WORD SIGNALS
WORD SIGNALS/SYMBOLS
Pay attention to: names of places, objects and any word/words that catch your attention. Write them down!
For many years now, I have noticed that when I am attracted to a word that is the name of a geographic location or a business for example, things seem to work kind of magically for me if I follow the 'lead'.
All words can communicate meaning beyond the formal definition or typical understanding of them and my awareness of this keeps me current on new opportunities that just might have passed me by unnoticed otherwise. The opposite has happened too, when the name of a place actually repels me and I go there anyway, the best result I have experienced when that happened was... nothing at all occurred. In retrospect, I have seen too many times what I would have been better off not doing and I ignored it. I hope not to keep making that mistake. Indifference to a word has seemed to have a neutral effect, nothing magical or especially positive comes about but maybe I wasted my time thinking I was pursuing something when my attention could have been focused elsewhere.
The best years of my career in education came when we moved to a location where there were several places in the area I was drawn to because of the names of the towns and schools. I quickly had more than enough work to sustain me very comfortably for a long time, doing what I loved most.
MUSIC SIGNALS
Pay attention to: Names of musicians and groups. titles of specific songs, lyrics
Don't overlook things, especially if they repeat and/or YOU don't understand them. Notice and wait, the understanding will come.
Consider anything that catches your attention, then PAY attention to it!
Be open!
THE BLACK CROWES
2025 The Black Crowes "She Talks to AngelS"
We were in the car and this came across the Sirius screen: 'The Black Crowes 'She Talks to Angels' . It seemed very familiar and greatly upset me. I wasn't sure why. It was very disconcerting. I wrote it all down and forgot about it until a few days later, at a different time of day but in the same location I had been the previous time I saw it and honestly, it freaked me out. Then I remembered what I needed to recall.
My daughter shared music with me that she liked and truthfully, I would half heartedly listen to a lot of it because I could barely make out the lyrics and often the beat was kind of slow for me. It is likely I never listened to it in depth before, which of course now, I regret. The lyrics are what was important and I know why she shared it with me.. It was right in my face twice before I 'got' the message. I haven't heard that song or anything else by that group since then, nor had I prior to those two times..
BELLE and sebastian
2025 Belle and Sebastian
We were listening to a channel we hadn't heard before, and words 'Belle and Sebastian' rolled across the screen. Belle and Sebastian?! I didn't know until now there ia a musical group by that name. I immediately remembered the wonderful Japanese cartoon, Belle and Sebastian that my kids watched in the 1980's.
My daughter Kimberley loved that show.
June 6th was my great-granddaughter, Rhiannon's first birthday and I am absolutely sure that Kim sent be 'Belle and Sebastian' to remind me that she is here and also as a gift for her great-niece. I have a few stories like this one and it is taking me a while, but slowly, I am finding it easier to believe that my girl is still right here with me.
Ave MARIA
2012: Santa Fe The second time around
Santa Fe: NM I recall so clearly sitting on my loveseat in a Tacoma, WA condo, working online and responding to a post from a student about California mission churches. I love the mission churches of Arizona and New Mexico and no one had mentioned them, so I was posting information and links to Chimayo in New Mexico and San Xavier in Tucson…two of my very favorites.
I clicked on the Chimayo website and a local singer’s version of Ave Maria was playing. Ava Maria had never had any real meaning to me……yet I burst into tears and knew without a doubt I had to return to Santa Fe for a visit, not thinking about moving back. The first time living there had not gone particularly well.
This happened about a month or so before Mother’s Day in 2012. I called my daughter Kimberley and asked if she wanted to come with me. I felt compelled to go. Every time I listened to that rendition of Ave Maria tears rolled down my face and I felt it in my heart and soul…so deeply I just didn’t understand it yet I couldn’t deny the power it had on me. I was certain that I had to visit and we came on Mother’s Day weekend that year. When the plane was landing in Albuquerque, I had tears streaming down my face and again, I didn’t understand why. But, I honored the feelings and knew there was a reason…or more than one reason I was back in New Mexico.
We stayed in Santa Fe, visited Chimayo, and more. It was a great trip and we both decided to move to Santa Fe together.
Crazy me, I thought I had to own a house to feel like I had a ‘real’ home, and I found one that although I was initially resistant to for a few reasons, I bought. The floorplan was arranged so that Kim could share the house with me, but we each had our own areas…we shared only the kitchen and laundry. That house turned out to be a disaster and that was also some of the worst years of my life. It sold in March of 2016 and I still don’t regret one thing about letting it go even though I lost most of my money ditching it.
Kim met her husband there and it was in Santa Fe that she died.
Chimayo:
We both loved Chimayo and went there quite a few times over the years together. In 2022, I took a photograph of her in my arms as a newborn and gave it to a priest who put it up somewhere in the chapel. So, now Kimberley and I are there together forever. She would like that.
