Soul Widows Spiritual Retreat ~ Six ~ Saturday ~ Breakfast, Talking, Angels, & Art Therapy

after my morning meditation, i went inside and joined the women for breakfast. we laughed. we rehashed what we had talked about the day before, at supper, and the night before. we enjoyed the feeling of family, of belonging. here we sat, different ages, different family situations, different everything and yet we knew each other's pain. we could tell when something had affected one of us. the mention of a song. the worry when a text message would chime on someone's cell. we were sisters. Hans Christian Anderson could not have written of a tighter group.then it was to the alcove.

candles on the shrine lighted. a soothing song played to calm ourselves, to center our thoughts to why we were there. we had some serious talking to do. our grief counselor knew she had to take our fragile selves to some very difficult territory, but she was there with us with the fire of her spirit and reminding us over and over of her presence.

she is not magic. there is no magic to be found when your husband dies. but she is there. we sobbed. we broke down completely, but we did so in the safety of our tribe. we did so beside the warmth of a fire in an inn that has stood for over 120 years. we did so with our Fiery Fairy letting us know she was not going to leave us there. she could not stop us from breaking. we will break. but she was not going to leave us there with platitudes. she has been where we are. she has experienced great sorrow in her life. she never left us.

so maybe i was wrong. maybe she offered a little magic after all. for staying with someone who feels broken beyond saving takes a little bit of fairy. it takes an openness to the eternal to sit there and not want to run. our grief counselor never budged no matter how bad the pain in our voices got.

bless you and thank you. you know what it means to us and that is the point, isn't it?

then lunch and after lunch our art therapist came. first she offered angels. angel cards. select one and then speak to it. i got Synthesis. i did not want it. it is boring to me and i wanted to talk about tenderness, or communication, or delight, or Creativity. hey! i am creative! fate on a 1 " x 3" card. ah, well, maybe the angels, or the card company that makes them, is trying to push me in a new direction. the art therapist, Diane Strazzer, tried to push me into elaborating, which i did. but i was a pill a little bit. but even in that, that is a step for me though i do not think she thought so.

i am the woman who raises her hand to speak. i am the woman who will not send food back that is wrong. i am the woman who lets people walk all over her, so being a little bit of a pill about not getting the angel card i wanted made me feel like i was still alive a little bit. i also knew that my tribe would agree with me. so i smiled inside. there is life in the 'ol Bun still. bring on the black leather and a Harley! i am ready to join the 2%!

but then it came time for ARt THeRapY!!!!!!! i love glue and scissors and paper. i love being creative.
we made books; journals to write in. oh, baby, i know how to write. the cover was to be a collage to speak to our grief. what we want to bring to it, or get out of it, or, you know, all i heard was glue and cut and sew the pages and grief and husband and i was off.
we got messy. we laughed. we chatted. no pressure. no depth unless it went that way. i love making things. i love, love, love it. the glue bottles were clogged which is no problem. unscrew the cap and it is time to get sticky. gosh, i love to glue things together. creation at its most basic. little kids have all the fun.

i know i got focused though. i got worried about getting certain images in on my paper. moon? definitely. and a flag. one of the women, the Goddess Diana, had found both and when she gave me the picture she had cut out of the National Geographic of a full moon, i sobbed. she knew what it meant to me and she just handed it over. she gave me the moon. sisters do that for each other.