+ Her Barefoot Heart

from fallow to feisty

Crumblingwall3

if you’ve visited in the past week, you know i’ve been in a bit of a fallow. and before i go one syllable further, i’d like to say to those of you who offered me pills and to those who offered me jesus: i know you offered from a place of caring, and i thank you for that.

my fallow is not depression. it is part of my creative process. the word fallow, as you know, refers to land that is left unseeded for a season in order to replenish the nutrients and minerals that nature restores during the resting season. during my fallow i wasn’t wallowing or wasting time. i was resting. replenishing, reflecting. i was taking care of myself. and though i never know how long a fallow will last (it isn’t about calendar or clock time), i woke up yesterday morning feeling refreshed and, well, feisty. plentiful, too as the words just keep squirting out of every nook and cranny of my being.

they’re not just words but clear realizations that i’m now ruminating on. and in that magical way that we can’t (and don’t need to) explain, yesterday was sprinkled with random (in the sense that none were scheduled ahead of time) phone and digital conversations with women enjoying the same quickenings, awakenings, shifts, signs of confirmation from the sweet spirit of surprise.

i have to go spiffy up the house in anticipation of the arrival of friends, but i’ll be writing more about this over the next few days – the big picture and the specifics. perhaps you’d like to join me . . .

6 Comments

  1. Karen Sharp

    SO grateful to be moving in the same currents with you…

  2. Acey

    well i always get the sense that we are disembodied twins of a sort.  looking forward to whatever you share of your experience.  just jumped over here after answering one of your comments on my blog (glad Pearl Margaret rings some bells for you. she’d like that, I think …) and now will read a few entries.  just get out of my own head, and a little bit into yours …

    • whollyjeanne

      acey, we are definitely cut from the same bolt of cloth, you and me – something i find quite reassuring and comforting. always a quickening when i see your name pop up on my screen. with big love.

  3. Anonymous

    This is so awesome and so true. I think, sadly, we Americans expect our hearts and minds to produce like little relentless machines on an assembly line and then wonder why they break so easily.

    Every time I try to plow through life without a little fallow time, I end up with some horrid illness. Last time it was shingles — as warning from my body and my mind to slow the hell down. Thank you for sharing this. 🙂

    • whollyjeanne

      Shingles? Oh no. That’s painful and hangs on forever, but then I don’t have to tell you that. You are exactly right, my friend. When we don’t slow down and take our fallow time, our body rebels and forces us to.

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