Rain Dances, Jellyfish Lamps, and Knowledge Recalled in the Nick of Time

This week, I remembered some things that I had forgotten I know. I remembered that I know how to heal myself. I remembered that I have access powerful tools to quiet my monkey mind, console my spirit, and access my core self. I remembered a state of expansion, stillness, and compassionate acceptance of what is. I remembered that emotions and moods are not permanent states of being.  I remembered that I know all of these things, although I haven’t put them into practice quite yet.  It was like being flat broke for months then suddenly recalling that I have a giant chest of full of cash stowed in the basement.

This remembering was brought on by two things--the compassionate listening of a professional, and the purchase of a Jellyfish Lamp. The Jellyfish Lamp was an impulse buy at my neighborhood drugstore. It captivated me with its gentle pink and green lights, its translucent rubber jellyfish bobbing gracefully in the burbling water, its hypnotic buoyancy. I snapped it up and took it home and put in on my computer desk, where I have been staring at it off and on for days.

Jellyfish have almost no ability to move under their own propulsion. They are carried along by the ocean currents, passively absorbing food that gets caught in their tentacles as they’re swept through the deep waters. They exist in a state of total oneness with their environment, having no choice but to give themselves completely to what is—the flow of the currents, the nutrients that are available in any given moment, the light that passes through them. I find their utter dependence both terrifying and distasteful to ponder, but they have survived this way for over 650 million years, so maybe they’re on to something.

Switching to a more writerly vein--the cover art is still pending for my chapbook, “The Acme Employee Manual”, but the book should be ready for release from Jaffa Press within a few weeks. I will keep you posted! I’m continuing to work on the novel and making good headway. My goal is to have a draft completed by the end of the year. And I will be releasing my short story “Cheesehead” in full soon—the specifics to be announced when I sort it all out. 

The words are flowing. The life-giving rain is finally coming back to Seattle. I think back to the river, my visit with the little otter, the flow of time, the flow of emotions as they pass through me, the flow of one moment into another, the currents of a marriage, the watery rhythms of my body, how I take in or reject nourishment. I hope this marks the beginning of less fear and rigidity, and more surrender to the wisdom of the tides.

--Kristen McHenry