October 31 – November 4
Samhain, Celtic New Year, All Saints Day, Day of the Dead, New Moon
This is a time of endings and beginnings. A time for reflecting back and looking forward. It is a fitting time to say good-bye to our beloved house in Placitas. It was a hard decision that we wrangled with over a handful of months. I decided not to really tell anyone for several reasons.
One was that I was still processing it. I would say that I grieved over it. I loved the house and being in Placitas with the quail and coyotes, bobcats and wild horses, roadrunners and flickers. I loved the quiet and the songs the wind created in the pines. I loved having apple trees in my backyard. I loved the smell of rain on the sage and the majesty of the Sandias looming across the valley.
I had a lot of fear over letting go of the house. I had always thought this was my forever-after house. Just as importantly, this was where my art was born. My fence-post shamans seemed to have sprung from the land itself. This was where Silver Raven Shaman was born. Where I dreamed I had black wings and could soar into the sky. I was scared I would lose that inspiration. I wondered how I would create without my garage workshop space and the sound of solar-powered hot water coursing through the house like the blood in my veins.
The first several days to a few weeks of a new move are always challenging. Ours was no different. There were boxes everywhere. Simple tasks required going from box to box to box. My art supplies were boxed up and stacked in a dim corner of the garage. There was no time for sculpture or embossing. But art and creativity are everywhere…if you look.
I realized it was a time for a rebirth of sorts. A time to declutter and let go of things that no longer served me like old suits, books I no longer read, blankets that had been hidden in the linen closet. This decluttering also included some thoughts and beliefs. Moving gave me a new perspective on things, shifted the light, so to speak. The new house took on a new aspect. My eyes saw it as a blank canvas.
I took my old, plain bulletin board and painted the edges with a coat of chalk paint, then some glitter paint, and then a protective coating. Paintings and art got rearranged. Art that had been in a bathroom got moved to a hall. A painting that had been in the bedroom in Placitas no longer felt right in the new bedroom and waits for a new spot or to be reworked as ideas swirl ’round my mind. Art and creativity.
I’ve finally started unpacking my art supplies and setting up a space to create. Although I can see the Sandias from the new house, they are no longer up close and personal. Instead I feel the sacred presence of the Three Sisters. Quietly they call to me, waiting for me to find my hiking shoes and stick and make my first pilgrimage.