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early morning thinking

just woke up from a series of dreams. i dreamt i was watching diane lane in a horror movie where there was a man in the house, she could sense him and had to get out of the house. it was very scary, but didn’t end there. she got downstairs to the street and he came running out behind her and was threatening her, seemed crazy. then it got kind of ridiculous. she grabbed his arm to hold him in place for a trash truck to hit him, and it swerved. then her neighbor kanisha popped up from pruning the bushes and diane told her to cut off his arm but the pruning scissors were too worn down. he got less and less scary and more sort of laughable hi-jinx.

as i lay (lie, laid?) here, i was thinking how life is often like that. something unknown can seem so terrifying, and then when it has actually happened, or you’ve faced it, or accepted that it may never happen, the threat can become smaller and approachable, even humorous.

in another dream i was in a multilevel house overrun by puppies and children, and i picked up one adorable creature and realized it was my niece. i don’t have a niece but this was clearly a niece of mine. the puppies were showing up because I had dinner last night at the home of someone who had 18 outdoor cats, 6 indoor, and 3 dogs, all boxers, 2 puppies. the boxer puppies were amazing, especially the runt. squished square faces, slender bodies, long legs and massive monster paws which gave away their futures. (this pic is closest to what i was dealing with) i wanted to steal the puppy and bring it home. but i only wanted to play with it in puppy phase. i’m like that with kids too, preferring them to what they become (adults). i was excited to dream-preview my niece, and i have LOVED getting to know my perfect and brilliant nephew, but that hasn’t start some ticking in me for my own kid.

i have been thinking that the period of populating the planet, of that being a mission of ours, might have come full cycle. that now we may actually have enough people, and producing children doesn’t have to remain the sole defining possibility of a loving partnership. there was a time when there were barely any people on the planet, and it seemed imperative to populate, to not risk extinction with small numbers. we created religious parables and mythologies to support this need, to drive us by fear and faith to procreate, to believe any relationship not based on breeding was unholy.

now things are shifting. our numbers are not necessarily more than the planet can provide for, but so far our numbers have stumped us. we haven’t been able to get the species excited about a better distribution of resources, about participating in large scale sustainability and justice efforts. so maybe its time for a new mythology, a second coming, modern prophets in each of the major religions. we don’t trust our own eyes, we need to be told. the message: babies are cute, but we need lots of same-sex gardening couples at the moment. we need immaculate gardens. the meek and chic shall inherit the dirt.

and i promise, in that new world of faith and belief systems, to be the most amazing auntie ever to the children that are brought into the world as intentionally and sustainably as possible.

speaking of, i met two beautiful women in bermuda who are both part of a movement for home births, midwifery and challenging the assumption that birth must be a medicated, hospitalized affair. both of the women had the kind of smiles that should welcome children into the world.

i also met a very brave group of folks who are organizing against discrimination of gay people here in bermuda. their effort is called two words and a comma, and they want “sexual orientation” added to the list of who is covered by the human rights act. hopefully our training will support their efforts, while we connect them to folks organizing around gay rights in the u.s.

enough writing, looks like the sun is out!