REVERB15 (Day 2): Epiphany of loving rocks

SPRAWLED ON THE CRETACEOUS SOIL OF THE BADLANDS. This photo taken by my paleontologist husband, Chiboogamoo, in July 2014 in Montana, pictures me, Hallelujah Truth, relaxing into a landscape where dinosaur bones of mothering dinosaurs are weathering out of the surfaces beneath me. I have painted characters from my "Cosmos of Hallelujah" on top of the image to incorporate the depths of my psyche with deep time of the Earth. (Collaboration by Tony Martin and Ruth Schowalter)

REVERB15 (Day 2) PROMPT: What surprised you this year?

Dear Readers, fellow Pilgrims of Life, many things caught me off guard this past year. Some were unpleasant, like my dear friends Chris and Mark leaving our beloved city of Decatur, Georgia, and moving northward to New Jersey and artist friend Cecelia Kane making what seems to be a permanent move out west to Portland, Oregon. How terribly I miss them. Others surprises were delightful like the flow of love that continues to well up and out of me to the world as a result of the "forgiveness" work I've been doing in my life. But the one surprise I want to write about today for the second day of REVERB15 is the discovery I had about a specific connection I have to our glorious EARTH.

Let's call her MOTHER EARTH!

THE RISING. After months of creating images of an archetypal mother nurturing Hallelujah Truth at the beginning of 2015, I experienced a psychic rebirth. This younger version of Hallelujah emerged with the mother no longer being human but being MOTHER EARTH. This dual emergence surprised me powerfully. (Art by Hallelujah Truth, aka Ruth Schowalter)

In the past, I would balk when asked by others which elements of the Earth I felt most connected to. Oceans and lakes or mountains and deserts? Water or Land? Fire or Air? I LOVE them all. End to my answer.

In 2015, my past experiences from the time I was a child to the present with rocks, minerals, mountains crystalized. I LOVE ROCKS. Their vast and varied shapes, colors, and surfaces. The way they feel under my feet and against my body. The way mountains create horizons holding the sky and earth. The rich information they hold about TIME and all of CREATION. Is it any wonder that I married a geologist/paleontologist? 

EPIPHANY AT DAVIDSON-ARABIA NATURE PRESERVE. This past May, I had my epiphany about how deeply in love I am with ROCKS at this nature preserve a 30-minute drive from my home in Decatur, Georgia. (photo by Chiboogamoo)

In May after our trip to Golden, Colorado, and before Chiboogamoo's foot surgery, we ventured out for a hike at the Davidson-Arabia Nature Preserve, a quick 30-minute drive from our home. It was there on that warm May afternoon, that I had my EPIPHANY of LOVING ROCKS. POP! And like that I knew I was in a deeper stage of love. Mature. Ripened. An emotion that took a life time to cultivate culminating in a moment. I danced then and there on behalf of my relationship with the ROCKS.

Oh there is more to tell how I spent a life time coming to this realization. And even in the months before my embodied knowing, my knowledge and experience of how we humans are connected to the earth was deepening and growing. In conjunction with going to Dinosaur Ridge in Golden, Colorado, with my dear paleontologist husband to look at dinosaur tracks, I was also reading Malidoma Patrice Some's book, The Healing Wisdom of Africa.
 

DINOSAUR RIDGE, GOLDEN, COLORADO. That's me with my Chiboogamoo on my left, and another paleontologist on my left, Martin Lockley. Where we walked, the dinosaurs walked. We are all connected. (photo by Karen Chin, another paleontologist).

Alice Walker describes Some's book as "The way back to the memory of who we once were; the way forward to who we are or might become." Between my physical experience of walking on the same rocks that the dinosaurs walked and reading about nature, ritual and community in Some's book things were congealing for me to have my epiphany.

EMBRACED BY NATURE. Hallelujah Truth embraces herself while being embraced by nature. Where dinosaurs walked, we walk. Through time--deep time--we are all connected. (Art by Hallelujah Truth)

As I conclude this blog post and get ready to head to Florida from Alabama for my Uncle Ken's funeral, I feel a deep connection to my ROCKS, the Earth, to you all. Blessings to you all!

That's Coffee With Hallelujah! SOUL BLOG with me and tell me your own answer to the question: What surprised you this year? What do you think about my epiphany? What is your connection to the EARTH. How do you know?