tamarjacobson

While I was walking home down the hill today I noticed that there was a smile on my face. Not a great big one. Just a small, bemused kind of grin. The day was humid and cloudy interspersed with pelting rain showers. It felt as if I have been raging, hurting and running for years. I wondered what it has all been about. It seems like it was a dream, far away, in some distant past, happening to someone other than me.

All that conditioning to feel undeserving, guilty and heavy with shame seems to have dissipated into the air, scattered to the winds – leaving in its wake, lightness, exhilaration, peace.

And a very clear, deep sense that what will be … will be.

Is this heaven?

From left to right: Danny, Tamarika, Sophia, Neilochka (pronunciation is with the stress on the first syllable: NEIL ochka)

For an excellent account of the event, check out Citizen of the Month.

For me?

I could have danced all night …

… and now, all I have to show for it are shining, painted toe-nails … and the memories … ah, the memories …

A year ago at Mining Nuggets: The company of friends (Update)

Waking up in California the air is different. We saw pelicans yesterday – flocks of them, flying low over the Bay. Glorious sunshine and cool breezes. All the family together walking by the water. It was magical.

My book is formulating in my mind and accompanies me as I create new memories with newly found niece and nephew. I will never let them be lost to us again. Philosophical talks with a seventeen year old about what it means to be an adult. I say something about becoming an adult after learning that life is really messy. He replies instantly, quietly, firmly: "I think I know what messy is – it’s just a matter of cleaning it all up." I sense the pain he has already endured and is just seventeen. I will never allow them to be lost to us again. I write down what he says on a slip of paper, the old boarding pass to yesterday’s plane flight. This must go in my blog, I tell him. He smiles from ear to ear and tells his sister, "What I said is going to be up on her website." My book is formulating. More and more confirmation that there is nothing more important than relationships. Math, reading, all that great stuff is great but meaningless if relationships leave us hollow, in pain, searching for our hearts and souls.

Relationships have always been my greatest challenge. The vulnerability to expose who I am, what I think and feel in fear of losing everyone over and over again because I am so unbearable, such trouble … the longing, aching for acceptance and acknowledgment … on and on.

And on the other hand, relationships have saved my life. Validating, supporting, consoling, understanding, accepting, unconditional loving kinds of relationships, hands extended to me from strangers, one or two family members … on and on. Learning when to let go or how to hold still. Challenging and life saving, back and forth like a lullaby, swelling and ebbing like the tide … on and on and forever.

There are other things on my mind related to relationships, accompanying me on this trip out West. My son has decided to return home to Israel. He goes back as a grown man, 34 years old. I feel as if the bow of life is being pulled and he springs forth like from one of Gibran‘s arrows. Even as he chooses to move so far away from me physically, my only real family here in the States, and even as my heart cries out with missing him already, I let go and hold still all at the same time. Ache and rejoice all at the same time for oh so many reasons … back and forth like a lullaby, swelling and ebbing like the tide … on and on and forever.

Kahlil Gibran‘s poem about Children has meaning for me now as I am challenged with this new situation. The poem rises up to greet me, cradle and strengthen me this early morning in San Francisco. It returns to me after 35 years, as I recall reading it while living in Manchester pregnant with my son.

Children

And a woman who held a babe against her bosom said, "Speak to us of Children."

And he said:

Your children are not your children.

They are the sons and daughters of Life’s longing for itself.

They come through you but not from you,

And though they are with you, yet they belong not to you.

You may give them your love but not your thoughts.

For they have their own thoughts.

You may house their bodies but not their souls,

For their souls dwell in the house of tomorrow, which you cannot visit, not even in your dreams.

You may strive to be like them, but seek not to make them like you.

For life goes not backward nor tarries with yesterday.

You are the bows from which your children as living arrows are sent forth.

The archer sees the mark upon the path of the infinite, and He bends you with His might that His arrows may go swift and far.

Let your bending in the archer’s hand be for gladness;

For even as he loves the arrow that flies, so He loves also the bow that is stable.

A year ago at Mining Nuggets: May flights of angels sing you to your rest

Quote of the day:

To be nobody but yourself in a world which is doing its best, night and day, to make you everybody else means to fight the hardest battle which any human being can fight and never stop fighting. e. e. cummings

It is time to pack the bags and travel again. Tomorrow we head out to California to see the gang plus two. Just for a few days this time.

And in between I will fly over to LA, just for one day, to see Danny after a long, long time, and meet Neil for the first time.

Well, Neil owes me a date, actually but with the brief time allotted and chaperoned by Danny and Sophia, I wonder just what kind of a date this will be.

Come to think of it, I have not seen Danny since he suggested I start blogging two and a half years ago. So, yes. This can definitely be called a Bloggers’ Meeting in the making.

When I return, I plan to bury my head and heart into writing … remind me of this plan, will you? Especially when I stray to playing on Facebook and Twitter, watching movies, blogging, seeing friends, walking in the Wissahickon …

… ain’t life grand?

A year ago at Mining Nuggets: There’s a post in me somewhere …

Staring at the screen and wondering what to say. Time passes. Half an hour perhaps? Reaching into the brain searching for words to express. Coming up blank. Walking around a little, taking yet another cup of coffee, stopping to stare at the tall oak tree, returning to the chair, desk, computer screen once again. Deciding to write about the writing. Holding still while anxiety rises. Waiting for the brain to get those fingers tap, tap tapping at the keys. Deep breath. Anxiety subsiding. The brain never sleeps. That is true. Dreaming, thinking, feeling, experiencing, watching, observing, ruminating. Adding a Facebook application: Catbook. Ada Mae will accompany me through this exercise. And Nick Drake. Piling laundry into the machine. Giving it up. Needing to juggle up the brain, turn the blood around. Climbing onto the treadmill.

I’ll try again later.

A year ago at Mining Nuggets: A day to remember

I was determined to walk 100 miles across England. So determined that I stood outside the Passport Agency at five in the morning. So determined that, for six months, I worked out my body with walking, jogging and weights so that I might withstand and have the stamina for hours and hours of walking in the rain and mud, up and down dale. So determined that I put everything else aside, allowed the world to stand still outside the walking space, and focused only on that.

I was determined in a way that let me know it was more than just the walk. It actually did not have to do with whether I could make it it or not. It had to do with something deeply emotional inside me. A culmination of self-alteration and reflection work these past four or five years or so.

  Yes, indeed. I was going to say goodbye.

All the way there, during the long days of walking, and in the nights as I fell into a deep, fitful, dream-filled sleep, I knew I was preparing to say goodbye.

These past few days back home in Philadelphia, walking and jogging on my treadmill, doing my daily house chores, writing, preparing for work, visiting friends, or going to movies, I sense a lightness of being, that has nothing to do with the physical 5 pounds I lost during the walk. Nor is it connected to not having the daypack on my back this past week.

It has to do with shedding baggage.

Bidding farewell to the past. I left behind, up in the hills by Hadrian’s Wall, pain and anger that I held onto for so long. Just as, one day during the walk, a necklace of sentimental value to me, was lost in the hail storm – left behind in the little copse up there near the sky at the highest point of Hadrian’s Wall – so too did I leave my past pain behind – in the wind, hail, and rain.

Ancient demons and nemeses shrunk down to a manageable size, and I realize now through the lightness: I no longer fear them. Their actions or in-sensitivities have no relevance for me any more. All of them have as vulnerable, complicated, complex, mysterious beings as me. Mostly they haven’t the emotional space or energy to know what they are or are not doing. Their descriptions, labels, stories about me have nothing to do with who I am. I stopped trying to dispel their image of me or prove my worthiness.

On the train from Carlisle to London, I noted in my journal:

I am no longer connected. It is not that I need to disconnect. I am, already, dis-connected. Free. Beyond all that. It has taken place. I just don’t care any more. The exclusion of me has been so complete that I am now, by choice, dis-connected. No need for major decisions or acts of re-action. It is done. I have, in fact, moved on. No need for big decisions, dramatic actions. It is done … I came to say goodbye – but that, too, was done. In March. Between January and March. Six months after fifty seven and a half years of learning how I came to be who I am. Gathering strength, validation, knowledge, support along the way, growing and maturing, analyzing, redefining, self altering. A struggle, at times excruciatingly painful – just like the walk – full of moments of tremendous fear. But, at the end – a great and uplifting experience. One full of a feeling of achievement. Emancipation. Individuation. Discrimination between I and thou. My brain and heart is my own. Dis-connected. De-(a)ttaching. De-(a)ttached. It is done.

"And in the end, so much of it doesn’t even matter," says the Meryl Streep character in Evening.

All week, for some reason, I have been thinking of the poem by:

e.e. cummings, i carry your heart with me

i carry your heart with me(i carry it in
my heart)i am never without it(anywhere
i go you go,my dear; and whatever is done
by only me is your doing,my darling)
i fear
no fate(for you are my fate,my sweet)i want
no world(for beautiful you are my world,my true)
and it’s you are whatever a moon has always meant
and whatever a sun will always sing is you

here is the deepest secret nobody knows
(here is the root of the root and the bud of the bud
and the sky of the sky of a tree called life;which grows
higher than the soul can hope or mind can hide)
and this is the wonder that’s keeping the stars apart

i carry your heart(i carry it in my heart)

A year ago at Mining Nuggets: Behind bars

As I bid my blogger friends farewell on the first night that I arrived in London before the walk, I was hoping they would write about our meeting while I was away up in Northern England. It was difficult for me not to be able to blog about it immediately afterwards. So many thoughts and feelings were running through my brain, and I was forced to put them aside to focus on traveling through Kings Cross Station up to Newcastle, meeting and greeting the walkers, including my sister whom I had not seen for a couple of years. Naturally, I wrote about some of my impressions and emotions in my journal, but, still, I wanted to blog about it. And so, I was hoping that the other bloggers would describe their impressions and feelings so that the moments would not be lost as time moved on as it does in the blogging world like a snap of one’s typing fingers.

Just before I fell dead asleep on June 23, the first night in London, I wrote a few lines in my journal:

Delightful simple Penn Club – stoic, but ample room – coffee and tea-maker – Oh the British tea is so good! Why do I drink tea in America?

Jean picked me up in the afternoon – just like her picture on the blog. We have a coffee in Russell Square garden cafe, sun shining with clouds threatening rain – so beautiful.

And then a bus ride to meet Natalie … her home full of her wonderful art! Tea and cookies, wine and humus …

[Natalie’s front door]

Andy arrives …

… and then we talk – really talk – about blogging – our secret language. A few photos and then down to the pub.

And then the photos [really] begin – flashes and flashes.

I am laughing with all my heart

– feel as if I am with a kind of family all my own – become so sad to leave them. I want to be near them always – around the corner, meeting for coffee every now and then – like people I’ve known even before all my life.

Jean takes me back to The Penn Club, bus ride and then walks me around and around. I think she might have lost the way, gently, sweetly under her umbrella as the rain starts to fall. We come up to my little room and, oh my goodness, what a surprise – she has my book! Has brought it for me to sign! I am ecstatic, honored, touched, grateful, humbled.

[All the photographs posted here were taken by Jean, Andy and Natalie]

Now, as I sit at home, in my little study in Chestnut Hill, rain falling gently on the lush green woods behind my window, cardinals pipping and Ada chirping back at them, I think back to more than a week ago, about our bloggers’ meeting.

Jean wrote in her post the next day:

So here we are in a pub dining-room in North London, close to Natalie’s welcoming, art-filled house where we gathered earlier, with too much to say, and nothing quite adequate. "You remember what you wrote 6 months ago about that? It made me cry and I thought about it for weeks." would be kind-of embarrassing. And so would staring longer than is quite polite at a smile that is wider and wryer than in their photographs …

Andy wrote in his blog a few days later:

We met as bloggers; we departed as friends … it’s been reported on any number of occasions how it is that, having first met on the pages of a blog where secrets may be shared which might never be expressed in everyday conversation, relationships get a kick-start. Much of that getting-to-know-you preamble can be dispensed with; it’s already happened. Not only the simple sharing of facts and opinions; when you lay open aspects of your heart and soul and find them accepted, a mutual trust can develop; a deep respect and caring which is all too rare in the everyday world of hurried superficial relationships …

There is no doubt in my mind that the type of blogs we have in common share our feelings and personal thoughts. Therefore, a level of intimacy was already present from the moment we entered each other’s physical space. What was also present, perhaps, was a curiosity about the reality versus the virtual other and, of course, what we all sound like. I love that I can hear their voices in my mind as I read their words now. For me, there was not one iota, not one instance of disappointment in any expectations I might have had, if I had any at all.

Just a longing to spend more time with each, in person, to bear witness to their inner and outer lives, as well as sharing mine with them. To be able to look into their eyes, hear their voice, and touch each other every now and then. For our reality hugs were as warm and friendly as any of the virtual hugs we might have sent out to one another through our words or symbols over the years: {{{}}}.

Indeed, these past two and a half years of blogging, have buoyed me up and supported my introspection, validated my life experiences, and have encouraged my growth and development as a writer.

And all thanks to people like Natalie, Andy and Jean – like-minded, like-souled.

    [click on pictures to enlarge]

Here we are – Walkers, ages 43-70: (right to left) Karen, Fiona, Elise, Reina, Tamar, Beth

We came to walk the Wall:

Hadrian’s Wall:

We started out at Newcastle, at the East coast, gathering a sharp stone from the banks of the river to the sea. We started with four of us and were joined by two more on the fifth day:

Six days and at least 84 miles later, arrived at Bowness on Solway, on the West Coast where we cast the stone we had gathered in Newcastle, into the waters of the Solway Firth (my sister and her friends have developed this ritual over the years, through six different walks. They throw the stone high over their shoulders, with their backs to the sea):

There was much to see along the way, apart from the Wall that is. Green slopes and rocky climbs. Ancient trees and wild flowers as far as the eye could see. When Karen sends me the photographs she took …

… I should imagine there will be fields of poppies to show. Knowing how much I love wildflowers, she directed my attention away from blistering feet and exhausted muscles to the fields of red and orange poppies along the way. I would stop for a moment, lean on my walking stick that Tom had given me for my birthday this year (with a compass on the top of its handle to guide my way), and gasping for breath look out at the poppies, thankful for the sight, getting my mind away from physical pain. The rain poured, dripped, showered and dribbled, day in and day out, falling down our backs, dripping into our eyes, lashing our cheeks, and filling shoes with pools that soothed and buoyed my constantly forming blisters with cool, soothing waters. And on and on we walked. For hours. Sometimes chatting and laughing, telling our life stories and sharing anecdotes or jokes. At times we fell silent, contemplative or just silent, meditative, minds at rest following the fields, the hills, or sky. Once, at the end of a long day, we broke into a brisk run, and jogged into the village as evening fell. I could not believe what was happening, as just minutes before that I had been hobbling along gingerly, taking care with each step, aching and exhausted. One afternoon during the longest walk of all, I even broke into dramatic singing, which helped spur me onwards and onwards, keeping up with these strong, forceful, dynamic and unyielding women. When I would joke about finding the nearest bus, calling for a taxi, or even calling out and up to an overflying helicopter to come and save me, my sister-walkers would become serious and determined, refusing me that option, and telling me glorious tales about feelings of achievement and satisfaction with completing the walk at all costs. One day, walking through a small copse, the skies blackened, lightening flashed and thunder roared and pellets of hail began to rage down on us as we huddled together against a wall of a nearby farm. We were way up coming upon the highest point of the wall, and the weather seemed as close to the sky as it could ever have been. Scrambling down rocky inclines and walking over a tall bridge were challenges for me with my ancient fear of heights. My sister grabbed my hand and talked me through some of these moments with a firm, gentle voice that calmed and strengthened me. I guess I will always be her little sister. I was grateful to overcome those hurdles. When I would become excited about an easy patch as we walked briskly down a road, my sister would caution me softly,

Remember. What goes down must come up …

And, indeed, up we would go, as sheer and steep as an incline could be, straining the calf and thigh muscles in ways I would never have dreamed possible.  Each time I arrived at the top I would whisper to myself words of encouragement and amazement that I had made it. Each time was as exhilarating and exciting as the first. In fact, it seemed like a miracle that I made it at all!

Walking, nay sinking in, the mud, sometimes mingled with huge, watery, cow patties, was quite the challenging experience. Sometimes I thought I might have to leave my shoes behind, but presto, out my foot accompanied by walking shoe, would pop, squelching and sucking through the thick brown substance into the air, only to fall way down into the next boggy mess once again until we found our way to a firm piece of ground or grass.

But at the end of each day, a charming Bed and Breakfast would greet us with floral drapes and hot cups of tea, warm showers and comfortable beds. Following a cheery evening meal at a pub nearby, and perhaps a game of "speed scrabble," I would flop into bed exhausted, aching into muscles and bones and fall into a deep sleep, only to rise fresh and clear, ready to start again. Early in the morning, I would stretch into yoga postures, ironing out the creases and wrinkles of yesterday’s pain, do my breathing exercises and over and over again would miraculously discover renewed strength each and every day to do it all again. And each time I would marvel at the resiliency of the human body.

One day, I wrote in my journal comparing my psychological development and maturation with the walk:

… after fifty seven and a half years of learning how I came to be who I am. Gathering strength, knowledge, validation, support along the way, growing and maturing, analyzing, redefining, self-altering. A struggle at times, excruciatingly painful – just like the walk – full of moments of tremendous fear. But, at the end – a great and uplifting experience. One full of a feeling of achievement. Emancipation. Individuation. Discrimination between I and thou …

Early this morning I described my trip briefly in an e-mail to Joe-from-Philly:

The security at Gatwick was fine – strong but not too intrusive. I arrived there with plenty of time to spare so was not affected by the terrorist stuff. What a week to be in Britain though – new Prime Minister, flooding (it rained every day but one while I was there!), and then terrorist attacks! I spent the whole time pretty much oblivious to it all though – just walking and walking through fields and slopes of sheep, cows and mud! However, Hadrian’s Wall was impressive and the most important thing for me always is human connection and there was plenty of that with all the women walking together – ages ranged from 43-70!

[near Carlisle – taking a rest]

Quote of the day:

So, whatever you want to do, just do it….Making a damn fool of yourself is absolutely essential. Gloria Steinem

[at the end of the walk – 84 miles – Bowness on Solway]

Yes, you’ve guessed. I am home. 90-100 miles of walking later. Lots to tell and reorganize. Hang in there. I must catch my breath, clear up the last remaining blister and clean the bathrooms. And then … I will have tales to tell.

Did you miss me?

P.S. Check in at Jean and Andy for their reports of our Bloggers’ meeting.

… On a Jet Plane …

Before I leave, I heard fom Joe early this morning. He sent me this article from the Philadelphia Inquirer. He said: "We acted at the right time, because now the word is out about how early you have to get there … A bullet has been dodged, and it is just now sinking in how fortunate we are to have our passports." It says in the article: … it practically requires a miracle …

… I guess my trip has turned into a miracle!

I will be back in about ten days. I will surely not have access to Internet during the hike, but who knows what may happen before or after.

With regards to our bloggers’ meeting on Saturday perhaps Jean, Natalie, Andy or Ernesto will write something to keep you posted. Check them out during the week!

If I do find a computer somewhere along the way, I’ll drop a line. Otherwise, I hope you will stop by when I return.

I will miss you.

But rest assured, I take all of you with me, for as adventures rise up to greet me, I will be thinking about how to describe them to you later.

I received this quote in my e-mail today and, after sharing it with you, have decided to take it with me on my trip:

Your life is the one place you have to spend yourself fully – wild, generous, drastic – in an unrationed profligacy of self.  Robin Morgan

Bye bye!