I embarked on a journey as one of 12 women, each of us strangers, to South Africa’s Londolozi Reserve. We were with life coach and author Martha Beck, part of her African STAR program. During our workshops, we’d set off every morning before the sun rose to explore the unknown, track the animals, drop into wordlessness and become one with the universe. When we’d return to camp, Martha would ask us to do a “three-minute capture”: to write down whatever thoughts came to mind of what we had just experienced. Here below are a few of mine. They most likely will mean nothing to anybody but me. And I love that.
Caregiver to all from age ten. Raised by a schizophrenic mom, then to raise a schizophrenic sister. Tried to control it all to my own neglect. Failed in so many ways. Work became my identity. I ignored the work that was – for me – natural and more play. I always worried and thought of the next paycheck, in preparation for the next shoe that would fall. Now I am finding myself adrift alone. No anchor. Both good and bad.
The sounds: the gnarls of the lions and their breathing and sparring. The sounds: the gurgling of the elephants slurping water, splashing it over themselves, and I think toward us to ward us off. The sounds: of silence with a stealthy leopard and the padded feet of elephant that you just don’t hear other than crackling twigs beneath. The sounds: of interference and noise, of people chattering, even whispering, trying to overpower the peace, along with the voices in my head.
A tree, half of its bark gone and red streaming down as if weeping blood. A tree, its reflection in the water, its other half not where it should be. A tree, sitting beneath her, a double trunk split: half smooth and strong and the other half wrapped up in a snakelike vine, constricting or trying to. And, yet, nearer to the top, the coils cease and the trunk breathes free.
Blah, blah, blah, blah: for the first part of this morning’s drive, this girl couldn’t seem to shut up. New jeep full of new faces and friends, but my voices said keep chattering and other voices in my head said to stop. But I was loud, so loud that I wonder if we couldn’t find the leopard because of me. Not until we hit the road with the water flowing, the sounds of that rushing water, did I quiet myself. My oneness of the morning: a lost opportunity.
We’re supposed to look at the path, but my soul is drawn skyward. Clouds. All day. I can’t help but see them, hear them. Big billowy frothy egg whites anchored by a grey purple table that seems too heavy to stay up and yet it does. The sun peeks through: awesome halos surround and shadows of dark and light play on the trees, the brush, the ground. We set our feet upon the path. One of the others’ shadow shifts and reveals our first rhino tracks.
One of the others finds a feather. A dragonfly watches me, opening its wings and seeming to point them directly at me. A green bird, an explosion of guinea fowl… I am drawn again to the sky and so, too, even with the leopards as they climb a tree, I feel light, connected, excited, and part of my tribe.
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