Water

Phone reports that weather service predicts rain, wind, and frost tonight--all three. For me who has become wicked cold sensitive (as opposed to the usual "heat sensitive" that MSers usually are, which of course I also am; I seem to be Schrödinger's MS Patient) this whole "wicked cold" thing is keeping me inside. At most, I wheel myself onto the veranda, smell the air, feel the temperature, and zoom back inside... Although there have been days when I open the back door, take a hit off the air, and wham! Back we go. NOW.

Five-Element acupuncturists call this the season of Water. How he speaks of the Element is positively poetic... Read it, it will definitely send you down an interesting road.

As I told my own 5-E acupuncturist on Monday, I got a very clear "buzz" from Nature, this season... what came at me was the season itself saying, "I've got more important things to do than worry about making things pretty for you." He loved it, and laughed loudly. A really nice smile. And he definitely knows Water people... I guess I was right.

I, of course, am a Fire person. For years, I've just felt squashed by winter. Not a time of heavy power composition... I always used to spend the summer writing music for six-months-later Christmas. but that is the Fire season, after all.

But, as the Five Element folks will tell you, each Element exists within each Element; there is Water within Fire, and Fire within Water. If you just sit in nature and just pay attention, you'll feel it. This year here in Pasadena the unseasonably hot (100-degree days) that hit during the Earth season definitely had a lot of Fire within it, but I could feel it reaching for Metal, even for Water, as the wind changed. Every day is different. Every day.

So, today, I seek the Fire within the Water, yes, but all in all, if you'll forgive me mixing metaphors, I'm dedicating today to just going to ground. My wife is heading off with her mother, K-Mom is going home January 1 of all  things, boy will that ever be fun, I'm here at home and I am going to do nothing beyond as Gumenick says, finding the "dark, quiet pool within ourselves where our essential self-identity resides."

A friend may come over; he may not. I might call a different friend to come over; I may not. And he might not be available anyway, but that's on him. I might make some phone calls; various doctor's offices have called with questions, I need to answer them, but those hardly are places where my "essential self-identity lies."

My "to do" list today is very humble. I will feed myself properly. I will take my herbs. I will deal with the rigors of the Cath Club (next on my list this morning). Yeah there's business to do, but today, by priority is to do only that which strengthens me. As Gumenick writes,

A time for internal work.