Nancy’s Musings

Slow Dancing

I have had lots of time to sit aboard “Slow Dancing” to Nowhere....here in Jamaica....pondering life and bumping up against the places that my mind goes when there is nothing to do..... I was born out of the waters of my mother and set adrift into a world where I lived on land for 55 years. At age 55...after a long lapse between amniotic fluid and a chosen life aboard the waters of Mother Ocean...I returned to complete what was imagined to be mine in those first moments, hours and days after birth... Connection. What I found at Sea was the relationship that I had longed for all of my life. And where I found that relationship was extraordinary. Like the ruby red slippers....I was always there. The return to MY Home Port has been a breathtaking, heartbreaking, expansive voyage. At times with a “hail” of MayDay where the question asked is: “Is anyone aboard in imminent danger of loss of life?” My answer at times has felt like “Yes.” I believe the ocean is saltier and deeper for the time I have been living here. The amount of tears I have shed aboard my boat...this womb....of healing....are seemingly measureless.... The first “passage” most babies take is through the Birth Canal. It is an arduous journey where life and death are merged, lines are cast, one leaves safe harbor through uncharted waters, to a destination that is known.... the courage to leave the womb must be in that the knowingness that the Mother will be there to receive her newborn baby....It’s like there is a soul contract that occurs.... We have chosen one another....the baby sleeps to the mother’s heartbeat, swims in her uterus...is held in safety and trust....and as an in utero being - knows when it is time to let go...with the inherent belief that the voice and the heartbeat and the externalized smells of the internal experience will all be there to be embraced in.... Only that does not happen in the soul contract between a mother that relinquishes her newborn at birth... How could I plan a passage to an island....weigh hey the anchor....set off into the seas for days and weeks at times....through storms and calms....through sleepless nights and standing watch....to arrive at the destination...and the island does not exist? It’s unthinkable... Impossible... and yet... as an adoptee we Birth into a world where the destination vanishes before our very eyes...and we are left without a compass or any familiarity to navigate our lives...having been betrayed at the deepest level known.... But, what if the soul contract as an adoptee was in fact an intentional Life Journey for NOT the “chosen child” to complete a non Biological Family.....rather Chosen for something far more courageous....??

Clarity

When Clarity arrives - it is UNDENIABLE... "Names" are On my Mind today. I was born "Baby Female Bruns." I was placed for adoption with the "West" family- a "made up" name-with NO ancestry whatsoever. My Adoptive Father was born in 1927 as "Marvin Weisblum" and for reasons that are truly only known to him- and have been told in varying ways- "Post World War II and applying to medical school with an identifying Jewish name"; "a desire to sever from his own father whom he disliked"...he had a process in his life that came to this Clarity....In December of 1948- at age 21- Marvin Weisblum became "Michael West." And 9 days after I was born (5/15/60) as "Baby Female Bruns" - on May 24 - by virtue of being placed by my mother, Margaret Bruns, into the arms of Bernis & Michael West....I became "Nancy West".... Since I was 14 years old- I have sat in a therapist's chair or in intensive workshops- Deep Diving- examining, contemplating, integrating...my humanness.... Today at age 57 I claim- I CLAIM- my name as "Nancy West" with Clarity.... I claim a name that holds all the history that is a testimonial to my life....and holds the Energy of a lifetime of "adopting" names. I carry Bruns and Coker DNA...Weisblum cultural heritage and West Upbringing...Through Marriages I have taken other names and my children are a combination of lineages. All of that is True. I am a Dynamic Woman and my deepest values are in Truth, Liberation and Empowerment. What does Clarity look like for YOU??