I find myself flip flopping between a sense of purpose and full blown depression. This time last year, My Beloved had a major health crisis.  He had decided with the assistance of doctors to stop taking a certain medication. And it turned into a total and complete nightmare. For both of us. I had encouraged him in this experiment and had no small bit of guilt about it when things went horribly and terribly wrong. Four days before Christmas, he disappeared. I had been worried before but I was beside myself at this point. 

A couple of days later he called me and told me that he was leaving Seattle and going home to his family in Minnesota to recuperate. He didn’t know when or IF he would return. I’ll never forget our last night together before he left. He wanted to sleep alone. Neither of us slept at all. Neither had been sleeping well as it was but the stress made it impossible. Finally, just before the first glimmer of dawn, he joined me on the sleeper sofa and we held each other until daylight. We tearfully opened presents and at mid afternoon I took him to the airport and watched as he walked away.  With his medications in his bag and both our hearts breaking.  It was Christmas Eve.

He didn’t return until mid February and honestly until that last week before he returned we still didn’t know if he would. But the medications had begun to kick in again and we both had hope.  I was taking medication for my peri-menopause and managing emotions better by now too.

This year has been incredibly topsy turvy. Lots going on. Most of the hard work I’ve been doing has been inner soul searching. Finding my patience, my balance, my strength, and my love. Trying to live in love even when my heart is breaking or I’m mad as hell, usually both.

So here I am. It is 3 days before the birthday of my son who I gave up for adoption 26 years ago. It is 4 days before my brother arrives from France with his family. It is 5 days before my father’s birthday. It is 6 days before the anniversary of my beloved Nana’s death on Christmas day.  It is 5 days before the anniversary of leaving my love at the airport.

While I’m trying to stay positive about this new experiment we are living, some old stuff is coming up. I try to stay in the moment, out of fear (fear is the mind killer and the soul stealer). I keep asking for guidance from Hekate in particular. The loving and sometimes stern grandmother Goddess with the flaming torch to guide me through my descent and ascent through the Underworld.  Again.

And every day, no matter what, I get to see that torch. I wake up in darkness, my heart pounding, tears close to the surface, doubt and fear and worry plague me. And Hekate shows up almost immediately to light the way to brighter thoughts and brighter deeds.

This morning’s bright message was that both the Beloved and myself are in the middle of our midlife passages and transitions. Suddenly I had something to work with. Something to research. Books have been found.  I find myself able to live in love again.

Love is not the answer.  It is not something you attain and then you move on to another question.  It is simply the assignment, life long.  I try to revel in this most blessed opportunity to continue working on the love assignment.

Last year when I was hanging by a thread, I sought to find Jeshua, the energy of Jesus who M.B. (and now I) cherishes.  I got very still, opened up, found Jeshua on the spiritual plane and I asked him.  “What can I do?  I don’t know what to do.”  Very clearly I heard:

Love is easy when it’s easy. The challenge is to love when it is not easy.  It is still the assignment.

From Tom Robbins:

When two people meet and fall in love, there’s a sudden rush of magic. Magic is just naturally present then. We tend to feed on that gratuitous magic without striving to make any more. One day we wake up and find that the magic is gone. We hustle to get it back, but by then it’s usually too late, we’ve used it up. What we have to do is work like hell at making additional magic right from the start. It’s hard work, but if we can remember to do it, we greatly improve our chances of making love stay.