Wednesday, January 6, 2010

Blue, Green, and a Lizard



















This morning I was feeling blue after waking from a melancholy dream in which J. and I were waiting for a train that was long delayed. J. wanted to leave the station and find a restaurant. I thought it was not a good idea but went along. We ate; I was more and more uneasy. When we got back to the station, the train had come and gone, the station deserted. O, those desolated train stations. I realized the bag I had left in charge of the porters was missing. They told me to look through a pile of luggage. I could not find my cream leather bag and thought of all the special clothes I had packed for a warm climate, clothes that were particular to me, intimate with me. When I got out of bed, an old medical problem kicked up.

I could speculate about why I had this dream of loss--loss of myself. It might have been because I had spent much too much time putting my little cabinet of wonders in order, dusting each thing, setting the cherub more securely in the cup full of pennies, opening the fan, throwing away old papers and finding a note from J. on which he had drawn a red heart. It brought back memories of a difficult time when I had acted badly. But what use is it to look for causes?















The pain in my leg eased up. I put on make-up, went out, and found a lizard sunning itself. "That's what I'll do," I said to myself, and walked facing the sun.















On the way home I saw this blue flower--I think it's plumbago--growing along side the cactus.
















It's time for me to listen to myself no matter how soft my voice.


9 comments:

  1. I agree, Mim, listen to yourself, and your dreams.

    As my analyst - which sounds such an awful thing to write,as if I become another Woody Allen - -nevertheless, as my analyst once said to me, 'Pay attention to your dreams, they are your friends. They can tell you what's going on in your unconscious mind'.

    So I think of my dreams now as friends and I play around with their meanings- multiple- knowing as I do that the only real sense I can make of them is idiosyncratic and mine.

    Your images here are wonderful, especially the lizard and plumbago.

    I have a love/hate relationship with plumbago. I love the eye-blue of its flowers, but I hate the way they drop off and stick to your clothes when you brush by too closely.

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  2. It's good to hear from you this morning!

    My analyst was very helpful when I saw her years ago. I believe in the talking cure.

    Today I'm talking to myself and listening.

    Thanks, Elizabeth.

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  3. sometimes it's hard to hear your true voice, there are so many interlopers interjecting rude comments...at least, in my tangled mind.

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  4. that lovely little lizard, without enough sense to get out of the way...
    take care, dear Mim..........
    xxo

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  5. Mim-

    This post broke my heart open like a three minute egg.

    I don't know how to express the tenderness you made me feel- toward you in particular, and the whole wheezing contraption in general, but I was, and am, deeply moved.

    What a gift this strange internet can be.


    I am glad to man the oars next to you, dear Mim, and to pull for all I'm worth.


    yrs-

    tearful

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  6. O, dear Tearful: I'm with you!

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  7. your words, combined with the pictures have an own smell, a special atmosphere which makes me slow down, its almost like listen to your voice over a slow motion movie; I imagine the deserted train station,this lost feeling caused by lost luggage, by the lost self.
    fragile poetic from real life, thank you!

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  8. How we can go from strength to fragility and back again, Smilla.

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  9. I think its only possible with accepting both. And accepting the quick, surprising changes, sometimes hard to understand, aswell. Thanks for your answer, and sorry for my late responding, I first had to visit a wedding party, and now I found some time for my first little research... :-) Thank you!

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