I remember that only two months into the pandemic, friends here would say, “things are going back to normal soon.” I knew that they weren’t.

Once Upon a Time, there were characters here that I would meet and write about. I met an Earth Angel while I was doing a demo for my broth. He was reading a book on the inside tables. Since then we’ve taken some twists and turns. We visited each other often here, sharing and mentally working out life. Our last day here was a couple weeks ago before he left LA. I sat down next to him and looked straight ahead into the glass windows. I listened to him for a few minutes, he listened to me times 3. He’s on his way to live in a Yurt up North. I talked his ear off, and without a breath, spontaneously turned around and held him tight, my face hiding over his back. Tears burst out of me. I’m happy and sad when the old times dissolve. “I hoped you wouldn’t come so I could just slip away,” he said as tears dripped down his face. I needed him like I needed a hematite stone, and that’s what I handed him when he left that day.

There was a Dragon here. The kind of Dragon spirit who disappears. I had another Dragon spirit before, so I was prepared. We experienced the most blissful 2 hours once sitting by the bushes with popsicles dripping down our hands on a hot summer day. All the chaos of the world just dissipated for that moment, we were so present. The last I saw him he hugged me better than he ever had, like the way my Grandfather hugged my Son the last we ever saw him. The dragon did what no one else had done when he hugged me. He held my hat at the moment I hoped he would so it wouldn’t fall on the street. No one else cared to do that. He was a challenging character who threw my sensitive nature in a spiral, but I really cared about him. It seemed like he didn’t care so much about honoring sacred things, though he saved my pink hat from falling so that was something. My carefully chosen hats are very sacred and he knew that. He never tried to take it and put it on his head. His silly baseball caps wouldn’t have that anyway. Though, he often joked that my hat was my need for protection. I ran away towards the door from the parking lot, and blew him a kiss when he said, “I love you so much”. I walked in the door with a bearded friend who for years has been one of my top supporters for Soup Sorceress. I turned around to see the Dragon drive away in his speedy Tesla. He was waving goodbye to everyone. Symbolic of all the characters in my realm, I knew in that moment, that: That was all folks.

And there were others. Today, I’m facing a lot of sadness. Maybe the loneliest I’ve ever felt. They all disappeared. 

Now I’m experiencing a taste of normal. And not the kind of normal people keep hoping will come back. It’s not because I took off my mask and talked to someone. Or invited a friend over by the fire and shared my crazy delicious homemade chocolate cashew cream pudding. Or shared my homemade cashew cream pumpkin ice cream w/ shatavari and reishi, sweetened with maple syrup. Or shared my tomato and herb soup with skullcap.

It’s a taste of normal because all the lively spirits that I gave fun character names too are gone. Erewhon is desolate. They removed the tables. The old characters melted away in different types of ways, like cotton candy people. I’ll never remember the title of that kids book. It had a creepy ending of the family next door who was acting normal and suddenly melted at the front door because they were actually cotton candy people. The story really effected me when I was 8, and now.

As I mourned the melting of old characters, I ignored a few new ones. I just couldn’t bring myself to answer their messages.

I had a favorite dress and now I don’t wear it anymore. I have a new dress, and I’m better than ever.

Here’s to normal things, like spinach, and keeping healthy, because that’s always been my goal no matter what story I’m creating, “A Healthy Earth”.

Inspired by questions in a Rumi poem.

I noticed the empty floor.

I heard the sound of nowhere.

I admired the way synchronicities flowed for me here, and I intuitively knew who I would see.

I was astonished when everyone left.

I wish I could see the child who asked to see me.

My tender heart is drinking years of loneliness.

I thought they were ridiculing my every move.

The most wonderful part was creating a new outfit every time I fell down and re-birthed again and again.