Everyday Bliss

Krishna  tagged me to write about 8 random things about myself so here goes. I’ve decided in typical me-style to be truly random… 

1. Like Krishna, I’ll start with my name. "Maryam" is the name I took by requirement during my three-and-a-bit years as a practicing Muslim, circa 1981. It felt so much more "me" than my given name, I made it legal and permanent. "Webster" is an ancient name in my mother’s family line I re-monikered with after divorce.  It didn’t occur to me until I used my freshly-minted driver’s license as ID, that the combination together sounded similar to the name of a prominent dictionary. People have been reminding me of that (usually with laughter) ever since…
2. When I first put up my website in 1996, I got a nastygram from the Merriam Webster dictionary people as I too am a prolific writer and produced tons of material that contained words in their book. Imagine the cheek, they said. They desisted after a spell of chatting with me. An almost magical sense of charm and persuasion goes a long way back among the women in my family.  
3. I am a veteran of nearly thirty years in shamanic practice of both metis and Nordic medicine ways, and apprenticed fifteen years to a Missouri sweet medicine man, Corliss  "d" deLarm, who stands unequalled but by the Dalai Lama in spiritual presence, in my personal experience. I’ve taught the Nordic system of runes as healing, divinatory and spiritual advancement tools for about twenty-five years.  My, how Dagaz flies…
4. Speaking of the Dalai Lama, I  have received two initiations from His Holiness Tenzing Gyatso, the Fourteenth Dalai Lama. The White Tara longevity empowerment and the Medicine Buddha initiation and blessing for my work in healing. It’s not as cool as you think though – I was one of about five thousand that day to receive these blessings.  And he was going along so fast in Tibetan you had a hard time keeping up with the visualizations of a white Buddha above a towering stack of golden Buddhas all holding lotus flowers and so on and so on.

   It worked though. About a month later I gashed the living daylights out of my thigh vacuuming (a dangerous profession), managed to clean the 2" deep wound out, instill betadine, close the wound with steri-strips and get a pressure bandage on it all while reciting the Medicine Buddha mantra and the husband was fainting dead away just at the sight of the thing. Chanted the whole way to the hospital and had an amazing personal experience with both Medicine Buddha and His Holiness, plus didn’t feel a thing when stitched. (12 stitches, 4" scar just above the knee) Cue doctor amazement and personal happiness…

5. I have a broken back. Almost everyone’s heard this story but if you haven’t here’s the teacup version: Whilst living in Cambridge, England on a rainy night, drunk driver sails over the top of a roundabout and slams into my Mini van (Mini as in Cooper) causing iron box with heavy pipe wrenches to slam into my back. *crunch*  L4 cracked vertically, spinous process on L5 fragmented, spinal cord trauma. Had to move back to U.S. for surgery as in England, would have been on a two year wait just for a diagnostic MRI. Progressive paralysis. Spent a total of three years paralyzed from the waist down, intense surgery, six more years recovering mobility. Can walk, run, dance and hike now. Today, it’s only a problem if I don’t keep up vigorous exercising.
6. My favorite form of exercise is hiking in the redwoods, but don’t get to do that every day. Yoga, I do every day and couldn’t live without it.  At right is me circa 2006 outside my old studio – Willow Glen Yoga in San Jose, CA with cone-head hair after the last downward facing dog of the day. Great yoga and good people – click my picture to go there. Been practicing yoga since 1974, when I learned in an afternoon class in junior high school. We learned straight-up hatha and our teacher busted our chops. Then and again, we were young and our chops could stretch a lot further in those days… My spiritual mentor d. deLarm extended this practice through the next twenty years in sharing the blessings of Integral Yoga. Balance Yoga (balancecenter.com) got me mobile again following my paralysis. Lately my passion is Yin Yoga (paulgrilley.com) as I’ve still got a lot of shortened tendons and stiff muscles. Yoga keeps ‘em limber and the mind, serene.
7. If you like cats and you’re a computer nerd, you might "has" seen the picture at left. (No, it’s not my kitties, it came from here) While I love friend’s children, I am blissfully child-free, though am mother to two mitties. (cats – mitten + kitty = mittie….don’t ask) They are dark charcoal fluffball, the Princess Anoushka and her lean grey huntress companion with the perfect white bikini, Tashi-Claire. The Bear wanted to name them Xena and Gabrielle but was overruled by the cats themselves who told us their names and insisted we use them.

   The mitties  exist in a partially contentious, partially collegial relationship and strictly enforce territorial limits of the garden. Tosh-cat is an avid bird watcher and is generally interested in the wildlife that pervades the area around the pool. Anoushka is a garage kitty and hangs out on the persian carpet under the Bear’s office chair, even on the hottest and muggiest of days. We figure her to be an adherent of Virginia Woolfe.   Myself and the Bear are seen as jailers and parental units. I love them unmercifully of which they are tolerant and accepting and both feed and comb them. But when the Bear is home, I am relegated to chopped liver status. They are the only cats I know who actually *dislike* chopped liver…

8.  I am an accomplished frontierswoman. Though you wouldn’t think it to look at me, I can make my own paper and ink, spin, weave, dye woven goods with native plants, make soap in a cast iron cauldron, split logs, make brooms and other tools of wood and local plants, harvest and manage forest foods such as hickory nuts, boil the hickory branches to get  three kinds of food: salt, sugar and milk (yep, you can), muddle and sweeten ground roasted acorns for frontier flour, construct a log cabin (well, in theory, I only did it once and that was with a lot of help – those logs are heavy!), grow, harvest and make herbal medicines (plus know how to use them), midwife human and animal babies into the world, make shoes from leather, plants or refuse such as old tires (great for treads), set, manage and harvest a trotline for fish, snares for rabbit and quail, plus skin and dress the meat if called upon to do so (not my favorite thing) and tan the skins. I can build a fire with a bow drill and pine duff or other local tinder, though it takes a long time. I can construct a shelter out of almost any material available, and find food in a forest even in winter. What’s more, I have a hardy spirit and am a survivor, born of a long line of women who persisted, shared their knowledge and endured to win in life.

   I’ve not been called on to do any of these frontier tasks in a long time, but the memory still persists. My mother was a great one for recapturing the pioneer spirit and my great grandmother on my father’s side up in the Smoky Mountains of Carolina (they really do look like they’re smoking – see?) thought a girl child should know how to weave and dye and make soap, ink, paper and so on. 

   The picture above  right is in front of the National Frontier Trails Center in Independance, MO, close to my hometown, and she was always pointed out as a model to follow. Though I must say I adore my computer, electric fans, swimming pool and other modern conveniences, if and when the lights finally go out, I’ll know what to do. Can’t buy that kind of peace of mind, plus it’s a joy to know you can survive by your own efforts. 

So now it’s my turn to tag eight people so I’ll now ask some of my great "virtual crushes" I’ve connected to through life, business, blogging and sharing personal energy, to share 8 random things about themselves. Over to you folks:  Suzanne Falter Barnes, Jen Louden, Andrea Lee, Ellen Britt, Betsy Muller, Gloria Arenson, Sarah Zeldman, Jasmine White and Vikki Hoobyar…