Izzy’s adventure

Yesterday evening I sat out on the new bench overlooking the pond. The water still as glass, the dun cattails on the far edge a rough tangle hedging eternity from eternity; the horizon falling into dusk and the pond lip a brief earthly purchase tipped towards deep space and dark matter, right there, just beyond the skim of atmosphere softening the edge of our planet. 

My cat Izzy made her way over slowly. She started on the back deck, darting to the safety of the lilac, and then sat, sounding the distance with intermittent meows, nose quivering in the flush of smells released with the setting sun. 

I encouraged her and soon she sprinted over the green grass, closing the distance in a ripple of fat and grace, and leapt into my lap, body alive with the edge of her comfort zone.  

We sat together, or more accurately I sat and she curled around and around, bumping her head into my palm and arching her back as I pet her, ears perked to the first call of the peepers and the quick beat of a pair of ducks looking for a night's rest.

Eventually she sat, but just barely;  the evening was alive with a stream of air flowing down from the swamp behind us, over the dirt road and settling around the pond, drawing intoxicating smells of spring and long known riches from the muck.

Izzy and I, our very bones smelled the night, and who can sit still for long with that much to take in? Soon she jumped up and ran down the bank to the edge of the water and drank.

The bench stands in the same spot I first sat when I looked at the property. It was late December of '23 and I'd gotten Saul on the bus and then headed over in the old red Yaris, 205k miles and counting, long term life partner. I was dressed in carhart bibs, layers of cashmere, and my Camp 7 jacket. I'd made up a hot water bottle and brought a thermos of coffee. 

I wanted to sit and listen to the land. I wanted to tuck into the pond bank in the light of the rising sun and listen to the spirit of the place. Places and things speak to us, but in their own time. 

I had not alerted anyone I was coming, however the property was unoccupied, and no more than 5 cars go by each day; I decided it was ok this one time to come and sit without permission.

I cozied up next to a spruce with a sheepskin rug beneath me, hot water bottle nestled in my lap, and opened the thermos of coffee. The sun had just crested the hillside beyond, grazing sparks of fire out of the frozen grass and ice crystals growing on the edge of the water. 

I could see forever, and up close so much sweetness.  Chickadees and nuthatches swooped back and forth to the feeder behind the house; the owners must have cared about keeping it stocked with suet. There was an intimacy here, an old-fashioned embodiment in the house and land. For all the dark-eyed juncos and I knew we were watching the sunrise in 1940.

I don't remember when it happened, but all of a sudden, by some ripening quality of the land I remembered, without one bit of conjuring, the full exact feeling of self- knowing and self- worth I had as a little girl. I remembered who I was before all of the trials and hardships of life.

I felt it in my body. Somehow the land knew me as I really am, it held the place I have forgotten all these years, and was able to show me.  

I knew right then that I could heal here, that this land knew me better than I knew myself. I wanted to be here and let the land remind me over and over who I really am, and I knew I was going to live here, settled up high on a ridge above the fray and web of social connections and politics. Up here in Alsan's home, towering spirit swans sailing off into the immensity of night above the hills, regal and strong in the eye and beak.

Years ago an aquaintance told me about a period of depression she went through over the winter. She said while she went through it her husband held her heart for her when she couldn't. I remember the way she said it and the way she cupped her hands to demonstrate how he held her. It spoke to me; she made me aware of a place inside that had dried up slowly over the years. Sometimes we need to be held when we can't hold ourselves, and sometimes we don't know that dried up place is there until someone touches it with a word or gesture.
 

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