4:30 p.m. - 5:45 p.m.

Breathe in the push/pull of contractions.  Step into the spiral of the new energies of birth and rebirth.  Claim your vibrations of joy and happiness.

No reservation required.  Donation: $25 at the door

Note: The meditation is guided and includes a transmission of energy.  Given that it is Spirit directed, all things are possible.

Sunday: 11:15 a.m.-5:00 p.m.  Pre-registration is required.

$125. Lunch is included.

In an era where time takes quantum leaps, months collide into one another, and your “to do” list dates back to 1999, gift yourself a day to revitalize, replenish, and re-strategize.

All those 1’s tell us it’s a day of new beginnings. Let’s explore the energies of numbers; let’s sink into color, resonance, shape and time-space. Let’s pull the plug on stuckness and stagnation. Let’s learn the lessons that joy can teach.

So, come and kick start the new year with some strategies, in-depth swimming as well as the good medicine of laughter. Rebirth your wildness; find your daring and boldness. Reclaim your core. 

DRESS comfortably, bring your journal, and if you like, a small pillow and blanket for extra comfort.

PRE-REGISTRATION is required by December 28, 2009.

PAYMENT of $125:

• PayPal on this site
• check payable to Adele R. McDowell, Ph.D, P.O. Box 385, Riverside, CT 06878

DIRECTIONS are available on convent’s website.  Do note that where the directions read “Right at first light onto Old Farm Road,” you will most likely not see the sign for Old Farm Road, but you will see the sign for Locust Hill.  Do not take the sharp right onto Locust Hill, but a soft jog towards the right, in front of the school, which is Old Farm Road.  Everything else is clearly marked and easy to find.  Parking is to the left of the main building.

On Sundays, there is a mass (9-10 a.m.) at the Convent, followed by a coffee hour (10-11 a.m.) which can make parking problematic.  You will do well to arrive a bit after 11 a.m. to save yourself the hassle of jostling for a parking space.

Questions and concerns: channeledgrace@aol.com or armcdowell@aol.com

7:30 p.m. - 8:45 p.m.

Take a moment to enter stillness, and travel deep into the void.  Find the nothingness that creates form; embrace the darkness that births the light.

No reservation required.  Donation: $25 at the door

Note: The meditation is guided and includes a transmission of energy.  Given that it is Spirit directed, all things are possible.

 10:00 a.m. - 1:00 p.m.

Soul contracts  ~  Reincarnation  ~  Past lives  ~  Past loves 

Life, death, and rebirth: this is the wheel of karma.  And what is the one constant as the wheel spins round and round?  The soul, of course.

Come join us for a Past Lives Workshop:

• Scan the self, and call forth the soul
• Travel the time-space continuum
• Delve into the depths of memories and meanings
• Dig into days of yore, and extract the wisdom for today
• Learn about current research
• Take several rides on the karmic wheel

This workshop is highly experiential.  No experience is required; simply come with an openness to explore and a willingness to listen to your soul.

Dress comfortably, bring your journal, and, if you so desire, a covering for your eyes, a small pillow and blanket for your comfort.

Registration required:  Contact Reverend Simeon at Albertson Memorial Church or email Adele at armcdowell@aol.com

Cost: $65 donation at the door

Remember, there was Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance, followed by similar books on finding the Zen zone in golf, archery, and happiness. Mindfulness has been used in stress reduction and paired with many current forms of psychology. There is mindful breathing and mindful eating.

It stands to reason that mindfulness would cozy up to sex - and it has.

At the OneTaste Urban Retreat Center, orgasm meets meditation, and slow sex becomes a series of classes. Here, mindfulness, consciousness, yoga, intimacy, education, discussion, and sex find each other through an assortment of offerings.

OneTaste began in San Francisco, where it continues to be wildly successful. Now, OneTaste, featured in The New York Times, has opened a space in New York City. If you live elsewhere, OneTaste offers distance learning options through teleconferences, online videos, and audio pod casts.

OneTaste offers classes, events, personal coaching, and gender-specific discussion groups. There is, also, an online community where (for $20 per month) you have access to blogs, articles, videos, podcasts, online “Intimate Life” course, and weekly emails on subjects such as mindfulness and sexuality. Their programs are open to adults 18 years and older.

OneTaste grabbed the media’s attention with its threefold, holistic (read: mind-body-spirit) practice that is offered daily. This practice, which is their version of “OM’ing,” includes three 15-minute segments of movement (i.e. yoga), sitting meditation, and orgasmic meditation. The orgasmic meditation is a structured, mindfulness practice where, when focused on women, the men put on gloves, and the women remove their pants for specific, measured exercise and focus.

“With openness and curiosity, your ability to feel is refined through the practice of Orgasmic Meditation. When you actually pay attention, a deep buzz may reveal itself which otherwise would have gone unnoticed. Sensations that were once dull and fuzzy become crisp and vivid, pulsing and alive.

The simple beauty of slow sex is that one doesn’t need to go to the extremes of heedlessness or renunciation to experience this vital part of ourselves. You can understand it by slowly and deliberately peeling away the layers of distraction and uncertainty and coming into this amazing energetic core.”

The founder, Nicole Daedone said, in an ABC’s Nightline interview: “This is just a way of saying, you know what, every single day… I’m going to take time out for myself and my partner and we are going to take that time and make that the foundation of our lives, this connection … And you get to feel the world around you in this unadulterated way, just raw sensations of life.”{

She furthered allowed on her website (www.onetaste.us), “Through mindful sexuality, a sense of self, and a deep feeling of connection with others, our lives are grounded in meaning, fullness and happiness.”

Intimacy, which requires a mindful, present self as well as a sense of trust, is the basis of strong, healthy relationships, and it is a huge theme in OneTaste’s work.

The most interesting version of yourself is the “you.” Think about it.

What if, when you are relating with someone, you just stay in the moment? You avoid the narrative in your head and the personality that you’ve always used with others, and just honestly drop into yourself and let the other person see you there?

Courageously uncovered, giving them permission to do the same, you may find a moment of connection and intimacy that is more intense and fulfilling than any you could have concocted. With nothing extra shielding you from the real experience, you just might engender more intimacy in your life.

OneTaste is not a prurient practice; it is a way to make peace with your intimate self. Their concept is bold, daring, and innovative. Expressing your authenticity, sensuality, and sexuality in an open-hearted, conscious manner is a healing endeavor.

There is a fine line between sexuality and spirituality; OneTaste offers a bold and mindful point of convergence.

Has your relentless job hunting evolved into Groundhog Day revisited? Has chronic CNN and MSNBC watching given you PTSD? Is your life an episode of Survivor? Have you been known, from time to time, to take refuge on the floor of your closet?

You might wonder if the world is coming to an end.  Was, in fact, Chicken Little right, and the sky is falling. Or are we about to live Cormac McCarthy’s version of The Road?

It’s enough to give a grown person the willies. Many things that once seemed bedrock-solid are crumbling. The world is changing; it’s all very fast and furious. Terra firma is shifting, at best, and a bad B movie, at worst. Nothing seems enduring; everything feels fragile. Chaos has found its voice. It is, without question, a very scary time.

There are so many variables and so much reactivity; it is hard to find your footing. Let’s talk a few coping strategies so you can ride this historical bucking bronco and not find yourself splayed in a heap in the dust.

1.  Perspective, i.e., time to don the lenses with the big viewfinder.

Human beings have a remarkable capacity for resilience. There is a reason one of us created the maxim that “necessity is the mother of invention.” We have survived and endured; there are millennia of history before us. We have created kick-ass lemonade with lemons. And it is time to do that again.

This is particularly American. We are the land of can-do, the place of rebirth. We love the underdog doing what needs to be done and coming back on top. There was a reason the return of former down-and-out actor, Mickey Rourke, in the movie, The Wrestler, resonated with so many. We all like a come-back story.

It’s like the loose thread at the hem of your coat. You notice it; you might even try to yank off the dangly bit, but it is not a priority, and, often, it gets ignored. When the hem has fallen, and you are looking very rag-tag; it becomes a priority, and you begin to make the repair and mend your coat.

It’s the same thing here in this great United of States. We have ignored the falling hem (read: hungry children, homelessness, inadequate health care, broken schools, decaying cities, housing, energy crisis, depleted environment et al) and, now, we are looking fairly wrecked and disheveled. We are ready for repair, serious repair.

I see this whole bucking-bronco-ride as a course correction that exhumes core values. I see in working together for the betterment of all, we become stronger than ever.

To change metaphor in midstream, like a snake swallowing a rat, more than likely, there will be a few more deep contractions to get our attention, to cease the bifurcated posturing and allow us to come together, our great United of States to solve our problems and be better for it.

In other words, it is time for perspective and the long view. It is time to keep the faith in our abilities to mend and heal. Encoded in our can-do USA citizenship is the gumption, grit and vision that allows us to ride, ride, ride that bucking bronco and tip our hats to history and know that we can create a brave new world.

2.  Discharge excess energy.

Do not simmer, sit, stew, obsess, ruminate, nit-pick, worry, fret, agonize or perseverate. In those internal twists and turns, you create a head full of excess energy, as well as a body contracted and knotted with tension.

In other words, for the moment, you’re a mess. Your sleep is disturbed; your eating is off or very on. Your temper is short; your fear is long. You are unraveling and feel like you might snap at any given moment. You are on sensory overload - too much bad news, too many demands and too limited resources, too much to juggle, too much shoulder.

A practical approach is called for here. May I suggest you discharge this excess energy? It is serving no real purpose save to make you tight, taut, tense and cranky.

There are two ways to discharge excess energy: the physical and the expressive. The physical, as you could well guess, includes any kind of movement, exercise, walking, dancing, sex and the like. The expressive, as the name suggests, is about releasing via expression, be it a heart-to-heart talk, writing, singing and any another creative endeavor that funnels the energy out of your system.

Like an overcharged battery, once your excess energy has been drained, you will become more effective. And given all you have to do, that would be a good thing.

3.  Breathe

It sounds so basic. You do it every day - without thinking. However, a regular practice of a dozen deep breaths, a few times a day, can re-ground you in you, help you reconnect with your physical self and decrease stress. It’s simple; it’s a no-brainer and so easy to do. You oxygenate your body; you re-inhabit yourself, and you become more clear-headed, less frazzled and able to deal a bit better.

It can’t hurt, and it works.

4.  Follow Gandhi’s advice: “Be the change you want to see.”

If you accept that everything is energy, wouldn’t it follow that every one of your actions is a kind of energetic input that impacts not only your existence, but that of the world as well. Every action makes a difference. Quantum physics has proved this.

Therefore, consider being your Highest Self and act with integrity; treat every one like your brother/sister, work for peaceful and respectful resolutions, and offer a hand to help those in need. In doing same, you become a powerful change agent that helps create the shift towards a more responsible, conscious, interconnected and caring world.

Dear reader, may your ride be easy in the coming days.

Today, I am not so young, but I remain hopeful for what I call everyday peace. I do not flash the peace sign, nor do I use the current generation’s lingo of “peace out.” Instead, I endeavor to live my daily life from a peaceful place, which, let me tell you, is easier said than done.  This means, I can no longer clobber myself unrelentingly for my personal screw-ups. Now, I must take a deep breath, try to open with compassion, and learn from my bloody stupidity, which, truth be told, is often my whining, less-than-mature ego that has decided to come out for a spin and scream, “What about me?” and make a huge, messy ruckus.

I am working hard to avoid war on every front. I want to defuse — note: I did not say avoid or deny; I said defuse as in wanting to extricate the red wire out of the ticking bomb — conflict, be it inner and outer.

This does not mean that I am meek and mild and without strong opinion. I am none of those things; in fact, my temperament often runs hot and fiery. My red face and flashing, angry-Snoopy eyebrows have been known to signal storm clouds.

What this does mean is that I consciously inhale - ahhh…in with the good air — versus exhale with a barrage of steaming vitriol. I do not verbally, mentally or energetically pummel you with my ire, as much as I might want to; nor do I instantaneously decide that you are a bold-faced idiot. I work hard not to polarize the situation and make you the boneheaded, unseeing, completely out-of-your-cotton-pickin’-mind wrong one as I shine in dazzling superiority as the one who knows best.

In younger days, my sniveling self got pumped on those linear leaps of black and white, good or bad, right or wrong.  It was satisfyingly smug to stomp and scream, confer and confirm with my compatriots that I was right and wonder what-in-God’s-name-was-your-problem. You became my nemesis, the enemy, the object of my righteousness.

Delicious, it was — until life wore away the patina of certainty and control, until I experienced firsthand betrayal and injustice, until I understood there are more that two sides. My eyes were opened, and the linear model no longer worked.

Of course, conflict is inevitable. There is no running or hiding. Alas, conflict exists everywhere. But does that mean enemies are also inevitable?

Logic syllogisms would probably suggest same, but, hey, this is a new world, a new day. I think we can work with a new model. I think many of us want to work in a different way, one by one, person by person.

My solution: everyday peace. By that I mean, I make an effort, you make an effort to create peace, no matter the size, no more the weight, every day, in response to all that the world presents to us. Small, daily steps that build person by person, family by family, neighborhood by neighborhood to a world that chooses to operate from higher consciousness. Really, what do we have to lose with everyday peace?

Gandhi told us to be the change we want to see. I suggest we be the peace we want to see.

This is not wimpy work. It takes strength of will to stop reacting out of ego. It is stretching to learn to see the bigger picture. It requires creativity to find out-of-the-box solutions. It takes compassion to walk in another’s shoes. It takes wisdom to find the common ground.

Without peace, there is much more — more death, more darkness, more destruction, more fear, more grief, more division, more derision, more tears, more chaos, more trauma, more terror, more wounds, more broken hearts, more broken families, more broken countries. Without peace, we are constantly in pain, at war and at odds. We are hemorrhaging life force.

Peace is the root of all healing, be it healing of self, family or globe. Why not make peace with ourselves, with our families, with our neighbors? Consider the practice of everyday peace in your life.

As a parting gift, I leave you with one of my latest finds, a new poem to add to my favorite’s list entitled “Pray for Peace.” It’s an excellent reminder that everything can be done in the name of precious, healing and life-affirming peace.

Peace be with you, dear reader.

Pray for Peace

by Ellen Bass

Pray to whomever you kneel down to:
Jesus nailed to his wooden or marble or plastic cross,
his suffering face bent to kiss you,
Buddha still under the Bo tree in scorching heat,
Adonai, Allah. Raise your arms to Mary
that she may lay her palm on our brows,
to Shekinah, Queen of Heaven and Earth,
to Inanna in her stripped descent.Hawk or Wolf, or the Great Whale, Record Keeper
of time before, time now, time ahead, pray. Bow down
to terriers and shepherds and Siamese cats.
Fields of artichokes and elegant strawberries.

Pray to the bus driver who takes you to work,
pray on the bus, pray for everyone riding that bus
and for everyone riding buses all over the world.
If you haven’t been on a bus in a long time,
climb the few steps, drop some silver, and pray.

Waiting in line for the movies, for the atm,
for your latte and croissant, offer your plea.
Make your eating and drinking a supplication.
Make your slicing of carrots a holy act,
each translucent layer of the onion, a deeper prayer.

Make the brushing of your hair
a prayer, every strand its own voice
singing in the choir on your head.
As you wash your face, the water slipping
through your fingers, a prayer: water,
softest thing on earth, gentleness
that wears away rock.

Making love, of course, is already a prayer.
Skin and open mouths worshiping that skin,
the fragile case we are poured into,
each caress a season of peace.

If you’re hungry, pray. If you’re tired.
Pray to Gandhi and Dorothy Day.
Shakespeare. Sappho. Sojourner Truth.
Pray to the angels and the ghost of your grandfather.

When you walk to your car, to the mailbox,
to the video store, let each step
be a prayer that we all keep our legs,
that we do not blow off anyone else’s legs.
Or crush their skulls.
And if you are riding on a bicycle
or a skateboard, in a wheelchair, each revolution
of the wheels a prayer that as the earth revolves
we will do less harm, less harm, less harm.

And as you work, typing with a new manicure,
a tiny palm tree painted on one pearlescent nail,
or delivering soda, or drawing good blood
into rubber-capped vials, writing on a blackboard
with yellow chalk, twirling pizzas, pray for peace.

With each breath in, take in the faith of those
who have believed when belief seemed foolish,
who persevered. With each breath out, cherish.

Pull weeds for peace, turn over in your sleep for peace,
feed the birds for peace, each shiny seed
that spills onto the earth another second of peace.
Wash your dishes, call your mother, drink wine.

Shovel leaves or snow or trash from your sidewalk.
Make a path. Fold a photo of a dead child
around your Visa card. Gnaw your crust
of prayer, scoop your prayer water from the gutter.
Mumble along like a crazy person, stumbling
your prayer through the streets.

 

ELLEN BASS’s poetry books include The Human Line (Copper Canyon Press) and Mules of Love (boa Editions). She teaches in the low-residency MFA writing program at Pacific University. Find more at www.ellenbass.com.

In the beginning of the week, I was called to assist (in a grief-counseling way) at a work place. Over the weekend, a young, happy, and seemingly healthy mom died suddenly during the day; she was discovered on the floor of her home. She left two small children and a husband as well as a number of long-term coworkers, all reeling in disbelief.

These days, work hours are often longer than the “awake” hours at home. There is the press and drive of companies today coupled with an employee’s motivation to do well, get ahead, and earn more. Certainly, coworkers can become extended family.

And like family, they are doubled over with grief. The thought of their coworker’s children without a mother renders many speechless; the thought of their own children without a parent is unbearable.

Death of a loved one is a trigger; it reminds of all our other losses. It’s as if we each hold a memory box close to our heart which is usually closed. Yet, with a new loss, the box springs open with our personal well spring of grief and sorrow. There is a parade of visceral memories and sensations. In life, we do not forget death.

My second reminder of sudden death was personal, a member of my extended family. A young man, 18 years of age, ready - in mere days - to graduate high school, was found with a book on his chest looking as if he had drifted off to sleep while reading before bed. His family, his school, and his town are shattered. There are no words; there is no comfort, at this moment. The promise and potential of his life unlived casts a pall over everything.

And his death becomes the uninvited guest at his classmates’ graduation, where, undoubtedly, parents will hold their children a little bit tighter and say, “I love you” with a tear-filled eyes. And these parents will wonder how they could ever survive the loss of their child. The idea is unfathomable.

Sudden death hits like an enormous, out-of-the-blue thunderclap to the heart. It is a sucker punch to the gut. You search your brain thinking that this can’t be true. One minute the person is there; the next minute they’re gone. Like a flame extinguished, you are plunged into a darkness that is incomprehensible and, often, crazy-making.

And you try to make sense of it all; you retrace your steps. You race back in time to the very last connection you shared. You think of the “Goodnight, honey” or the “Don’t stay out too late” to a family member or the “Have a good weekend” to the coworker on her way out the door. The everyday words, the daily connections seem so trivial and unimportant given the enormity of the loss, but they are the connective tissue of life.

And your mind, like a Google search engine, comes up with all the related memories and associations. You remember the shared laugh over a quick cup of coffee. You think of the sharp words about keeping the curfew or who is going to pick up the quart of milk, the dry cleaning, or the babysitter.

You remember yesterday, last week, last year, the day they were born, the day you got married, the day they walked into your class, your job, your life. Whenever and whatever those points of intersection, the moments of laughter and love, the hard times, the good times, the better times, you want to remember it all - in vivid, painstaking detail.

Images and words jump to the fore. Your knees buckle at the image of reading him a bedtime story or brushing her hair. Bath time, bedtime, play time, sleep time, making love time, not-speaking time; it all spreads before you, a map of your life with them.

What you shared was real; it was so very, very real. And you find yourself choked up; words, memories, and feelings are caught in your throat and chest. It is difficult to take a deep breath. Everything feels so fragile and precious now. It is hard to navigate these uncharted waters; you lurch from side to side feeling broken into a million little pieces never to be whole again.

So, how do you make sense of a sudden death?

Be very, very gentle with yourself. It is hard, exhausting, excruciating work to make sense of the un-sensible and to unpack and repack a life that you have held with such reverence and tenderness.

Take all the time you need to feel all that you need to feel.

Take all the time you need to remember and revisit all that you experienced and shared with the one you lost.

There will be a day when you do not weep.

There will be a day when you surprise yourself with a small laugh.

There will be a day when your heart’s heaviness has lifted.

And there will be a day, when like a tiny blade of grass that pushes through a crack in the cement, you will be ready to take a step forward and be in the sunshine.

And until that day comes, allow us, your family, friends, and coworkers to walk with you and share the loss. It is primal; this connection that we feel when we hear of death, especially the deaths of the younger ones.

There is a ripple effect; the loss moves out in ever-widening circles and whoever hears or knows anyone impacted by the loss wants to do something. Make a meatloaf, bake lasagna, make the calls, organize logistics, walk the dog, be a shoulder, lend an ear.

We want to feed you, nourish you, and hold you. We want to help you stay afloat when you are drowning in heartbreak. We feel your loss; your loss becomes our loss.

Unfortunately, loss is a universal, and the experience of loss is most commonplace, although it feels anything but common. With loss, there is a part of us that wants the world to s-t-o-p and pay heed. Don’t you understand, we have lost our loved one. Yet, life goes on and you find yourself retreating from the din and dailiness.

Loss sends out the call to gather. Hear ye, hear ye, all family and friends, it is time to circle the wagons. It is time to stop and attend. It is time for reverence and remembrance.

Jungian analyst, poet, and cantadora (keeper of the old stories), Clarissa Pinkola Estes tells us that the wise, elder women of her family would say, “The only miracle medicine we have is each other.” And so it is, even in sudden death.

To all families going through such a difficult time now, may you find peace and comfort during your dark days. And to Jordan who sat across from me at the Thanksgiving dinner table for many a year, may you rest in peace, dear one. You will be missed, and you will be remembered well.

In an essay in the Australian daily newspaper, The Age, Carter is quoted as saying:

“At its most repugnant, the belief that women must be subjugated to the wishes of men excuses slavery, violence, forced prostitution, genital mutilation and national laws that omit rape as a crime. But it also costs many millions of girls and women control over their own bodies and lives, and continues to deny them fair access to education, health, employment and influence within their own communities.”

Given these most cogent words, it is no surprise that Carter came to his hard decision. He has ended a 60+ year relationship with a church, one would assume, that has provided him with much sustenance and succor over many decades. Carter strikes me as a man of profound faith, and a living faith, at that. In other words, Carter’s words and actions are in congruence. He is a man who believes in social justice and lives his life that way.

Since he left the White House in 1982, after serving as the 39^th President of the United States, Jimmy Carter has dedicated his life to one of service. Along with his wife, Rosalynn, they founded The Carter Center (www.cartercenter.org ), a non-profit organization to promote human rights, address worldwide health issues, and advance global health initiatives.

Carter is well known for his work and involvement with Habitat for Humanity (www.habitatatforhumanity.org ). He is, also, one of Nelson Mandela’s Elders (www.theelders.org), which is “an independent group of eminent global leaders brought together by Nelson Mandela, who offer their collective influence and experience to support peace building, help address major causes of human suffering and promote the shared interests of humanity.”

Carter has been behind the scenes as well at the negotiating table in working to bridge divisiveness and to create peace. In 2002, he was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize.

Jimmy Carter is a man who clearly lives by his moral compass. He is a power of example to us all. Quietly, diligently, he takes step after step, hammers nail after nail, all in an effort to better his neighborhood, our neighborhoods, and the world.

Religion, as well as government, espouses to help humankind, but all too often the human element of concomitant fears, belief systems, greed, power, and assorted vested interests get in the way. People are too busy covering their own backsides or feathering their own nests to realize that in subjugating one segment of society — in this case, the women — they are creating more harm than good. There are destroying balance, peace, fairness, and justice. People forget to connect the dots: what we do to one, we do to all. We are tenuously connected on this fast-whirling Mother Earth. We all need each other.

Do you look at your mother, wife, daughter, sister, granddaughter as well as female coworkers, bosses, doctors, and neighbors and really think they are subservient, less than, not as good as, and unworthy?

It is unfathomable to me. It is, also, outrageous, and, even, shameful that in this 2009, after all the history we have lived, all the lessons of history we have learned, that we think it is for the good of humanity to say that women are to be subservient to their husbands, and women should not be ordained.

I applaud Jimmy Carter for voting with his feet and taking a stand that says women count; that, also, says every human being counts — equally.

Thank you, Mr. Carter, for having the courage of your convictions. May your example lead others to walk the high vibratory path you have chosen.

Ahhh … the pool, it was a sanctuary of chlorinated coolness. I loved the feeling of being under water; it was like another world. Do you remember Dustin Hoffman’s character, Benjamin, in the movie The Graduate? How he would be hunkered down, under the water, in the corner of his pool? Benjamin was alone, unbothered, and in his own bubble - at least until Mrs. Robinson came on the scene.

This summer, as much as humanly possible, I want to be underwater, not in the conventional sense of scuba diving, snorkeling, or swimming, but in the detached, free-floating, not-in-this world sense.

I want to be free and unfettered, without constrictions and containers, and allow myself to sense life without the daily pounding of extraneous sensory input and information.

I want to be suspended in space, floating freely and weightlessly in cool, blue-green water that shields me from the breathless heat of summer, the hot tempers that follow, and the call to do anything irritating and enervating. It’s that last piece, the call to sidestep the irksome, the energy zapping, and the superfluous that makes my dive into the water so delicious.

Life does do life, and, obviously, there are moments when I happily participate in the great circus that parades through my life. But this summer, my vacation is to go glub, glub, glub and, metaphorically, dive into the quiet, watery depths.

By taking the plunge, I opt out of the rush, the push-pull, and the never-ending chase of everyday life. I float; I hang out and I hang loose. I can swim and morph into a graceful being, at one with my body, at one with my mind, and at one with the water that holds me tenderly like a long-lost mother.

I am able to look up through the shimmering scrim of undulation and see a blue-blue sky with puffy, white clouds lazily circumnavigating the globe. I can watch open-winged birds use the sky as their tablet to write love poems in some invisible ornithological alphabet. I can witness multi-colored schools of fish drift by in a languid, liquid ballet.

And impossible, but true, is that it is possible for me to perceive the variations of sunlight and moonlight and starlight as the lumination penetrates the layers of blue and green and aqua tinted waters. I can witness the light dancing in waves as it wiggles through the watery prisms. Simply by being present, I, temporarily, bathe in streams of light as if I were a piece of a stained glass treasure found in the sea.

By diving in, I pull the plug.  I can float and dream and simply be.  I can reconnect with my soul that craves quiet, freedom, and a place to be.

There will be no sound of the constant clickety-click of my brain. There will be no rushing to and fro. There will be liquid time and space. There will be communion with the elements. There will be an opportunity to see, sense, know, and feel differently. It sounds like the perfect vacation for me this year.

So, do not be surprised if the phone goes unanswered, the mail piles up, and my computer weeps from lack of contact. I will be deeply under water, taking a very long breath.