Fear Don't Stop My Eager Soul to Soar
Fear don’t stop my eager soul to soar!
I can't remember who said it, but I quoted it at the graduation from high school speech. Don’t worry, I wasn’t the smarty valedictorian, I auditioned to make a speech cause I loved the idea of talking to a stadium full of people. I spoke of us going forth! and conquering worlds! and trusting ourselves and not losing faith and not ever, ever being driven by fear
But that was before I knew that part of my calling was to talk to dead people. I mean, you can commit to no fear when you think your calling is environmental law. You can make speeches about not denying the call when you think you’re going to save the oceans or fight gas lobbies. You can already feel that smart Ann Taylor suit on your thin frame (it’s my fantasy, go with me) as you pace the court staring down the evil, greedy pollution loving bad guys. However, when you are informed, no hon, actually, the call is - pick up the phone and listen really, really hard and see if you can hear what dead people are saying through static and sweat and the complete knowledge that you’re probably crazy, your inspiring little high school speech feels like utter bullshit, full respect to your eighteen year old sweet faced self.
God bless the spirits, I mean, sometimes they talk. But. Most times the experience is that they imprint little thoughts that feel like someone barely brushing against your arm but then you look and they are not there. Or the vague impression of your grandmother's favorite perfume and you don’t know the name of it so that’s useless. Or an image will suddenly appear, followed by another one, duck, typewriter, silver earrings. And these images are just so dang random that saying them would sound like insanity on a plate with toast.
Suddenly a car drives by, what kind of car? You look, it went too fast. How loud was it? Was the driver happy? Or suddenly everyone is playing bridge. I mean, I think that’s the card game. There are 4 of them, isn’t that bridge? And you’re wondering all of these things about, you know, card rules, and your sitter (the person getting a reading) is either sitting there staring at you while your face goes from puzzled to confused back to fear or there is deafening silence on the line so you’re just wondering, waiting, and they are too and mostly you’re sweating just like JESUS can someone just talk to me. Like in a sentence?
But once that string is pulled it's like an old doll that comes to life and you start sentences like, “I feel like she is happy to see you but comes worried about your Mom, there is some reason she should be worried about your Mom.” Solemn head nod or affirmative murmerings leads to the voice maybe piping up, the creaky voice on the ephemeral line says, “...My daughter is too upset about my death and her life is stopped in an unnatural way.” By now you know you don’t say the word unnatural like ever so you might be onto something, so next it’s - “By the way, I saw her drive by in a car.” And then you stop time in your image and like pinch zoom with your memory, the car is blue. And she loved the car, you suddenly just know, she loved the car. And you’re like, “OK, she LOVED this car!’ And your person is like, “Oh yes, she had a blue car, she did love it if was a Plymouth”. And then you think upon seeing her wave from the car, ‘Hey, nice scarf~!’ And now you’re cooking with gas, the flowers are raining down, the manna from heaven, words and symbols and yes even deliciously long sentences.
But god. Getting there. That anxious sweat. The fear of massive- cardiologists-calling-heart stopping failure is nauseating. A small animal runs by you. “Did you have a dog?’ And then you think, ‘duh! Everyone has a dog’. So you go through the thing again. Dog, what kind? What size, freeze frame the image. Curly or straight? Tall or short. You take a stab. Tall white dog, curly tail. But then the brain; ‘Shit! That sounds like my childhood dog. Did snowball just walk into this reading uninvited?’ And now they are going to think I have no idea what I’m talking about and I’m going to have to end this meeting in a shame spiral of sputtering and awkwardness. But. You never do that, because there is a dog. It’s white. It’s name is Horse or something funny like that. And your heart might slow down just a beat or two. I got the dog. I got the car. Ok. Ok. What’s the message?
And this is the part that comes through like butter on corn on the cob, like icing on a hot Cinnabon. It slides right into your mind through the warmth in your heart. You say, Your Mom says I love you so much. She says 'I am watching and I hear you. Please know that when you play my favorite song I sit with you in the car and cry too. Please know that when the windshield wipers stop squeaking, I did that. Please know that the cat is staring at my painting because I've asked her too. So when you wonder that, please don’t worry. I love you and I’m asking Oscar the cat to help me love you too.’
And then it's all so dang worth it, right? Like the reading started off slow and you hated your life and your desire to ever do this, but by this point everyone is crying and convinced of unity and grace and other things that have no other place to be outside of like church and orgasm, and even though your shirt is pitted and your stomach is gutted.
You’re in the right place. It’s a weird place, for sure, but it's yours.
