Job confirmed, to start Monday December 28, 2009.

I won't be around E2 nearly as much. TRY to look sad and bereft, just for a moment, ok?

One hour 40 min commute, assuming it's not icy. Well, it's only for three months. I need to get as much stuff done for my clinic as possible before then but all I want to do is celebrate, got the job, got the job. Hoorah! I was just a touch nervous (liar) because of the firing back in May and they wanted the name of my last supervisor, who, of course, is the one who fired me. On the other hand, how much bad stuff can they say if they employed me for 9.5 years?

I had a deep hug from a friend this morning, a long one. I had been reading sensei's work for an hour before that. I like the image of the nodegel and floating in it. While I was being held, I opened that door in my chest to longing. It is dark inside and deep. It expands outwards and I see stars, like the firmament. Supernovas, suns, black holes. It expands and touches all the edges of the universe and merges with it. And I feel connection, down to the tiny maternal mitochondria.

The mitochondria are maternal. They descend from our mothers. How many generations can you name, names of the mothers, of the ones your mitochondria come from? I can't name enough, yet.

I am always scared when I open that door, but Rumi's poetry inspires me over and over again. He says that longing is a gift to the Beloved and calls the Beloved. I'm always afraid of being lost or overwhelmed.

But as my sense of longing expands into the universe, it merges with it. Stars, mitochondria and nodegel. I have a sense of the infinite and the microscopic for just a moment and then I am back in my body. I am held. I am holding.

Happy Solstice.