Porecelien and bronze God/desses

Bronze and Porcelein God/desses

Jeci and I are family. It started out as college friends drawn together by a force that has a million names. Whatever or whoever this force is in connects us by an invisible thread. The eternal dance of two entities: fire and air, earth and water. We feed and grown off each other.

Recently we were seperated by miles of ocean, her in Germany and I in the United States. The wonderful thing was, we had grown to be better friends, worldy partners, somehow closer from our distance.

I find the most amusement in our physical selves. Jeci is the earth mother. The all giving all loving tomboy, lover of red hair, men in skirts, and indigenous music. She is the one in moderation, the think before you leap, the surveyer of every option before taking the one with the best view, over the best deal.

I am the firestarter rebel-rouser, the girly girl who likes getting into bar fights, the painter of nails, and groomer of brows.

Jeci was the line holding me back as I charged into an altrication.

Funny to see how we have changed.

We both had painful physical and emotional times while apart and it seems by complete grace that we not only overcame the pain but came out better, albeit different people.

Jeci became a mother. A damn good one, but not without a little hit or miss. Recently she’d gone to Thailand to refresh her spirit, visit her father and just be Jeci instead of mommy.

I went to Minnesota to go through therapy for syringomyelia, to visit my Nana and remember who I had been.

For both of us it turned out to be skin-deep changes that quickly rolled up into a life overhaul. Funny how she and I always seem to do things in pairs.

For Jeci she learned who she was again, and who she wanted to be. She told me that she met women there who paid for creams to lighten their skin to make it more white. She asked me if I would send her bronzer to show them how Americans love tan skin. I told her to buy her own makeup. She took it to the extreme that only Jeci can.

She went from “If I brush my hair and have time to shower, good enough!” to 18 minutes in the morning until mommy gets her face on.

The irony is that as Jeci was blossoming into a painted pony, I was embracing minimalism.

I remember sitting under exam room lights being poked and prodded, and brought in and out of consciencnous. Slowly loosing my physical stregnth and memory. In Minnesota I realized that who I’d been didn’t metter anymore. Even if I had felt that I needed to put makeup up, it took up precious time that I could spend reading, or talking to my partner, or just thinking with my cats.

I became the “brush and go”

Jeci recently came to visit me and bestow Thailand elephant art and funky t-shirts upon me. She thoroughly spoils me the way only a soulsister can: Thouroghly without hesitation.

I told her about the story I wanted to write about us. How she wore lipgloss now. How I didn’t. How these small changes seemed to be bigger than they seemed.

She got this smug sneer to her face and got up. When she returned she had what appeared to be a small tackle box.

“Lip gloss?” she said. “I am too organized now for one lipgloss” she proceeded to show me 2 lipsticks, 4 glosses. Next pocket: 3 powders, and one liquid blusher. Next pocket: Sunless tanner, and powder bronzer. Final pocket: plastic gloves, eyeliner, and mascara. She also pulled out about 15 items that could be used as blush, lip and eye colors, and more “fun” items.

I sat shocked. Then slowly, silently, began to laugh. She turned to me shaking with the same silent laughter.

Later we surveyed my bathroom. Lip Balm, face wash, toothpaste, toothbrush, and deoderant.

In the shower there was shampoo+conditioner, a bar of soap and a loofah.

Everywhere else held boxes of medications, bandaids, and plastic gloves.

It hit me. Our priorities were changing, but Jeci had kids, makeup applied like artwork, a husband, and school. She had a home to make; she had started using what she’d learned to build upon what she’d been given. Pain had made her a different person.

I had medication, a partner, cats, and a volunteer job. But what had I done to build on what I had been given? The excuses to not kill my body with labor and barfights. The reasons NOT to have children, and a handicap parking pass.

What did I get? What was I supposed to do now?

I had been given time. Yet I hadn’t used it to build anything.

I still had my sister, but who did she have in me?

So I waited. Then by accident I read an article by a friend in the local paper. Another person was bashing him for having an educated opinion. My friend was very upset and didn’t know what to say. “How can I defend myself? I don’t have the words!” he’d said.

I was furious. Here was a good man, a rare man, being publically humiliated for having an opinion. A well documented and evidence supported opinion! I couldn’t well go beat the man up. So I fumed.

I sat down in front of my computer and wrote a rebuttal. I had no other mission than to give this guy a piece of my mind.

I sent the letter after my friend edited it for me and promptly forgot about it.

Weeks later he came running into my office. “Its in the paper! Your letter! They loved it and published it!” He showed me the paper. There was my story, in print, and being read by hundreds of people.

Weeks later proved that they liked it. I recieved e-mails, my boss read it at a staff meeting and people clapped. A local animal shelter asked me to write something for them. My friend offered to be my editor. People began to ask me “What are you going to write about next?”

It felt right. It felt like a logical question, what was I going to write about next?

I am a firm believer that everyone has a task. A task to complete for the greatest good. A task to maintain balance in life as we know it. Everything happens for a reason. No event is happenstance and we all have parts that we will play. Sometimes it takes some time before we get on the stage. But take heart! There are lines to learn, people to dress, and makeup to be done.

So maybe my sister is the one with the tacklebox to pretty the players, and the massage skills to help them relax. Further maybe, just maybe, I can be a writer for this play called life.

God/dess knows that this porcelien doll and her bronze sister have plenty of things to write about.

It takes all kinds of things to bring us from who we were to who we are, and furhter who we will become. Find your place, make your peace, and join the pageant. There is much to see and lots to do and there will always be a place for you.