It is not by chance that I posted a picture of Mae West and a few days later a short essay about George Raft. I did not know the connection between them then, but after some research and reading his biography I came to realize the relationship they had with each other. This is how synchronicity works and for them it is also about a deep love.
May West is overwhelming sexy. She is a classic vexing iconic blonde bombshell. George Raft is the sharp gangster. He is a tough guy with a chaos deep voice, so unique and enduring he defines a generation of look and style. For us they go on doing this with endless images, films and books. The thought of them together as lovers and friends is the enhancement of romance. As a sensitive person I feel this is the story that I am procuring about them.
In silent films, Charlie Chaplin’s character, “The Little Tramp,” often used a side glance to convey his mischievous and playful nature.
They both died within days from each other; ending up lying in the same morgue alongside each other. This was not planned by them. It could be just by chance that these two iconic film stars came to lie together like this. I can say from a physical perspective it may be true, but for me chance has no say in this; I know that there is no such thing. Their story and death has meaning to me and says something beautiful about the two of them.
I am reflecting upon a film that is about another great love story. It dreamily reveals my intuitive insight about Mae and George’s love story. It is the film The Ghost and Mrs. Muir. It is about a ghost and living woman who fall in love. It is a humorous and titillating story. The actors are not Mae West and George Raft but what happens at the end of the story is my focus. Mrs. Muir lives her life and at the very end of the film we find her siting in a rocking chair. This is where she dies. In this scene we see the young Captain, the ghost, walk up to her and reach for her hand. He pulls her up. She is now also a ghost. The two of them, youthful and beautiful, are together once more and so a new journey begins when they walk away together.
I envision this same scenario for Mae and George. As I look down I see the old age, sickness and death of Mae and George, but as I look up I see two lovers gazing down then up into each others eyes. They are youthful, beautiful and together again moving onward and beyond. This is what I see in the best desires of my imagination for them.
To look at old age and death as a sad and lonely time is to miss the point of life. Waiting is sometimes the price that true love pays. As we grow older the mind naturally goes inward. Reflections and images become stronger. Mae and George live on in our memories and I would not be surprised, but delighted, if more synchronicity mysteries come forth for me about these love birds. It really is a wonderful thing for me to see. This type of information is not so much linear; But comes in a roundabout imperfect way and it grows as leaves on a tree, or slowly collects as dew on a petal.
This is the lesson they’ve taught me…this is the meaning of this synchronicity about their love.
This got me thinking about the continuity of an image. An image can fly around through many cultures and not really be understood, even though it sometimes carries great meaning, wisdom and insight.
Hudley Watercolor
As an older woman I find nothing in my current culture to affirm what I am going through, which is menopause. I look at the celebrities and they all practice yoga and get plastic surgery. Most of them all look the same. When I look at ancient or archaic cultures, I see women statues of big bosoms and round behinds. Some are smiling like Sheela-na-gig while holding their vulva’s open for all to see. I get confused.
I cannot talk to my mom because she is dead. My sister raced through menopause due to chemotherapy, so she does not really have to play the waiting game; something a woman goes through, wondering, what in the hell is going on?
(I must say in retrospection that both my mom and sister had their own suffering and were waiting to attend to with what they went through. It is different. I don’t know if either of them wondered about menopause like I do now?) All my grandmothers are pretty much dead or beyond reproach. I do not have a real tradition passed down to me. No old women sitting around the campfire telling me their wisdom women stories. So, I went looking.
My education is rich, and I have studied many cultures. Mostly it is the great erect patriarchs, histories, and mythologies, which are floating around in my brain. Occasionally a matriarch pushes a couple of men out-of-the-way like Cleopatra or Inanna the Sumerians Goddess; but this is rare. The Thirteen Grandmothers of the ancient Native American culture are extremely helpful, yet not really something that has overwhelmingly screamed to my ovaries.
I have found that it is a bird that has come to initiate me into my lost women mysteries. The owl has been with me all of my life, even when I was growing up on a wild hill in Woodland Hills. I remember hearing the hooting of the owl at night. I recall seeing a white owl in my twenties in Whittier while taking a walk on Easter day.
I remember the two owls perched on a tree at the medicine wheel gathering in Santa Rosa. The medicine man told me not to look at them.
“I would not look up at them very long, they are very powerful beings.”
Their eyes were like molten lava. Their image burned in my brain.
At home I have a plastic owl on the tallest metal racks in the kitchen. The kind of owl you see in gardens or on tall buildings to keep the others birds from pooping on someone’s property. The owl is looking outside. At night I can see it’s reflection on the widow looking inside at me.
I have been studying the Eleusinian mysteries for many years trying to understand them. Yes, this mythology is a good one. The archaeology is fab and it is as old and ancient as women. It isn’t telling its real mysteries to a patriarchal culture. I am only finding out now that the owl does have a story to tell by these mysteries.
I have learned that in part of the Eleusinian mysteries women would wear large coins on their heads. They would tie them on their heads and drink fermented drinks as part of the initiation. The image on some of these coins is the owl. I studied this ancient image and then I rendered this image on paper with my own hand.
This got me thinking about the continuity of an image. An image can fly around through many cultures and not really be understood, even though it sometimes carries great meaning, wisdom, and insight.
Who first saw this owl? They saw it, drew it from their imagination, and then a coin was created by casting the metal into a mold. This is the process of seeing, imagining, and creating.
Is it by chance that this image has flown from antiquity onto my wrists as tattoos?
Is there a place where the old women still meet around an ancient fire?
Is the continuity of an image as an owl, the ancient symbol of female initiation, my participation in this waiting game known as menopause? Is an ember of the fire still warm and are the ancient women telling me now their stories …if I take the time to listen? Or am I only melting into goo on the floor, that will soon petrify and with time fly away into dust?
I only have a copy of this book from the library. It is one of the most valuable things in my heart.
I like this man because he attacks perfection. He attacks technology and he attacks big egos.
I think everyone should read this book. Blake is a humorist; he is very esoteric and clever.
He knows human nature best because he shows he has been burned emotionally by friends.
Betrayal is the great realism or knowledge of the heart.
Blake includes nature and art. What a remarkable creation. Why are all the interesting people dead… well maybe not so? I feel like he is around when reading his work.
Get it and make some wrinkles in your clothes. Go out and misspell something. Be imperfect in grammar and voice.
But never-never be insincere, greedy, or inhuman.
Read. Intelligence of the heart is the game he plays… and you got to have one to play Blake’s game of intelligence…brain, heart and honesty and William Blake.
I find so much decadence, arrogance and lying in the world today…How comforting it is to have Blake in the world to read.
Image of Beloved Huckleberry a Flipside Catby Joy Aoki
The 1980s:
Cats are a part of my life. They always have been and always will be. This is a short story about Buzz the grey feral cat. He is surrounded with a cloud of mystery and synchronicity. I do not know what became of him. I trust that my ex-husband and staff took good care of him after I left. Buzz was last visited at my ex-husband’s house about 22 years ago. As noted in the image above. At this time Buzz did not accept me anymore and so I let him stay.
Cats are transitory little beings. Domesticated cats are 10 % wild and 80 % domesticated. Buzz was 90 % wild and 10 % domesticated. He grew up to be a hide & seek cat. He was not social with humans. In the mid-1980s, he was my cat and came to me only. I was about 80 % wild and only 20 % domesticated. Buzz and I had a lot in common. So, the story goes…
Once upon a time there was a highly intelligent cat named Sir Huckle Berry Finish Raoolish Maximus. We called him Huckleberry or Huck for short. He was a gift from our photographer friend named O who hung out with the punk band M.I.A. Huck was a grey American short hair. We loved him.
One night we had a party at the house. I left to go get some more party supplies. Huck got out and followed me. On the way back I saw him lying in the street near my home. It was a hit and run. We took him to our veterinarian. They did all they could do to save his life. He passed away. This was an incredibly sad time for me.
I watched a series on Nick at Nite Nickelodeon called Route 66. The original TV series was aired in the 1960s. The main characters Tod and Buzz traveled the land in their Corvette sports car. One day at the local thrift store after the death of Huck I found a vinyl LP called George MaHaris Sings. On his album George sings Moon River.
“Two drifters, off to see the world.
There’s such a lot of world to see.
We’re after that same rainbow’s end, waitin’ ’round the bend.
My huckleberry friend, Moon River, and me.”
The song Moon River is the song that inspired me to name this cat Huckleberry. I did not know that George MaHaris sang this song, but he did play the character Buzz on the series Route 66. I felt captivated by Huck when I found the LP. I listened to the song over and over and cried. I missed my Huckleberry! I did not know it then, but two cats and a song were about to make my life come together in a remarkably interesting way.
The same day I found this LP I later took a walk and noticed across the street some kittens and their mama sunning their bodies. I thought this was cute. Then I noticed that it was right across the street from where Huckleberry was hit. With my eagle eyes I focused in on a little grey cat. This kitten looked just like Huck. I was amazed. All this coincidence hit me hard it had to mean something.
What could all this mean? The record with Buzz /George MaHaris singing Moon River, the place where Huck died, and the little grey cat across the street, all came together through the process of synchronicity. I then planned. The next two weeks I studied the mama cat and her kittens. I saw a pattern. They lived under an older house on the street.
They only came out at certain times for a sun bath, sleep, and play. The kittens always stayed awfully close to their mama.
I then made my move while the feral cats were sleeping out in the sun. I walked down the street, crossed, and slowly approached the cats. I quickly grabbed the little grey kitten and made a run for it. That mama was on my tail for three blocks. She yelled like a wild animal. She clawed and bit my feet and ankles. Then she gave up. I do not blame her, but her wild little grey kitten was mine now!!
It took some time, but the grey kitten learned to love his new home. We took good care of him. The other cats became his family. I named him Buzz or sometimes Buzweld when he was bad, which was not very often.
Rosey, Buzz and Hud 1990.
Joy Aoki
Joy was known to dance with us round the wild circle in our living room at Halloween parties, and we did the same at her Otis College dorm.
I think it was 1985 when I first met Joy. She was at a rather small punk gathering. She had a camera and awfully long hair. Hanging at the punk scene is always a great way to meet other punkers. We talked and grew to enjoy her company. I remember the gifts she gave me. One was a blue masque she made in art class with blue feathers. Very Mardi Gras!
“I made this for you Hud!”
“Oh, OK!?”
I really did not know what to do with it. I was embarrassed. I took it and kept it for many years. Another gift she gave me a few years later, that I still have, is an image of a flying Ostrich with an Asian/ Indian woman riding it. It is a large art piece that I have framed. It now hangs in my bedroom. I enjoy it immensely. It is an encaustic painting on a silk material. I guess these gifts were her way of wooing our friendship into existence. It seemed to work. Joy worked her way into the Flipside house and became a punk woman of integrity. Her art, shit work and journeys with us to gigs amplified the Flipside crew experience and we all enjoyed her presence.
We met her while she was attending High-School, and then she went onto Otis College of Art and Design of Los Angeles, and then to the prestigious Art Center College of Design of Pasadena. Yes, she grew up right in front of us developing skills I can’t even imagine.
I did not ask her about her family, but she told us stories. She volunteered her time with us, so I figured if she attended college her expenses were all paid for. She was not the struggling artist, and she was not guilty or shy. One story she shared with us is about the relationship between her parents and the atomic bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. Her parents received yearly health-screenings because they moved to California after the war. My dad is a purple-heart veteran that served in WWII. He bombed Japan. Forty years of time and once known enemies are now friends. Amazing!!
It was not easy making it into the ranks of the Flipside house. We had our tests. Joy passed them all and I am proud we were friends
2021: We have a kitty now named Mikey. He is a short haired grey cat, and he reminds me so much of Huck… so I thought I would share this amazing story about three cats …. they are so much alike… yet uniquely a part of my life…. at different times… I am not so wild anymore … about 90 % domesticated and the rest wild… kind of like Mikey.
Today was the day of the word hub. I define hub as a center of activity or interest, a focal point. Last night is when the word really started. A friend showed us a picture of the hub where he works. He used the word hub. I was interested in the word instantly. I have not heard it for some time but there was a little excitement in the word as he said it.
Anyway, the word hub made an impression on me.
Today the word came up many times while I was reading. I will focus on three of the most interesting places the word hub emerged into my consciousness. We call them aha moments.
I was sitting on a chair at the local Jr. College waiting for my son’s class to end. Enjoying the time near a tree I was studying my book Jung, Synchronicity, and Human Destiny by IRA Progoff. I was intensely focused when that word popped up. I thought that was an odd word for this writer to use, this book having a copyright from Delta Books 1973.
“The specific role of the archetypes in synchronistic phenomena seems to be to serve as the constellating hub of a situation across time, and to be the factor of inner orderedness that gives the distinctive set to the situation.”~ Pg. 135
Later in the day it was rather off time to be reading the Los Angeles Times but the day was running slow. My kids were playing games and Mr. Husband was hogging the computer so I turned to some news for no reason. I read an article about the unveiling of the new park Grand Park of L.A.
To city leaders, Grand Park provides this new community with much-needed open space, a respite from the grid of city life as well as a hub for community events.
Front Page Los Angeles Times, Grand Green Dream, Paragraph four.
Then believe it or not about three hours later I almost tossed the paper in the trash when by chance while separating the advertisements from the rest of the paper the LA EXTRA fell down on the couch. This tends to be my favorite part of the paper, so I sat down to read it. I was totally amused when I caught sight of the article on page AA 3, Condom Measure Put on Ballot. I had to laugh when I read what Supervisor Gloria Molina said on the subject of condoms and pornography which was next to the last paragraph of this article,
“It doesn’t apply to the San Fernando Valley, which I understand is the hub of where these films are made.”
I am now taking a breath and realizing that within the hub of understanding this word hub I was in fact in the process of a synchronistic phenomenon experiencing a hub of a word across time.
Seriously how wild is that?
(August 19th 2012… my sister told me that our Grandmother on the paternal side use to hold her arms and hands up in the air and say “Hubba-Hubba”… and so this synchronistic phenomena has its charm )
Notes from the Book: Jung, Synchronicity and Human Destiny~The Archetype of the Magical Effect
Reflective notes:
Archetype of the Magical Effect
Thus I have found the diamond within this book by Ira Progoff. Jung calls it the Archetype of the Magical Effect. To understand this concept one has to bring up the background of how it works. This is a beginning study of something that intuitively is part of us as human beings. Some are more awake to it than others. This is not a good or bad thing, a smarter or more gifted thing, or anything like that.
It is based on curiosity and the desire to focus on something that I find fascinating, and to explain feelings and ideals I could never quite grasp before.
I would like to start with what Carl Jung says about us as human beings. He says we have four levels.
1. Ego Consciousness which is at the surface.
2. The Personal unconscious which is just below this.
3. The Collective unconscious which extends for a great dept below this. It is called the transpersonal level.
4. The Base is called the Psychoid. This is the level that is the very realm of nature itself
Next is the idea of self. Jung calls this the self r and the self R.
The Self r is the ground of human reality. The basis for all the phenomenon that the sciences of man undertake to study.
The Self R is what ‘Leibniz’ called the pre-established harmony. The Tao. It is the encompassing unity in which and by means of which the macrocosm and the microcosm participate in each other and specifically by which the ultimate realities of the universe are expressed and reflected in the life of the human individual.” (pg 113) (Neoplatonism… maybe?)
Now with the above information one can grasp a better understanding of the archetype of the magical effect. Also one needs to understand numinoisty. I will call it a place of the supernatural. The below quote describes the archetype.
When a numinous event occurs, therefore, it draws a large concentration of psychic energy around it. This energy constellates around the archetype symbol that is active as the effective center of the experience. A complex, or cluster, of psychic contents is thus formed at this point. As the energies available to the psyche are drawn together in one part of the psyche, the other areas are left more or less depleted. (pg 109)
The blend is genius
In conclusion I find this a very fulfilling exercise in trying to understand this experience. Archetypes are numinous and correspond with nature, human beings and the universe. It is an all inclusive correspondence and we all have the ability to become aware of it and this helps me to understand better my place in the whole of the creative universe. It is empirical and far-reaching and magical. The blend is genius.!!
Quotes from @ Jung, Synchronicity and Human Destiny by IRA Progoff
The other night at the local Pub, Scotland Yard, my friend, an expert toxicologist, was talking about synchronicity. She seemed a bit frustrated about them. They were happening to her a lot and she did not know what to do about these experiences.
“What do they mean regarding to me?”
She affirmed many times that evening.
Telling me that many synchronicities happened to her in one day, one right after the other.
I spoke.
“You know you have heard about multiple orgasms? Well, when that many synchronicities happen in a few hours or minutes; I call them multiple synchronicities.”
The pub was loud, but she got the drift in what I was saying. These synchronicities are extraordinary experiences found in simple things around us that have symbolic meanings absolute to us personally. Now how can that be, that is just strange!
I was extremely interested in her conversation. I used to have a lot of such experiences. I was glad she brought it up, the subject, because I did not often talk to others about it. I found my answers in books. Carl Jung the Swiss psychologist and psychiatrist who founded analytical psychology; and the Medicine Wheel, based on the teachings of Native Americans, have both been major sources for me. They both teach us about synchronicity!
The medicine wheel looks at synchronicity as a coincidence. I was taught that coincidence has great meaning, and one should take notice of them. They are more than chance.
Jung refers to synchronicity as more than causality. Jung coined the term, and it was based on a visit he had with a scientific community.
Albert Einstein was in attendance, and he had an enormous influence on Jung. Jung seemed to need to incorporate this concept of synchronicity within the rationalist scientific community. The five senses are especially important yet there is another sense that needs to be included that was more than the usual idea of causality.
Recently I viewed the film, Forrest Gump. It took me many years to see the film. It was a highly published media movie. So, I tend to somehow reject this. Anyway, after seeing the film again I realized something. At the end of the film Forrest gives a wonderful definition of synchronicity.
“I don’t know if Mamma was right or if it’s Lieutenant Dan. I do not know if we each have a destiny, or if we are all just floating around accidentally-like on a breeze, but it is both. Maybe both are happening at the same time.”
The proof is found in an extraordinary way that the character of Forrest Gump lives his life. He lives a life of synchronicity.
To me the heart and the mind need to be at a place of balance and our insect antennae, like the intuitive praying mantis, need to be up and aware and open to a new type of living. Somehow this is when we are balancing experience with emotions and intellect. It is letting the feather blow around you and then grasping the notion that something special is being revealed just to you as an intuitive pat on the back.
This little essay is based on a night at the local pub that took place a few weeks ago thanks to a master toxicologist.
This entire process has led me back to Carl Jung and IRA Progoff and his book entitled Jung, Synchronicity, and Human Destiny. They have led me back to the I Ching. A book that gives one understanding based on ancient principles of synchronicity and Taoism.
In this dream I came upon my cat Flash trying to jump up to capture and then eat a big beautiful white Praying Mantis. She was resting on some crawling rosemary in front of the house. I was focused when the Praying Mantis spoke to me,
“Do not be concerned with me and what the cat is doing!”
I was concerned because I witnessed the eating of a few Praying Mantis this past summer.
She whispered to me,
“I am a huntress too!” Cat and I both hunt for food and that is a wild part of our nature.”
I then realized the truth of what she said. She was not afraid of my cat nor was she afraid of death.
“I know your cat. He has been hunting in this garden for many seasons, as my family has. Didn’t you see one of my babies eat a butterfly?”
I had to agree with her, and I was not pleased with that.
Then a breeze blew on us and she spread her white gossamer wings and flew away. I awoke remembering this dream.
The Crystal Bowl
When we first moved into our house I was amazed how the pesticides used created such an imbalance with the insects, birds, and animals in our garden. It took me many years to reach the balance that I have today.
We once had an avalanche of crickets and black widows galore. Yet with time I befriended the Praying Mantis.
This is a short story about my first encounter with a Praying Mantis. The Mantis has helped in the balance of our garden without pesticides.
One day while dusting the house, I dusted a big crystal bowl on the kitchen table. It was usually filled with fruit and vegetables. I looked outside the French windows and saw a big golden Praying Mantis resting on a white plastic chair.
She was gazing in the house at me. Every day throughout the summer Praying Mantis would come to visit on the chair. I did not know the focus of this Mantis’s gaze. I thought maybe me. I soon found out what it was.
A few weeks later I dusted the crystal bowl and reached behind it. I heard a loud screaming shriek. Looking with amazement I found a Praying Mantis there. I looked around and saw that the door was open to the back garden. She came into the house to be near the crystal bowl.
The light of the multifaceted crystal must have fascinated this, Mantis.
This is only the beginning of my many experiences with the Praying Mantis from my garden. I think our life together, on this planet, is about nature and the changing seasons.
She shows me the cycles of life, death and rebirth and affirms that I have nothing to fear!
Her name has come up here and there over the last few days. I am happy to have found her. So many elements to her ways ring true to me. Poetry, the underworld , the cauldron, love-death-rebirth, maiden-mother-crone-…
I am very in tune with her and she seems to know me better that I do her. As I am wandering through the dark forest of menopause. I am transforming and changing, stretching and aching. I have reached the second return of Saturn.
I am 54 and I am at that place of the mystery of women. Passing the tests of time of experience, of knowledge~ maybe too I have passed her tests. I hope so. It is not so lonely now. I am ready for storytelling, sharing and learning.
I am not a big follower of Sigmund Fred but I must admit that he had a great understanding of culture, the unconscious and the shadow. His argument is that when society is given a place of immunity, or a place to play without any moral responsibility, wild things will happen. Jiminy Cricket is not always hanging on one’s shoulder when it comes to the seduction of the dark side. This is in what it is to be a sexual animal that we are with the temptation to ignore any responsibilities that we hold dear to others. This is because we don’t think we will get caught! No one is perfect. My point being it is dirty politics to use this against people in power. Politics, the armhole of power, is a place that I am sure attracts untold stories of seduction. I don’t feel that this should affect the career or performance of a politician or anyone for that matter, for it is a family affair. As a friend told me recently, it takes two to tango.
“In a sense you’re right. I think there is a way in which both black and white did regard the Bushman in his natural state as a kind of wild animal.But to do justice even to the unjust, as we are bound to do, I regret, if we are ever to understand this horrible business, by “taming,” they meant becoming “civilized” in the sense the term held for them at the time”
~ Laurens Van Der Post
I was given this book by my older brother Greg. He knew I was into the little insect called the Praying Mantis. A Mantis Carol is a deep, slow-moving and intense story about so many interesting elements of nature, a man, a woman and a Bushman. One becomes aware that the Praying Mantis is always lurking about in this story. This is not a lighthearted book but asks some extremely deep esoteric questions. It contains beautifully written words that bring forth images of nature..
