News Flash: Hermit to Wed

I am participating in Leslie Avon Miller's six week program on Re-Freshing your creative practice. Each week there is a group phone call, plus we have a private blog and homework assignments too. This week we were to create a ceremony to wed or acknowledge or commit to our creativity. What follows is my ceremony.

(pre-ceremony photo)

from the Frozen Tundra Times:

Suki (aged 64), self-professed hermit, recluse and ordinary person as monk and mystic, came out of her ice hut seclusion today to announce plans to wed her muse (ageless).

Friends voiced surprise. "Suki has been single for years. I was just taken aback by the news," says Lucia Carruthers, a close friend and fellow tea drinker. "She tried marriage once years ago and has always said, 'once was enough', said poet Armand Flight. "She hates committing to anything. I can't imagine what changed her mind."

Suki and Muse will join hands in a brief ceremony later today. The bride is wearing her trademark red beret, her Ecuadorian rainbow jacket (thrift store $3.00), her black corduroy jeans (real store $80.00) and her black wool clogs. She will carry a bouquet of icicles and pine boughs. Music provided by Anoushka Shankar. Green tea wil be served after the ceremony.

The couple plan a quick trip to Brattleboro to cruse the shops, restaurants and galleries during this lovely January thaw. They then will return to their ice hut until the spring sun and flowers arrive.

Wearing the above outfit, I performed my wedding ceremony alone but for Muse, in the warmth of my kitchen. I created an altar of some numinous objects which I will keep on a side table for six weeks to remind me of my vows. The little statue is of Ganesha, remover of obstacles.

A bowl of snow which reflects the great outdoors at the moment but which will soon melt into water: rivers, streams, ponds, lakes and even the ocean, if I add a dash of salt.

Myself at 4? Keeping the child within alive.

Raku house and ceramic bird nest and eggs signifying my desire to buy and settle into a home soon. Where I can create to my heart and muses content.

The red heart I purchased from Leslie in New Zealand. I bought it for Mom's 91st birthday. She died several days before her birthday, but I had given the necklace to her early. The grey stone heart was sent to me recently by a friend. The amber heart is from another friend to aid in my house search.

The rings I have worn since I married myself two years ago. (Am I now a bigamist???) The plain ring I have worn for years. The garnet ring I bought purposely for my engagement to myself. These rings are now symbols also of my Muse marriage today.

(Photo post ceremony)

Here are the vows I wrote (I awoke from sleep this morning and dashed for paper as these words were already in my head):

Dear Muse, Dear Creatrix:

In joy and respect, I think of you today,
you who have led me to dance, to sing, to seek,
to embrace the gifts loaned to me
for my short journey on this earth.

I thank you for all you have given
ever since I was a babe,
through dark times, through light:
that desire to express myself
whether by paint or pen, by voice or prayer.

I thank you for your clarity,
for your mystery,
for your talent at sensing below the surface
into the depths, beyond the visible
into the unseen.

And I pledge to honor you
and care for you from now
until the day I pass from this human
form into the great grazing field of
universal consciousness.