Every night I dream about plants and herbs and preparing foods, it seems.  Last night I was making brown rice syrup, but in some beautiful, tribal, traditional setting.  I’ve been trying to figure out how to make it in real life because someone contacted me recently on the internet about a post I made two years ago where I was trying to figure out the process.  Last weekend I managed to create a syrup but it had a horrible bitter aftertaste.  I will try a new batch in a few days when I get more barley sprouted (barley sprouts provide the necessary enzymes to break the starches down into sugars).  The dream leaves me with the feeling that what I’m doing is important.  I’m trying to re-invent the wheel, basically—trying to rediscover traditional knowledge that, while it hasn’t actually been lost, is not readily available. It feels important, in this instance, not for cultural reasons but for personal reasons.  What I sense is that this process of discovery is teaching me things that are important to my development right now.

There have been a lot of interesting synchronicities in my life recently.  On Tuesday I was thinking about animal allies, and trying to figure out what my greatest animal ally would be, if I actually had one.  I know it would be one of these four: black bear, mountain lion, great horned owl, or eagle.  All four of those have figured into my life in various significant ways.

I was thinking about the eagle and how I hadn’t seen one this year.  The thought flashed that if this was my ally, I might see one in the next few days.

Driving home on Wednesday, Collin and I were crossing on the overpass just out of Brighton, about to get on the interstate.  Collin said, “Ooh look, Mom, a bald eagle!”  There it was, wheeling around on the currents created by the cars and trucks whooshing through the underpass.  It was practically at eye-level to us, just right off the north side of the overpass.

On the drive in I had seen two dead hawks along the side of the road and thought it was really odd—I don’t remember ever seeing hawk roadkill, let alone two.  It got my attention and made me think about the ally question again.  I guess it was a nudge to remain alert.  But actually, if Collin hadn’t been with me, I wouldn’t have spotted the eagle.  I had a splitting headache and was only focused on getting home.  So thankfully he was there and alert!

Birds seem important, symbolically, these days in the way in which they seem to bring earth and sky together.  And the weird way my hands morph into hawk or eagle wings and I see a hawk or eagle flash before my reflection in the mirror sometimes.  There definitely seems to be something I’m meant to learn from these birds.