The Windfall
On July 17, 1987–I will never forget this night–I had an experience that changed my life forever.
I was living in Inverness, California, a village about 35 miles north of San Francisco, in a forest on a peninsula that separates a beautiful bay from the Pacific Ocean. Having grown up in suburbia and then moving into the city, living in such a rural place was a radical departure for me. But two years earlier, I had woken up one morning and knew it was time to move to a place where I could experience nature more directly. It was so clear to do this that I got right up and went looking for a place to live that very day. Once I made the decision to move, everything opened up immediately, and I went from renting a tiny studio apartment in the city to buying a whole two-bedroom house in the woods, for the same monthly payment.
With the exception of going to Girl Scout camp for two weeks every summer from ages eight through sixteen, and an extra-curricular nature study course in grammar school, I had not directly experienced nature in my whole life. For the first time, I became aware of nature as something immediately present–it wasn’t “out in the wilderness” somewhere. For the first time, I experienced the natural progression of wild flowers appearing from nothing in the spring into full bloom and then disappearing completely until the following spring when they would appear again as if by magic. For the first time, my neighbors were deer and raccoon.
For the first time, I witnessed the whole cycle of watching green leaves unfurl from bare branches to their graceful flutter to the ground in the first winds of winter. A huge plum tree hanging over my cottage burst into pale pink blossoms each February to let me know spring was on its way and summer meant collecting blackberries for breakfast from the bushes growing wild in my front yard. Each day of winter was obvious as I shivered from my warm bed to the wood stove, where I actually had to light a fire for heat. The moon caught my attention too, occasionally shining through my bedroom skylight, as it made its monthly rounds.
I lived there alone and quietly for the next two years, without the constant activity of city life. I had never been alone like that before, nor had I lived in a natural ecosystem. I completely loved it.
On this particular night, the coastal wind was blowing harder than usual. It had just gusted up unexpectedly to almost gale force after a long period of summer calm. I went outdoors and felt it whipping around my body as the 200-foot trees swayed and creaked as if they might break at any moment. It felt very powerful to me, like a wind of change. Without thinking, spontaneously I said aloud, “All right, wind, if there is something in my life that I no longer need, take it away!”
Immediately, the lights went out–a power failure–but only in my house. I looked across the street and next door and the lights were still shining though the windows into the dusk. My assistant, Mary, was inside adding new names to the newsletter mailing list in the computer, and that went out also. Within a few seconds, the power came back on and we started up the computer again. No sooner did Mary begin to enter names, the power went out again. When the power came on, we loaded the list again, and for the third time, the power went out. We gave up for the night.
The next day I was out all day. As I was driving up the winding road to my house that evening, I suddenly knew that Mary had been unable to load the mailing list because it had been damaged in the power outages. Sure enough, there was a note waiting for me, with exactly that message.
I burst into tears. My whole business revolved around that list and I didn’t have a backup. Terrified and alone, I cried all night. I called every friend and family member and nobody answered the phone. I called suicide help lines and nobody would talk to me. I was all alone and had just lost my business.
The following morning the sun was shining, the wind was calm and I had cried all my tears. Only one option seemed clear to me. I said out loud, “OK, if I am not to do the work I have been doing, what am I to do?” And then, with utmost clarity, I became aware of the words, “Learn how to live in harmony with Nature, and write a book about what you learn.”
This whole experience was so dramatic in the way that it happened, I felt I had no choice but to follow this new path, even though I had no clue where it would lead, what would happen, or even what the next step was. But since that day, as I keep taking the step before me, the next step becomes apparent. And along the way, since then, my life has unfolded in wonderful ways I could never have predicted or imagined or asked for. I’m still working on that book, and every day I understand more about nature and become more able to write about it.
At first, I attributed this experience to something “beyond myself.” It was only many years later that I realized that everything that occurred was the result of my own command for anything I didn’t need to be taken away. And so it was.
I really enjoyed this story. I have one too about cars. In 1982 I moved from Monterey, CA to Houston, TX. I drove there in my little yellow VW Superbug. The economy was terrible and Houston had put a call out for teachers and I was one. I did other jobs at first while I was there because the pay was better. After 3 years, I got a job as an artist-in-residence at a small outdoor day school pre-K to 5 grades with a commission to do a large outdoor sculpture. My car had to be outside and spring and summer storms in Houston are full of rain, lightening and floods. We even went through a hurricane, Alicia while I was there.
I had to get repairs made on the engine, the car was 10 years old and had been across the country and back and half way again. After it was fixed, I was driving on a freeway at rush hour. I looked at the rear view mirror and black smoke was billowing out the backend plus red flames. I panicked, then found a place to pull over. I jumped out and a guy in a pick-up truck pulled over just ahead. He held me to keep me from going back to the car. Somehow the fire dept. was notified and while I watched the tires melt onto the pavement and the bright yellow paint turn into sooty black, I couldn’t help but stare into the front seats. After the fire was out, a lady cop came up from behind me and said, ” Looks like someone else was in that car.” She gave me a knowing look. I looked at her and nodded and then looked back in. I could have sworn my grandfather was sitting in the burned out car for a few seconds. The only thing left was my French book open on the back seat, the pages burned around the edges.
I have never replaced that car. I have learned to walk and take mass transit to this day. I moved from Houston shortly after that to Ohio then on to Boston. By 1989 I was ready to come home to Monterey and moved back here just in time for the Loma Prieta earthquake. Since living in California, I have moved from Monterey to San Francisco to San Jose where I currently live. Always I take mass transit or walk. When the hybrids came out I wanted to buy one, then the EVs started looking good. But I think I will wait for the hydrogen fuel cell cars. I’m an environmental artist and the life-changing fire in Texas helped deepen my awareness and added depth to my creative life.
Debra and S. Michele: You both are such BRAVE beings! I was just today telling one of my dear friends that I seem to get attached to certain THINGS especially when they represent love, security, or an answer of some sort. Debra’s story suggests that those things grow and change just as we do. But a person has to be SO BRAVE to let those things go. I’m not quite there yet. I admire you both so much.
Louise Rose
Louise ~ It did take courage to let go of the past and take a step into an unknown future. But the rightness of this was so strong that as a spirit I had no doubt but to go in this new direction.
There have been other times like this where I just KNEW as a spirit it was the right thing to do. Like shortly after I met Larry, there was a night when we were going to go out on our first real date. We had spent a a couple of days together with the mutual friend who had introduced us while he was painting my house, and he had come over to help me one day around the house, so we hadn’t spent much time together. I was leaving to go to England (this was right after the Windfall story) and I was thinking, “What am I doing? I can’t get involved with someone now. I’m leaving.” I called and left him a message breaking our date and then I went out for the evening to be sure not to see him if he showed up for our 6:00 date. At 11:00 I came home and he was waiting on my doorstep. “What are you doing here?” I asked. “We had a date,” he said. “I’m here for our date. Where have you been?” He wasn’t angry at all, just puzzled that I hadn’t kept my agreement. After I told him how I had been feeling earlier in the day, he said, “Do you want me to stay or do you want me to go?” As a spirit, I knew the question wasn’t do you want me to stay tonight or go home and come back another time. No, the question was, do you want me to leave forever or stay forever. I KNEW the answer as a spirit, no thinking involved. “Stay,” I said and so far he has stayed for almost 22 years. And our relationship has been way beyond anything I could have imagined at that moment.
Another time I made a decision to sell my house and move. I didn’t know where I wanted to move, I just knew it was time to leave that house. Larry and I decided to move to Florida. We had been here for three days on a vacation once, and decided to move here. We just packed up our things and drove across the country from California in a big truck. It was completely unknown and strange at first, but it was a completely right decision, made entirely from spirit knowingness. I left the security of my birthplace in California and went to the place where I wanted to be as a spirit.
As I grow as a spirit, the life that was defined by my upbringing or social conditioning or mental ideas just falls away and I define my life more and more as a spirit. At first it required courage, but now, it’s fairly easy to let go of the old because I am propelling myself into an exciting future that I know I am intentionally creating.
I’ve also learned that if I continue to create my future and allow things to grow and change, I have had fewer instances where I just lose everything. Losing everything seems to happen when we don’t follow our own spirit promptings to grow. Old structures have to change. We can change of our own accord, or wait until the old ways break. It’s a lot easier to be in control of the evolution of one’s life.