Chinese Paper Lanterns

Let your mind start a journey through a strange new world.

Leave all thoughts of the world you knew before.

Let your soul take you where you long to be…

Close your eyes, let your spirit start to soar,

and you’ll live as you’ve never lived before.

Erich Fromm

This morning, in my loving and much loved truck, a white double cab Hilux, mood heightened by my music, I found myself calling out, “Elle, I don’t know what the fuck is happening, but whatever it is, it feels right and it feels good.”  I also said, “For better or worse this is how it is now, and that is okay with me.”  It goes without saying that I had a pretty exciting start to the day.  I would never have thought, just over two years ago, that Kate and I would each have a rewarding and meaningful blog, in our eyes at least.   I also couldn’t help registering that for at least twenty years all my emotions were so measured.  Never much more than a little up or a little down.  I also stopped singing because my voice wasn’t good enough, or some equally stupid reason, and now that has all changed.  Not having sung a note for at least twenty years it took about six months of daily singing, after Elle died, to bring it back to something that didn’t split apart on the higher notes, and before it was able to hang around the right pitch such that it satisfied my own ears.  I have even learnt to open my throat!  It will never be a good voice, but it is definitely good enough to give me pleasure. Naturally, I also can’t help drawing attention to the disguised deeper meaning between a low emotional involvement with life and not feeling like I have a voice worth hearing.

Whatever this journey is about, and however much deeper it runs than the eye naturally sees, I am always grateful for the fact that I have found new meaning to my life after Elle.  How would I forgive myself and the gods otherwise.  Not sure whether I forgive her for leaving us, though!!!  But she knows what I mean and forgives me.  Fear has gone from my life, and clarity has rushed in to take  its place. There are times when darkness and pain roll in across the plains, but the winds of time soon drive them away.  It is not for me to ever know whether I am ‘on the right path’ but, in my madness if that is what it is, life feels worthwhile and rewarding.  I see dots joining up where I thought answers could never be revealed, I feel more alert and definitely I feel more alive.  I don’t believe that I am lucky or privileged.  I do believe that this journey is available to all of us travellers through this life – and perhaps it was sloth and resistance that kept me blind to it.  I have found a way to live with, and recognise the value of, my own peculiar voyage, and I am content that I have found a means to express it by attaching my musings to Chinese paper lanterns and sending them off into the internet of ether until my candle burns out.  I remember and note, Chase, the ones we all sent off at the scattering of the ashes ceremony.  Seamlessness.

By way of explanation, I have had the feeling that a few of my cars lay claim to a consciousness of their own.   My latest incarnation shows a lot of love, and knows I love it back.  Proof of my madness – I leave that for you to decide.

Author: jenniesredbook

Someone who is trying to find the stepping stones that will make a difference to her in this lifetime. View all posts by jenniesredbook