A Day of Gifts

Hi Everyone!

House cleaning, as we all know, is an ongoing, perpetual motion machine of its own. And today, I continued to do that stuff by moving the four stereo speakers out of the hogan to my new office--thanks to Dave. And I retrieved my drum and brought her back to the hogan, which is her real home.


Copyright Eileen Nauman 2006
Progress on the hogan today! Dave got all four speakers up to the new office. Ibrought along the electronic equipment. You can see that the corner is cleaned up. And, best of all, I hung my drum up on the west wall of the hogan. She's a 'traveling' drum. When this drum is played, she sends people on journeys--sometimes a past life, or to some place in this life, that they need to be. She's a very powerful drum and was made by a woman. The hide is elk. She has a deep, throaty resonance that I just love.

And I trundled along with the amplifier, CD player, tape player and all the cords dragging behind me.

And I washed all the windows, inside, the new office. I also washed them on the door as well--inside and out. I happen to have a big bug smear across one window and it made a really good streak. As I was looking out the smear, everything was distorted outside of the window. I began to think of how I distorted things -- how we all do -- and that I wished we had a big can of window cleaner to get us out of our skewed, distorted position. But no such luck! The way we get out of a distortion is by drawing people or events into our lives that mirror our distortion to us--and sooner or later, by Grace or good luck, we will finally get it.


After I put more books away (Dave found a whole bunch in another room of the house and I really want all my wonderful identification books on botany away from flood potential, so he brought a box or two more to be shelved in the new office), I decided it was time to get busy on our house and do some serious cleaning. After all, we were cleaning the hogan and the new office--why not the house we live in? There’s a clue!


Copyright Eileen Nauman 2006
Here is on view of my 8-sided hogan. It sits in the green house area. Note that there are nine mesquite trees,in a circle, around it. Those trees were here when we came and were indicative of a vortex being in the center of this circle of trees. We literally built the hogan respectively to the circle of trees and even the small porch, Dave made holes around each tree trunk so that they could continue to be there and be a part of this wonderful feminine energy.

Between runs, I'd go back to the kitchen to get a huge drink of water--it was really hot and muggy today. And....as I passed the bathroom, I saw this:


Copyright Eileen Nauman 2006
Here's a funny: Jawee (Navajo for: "He hears but he doesn't listen....") is a bathroom sink kitty. He's twelve years old and weighs 20 pounds and he's known as King Kat around here. I picked him up on the Navajo Reservation back in 1992 and he's been with us every since--doing his funny things--like sleeping all day in the bathroom sink!


While I was busy making us lunch, Dave brought my canary yellow Dyson out of the hogan to the house. He vacuumed for awhile,and then I took over. I noticed there was a whistling sound and that meant the Hepa filter wasn’t locked into place correctly. As I pushed down on it, I heard a THUMP-GLUG-GLUG!!! I looked into the clear plastic canister and what do I see but a huge wad of dog and cat hair along with a cup of dirt flying out of the Hepa filter and into the canister. It had been STUCK in there--effectively blocking a good fifty percent of the possible dirt that could have gotten sucked up--and it got stuck there. No wonder the poor machine was huffing and puffing!


Copyright Eileen Nauman 2006
Here is another view of the hogan that Dave built for me in 1991. Ed "Eagle Man" McGaa came in for a visit in March, 1991 and helped build our first sweatlodge on the property. The hogan was almost completed by the time Ed came for a visit.

And of course, I was looking at the vacuum and myself. So, I had a big hair ball in me just like the machine did. And mine sure came rumbling and blowing out like a cannon ball just as the Dyson’s did! We all have blocks. That’s something we can count on. None of us are perfect. We’re all down here learning and this is a pretty brutal place to learn because spiritually speaking, the pedal is to the metal, to borrow an eighteen-wheeler term.


Copyright Eileen Nauman 2006
Here is a very moody looking western sky.


And when we have a ‘blowup’ literally or figuratively speaking, it can be like feeling cosmically constipated and then the BIG FLUSH arrives and THUMP-GLUG-GLUG--there it goes, blasting loose and hurtling into the vacuum cleaner (or toilet bowl) of Life! And we all know the relief we get when we pass a big one--on or off the toilet....


Copyright Eileen Nauman 2006
Here is another thunder being on the western horizon--just like last night--but what a difference, eh?



And once the BLOCK is REMOVED, there is certainly a period of relief with a lot of quiet so that you can begin to assimilate it all, integrate and apply your new awareness(es). Sort of like riding a tricycle before you graduate to a two-wheel bike with training wheels....and then the real thing, a two-wheel bike with no training wheels.


Copyright Eileen Nauman 2006
Here is Rocky doing his 'Rin Tin Tin' pose on a rock at Sunset Point. What a ham!


We go through process over and over again. Ad nauseum. But we all do it. And we’re past masters of it at this point. And it doesn’t matter what age we are. The good thing about this is usually, as we get older, we understand the process, the laws of the cosmos that apply, and get on with ‘the work’ so that we can get through it in better shape than we did when we were younger. There’s something to say about age after all....


Copyright Eileen Nauman 2006
On some nights, when the light is just right...everything is "just right" you get what I call a 'watercolor' sunset....this reminds me very much of Japanese paintings and there is such a sense of wonderment, calm and quiet beauty--as if someone had used her watercolors and this was the result....

And it was lovely to go meditate in my hogan this afternoon. I listened to Devi Prem--a gift CD from my Swiss friend, Michele Burdet, many years ago--and it was lovely to just drift into myself.

It has been a day of gifts! I love gift days, don’t you? We all get them. And I savor them when they occur. For starters, I had just gotten done with my meditation when Dave came back and guess what he had as a thoughtful gift for me? A Starbucks “Strawberries and Cream” Frappaccino--a big one! It has been so hot and muggy here, nonstop and we’ve been working so hard, that this was indeed, an unexpected treat! Whatta guy! Wish I could clone him and give copies of him to every woman--we wouldn’t have the grief we have between men and women if that could happen.

And then, I had ordered a Coldwater Creek vest--called the Peacock Vest (this has more story to it so look below....). It arrived along with a mandarin color white cotton long-sleeved blouse. I put them on and they fit. I loved the colors of the Peacock vest--purples, golds, blues and greens.

Lastly--you know things always come in 3’s....I was working on my book DARK TRUTH, and decided to take a break and look at my email. And there was my 3rd surprise! My wonderful lightning photo that I’d taken in late July had been chosen by Channel 15 (ABC/Phoenix, AZ) TV station to showcase the ‘lightning/monsoon’ photos sent in by viewers--and mine is on the front! WOW! That was terrific and unexpected. And if that wasn’t enough, he’s putting on the FRONT PAGE of the Channel 15 website--DOUBLE WOW! Here’s Dan’s two emails:

hi Eileen,

Thank you for your recent weather photo submission. As always you have some breathtaking photos! :)

We've created an online gallery featuring your photo (and other viewers' photos) on ABC15.com. You can view this special lightning gallery here:

http://www.abc15.com/gallery/slideshow/index.asp?doc=lightning/main.html

Thank you again for your photo, and thanks for visiting ABC15.com!

And Dan’s second email:

And fyi -- in case you haven't seen the front page of ABC15.com, I just posted a cropped version of your photo as a "tease" on our homepage, to entice viewers to click into the slideshow. It shows up under the top 3 news stories (you may have to click your web browser's "refresh/reload" button to see the photo tease, as I just added it about 5 minutes ago).

http://www.abc15.com



.:[Dan Sobczak, New Media Content Mgr
.:[ABC15 Phoenix
.:[www.abc15.com

So much for my '15 minutes of fame'. Let’s talk about peacocks now. My mom and I feed the birds around here. I happen to have 2 bird feeders by our north fence. I feed the birds morning and late afternoon. Well, this idiot male peacock likes to wake us at the ungodly hour of 5 a.m.! He thinks he’s a rooster and supposed to honk up the sun! One good thing, all the tail feather’s he’s gifting us with we are collecting and giving to Linda Metzler, who wants them. Right now, I could wring his scrawny blue neck....



Copyright Eileen Nauman 2006
Here's "Bird Brain", the male peacock who is moulting and dropping all his beautiful tail feathers. However, this idiot bird, who has no mate, and is lonely, loves to come over to the bird seed feeders just to be around the 50 or so birds that eat there. And he sits there and preens and pulls out his feathers which are scattered all over the place. Worse, he hops up on top of our roof at 5 a.m. in the morning and honks away--waking us up. So, we have a love-hate relationship with our bird brain intruder.


Copyright Eileen Nauman 2006
Here's my two bird feeders. We feet Mourning Doves, red finches, cardinals, mexican cardinals, sparrows and other friendly birds.



On my walk tonight, I had, one, two, three buzzards fly over me at very low altitude. All three were heading for the cut of the road. Sometimes, they will roost in that area. As I drew near, I really began looking for them. The light wasn’t good because of the thunder being spread across the sky. I couldn’t find them. On the last hill going up to Sunset Point, I suddenly spied one of the buzzards--right on top of a telephone pole fifty feet away! Wow, was he close! I stopped and sent him a mental telepathy ‘hello’ and asked if she had a message for me. Of course, she did. I shot a lot of photos of her but without a zoom close up lens (coming in late october....it can’t be too soon!) all I get are blurry silhouettes. But at least you can see her perched up there. Amazing, because buzzards just do not come this close to human beings--ever. And I’ve been having my fair share of interactions with them at very close footage the last month. Buzzards are about transformation...do I have a clue?


Copyright Eileen Nauman 2006
Here's my friend the buzzard waiting fifty feet away from me, perched up on a telephone pole. They don't stick around humans,so this is indeed, a rare gift to see this magnificent bird so close.

And then, we climbed up to Sunset Point. I fed my harvester ants and tonight, wore my screen netting over my head because the no-seeums were awful. But, the wait was worth it.


Copyright Eileen Nauman 2006
On the way home,just before we started down to Jon's vineyard I turned around and looked to see some fiery red-orange ribbon on the horizon. Very intense. Beautiful!


And the sunset was interesting, changeable and I actually had several to choose from. Which is your favorite? The first was a lovely water color scene to the North, near Sedona.


Copyright Eileen Nauman 2006
Here is a second 'water color' sunset--the colors changed a bit from the first one--still, just as movingly beautiful.

This was a changeable sunset tonight. Many different colors, layers and variations and intensities going on all at the same time.


Copyright Eileen Nauman 2006
This is pink clouds to the North, over Sedona after sunset.


And then, we had drama on the western horizon.



Copyright Eileen Nauman 2006
Now, here's a dramatic sunset! And hard to believe, but to the north, we had that lovely 'water color' sunset.

Even coming back on the road, the colors were still changing remarkably.


Copyright Eileen Nauman 2006
And this was the last photo I took before we went back down into the canyon for the night....

In Spirit....