The Furious Spinner

Shhhhhh. Can you hear it? That’s the closest sound I can come up with to describe to you what I hear outside my window. Not a roar but a sea whisper: huge dark and flicked with foam. Shhhh.

It’s dark inside this room, except for the glow of my computer, of course. I glance up and catch my reflection in the mirror. Eerie. I’d tied around my neck the kerchief I’d used for journeying earlier, and it’s so dark against my skin and peach colored camisole. It looks almost like a big blue butterfly is perched on my neck and chest, wings open, soaking up the dark. Maybe that’s why I can’t sleep. I slip it off.

I got two hours of sleep before I woke up as Mario was leaving the room. I was kicking him in my sleep again. Fortunately there are two bedrooms. When we first arrived this afternoon no one was staying here but us. All the other hotels up and down the prom were cheerfully busy despite the cold and rainy weather. Except here. Around dinner time a group of bikers showed up. These were no weekend warriors, mind you. These were the real thing, Harley Davidsons, leathered skin and all. Mario and I joked around about telling them that one of our friends rides a Harley. See we’re cool. (Please don’t kill us.) Uh-huh. We’re not as vanilla as we look. It’s all surface stuff, baby.

Then I reminded Mario that our friend sold the Harley recently. When they revved their motors for about twenty minutes, Mario came into the back room where I was working and said, “I’m going out to tell them to stop doing that.” And we both laughed. Later he looked out the window. “Oh look,” he said. “Someone else is here now. He looks like an accountant.” I could hardly stop laughing.

The motorcycles don’t bother me. Or the dogs on the beach that run up to me. Did I tell you that? At the workshop I complained about the mowers and the weedwackers and the airplanes, and Tom pretty much said, “Hey, get over it,” in his own way. That’s the world we live in and if we’re going to work with people, we need to be able to tolerate it. A couple people told me, “Use it to deepen your practice.” I had tried that before, but I was willing to try it again. Now when I hear machinery, I imagine I’m being protected, or that magicians are out warming up their powers. (Yes, magicians. Witches know how to flex our muscles quietly.) Whenever I see a dog now I think of them as protectors, sent by Hecate or Artemis. If they come too close, I ask Bear to growl at them. That worked on the beach this afternoon. This dog came right up to us. He was big and scary looking, but I didn’t flinch. I closed my eyes, and his owner called to him. On the way back, I didn’t want him sniffing around me, so I called on Bear. The dog turned right around and went back to his group. Thank you, Bear.

The night is full of bears. I imagine bears loping down the beach. The rivers and streams in this area used to be full of salmon, so bear would come here to feast, no doubt. This is the land of the Clatsop Indians. Clatsop means dried salmon. They’re all dead now. The Clatsop. And most of the salmon. And bears?

The journeying kerchief I just took off has bears and bear claws on it. Someone gifted it to me at the workshop. No doubt many people at the workshop had Bear as their power animal. How many people in the world have Bear as their totem? Bear must be exhausted! In most traditions, including Celtic, it was assumed that people had animal spirits as guides and/or protectors. Years ago when I wanted to know what my animal spirit was bear kept coming to me. But I refused. I knew that everyone and their brother thought bear was their power animal. What about the mouse or muskrat? When I refused, I began dreaming about bears. Many nights I spent running from bears or trying to protect Mario from bears. One night I dreamed I looked down at my hands and saw grizzly bear claws. Then I climbed up a tree. It was a great dream. I accepted then that maybe Bear was part of my peeps.

Even after that, bears chased me in my dreams. So I tried to figure out why and what I needed to do. Bears are associated with healing in many cultures. Maybe the bear was trying to catch up with me to heal me. I studied the mythology of bears and wrote Her Frozen Wild, which was all about bears and shapeshifters in Siberia—and the Pacific Northwest. Some of you read it when I put it up on my website. But the dreams didn’t stop.

Once I dreamed I was given a great teaching by a Native American elder in a cave. When he was finished with this teachings, I went into another building and a woman embraced me and called me by a name which means bear, of the little people. And then she sent me out into the world. When I awakened, I was disappointed that I couldn’t remember the teachings, but I figured the memories of them must be stored in my body somewhere. I believe it’s the only dream where I’ve been given another name.

A couple of years later I dreamed an enormous bear was wreaking havoc. We were all in terror of him, running and hiding. Then he came crashing through the a big window in our house, roaring, and I turned to face him. I offered to make love with him if he would stop the rampage. He agreed.

The bear dreams pretty much stopped after that. I’ve researched that dream. It is a common folktale throughout many cultures: the woman who becomes the bride of the bear. (There are some where the man becomes the groom of a female bear, but they are less common.) In Native American and Siberian folktales, young women often fall in love with bears they meet while picking berries in the woods or doing something along a riverbank. And if they stay with their bear husbands too long, they are in danger of becoming bears themselves. It is (or was) a common belief amongst indigenous people who lived near bears that they themselves were descendants of and/or related to bears.

Why all this bear talk as I sit in the dark listening to the ocean trying to soothe me to sleep. I have all this excess energy—or something—that doesn’t seem to want to go anywhere. It whirls around in my body. Feels like bear. I’m growling at dogs. I’m wearing bear kerchiefs. I can’t sleep.

I have not forgotten the rest of the world. I mourn for those imprisoned by our government. I mourn for those who desperately kill themselves. I mourn for the people killed in the name of my country. I still engage in those activities which I think will have the most impact. But I cannot rage, rage, rage against the machine if that is all I am doing. Bathing in horror for the sake of claiming I am informed isn’t healing either. We cannot act if we are paralyzed by fear or terror. As Rilke says, “Only in joy does creation take place.”

Politics is not the way, at least for me. They’re all part of the same problem. Doesn’t mean I won’t vote or stay informed or help where needed. It means my energy is going elsewhere. I’ve said before I don’t feel like the furious spinner any more—unless I am furiously spinning something. A gorgeous tapestry, with imperfections, of course. Subdue the demons with splendor! We must take care of our local communities—I believe that more than ever—while keeping an eye on what else is happening worldwide. We need to connect with our world, in all its forms.

Shhhh. I close my eyes and try to sleep again. Wake up. I’ve dreamed that I’m married to Richard Gere only he has two wives so I have to live next door in another house. I wander about his house when he’s sleeping. In the daytime he shows me the results of the garden he’s had growing for me. All organic but something is not quite right with the vegetables. The squash has some soft spots. The carrots are a bit weird. I tell him that it’s all fine, but I wonder why we’re having some man, some business, grow our vegetables. Why aren’t we doing it? I smile at this dream when I awaken. Even if someone had never heard of Freud they’d know what that dream was about. (When I tell this dream to Mario later and say the same thing about Freud, he looks at me and says, “I don’t get it. What’s it about?” I laugh. “Sex, baby. Sex.”)

Or maybe I just forgot to water my garden before we left.

Creativity comes from Eros and Eros comes from Creativity. I’ve always believed they are the same, or at least run side by side. Our culture is not comfortable with that idea. With those feelings. Eros is about sex which is about getting off; it’s secretive and dirty in our culture. Creativity is a mystery, too, but at least we can talk about it in polite company. It’s all life energy as far as I’m concerned. It’s all about how we connect with ourselves, each other, the planet, the Divine.

I think I’ve stopped being articulate. Ah this again. Shhhh. I get up and stand in front of the big glass window looking out at the dark ocean. I see my reflection, somehow, in the dark in the window and realize I should probably step back so no one can see me. I smile and don’t move. Outside along the shoreline something dark moves.

Maybe it’s Bear looking for salmon. Or a wife. If he doesn’t find her will he go on a rampage?

Shhhh.

I step away from the window. 4 comments

4 Comments:

Oh, bear. Love bear stories, and reading this post, Kim - like you, bear took over, totemically speaking, without my seeking that connection: occasional visits lifelong, but dream after dream in the last five years or so, starting with a repetitive series in which I would bump into bear unexpectedly, it would try to get me to play, I would refuse (being always in the midst of some Very Serious Activity), so it would rip my skin off, which would leave me feeling happy and light, and I'd go play.

Eventually, I gave in and did some research, finding all this Very Serious Stuff about meditation, 'going within,' 'the cave,' grief, etc., etc. - and while there were always aspects of this in bear, I also found that the playfulness and constant sense of "lighten UP!" I got from bear was absent in much of the shamanic and pagan analysis.

They are complex animals. There's this strain of play & not taking oneself too seriously, a profound emotional and spiritual depth that is both lovely and difficult, ferocity and protection, abundance of stored wealth, letting go.

Recently, bear dreams have begun shifting for me - after years of it being my most regular visitor (and one I got very comfy with), it's been pushing/chasing me away.

Interesting how at different times, different energies take care of us. And they are so CLEAR about it, too!

Hope your sleep settles and you get some rest (maybe bear can help with that?) -

By  Theriomorph, at 8:31 AM  

And then the next day to be attacked and/or hugged by a bear of a dog...very strange. Yet I feel invigorated by it all. Thanks for your insights. It seems as though Bear has come to us in similar ways. I have a painting in my work room of a polar bear dancing; below the dancing paws are the words, "Out of chaos comes the dance of balance." Probably Bear is saying, "It's the dance, baby; the dance is the thing." As we try to achieve balance or perfection or whatever, we're missing the dance!

By  Kim Antieau, at 10:44 AM  

Even in the ordinary world, the bears are busy:

real-life Goldilocks:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/americas/5097124.stm

and a cat very much like mine:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/americas/5067912.stm

Apparently the BBC also has video of a bear snoozing in someone's hammock, but I couldn't watch it on my slow dial-up. :)

By  Theriomorph, at 7:35 AM  

That is great! Especially the one where the cat chases the bear up the tree. Amazon cat, absolutely!

By  Kim Antieau, at 10:42 AM  

Post a Comment

All photographs and written material copyright © 2003-2008 by Kim Antieau unless otherwise indicated. May not be used without permission.