It’s a Sign….

On the evening of my one year anniversary we received rain, glorious rain. There has been no rain all summer, at least in my small world, and very little elsewhere. The scent of beauty surrounded me this morning as I went outside to breathe it all in – absolutely wonderful!!! One forgets the importance of a simple pleasure such as the smell in the forest after the rain – there is nothing quite like it. As I stood looking at the riverbank saying my thanks for such a beautiful gift, I realized yes, the rain falling on this momentous night (at least for me) is a sign; for fresh starts or……..new beginnings.

I was sitting in my room when the power went out, so there was complete darkness and silence as I reached for my flashlight so I could find my candles. This is when I realized the silence was not complete, there was the sound of rain. I had to go out to see it for myself, feel it on my body. This is also when I saw the spider on the wall beside the door, not one of the huge ones, but bigger than I was comfortable with. I have chased them out several times, but not for a week or so. As I opened the door to get rid of the spider, Sophia came flying through. I could not help but laugh because she was wet and I thought quite confused about how it happened. I realize this was in fact her first rain since leaving the safety of her nest when she could not yet open her eyes. One can only imagine the confusion of getting wet from the sky, an unknown source, for the first time. She sat down and looked at me, waiting for an explanation, which I provided. The rain stopped while I was outside enjoying the feeling of moisture, and the cool, fresh air, breathing it in.

Sophia decided she was not leaving the safety of my room last night, so for this one time I allowed her to curl up on the floor beside my bed. That she wanted to remain inside for so long was unusual for her. The power came back on for about half an hour, just long enough for me to receive an email about transportation to another important meeting on Friday. I was able to send my reply and then about 15 minutes later we were in darkness once more. The rain had also begun again, coming down a bit harder, lasting throughout most of the night I think, the power coming on sometime in the wee hours.

The spider returned while I was turning in for the night, only now it was beside my shoe at my bedside. Sophia was watching as I attempted to capture the spider with my plastic container, but the spider was too fast. I was doing a little dance trying to avoid both stepping on the spider and having it jump on me. It was difficult to see on the cement floor with only one candle lighting the room. This of course caught Sophia’s attention, she followed the path of the spider with great interest (her eyesight much better than mine), planning her move, and she got it. I did warn the spider, explaining it was not welcome to take up residence in my home, each time I took it out in the past. I spared it’s life each time, Sophia did not. Yes, I believe this is also a sign….

Things do change over the span of time, different wounds can heal, memories can fade as new ones are made, and our fears can diminish in size as we face them. It is a choice to believe in signs which come to our attention. We can accept them as gifts from the spirit world, or find reasonable explanations. As you know I choose to accept them as gifts, a way of thinking giving me strength as I walk my path. Short of giving the spider a mark of some kind to identify it, there is of course no way for me to claim it is the same spider I have removed time and again, but the reality is, it doesn’t matter. It’s insistence to be in my home created a situation making me deal with a fear of great magnitude, one I have had since childhood. Make no mistake, the fear has not evaporated, but I have been able to manage the fear.

The spider was removed permanently last night, but not by my hands, rather it was a small chain of events creating an environment where the spider had an enemy it did not expect. There was a certain satisfaction as I settled in bed once more, realizing the spider had been given a choice, it’s decision to stay ending its life. We are faced with making choices everyday, the smallest one can set off a chain reaction taking us somewhere we did not expect to find ourselves. We may not even remember the choice made which began the journey we find ourselves on. For example, Mali made a choice to follow me the other day, I chose to get on my bus rather than take her back – both our decisions could have resulted in serious consequences for her. Thankfully I do not have to face how I would have handled the consequences of my decision had it turned out differently. I really did not think it was possible, but I believe the experience has brought us even closer, both of us having faced the loss which could have occurred. Perhaps we needed to be reminded, taking our relationship and the steady presence of each other for grated over time.

Choosing to believe in the signs and recording them, is a way for me to keep track of my decisions, my way of thinking. Looking back on the entries of my journals, allowed me to see a pattern, helping me to adjust my thinking as I looked for ways to not only change my direction, but open a door allowing me to see truth emerge from the pattern. It was very significant and beneficial to see and comprehend the incredibly large number of times the signs guided my step. One of my favorite things about the movie “A Knights Tale” was that through determination and some crazy ideas, resulting in decisions being made that were out of depth for most, allowed the main character to “Change his stars”.

The death of a spider happening on the evening of the first cleansing rain in months, and it all happening on the eve of my anniversary here, is of great importance I believe. To me it represents the end of one cycle, the one that trapped me in a world of the unbelievable cruelty of my captors, now able to enter a new and beautiful circle. The fresh, clean air of a new life, one where decisions are made by me, the responsibility mine. So much of my life has been controlled by sources unknown, the consequences of those decisions falling unfairly on my shoulders. I say unfairly because they were made without my knowledge or consent, forcing me to make decisions later in life which came from fear of a past not remembered. It does me little good to wonder where my life would have taken me had I been left to ‘live’ rather than die this slow and painful death. But then again, perhaps wondering allows me to start at that point before they turned my beautiful world into chaos. On this fresh new page beginning with the death of a spider as the cleansing rain came to wash away the pain of the past, I now decide where that little girl can go. Kind of a great way to begin this next year!

Never forget, but let go and forgive. In this way we can maintain the importance of lessons learned, yet move forward with understanding all things put in our path can teach us something. I believe in Karma, something which helps me understand, more so after this past year, none of us is owed for the difficulties of our lives. If we believe that someone owes us for the pain we suffer, we will never get past it, but be stuck in the hell we create by waiting for someone else to “fix it” or compensate us for it. If we can however, accept it was our Karma, taking responsibility for our choice to endure rather than give in to the hate and anger, this allows us to find solutions aiding our healing process. No one else can do this for us, no one else is responsible for “fixing us”. It was a small adjustment in my thinking realizing this, one which helped me understand holding the many responsible for what happened to me was correct, expecting them to compensate me for the damage done was not. The price they pay will not be determined by me, that belongs to a higher court. There was freedom for me in understanding this simple difference, the threads tying me to those responsible and the control they had over me, broken. It is a process of course, one which is different for each of us. This has been my process, one I would be wrong to assume is correct for someone else. It is through the sharing of stories, we gain insight, if we are ready to see and accept.

While there have been many times I wished for my inheritance, or compensation of some kind, I realize there is no amount of money that could have helped me get to where I am today. Of course money can ease certain burdens, but I think it would have been too easy to hide behind the walls money could have provided. I am not sure I would have made the same effort to heal that I have without the comfort money can provide. Of course one can never know how the outcome may change if in different circumstances, but accepting what we have, while striving to improve our life is an important lesson, at least it has been for me.

The video below was an interesting find for me. To listen to others talk about the importance of music and how it helps them get through life was inspiring. Placing pianos in unusual locations, allows anyone to express themselves, especially for those in a situation not affording them the opportunity otherwise, it is an amazing gift. For the man Michael, it changed his life, but not in the way you might think. It gave him purpose, and joy. If I was him, I would definitely see the piano showing up as a sign……

For another woman who collects garbage for a living, an opportunity was given to appear on “The Voice” – you will have to watch to see how that turned out. She is such a sweet, humble person, with a gift hidden, until the street piano arrived. Sometimes we just need something unexpected to jolt us out of our patterned thinking. We can then make our choice based on a new experience – would the decision be different? The unexpected has been my journey this last year, the concerted effort to change my patterned responses, thus changing my inclinations to choose a certain way, the road it put me on. The gifts of last evening, a milestone of sorts.