November 19, 2024
Never for Money, Always for Love
Here in the Hedgerow, we celebrate our Scorpio kin (Chip, Jo, Carly) and welcome Pluto in Aquarius. The end of an era. The new visibility (because some of these ways are ancient) of radical community care, innovative economies, non-traditional ways of learning, electric insights and weird truths. The last time Pluto was in Aquarius, we had revolutions…And it augurs well for a little more exposition on what I’m doing lately, for those who want to know.
A lot of what’s going on can be summarized and sung along to Naïve Melody by the Talking Heads or whomever you want to hear giving voice to it.
I’m just an animal, looking for a home….
I’ve held this website since 2020 when I left MNW, and I’ve barely dipped my fingers into it. I had a whole lot of grieving to do, a significant bewilderment, a global pandemic, the birth of our first grandchild, the emergence of new guidance, plant teachers,, catastrophic illness in my kinship circle…it’s been transformation central around here. And never for money, always for love.
But money is part of it, of course.[1] Because money is part of everything, no matter what privilege or lack you’ve experienced. Because we are not self-sufficient, nor do we want to be. We want to be held in a web of material abundance. Because the thoughtful care of children—the vital spark of our species, from whence we all came, without whom there is no human future—is rarely recognized with a living wage. Because we want to honor the indigenous people who know and tend these lands and waters since time immemorial. Because we want those around us to have all they need, and we reject the ideas that we have to compete to get our needs met and that there isn’t enough for everyone and that billionaires deserve their wealth. Yeah, money is part of it, because we want belonging but we won’t sell our souls to earn it.
I’m not going to obscure the fact that this part of the transformation hasn’t been easy. One of the hardest things I’ve ever done in my life is to relinquish the gratification of being paid and having my work valued with money. I have worked for pay since I was eleven years old and it was hard, really hard, and it’s an ongoing challenge, to trust myself to a reality where nobody pays me for my labor, for my time or care or attention or intelligence. There was a lot of grief for me in the beginning, and anxiety about money and retirement and insurance and childcare and eldercare and the next big Pacific Northwest earthquake shaking our old bungalow off the foundation…and meanwhile I took care of my kin and fretted about monetizing my hobbies (there’s not much earning potential in cordage or sunflower seeds or poetry). But I have the moon in Capricorn (in the third house) and I know that it’s my responsibility to grow in understanding of value, tradition, security, and wealth, and I have, since 2020, relied on the support of my husband and kids to create sanctuary in my home to explore these elements. It was a huge shift, an abrupt reduction of over 50% of our income. We had to reorganize ourselves and take on practical responsibilities that we used to outsource and fully immerse ourselves in a kind of enlightened thrift by choice. We are choosing to downsize and curtail spending so that I don’t have to work for pay. Never for money, always for love.
The pandemic helped; everybody was changing. There was no business as usual. Everybody was working from home. And letting go of getting paid has healing in it too, and a freedom I haven’t known before. I began to see myself expanding into new self-definition. Self-employed. Homemaker. Artist. Quitting my job really changed me, and my relationships to my husband, my kids, my elders, my friends, my former students, my neighbors, my colleagues…and as time went on, the anxiety got smaller and smaller and my breathing got deeper and deeper. Dave was relentlessly calm and positive about it. We both kept realizing all of the things that were possible now that I was home. The self-care and the deferred maintenance on my own well-being was more valuable than my salary had been.
And so, when I turned 62 in August, I applied for social security. And now[2] I am paying myself for all the things I do, never for money, always for love. Being a wife, a mother, a nana, a sister, a cousin, a neighbor, a friend. Keeping a journal, which I’ve done since 1980. All of my wellness work and awareness practices and healing journeys. Taking care of Grace Hall and the half-feral Rain or Shine Gardens. And collaborating with my sister and brother to give voice to our stories through Sticks and Stones Press, our self-publishing company and kinship care collective. Dana brought forth the first book,[3] Amuse-bouche, using her pandemic relief money[4] and blowing our minds. Now all three of us have projects, separately and together. And getting this blog going is one of mine, because I need another space, a room of one’s own, so to speak, to help me give voice to all the love and questions within me. In the words of Hushpuppy from Beasts of the Southern Wild, “I want to be cohesive.”
[1] My friend Delila suggested I read The Soul of Money by Lynne Twist…only just got it from the library (it’s popular) but it’s so good and mind-expanding…
The Soul of Money—Buy the book
[2] Well, as soon as the payments start….of course there are snafus. This is America.
[3] https://www.amazon.com/Amuse-bouche-Taste-Melancholy-Dana-Huneke-Stone/dp/B0BQ9236GC#customerReviews
[4] A year after the publication, Dana was diagnosed with pancreatic cancer and since has been unable to have paid employment. Her Go Fund Me, https://www.gofundme.com/f/danas-road-to-cancer-recovery has been a lifeline, but that’s paying the bills, not publishing the poems, and the fund is almost depleted. She’s doing great, though. And I’m putting the cancer in a footnote, where it belongs.
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