out of whack

I woke up this morning with an out of whack perspective. Everything seemed not right, not good enough, too much, overwhelming. I walked out to the barn and felt like I might drop flat to the ground from all the things that needed to be done: more, better, differently.

The odd thing is that everything is the same today as it was yesterday, and the day before that.

I still have chigger bites. About 35 of them. The shavings pile is still low. New shavings delivery was scheduled last week for early this week. The horses hooves are packed with damp earth the same way they are every morning after a huge rain. The world is still full of midsummer insects that bite and sting. Our internet was out again, after a power outage yesterday evening. Nothing dramatic had changed in my world.

The only thing that shifted is my own perception. It truly felt like this little world I live in, the one I often write about with great joy and bliss, had become tilted in some way.

This is no great revelation - it's happened before, and will again, but there is always the need to remind myself that things have not gone to hell in a handbasket. It's my view of them that has tilted.

I don't know what actually causes it. It could be biochemical, hormonal, or energetic. Or all of the above.

I did morning chores, and came in for a shower. Our massage therapist was due at noon, and we honored the commitment we both made to Keil Bay last time - that we would be quiet and go slow for his massage. He was a fidgeting mess the first third of the massage. He finally settled down when she got to his back end. The final two thirds of his body he stood in a trance, licking and chewing, eyes glazed over with endorphin rush.

He has some body issues right now. I wish I could solve the puzzle for him, but mostly he seems content. I suspect the homeopathic constitutional is layering back through some medical issues from his past. We move forward together, one day at a time.

Today, after his massage, he panther walked to the water trough, got a long drink, and then headed out to the back field where he promptly rolled and then set to grazing. It was obvious that all was just fine in Keil Bay's world.

Due to the chiggers, which I Freudian-slipped and called "chives" - chiggers plus hives equal chives??? - we opted to do a 30-minute chair massage for me instead of the usual long hot stone massage.

Initially I was tight through the shoulders, which felt like Keil Bay's tension I'd picked up while standing with him during his body work. I talked for a few minutes but at some point I just disappeared. I had the sensation of leaving my body and then sliding back into it. But I was no longer "me." I was a turtle!

I was a turtle whose shell felt out of alignment. Something about the neck and the place where the shell hinges was off. I turned my turtle head back and forth and felt the tightness where the shell wasn't right.

Then suddenly I was on the beach. Back to my regular self, lying wrapped in a sheet in the sun. H's hands were warm like the sand, and the fans in the barn were the surf. There was something quite like an ocean breeze blowing through the barn aisle. I smelled the air and the sea and enjoyed the ambiance. The ocean has always been a healing place for me - the salt water, the warm sand, the mesmer-sound of surf and gulls. I was right there.

H. got to the end of the chair massage with a wisping touch I recognized as the final one. I breathed, thinking how nice it was to end my massage on the beach. But suddenly I was back in the turtle shell. And i realized that as relaxed as I was, the shell was still not right. I turned my head back and forth again. And suddenly H. put her hands right at the base of my neck, on the upper shoulders, right on the part of the shell that was pushing wrong. She put fairly intense pressure on that area and the shell clicked into place.

When she asked "how are you?" I came back to my body. Everything was right again.

The turtle image was so amazingly perfect for how I felt. My little world off its hinge, then righted.

And my time on the beach was just heaven.