Somewhere between Taxes and the Whispering Cottonwood Trees
A peacock sings down the road as the sun sets on a beautiful Spring evening, gentle breezes blowing papers about the desk when I left the door in the office open. Tomorrow it is supposed to be 85 and Thursday 95 degrees hot, leaving the newly leaved out trees wondering, along with me, what will become of Spring?
There has been a lot to think about this week as I muddle through paperwork, piles of papers, government forms and year-old bank statements looking for all the dollars and dimes hidden in them that need to make their way onto a spreadsheet that will “prove” those deductions against my income. You see, I have been self-employed since 1973. If I don’t keep track, no one will (except my amazing daughter who takes care of a lot of it now).
Uncle Sam has given me many ways to disclose and relay my information; those dollars and dimes and yet, every year I become, well, not me, this time of year. Yes, it is the last minute and I had gotten better at not pushing the deadlines but this year not so much. I would rather listen to the whispers of the cottonwood trees or dance in the rain.
Procrastination has come back to play with me for a while. Distractions and things I would rather do, jump to the front of the line all vying for my attention or push me into my comfy chair to ignore. I get grumpy, I get fearful I won’t have saved enough, I get worried I’ll get something wrong, and OMG get audited. Good grief, I do scurry down rabbit holes with such ease sometimes.
My brain takes leave of its senses and I find the numbers running into each other when the columns don’t add up. Heck, I might as well just guess and pray, and then common sense comes back and I re-add the numbers and they begin to make sense and fall into place in their columns to march off to the ‘taxman’ to explain their presence in this army of numbers. How’s that for a deluxe run-on sentence? Breathe… I don’t know how bookkeepers and accountants do it, but then maybe they don’t know how to make drums or paint their creative selves or listen to the songs of the cottonwood trees. Who knows…
“When a lot of noise comes swirling around,” Maria Schriver says in her Sunday Paper, “I’ve learned to take a beat.”
When the numbers begin to fight back, I am learning to take a beat, to be OK with an extension (after all, I’m almost finished with another book). Guestimate and pay, finish with ease then file and relax. Go sit under that cottonwood tree.
Waiting has been a challenge for me…waiting for the right time, waiting too long, waiting on someone or something else. Sometimes waiting is good, when the numbers begin to march to the beat of my drum instead of time, deadlines, and government forms.
What I have come to know this week, after a week of butterfly magic, is that I can understand the wind when I listen to the trees and the song of the peacock down the street.
“Life is throwing a lot on everyone’s plates these days,” Maria continued in her Sunday writing. “There isn’t really a roadmap for how to handle it all because no one has truly been here before.”
I wish for direction at times, to be young enough to depend on someone else to tell me what to do, how to be, what to think until I realize I am setting myself right up there on that familiar shelf when I go there, into those thoughts. Hell, (excuse me), the world, life, has always been and will always be changing; good, bad, indifferent, joy-filled, ecstatic, sorrow-full, growing, shrinking, expanding, bursting, and rebuilding.
I’m going to be a great-aunt again this year. The magic of life is alive and well in my family. Happy birthday today, to the best son in law in the world a mother could ask for.
Bless the tax man as I round up these numbers and corral them on the proper pages to gallop off into some other world of spinning 1’s and 0’s, to be approved or judged. It’s all good and beautiful and you wouldn’t believe how cool it is to type this while the evening breeze chills my bare feet, and the night sky turns midnight blue in the absence of the now gone sun, a crescent moon rising.
“You will get it done,” the cottonwood sings and the peacock crows in distant agreement, and I turn back to the numbers waiting under my elbow as I finish these Friday thoughts.
May Spring bring your release from the burden of your taxes, songs from the now green trees and baby birds cheeping from their nests waiting on their worms.
***
“Click here to get my Free Gift Living An Intentional Life”
Vicki Dobbs is a bold and adventurous warrior walking a path of heart to manifest spirituality in everyday lives. She opens existential gateways for individuals to face their challenges and embrace these tests as the great teachers that they are.
Her goal is to see everyone walk in beauty and balance every day of their lives empowered by the voice of their own authentic truth.
Through Wisdom Evolution and Sacred Wisdom Workshops, Vicki creates opportunities for others to make deep personal changes through experiential classes, ceremony, sacred art and story. She endeavors to inspire others to create their lives intentionally. Vicki is an Inspirator of everyday awareness, an Instigator of spontaneous stories and a Connoisseur of Creativity. Gratitude and grace sprinkled with humility and humor are the medicine she brings to the world.
As an Elder, Teacher and Entrepreneur, Spiritual Coach, Ordained Minister and Crafter of Sacred Art and Tools, Vicki perceives life’s journey as an ever-upward spiraling ascension of the human spirit leading her to wisdom, wholeness and authenticity.
Her experience includes being trained in the Harner Method of Shamanic Counseling and the Pachakuti Mesa Tradition of Cross Cultural Shamanism. She is a Graduate Teacher and Mentor with the Lynn Andrews Center For Sacred Arts and Training and has been the Administrator and Writers Guide for Writing Spirit, the School.
Vicki is also an Artist of the Spirit Certified Spiritual and Energetic Life Coach, a Graduate Mentor in the AoS program and a founding member of HeatherAsh Amara’s Warrior Goddess Leadership Team and Facilitator of the Warrior Heart Practice.
Connect with Vicki here on Facebook:
https://www.facebook.com/SacredWisdomTeachings
