for the first time since I boxed everything up in March of 2008 and hit the road, I was in my very own place, with all my belongings around me.
I'm opening up the boxes now. I know I just repacked everything this past summer, but it feels like I'm seeing everything for the first time. I open them not to inventory them and repack them, but to put them away. My kitchen shelves have dishes and my living room has bookshelves, and there's a desk in the bedroom waiting for an afternoon of writing, and quilts ready for winter.
Four years ago, in spring, I left everything in storage and, like The Fool card from the Tarot, stepped off the cliff to follow My Chem. I was going to come back to Seattle, but the road lead me in a whole different direction, and there was no There and Back Again for this particular Hobbit.
But this autumn, the road lead me home, at last, and every newly opened box says "welcome home."