November has been an interesting month. We had about eight inches of snow one day, I had to shovel so we could get the car out, so much fun. I tried to remember there is always mindful snow shoveling - it’s all about aligning the movement with the breath. That worked for a while, but the heavy stuff that the plow knocks in the driveway takes so many movements and breaths that you get dizzy.
Later in the month, it seemed like the next week, there was warmth and sunshine, in fact I think the temperatures went into the high 60s even here. Then there was a 10 degree morning everything froze hard, and now it’s warming again. Up and down, what does that remind you of? Oh, life. I always remember what my brother said to me when we moved back from Alaska, ‘November is a hard month because it can’t make up its mind.’ In other words, November forces us once more to live in the discomfort of liminal space, the space between autumn and real winter. A space where the old can be comforting (a blissful autumn), but there is always the chance or the expectation really that the new will begin (winter).
What really hurts us is the loss of the light. It gets dark before dinner, unless we eat at 4 p.m. I guess I’m just not in sync with the November. I don’t go outside much when it’s cold and that causes me to loose connection with nature. That’s interesting because this month we’ve been reading many native American stories that are all about connection to nature. First we read The Legend of Blue Bonnet by Tomie dePaola. What a wonderful story of a young girl who gives up her most precious possession for the people of her tribe. There are so many wonderful stories retold by Joseph Bruchac. I especially liked Fox Song. It’s the story of a little girl who wakes up for the first time in her life without her great grandmother physically present. As she is waking up she remembers the experiences she had with her great grandmother while walking in nature, the taste of the wild blueberries, the feel of the birch tree, the sound of the river.
All these stories remind me of the intimate connection we have with all of creation. My friend Marge told me of a time she was meditating on the beach and how her breathing became like the ebb and flow of the tide. Jamie Sams, another Native American spiritual teacher says that when we connect with the rhythm of the earth, when our heart beats in union with the earth’s rhythm, then wondrous synchronicities will appear in our lives. Maybe I just need to go outside and sit in November for a while, even in the cold, and get in touch with what it’s trying to teach me. Maybe it’s OK to be in a space between, where it’s neither fall nor winter, but a space of just being. Larry Beasley sent me this wonderful quote from Seth’s Blog: “Qarrtsiluni….This is the Inuit word for “sitting together in the darkness, quietly, waiting for something creative or important to occur.” Yes, November darkness has a lot to teach us.