moving madness and emptying the nest

For your info, we are moving next Monday, so my office has been packed away into a multitude of boxes too heavy to lift (full of books). My good friend Shelley helped me pack on Friday, or it might have taken me a week just to finish the office. I start reading stuff, deciding whether to throw or keep or recycle......I still have essays from my BA at Concordia (belatedly returned to school in 1986, graduated 1996 with an MA in English).

The house is looking very disorganized with piles of stuff and boxes half open everywhere, as I flit from room to room. I think the best part is finding old kid's drawings or pictures of them in pre-school, and not being able to remember that far back. Was it only 12 years ago we moved here? Now they're bigger than me, and choosing careers, off to university soon (not yet, though, not yet!). A big dose of nostalgia in all these boxes....and a lot of the past to let go of. That seems to be a theme, ever since Kripalu weekend with Marcela Lobos, cutting away the past, letting go of negativity, welcoming the present; welcoming joy. I'm surprised by how joyful I feel about this move.


Three of my sisters came up from Ottawa on Friday to help me pack, (first we sang a lot, and drank a few bottles of wine).... and it's been very comforting to have help, something I never would have asked for, if people hadn't offered. A 5-bedroom house one has lived in for 12 years, and grown 2 kids in collects alot of 'stuff'. The theme is 'empty empty empty' and that's what we're doing - Nova and la Fondation Quebecois, plus a few nephews and nieces are inheriting what can be reused. It's good to know that as we are ending that 'childhood and baby' phase, they are just preparing their nests for future little ones.

Speaking of little ones, I think the cats are starting to wonder if we've taken leave of our senses.....and perhaps they will have a hard time getting used to the new place, so we'll have to keep them indoors for a few days. They love this house, this yard, this cedar hedge full of birds.
We loved it too. The only reason we are moving is for an excellent view of the water and sky....otherwise we would have stayed put. Except for the lake, the cedar shingles, the calmness of the sky in the morning mist. I guess this is a rite of passage too, this letting go of one phase of parenting and where we lived it out, and welcoming the new phase, (almost empty nesters).

So, pardon my absence for a while from this blog, I'll be taping, stuffing, dragging, and re-organizing in the new place until next week......and back at ya, sometime in November.

hasta la vista,
jenn/musemother

Words from the heart

When the heart speaks....

Become quiet
and in that quietness,
a voice begins
to call. I hear,
but not with these ears.

When the mouth is moving,
the heart is silent.
When the mouth becomes silent,
the heart begins to speak.

When my ears are listening
to other sounds,
the heart is quiet.
When those sounds stop, the heart
begins to say what it has to say.

When I dance for the world,
running here and there,
doing this and that,
the heart is silent.

But when I stop -
then the heart begins
to dance

the dance of joy.


adapted from the words of Prem Rawat
by Jennifer Boire

Dear readers, I have been silent on the blog, but my heart has been very active! We had two wonderful visits to Canada from Prem Rawat, also known as Maharaji, on the Words of Peace Global North American tour. Montreal and Toronto were both sold out events, and I was caught in the whirlwind of preparation and conference organizing.

Suffice it to say, that there is no deeper well of wisdom on the planet right now than the words coming from this wonderful man.

I invite you to click on www.wordsofpeace.ca to hear him for yourself, although nothing can compare to seeing him in person.

The gift of knowing how to go within is what he gives, not just words.

enjoy the fall weather, the colours are magnificent, without and within,
musemother