Healing Light

The grandkids are visiting us right now, so I have less time for games.  A couple days ago, my granddaughter (Ellie) got an owie, and it reminded me...

When my daughter was that age, when she was hurt, it seemed as if it was mostly a head bump.   I don't know much, but I do know how to check for concussion, so whenever she'd bump her head I got out my flashlight and made sure her pupils dilated properly.  By the time my examination was over, usually all pain was forgotten.

Soon, she started coming to me after every bump or scratch, asking for the "magic flashlight."  She insisted that I shine the light on whatever injury she'd just sustained.   Even long after she knew better, it remained a tradition.

I asked Ellie if she wanted me to shine a light on her owie, but she declined.

My bird story - and part of someone else's

I don't get on with birds. This started when I was in high school. My walk home took me near a very territorial bird's nest. My first warning was when I felt a THUMP on top of my head. The winged rat had strafed my head! This continued for an entire year. I told friends and family, none of which believed me, until I demonstrated. I never learned whether the bird moved to a different area the following year, because I changed my route home.

The funny thing is that I don't really dislike birds. I have cared for a few, but never long-term. Parrots make me nervous, mostly because I know how strong those hooked beaks are.

Once while on the way home from work I found an owl in the snow. I took it home and once it warmed up it seemed fine. The only thing I could get it to eat was a mouse that had been killed in a trap. Eventually I just let it go, and it flew swiftly & silently across the street, where it remained as long as we lived in that house. We know this because prior to that day, we never heard owl hoots, but after it was nightly.

And of course I chose my name from a raptor.

Introduction to a Totem

I have never considered myself a spiritual person. And, despite being a quarter Cherokee, I've never thought of myself as Native American. But this happened anyway, about 20 or so years ago.

I dreamed that I was in a mobile home, a small trailer really - those silver bullets you sometimes still see. There was a woman with me but I didn't know her. Suddenly the trailer was being slammed, hard enough to make it rock, the sides being dented by the impact. I knew, in the way you do in dreams, that the shell was being attacked by a huge grizzly bear, and that she would not take long to tear through the metal.

In the same way, I also knew that the bear was after me, and I could possibly save the stranger from harm by leaving the trailer. So that's what I did - if this sort of thing were to happen in real life I don't know if I'd have the courage for that!

But once I left the trailer, the bear calmed down, and sat with me, and started to speak. I don't remember anything else. I sure wish I did, because this was my vision quest. And that's how I found my totem, Bear. Or rather, that's how she chose me.

It could have been just a nightmare, but I don't usually remember dreams for years.