a mother seen. vatsalya's health clinic for commercial sex workers. ajmer, india 2009

driving down the road a couple of weeks ago, it hit me. in the way that revelations tend to come: unexpected, surprising and concluding with a perfunctory "well, duh." my thoughts were drifting in that moment, drifting through the time-line of my story. the ways that events have strung themselves together. how where i've been led to now, in an imperfectly perfect sort of way. i was thinking about mothers and birth and how, for the better part of two decades, i wrapped myself in an impenetrable focus on becoming a midwife. so much so that i spent years studying toward the goal and even earned a BSN nursing degree at the top of my class in 2004– all the while ignoring the knots in my gut and, at times, the impossibility of taking a deep breath. 

so, i'm driving down the road a couple of weeks ago, and i am suddenly taken over by the memory of where that trajectory began. where i made my mind up that "this is what i will be when i grow up."

i was seventeen years old and a freshman at UC Santa Cruz. i was sitting in the middle section of an amphitheater style classroom. the class was developmental psychology. the professor introduced a guest speaker for the day who was a local midwife. the lights dimmed and the fan on the projector whirred up to full speed. the screen lowered. 

she had me at the first image. a woman. brown skin and a long, dark braid down her back. loosely dressed in a thin, sheer, white, cotton dress that revealed the taught ripeness of her belly. she was hanging on to a trellis lodgepole, forehead to the wood, eyes closed. her feet were large and strong, solid on the deck where she stood, a most stunning mountain landscape behind her. and she was lit perfectly by a sun either coming or going, casting shadows and a soft glow that swallowed me whole.

there were, of course, more images in the series. each telling the story of this woman's birth. the shedding of the garments, the unraveling of her hair. eye contact, sweat, and hands gripping. furrowed brow, anguish, rapture, and the smoothing that comes with letting go. she was free and wild. captured on film with a knowing and an allure that left me sure and longing.

captured so well, that a seventeen year old girl was forever changed. i knew i would chase the feeling stirred in me by those images to the ends of the earth. 

twenty years later, i see where i missed the mark. i see that what was alive in me that day was not the desire to do the work that was the subject of those photos, but, rather, to be filled with the essence of the photos themselves. to witness, frame, and capture the beauty, the connection, and the faraway place. so that i, we, can feel swallowed whole by a soft glow.

i look into her eyes, this other woman that i captured in the photo above, and that seventeen year old girl is awakened once again. the full circle moment has come. i can smile, shake my head, and say "well, duh."

and i can get on with it. 

 photo of me by denise andrade.

i think it's time to rest upon the grass and close my eyes. again. 

to feel the ground beneath me and to allow it all to not make sense. to vision this next phase coming into being without drama. untangled. just easy. flowing. harmoniously. simply. providing. 

to take some of those deep belly breaths. to yearn. and want. and desire. unabashedly. 

none of us are really that wise, are we? but i do believe our hearts are.

and mine would really like a nice long moment to speak and be heard. with nothing but the wind to fill the pauses.

how about you? 

 jodhpur, india 2009

there is absolutely so much going on inside of me right now. familiar darker things that crave a voice but, at the same time, feel tired and old and like they just need some dirt kicked over them. and new things, too. colorful, intense, could-they-really-be-true kinds of things that have my heart beating strangely and the top of my head blowing off repeatedly. i am scattered and one-tracked, depending on the hour, and i can be anxious or still, depending on the minute. i am slightly insane and zen at the same time.

i've also been short on words around here. i realized today it is because i've been feeling a struggle around how to bring this space back into the present, which isn't the rich textiles and spicy chai of my time in india, nor the speeding train that led up to going. honestly, i just don't feel that interesting, dynamic, or able to adequately express anything when my current experience is so inward. the present is about slowly returning to the land of unknowns. to the routines of carpool and lunches and squeezing my life in between the hours of 9 and 3. to paying bills and shaking watering money trees. to facing limitations and surrendering to the slower pace of practice and learning.

there are exciting trips being discussed and also there is groundwork to lay for how this passionate living thing will continue to play out. and there's the niggly voice of pragmatism, too. the one that knows that it is time to consider things like value and worth and business plans. like how to open doors for some revenue and to streamline this vision i have for the doorways project–and also how to seek some help with that. you know, the whole trust-in-the-universe but make-good-choices, too, paradigm. finding a balance between being faithful and being smart. faithfully smart? clearly setting intentions and then letting go.

so, honestly, this time for me is about so much, and so little. it is life simplified and expanded. it's as much about the pot of soup on the stove as it is about the next trip to afar. it is glow-in-the dark make-up on my son's face and my daughter's blissful tellings of campfires on her middle school trip. it is asking myself how much reassurance i need before i accept that i am good enough to keep taking pictures and sharing stories (including my own). it is persimmons at the market and a house that still doesn't feel like home. it is a feeling in my chest that is warm and radiating and almost more than i can handle. it is me, raw and tender, alive and vulnerable. passionate and ten steps ahead–circling back and surrendering. 

it is everything. and nothing. 

and it's as all over the place as this post.

i know there is richness and spice here, too. 

probably more.

i look at her and all i see is purity. sweetness. understanding. she appears as refuge to me. as hope. as peace. 

it's been challenging re-integrating into my day to day. defining my roles, finding meaning  and joy in the slowness after such an adventure. i'm craving the sensory overload of india, and, at the same time, keeping mostly to myself, quiet and at home.  fall is a familiar time of introspection for me. a season that has been filled with stirrings and self-examination in years past. i am remembering. and i am also noting how this year is different. how the train of awakening continues to move forward, even in the in-between time. 

nothing else is scheduled yet, which beckons both fervor and inertia in me. it's a little uncomfortable. but i am doing my best to let it be. to stay in the cave working with the bounty that i returned with. staying open to whatever comes and trusting that, when it does, i will be conscious enough to say yes. and i am finding deep gratitude for the purity and sweetness inherent in all aspects of my life. on adventure and at home. 

all the while, i'll keep sharing. even when it's all disassembled and scattered. because it is the wellspring of our connection to one another that keeps me alive. and because i cannot imagine keeping it all for myself. 

see below the (very choppy) video i took on my last night in india, as we stumbled, yet again, upon more celebration and festivity. in india, there is always an opportunity to dance with the divine…