FREE SPIRITS Dancing Through Life!!

It takes a LOT of energy for 'big' people to be Free Spirits - we go to lots of workshops, listen to zillions of CDs, meditate and buy books that give us all of the tips and secrets to be the FREE SPIRIT we are meant to be.  Well - I have been thinking a lot about this and I do believe we are missing the bestest teachers of free spirit that we have right before us all of the time...CHILDREN...they just have it and if we are not careful by giving them too many of society's rules and have tos - they will keep it.
Back to Greenville, DE and the Harvest Moon Festival yesterday.  I sat in my comfy chair, listening to totally danceable listening music and watching what was going on all about me.  This 11 ish young girl not only had the socks and colorful laces BUT her hair was red!  She didn't walk anyplace she went - she skipped and danced!!  Lesson 1!

One of my favorites was this total delight.  I was looking soomewhere else and all of a sudden, I looked over to my right and saw this persona - another 11ish one - spinning and twirling to the music and to the music in her head as well!!  She was graceful - she was dancing - and she was totally being HERSELF.  Notice the hot pink shoes. What 'big' person would wear those because they would be 'uptight' about the shoes not matching the dress!  Yeeks!!  I finally had to go over and meet this lovely.  I shared that I loved, truly loved her free spirit.  I asked the name that went with it and she prompty answered PRINCESS MADDY!!  She was into her role.  I acknoweldged and greeted her and then asked what name might be on her birth certificate and she promptly told me she was Madeleine ???  (I didn't catch her last name and that is not important to this story!)  She had a cool mom and a younger brother too - would it be fun to adopt and be Nana to them!!

Wait - there are more of these nymphs / free spirits about.  This one - 5 ish was twirling in her pink tutu dress and having a grand time.  What thrilled me the most was seeing her mom put her things down and join her daughter for together FUN time!  No telling her to be still or sit down (I did see one mom who kept pinching her free spirit's arm and pulling her back to the hay to sit down - oh restraint on my part to not go and punch her out - and her little one was a 3ish spirit and totally having FUN!!)  Yes, I had to go over to this mom too and thank her for being so awesome a mom!!!

Catch the look on this face - yet one more of my role models and she kept parading back and forth and back and forth along the hay bales - doing really well at keeping her balance too!!

The last one to share this post is "Little Barbara" - she was a total delight - talking early and always exuberant about life around her - asking questions and wanting to know!  Sad was she heard, "Why do you ask so many questions?  Why do you have to know so much?"  For years, she let the FREE SPIRIT she was go within so she could live in the world where she had been born.  But thank goodness it has NOT been lost forever.  As she/me has gotten older - there have been a lot of changes - Martie, photography, family, nature, life experiences, cross country adventures and more to come.  The challenge - totally releasing the free spirit that is without concern about what 'they' think.  It's a forever learning experience but as I sit and watch these children at festivals and just out and about, I realize that what makes me special is my CHILDLIKE WONDER - I haven't lost it, just reacquainting with it!!  As I say - WOO HOO!!  Life is to be lived and it is a dance!!!

Exploring GRATITUDE

Alli Anne and Molly Rose - also known as Allison and Martie - have been friends for many years.  Sometimes they were professional colleagues who did training workshops together.  Sometimes they were friends who laughed and sang and were joyful together.  Then came retirement - came about differently for each of them.  They started a few ideas for projects together but a better decision was to just be friends.  That could work.  They were the same in some ways but in so many other ways, just being friends was an easier way to dance together - and that was good.

So on their journey to being friends, they decided to go on an adventure.  They had created key ingredients for relationships and thought, "Why not see how many towns we can find that have the same name as the ingredients?"  Thought it would be easy - NOT.  Eventually AlliAnne searched the computer and the two decided on a Friend Adventure off in search of Gratitude.  It was on the map on the Cheseapeake in Maryland.  Did they find it?  Well, one discovery is that there is no town with that name although it is on the map.  But check this out

 

They found the Gratitude Marina in a small town right near where Gratitude, MD should have been on the map!  So one discovery was that it existed...sort of.  The real treasures is that they truly understand that Gratitude is NOT a place to be found as much as it is located within them and in relationships with the world.
  

Walking on a beach they saw an older couple pushing a stroller and walking a dog on a leash.  Look at these faces and see what Gratitude is all about.  This couple has rescued and adopted four daschunds.  Alli Anne and their owner talked about puppy health - see Alli Anne cooks bok choy daily for her dogs and so does this owner.  There was so much of the day that gave them messages of gratitude - weather - good food - great conversations with people who might have been strangers and then a visit to Chesapeake City.

Both remembered the little ice cream place by the canal and thought - in their childlike enthusiasm - "What a great way to end the day...ice cream!! "  They gave not a care to the fact that sugar is not a good friend for either of them BUT in the short run they had gratitude that they got favorite ice cream flavors and sat out by the canal watching the boats and ships of all sizes coming by.  A favorite to be sure - the teeny tiny tug guiding the giant car carrying vessel up and under the bridge out to sea!

So lesson learned...many lessons learned.  Best of all is to realize that GRATITUDE is NOT a place but a feeling of appreciation for each and every little things - each precioius present - that life gifts us with.  It's a simple no brainer - sometimes we just forget so it takes an adventure like this sometimes to guide us gently back to reality.