Dances with Scarves

My husband hates scarves.  When I ask him how they look - because I keeping hoping, he answers, “Beautiful, now if only you’d lose the scarf and wipe that stuff off your face.”

I should be more grateful for a husband who wants only the raw me, but the devilish part wants him to think all the time and money I spend on mineral and fabric beauty is worth it. 

“You mean my makeup?” I ask in distress.  

“Makeup, paint, what’s the difference.  Why do you want to hide yourself under that stuff?”

“I don’t hide,” I instruct, “I enhance.” And I try my hardest to turn on an allure born of confidence, wrapping my slinky scarf around his neck to pull him close.

“It’s much better back there,” he smiles, referring to the scarf behind his back.  

“Well, if you don’t like it you’d better have a talk with your family before Christmas,” I smile and his romantic green eyes lift in annoyance.  

My husband hates scarves, so it’s only fitting that my consistent presents from his travel savy family are scarves, and I’m amassing a distinguished collection. I try to wear them despite my husband’s disdain, but somehow our date night is always tinged by the scarf, and they are too impractical to where anywhere else.  Following the fashion advice of Edna in “The Incredibles”, who had her clients “lose the cape” because they led to too many fatal accidents, I don’t wear scarves as part of my daily dress because they attract stains and get stuck in everything from the washing machine to cabinet doors, and even the garbage disposal.  So they sit in a drawer collecting dust, waiting for their turn to be felt and appreciated.  

Finally on one sunny morning when my children are hounding me like little alarm clocks and I keep hitting the snooze button, they sneak into my scarf drawer.  Soon they are like kittens in a ball of loose yarn, rolling in billowy softness, running down the hall and flying them like kites.  I drag myself out of bed, turn on Raffi Sing A Long and we dance, swishing them here and there.  I am the bull fighter and they are the little steers crashing head first into silk curtains.

"You’re teaching our kids to scarf dance?”  My husband says after coming out of the shower.

“Might as well put them to use!”  I announce with a few tucked in my pajama pants and do a belly dance of sorts.

Before long the children cover him with their scarves, giggling and tickling his face with frayed ends.

“I love scarves now,” he says jovially and wraps one around his head like a Babushka, batting his eyes in playful fashion.  If only I had those eyelashes …

—Sarah B.

My Wild Woman

Morning. Solitary. Cat on porch. Sun outside before it gets hot.

Old Hagness stirs this and that, crumples my papers, snickers,

snorts, seems out of sorts, but no, she smiles, she is devious,

I know she is up to no good. "You keep ignoring me!" she grumps

and humps and shakes her nose, her eyes piercing into the innermost

hiddenest self I have. And I am at her mercy. "Hah! at my mercy!

I have no mercy! take that!" I sit back, take a sip of my coffee.

She snarls. She looks evil. She stirs this and that and I am

ill at ease. "Ill at ease!!! Good." she teases me I think

but I am not sure. She rustles my papers, stirs my mind,

my brain cells.  She gets right into my head, my heart,

and makes me shake, cringe, want to spit out all that is in me...

but I don't, I don't even write it out. I am frozen. "Well,

let's unfreeze you then!" the rough voice stirs me.

I am afraid, and sluggish, and know not what to make of it,

except that I am glad she is here, I am glad we will dig deep,

this morning, and extrude that thing that spreads through me,

that halts my energies, my actions, and starves for life.

I sit. She sits. Her face lightens, she thinks, she makes her brew,

yes always her brew, she grabs my cup, tosses my coffee,

and fills it with her own stinky brew, which she urges me to drink.

Against my will, I sip it. "Gulp it down" her hoarse whisper comes to me.

I shudder, and follow orders. Once down, it stops the bitterness,

there is an aftertaste of sweet, ever so sweet. I am afraid I'll fall asleep.

But she grabs and shakes me, and snarls ever so gently, like a big fat bear,

and I am in the bear cave, the sweet huge white bear, my friend of olden times.

I snuggle into her lap, safe in the dark solid walls of the cave. Peer out,

toward the lake, always the lake, the promise, the light. We sit,

there is no end to time, no limit to what we have. Endless, horizonless,

extended time melting into sky and water, light, soft light of the morning.

I dream. I am free. I love, am loved, in the lap of the Great Family. And it is

not my limited family, my family that I fear even as I love from time to time.

My ancestors, my grandparents, my aunts and cousins ... ... ... family friends,

yes we once had family friends, good friends ... ... ... the Great Big

White Bear, holds me and eases her hold, and I stretch, and Old Hagness

invites me to come with her, but I do not want to go, I want to stay

in the Lap of the Great White Bear longer, and she does not push me away,

and I meld into the soft darkness. I am alive. I feel energy pulsating

into me, through me, the earth energy, the earth that whispers, "I am the earth,

here in this cave, or in the city, or in far-away lands, I am the same earth,

the mother of all, I am soft or hard, cold or hot, dry or wet, I am the same earth."

I sit. And think and feel and ponder and let the world breathe me,

let the heart beat of the earth be my own heart beat. I absorb

the Great White Bear. We are one, we are two, we are same,

we are separate. And there is no difference. The earth breathes,

the heart of the earth beats the drum beats, I am, that is clear,

that is simple, that is all that is needed.  

The breeze of the morning brings clouds, and moisture, sun and rising dew,

clouds caress the earth in morning fog, in mystery. I sit. I am the not-I. Perhaps

that is the no-self of Zen. It does not matter what I call it, if I call it,

if I name. It is what it is. And the morning is gentle. So gentle.

Old Hagness is pleased with herself. She the morning "priest", the "shaman"

magician. She snorkels with laughter. Pleased with herself. So pleased.

She is not afraid to show her pleasure. "So, now you have had your morning treat,

now you are ready to work. Git, don't linger, don't dawdle."

But I do linger, I do dawdle, I do not want to leave this moment of magic.

"You cannot leave this moment of magic" she whispers "your life is magic,

you are magic, magic is inherent in your bones, your flesh, you breath."

At that, I cannot argue. I finish my coffee. And still am undecided

how to proceed.  Morning. Magic. Cool air. Cat on porch.

preciousqueentheodora III

6.7.12