Women Who Run With The Wolves, Part II

Every once in awhile, when a certain mood comes over me, I must pull out my copy of Women Who Run With The Wolves; close my eyes, open the book and read what is on the page.  I absolutely LOVE the way Clarissa Pinkola Estes, PhD, creates such inspiration with her writing...

From Chapter 13, Battle Scars: Membership in the Scar Clan...

" Tears are a river that take you somewhere.  Weeping creates a river around the boat that carries your soul-life.  Tears lift your boat off the rocks, off dry ground, carrying it downriver to someplace new, someplace better.


There are oceans of tears women have never cried, for they have been trained to carry mother's and father's secrets, men's secrets, society's secrets, and their own secrets, to the grave.  A woman's crying has been considered quite dangerous, for it loosens the locks and bolts on the secrets she bears.  But in truth, for the sake of a woman's wild soul, it is better to cry.  For women, tears are the beginning of initiation into the Scar Clan, that timeless tribe of women of all colors, all nations, all languages, who down through the ages have lived through a great something, and yet who stood proud.


All women have personal stories as vast in scope and as powerful as the numen in fairy tales.  But there is one kind of story in particular, which has to do with a woman's secrets, especially those associated with shame; these contain some of the most important stories a woman can give her time to unraveling.  For most women, these secret stories are embedded, not like jewels in a crown, but like black gravel under the skin of the soul..."

I find myself crying more than I usually do lately.  I think it is due to the emotional detachment/mourning to this place, this home I have created for my husband and myself.  In many ways, I will miss it.  I'll miss it, like, when we remember a special memory, of a special time, with a certain significance. I long to be around my daughters.  I miss their laughter, watching their expressions when they talk with me.  I want to see my youngest daughter's body grow and change, now that she is pregnant with her first child.  I was there for my eldest daughter with her first, and I want to be close with her too.

I think of my grand sons, and how I marvel each time I travel to see them in California, how much their faces have changed, matured and how much taller they are.  I HATE the fact I am so far from them.  I think of my Dad, resigning himself to the black hole of Alzheimer's and knowing he is disappearing a little more every day. Time is so precious.  We realize that when we age.

I think back to the river of tears I cried when my husband came here to Nevada, for a job interview, five summers ago, and was hired. Those tears of mine where joined with the tears of my eldest daughter who had just had her second son.  She cried, fearing her sons would not know their grand parents.  When I told her it was also my fear. I did not want my grand sons to forget us either, we knew we would make it work...and we have.  She is wonderful about keeping us informed of what they are up to, and the cute things they say...we talk nearly every day.

Those river tears brought us to a better financial place.  My husband had been out of work. I did not have to work, so I was free to travel back and forth to visit my family.  They came out to visit and we made memories and happy times.  We made the best of it.  Now, it is time to go back home...

This book always brings back bittersweet memories, for it helped me through some difficult times...I know my place is back in California, closer to the little ones, who carry on our future.  If I need motivation to help me to get organized and give me the momentum to get this house on the market, de-cluttered, sold, and to find another house to make into a home... their faces will propel me on to make it happen, despite my weary bones...