I have always loved stories.

That subject line is worth repeating: I have always loved stories.

That's what we humans, do right?

As a child, I constantly asked people to read to me. I asked my grandmother to tell me the same fairy tale over and over (Hansel and Gretel, if you're curious).

Once I learned to read, I devoured books. All the classic TV shows of the 80s—Family Ties, The Wonder Years, The Cosby Show, Full House—I missed all of them. Why? I was reading stories. Or writing my own.

Stories have shaped my life, and not just fiction. My ancestors' stories. Stories from strangers. My stories, as I was living them. 

July is my birthday month. It's always a time for reflection. Aging is a wild experience that I don't take for granted. Death is guaranteed for all of us, but not aging.

It's strange, living in a culture so fixated on youth, to witness how people are conditioned to bypass so much magic and power.

I like having the structure of a calendar. But at the same time (pun intended), we're also always living in elastic, spiral time.

It's been a huge lesson to realize that certain things further in my past are more relevant and intense NOW, further away in calendar time, than they were when I was younger, when those same things were much nearer in calendar time.

It all goes back to stories, and how they've shifted in significance as I remember them.

This year, I've realized how rarely I actually share my stories. I have friends I met as adults, people I've known 10, 15, even more years, who don't know some of my most powerful stories. (Even my husband, when he proofread this love letter, only recognized about half this list.)

Things like:

~ My foreign language studies began in high school, and I've tried to sustain them since. I like to be studying a language at any given time (past: Spanish, Japanese; current: Italian, Sanskrit; future: Arabic). Last time I counted, I know at least 1 word in at least 1 dozen languages.
~ I won a prize at my first and only bungee jump.
~ In my karaoke days, I relied on the catalogues of ABBA and Madonna, plus 1 Christina Aguilera song.
~ At my only visit to the Louvre, I had a few minutes with the Mona Lisa, completely alone.
~ I got a driver's license in a country where they drive on the left.
~ I spent 2 weeks counting lobsters every day at a reef, as part of a marine biology research initiative.
~ I have spun fire topless, in front of strangers.
~ I once participated in a samurai battle reenactment.
~ The most powerful moment I ever experienced around democracy was with strangers in another country, celebrating their first truly democratic presidential election in over 70 years.
~ I have swum within earshot of whale songs, within close proximity to various kinds of sharks, turtles, and rays. No cages or aquariums—all in the wild.
~ While my peers hung out in internet cafes and expat restaurants, I spent a month of afternoons hanging out with a tailor, mostly talking about spirituality. He worked the whole time, and we had breaks in conversation when I needed to write.
~ I used my crap Japanese skills as a cover to avoid touts at a famous historical site in the Middle East.

And so many other moments. This helps me understand why I've never been into reality shows, how much I appreciate my adventurous life.

Recently, I've been subsumed in thinking how to share more of these stories.

I want to share the mirth and the wisdom and the challenges and the triumphs. I want to support awakening and activation, to spark the connections and love we're all craving.

I have a few ideas. So far:
~ Numinous Spiral, my tarot deck that shares my stories and prompts you to consider your own.
~ Sundaylytical, a space to share stories and center people whose stories are often dismissed. If you're reading this early enough, you can join us at 5:00pm on FB live.

Aaaaaaaaaand [drumroll]:
Archetypal Doors, a class I'm coming out of teaching retirement to offer.

Hang on, WHAT?

Yep, it's happening.

About what?

Refining intuition and encountering more synchronicities.

Oooooh, how?

By diving into individual and collective stories. More details coming to your inbox in a few days.

Because stories change lives and stories change the world.

One of the greatest things about me is my age. The older I become, the more easily I bend time and shapeshift and travel at will. The revelations and the magic just keep coming. I'm more grateful than I could ever express to be spiraling in this dance with you.

Toasting our tales,
S.

—
she / they
Siderealchemy