Metamorphosis

Mikaela and I leave in 14 days for Ethiopia to pick up Yaebsira. Once again I am staring big change in the face and once again a caterpillar is my inspiration. On September 10th we plucked a monarch caterpillar from its happy home at Kathy’s pond and brought it to our house on a large stem of milkweed. Debbie donated a large pretzel container as a temporary home and Mikaela and I watched as it doubled in size every couple of days. Mikaela named her Milkweed. Every day she ate and ate and grew and grew.

This part of the change I would be very good at. It is the second part that I have trouble with. After a week of nonstop eating and a lot of frass production, she stopped. She spent the day crawling all over the container, trying out different locations. Finally she settled on the netting at the top of the pretzel jar and hung upside down in perfect ‘J’ formation ten minutes before Mikaela, Nigel and I were walking out the door for the day. We contemplated taking her with us. (We had already taken her vacationing in Ocean City) We were worried that she might not yet be anchored securely enough to travel. When we returned home we were happy to see her still hanging in her ‘J’ and not yet a chrysalis. We stayed up as late as we could watching her. In the morning she had transformed into a florescent green chrysalis. I guess change of this magnitude is a very private thing.

Here is a video that managed to capture this remarkable change.

This morning I got up and stared at Milkweed’s chrysalis. What is going on in there? I want to make a magnificent transformation in one week. I can’t help but think of Disney images. I want to be transformed into a princess. Okay, not really, but there is a part of me that would love to know what it feels like to be beautiful. I imagine stopping everything and only working on myself. Just the idea of curling up into a cocoon sounds wonderful, even if I came out the same after a few days of peace and quite. Is it like that or is it contained violence that is going on inside that chrysalis? The caterpillar’s mouth must change from one that is made to chomp on milkweed to one that has a delicate tongue for sipping sweet nectar. Just picturing those dental changes alone makes me cringe without even thinking about what would be required to create wings from a fat striped belly. I don’t think it is peaceful in there. Once, many years ago I stopped everything and did a Seshin at Zen Mountain Monastery in Mt. Tremper, New York. For seven days we made no eye contact with anyone, did not speak or read. For seven days we meditated in the zendo except for the few hours we slept each night. Although to an outsider, a room filled with meditating people might look peaceful our minds were anything but peaceful. It was scary in there at times! Imagine seven days inside your head with no escape or distraction. That turns into some serious monkey mind activity. It is wonderful to remember this. I haven’t thought about this in years. When Seshin was over, I was transformed in many ways. Watching Milkweed I am wondering how I can have a similar transformation while cleaning the house, packing for Ethiopia, working…

It is time to be very present.

Fire and Attitudes

Mikaela and I are lucky we have good noses. We were packing to head down to the shore for two days, a gift from my mother. This is our only family vacation for the year. I smell something burning. Something plastic, the bad scent of an electrical burn. I tell Michael. A few minutes later Mikaela tells me that something smells wrong. All packing stops. Michael heads down to the basement and Mikaela and I sniff around upstairs. In a 200 year old house it could be coming from anywhere. I imagine smoldering wiring in between the walls. Michael couldn’t find the problem and the smell was getting worse. I think we should call the fire department and Michael heads back down the basement where he finally finds the problem: melting wires inside the hot water heater. What causes a hot water heater to suddenly have a melt down? Michael turns off the circuit breaker and we begin to air out the house and eventually start packing again. We are so lucky this happened before we left. I imagine coming back from our mini vacation to find a smoldering ash pile.

We do eventually leave, many hours later than planned. I ask Michael countless times, Are you sure the circuit breaker is off? Driving down to the shore I keep thinking about fire and attitudes. M had a fire in her house, also caused by a faulty hot water heater. It was a traumatic fire. Everything in the laundry room and hallway burned and the thick smoke from the melted fiberglass washtub covered everything else in the house with a layer of plastic soot that could not be removed. It looked like someone poured black strap molasses over the whole house.The clean up took months but no one was hurt. For years afterwards (still to this day) M broke up her life into before the fire, and after the fire and would still make comments about inane things like gravy spoons- I lost that in the fire. Every holiday there were reminders of things lost. About the same time J also had a fire. We had plans to spend the day at Longwood Gardens. When I called her house to confirm the time she said she had lost her address book and was glad I had called so she could get my number. We spent a nice day at Longwood and it wasn’t until the end of the day, while relaying a story about something else, that she mentioned the fire that had destroyed her entire house less than two weeks before. Two people with very different outlooks.

At times my imagination can be the enemy. Mine is vivid and well used. I can imagine all sorts of catastrophes with lightening speed. It runs in the family. B can imagine impending storms ruining plans weeks before a weather report is available. There could be a cold front moving in… Lately, my imagination has needed to be tamed. Without warning I can suddenly travel down a path that sees continued health crises, financial doom, travel nightmares trying to bring my daughter home from Ethiopia and now fires that ignite without warning.

It is all a matter of attitude and outlook. The glass full or empty. We were lucky we were home when the melting started. We had a wonderful two days away, even though half of the time the weather was uncooperative. I love the beach. Nigel loved exploring the sand and the water. We ran into fellow OCers on the boardwalk and got to hang out together. We are so very lucky.

Now that we are home, the adventure continues. Michael is upstairs taking a very cold shower. I am sure he will be quite awake by the time he comes down. I put a pot of water on the stove for doing dishes. It feels a bit like Little House on the Prairie. A great history opportunity for Mikaela and me. Maybe we will turn out the lights too.