Transcription
Around the Cosmic Campfire by Tony Wright
Chapter 17: Some Really Short Shorts
Story Four: Annie Wilson
One week, I had been struggling particularly deeply with the fact that my daughter was still having so much trouble recovering from her kidney transplant six months earlier. We had been challenged for eight years with her illness, which turned into kidney failure. We were both quite exhausted from the never-ending fight to keep her going on dialysis at home every night. It was seemingly slow post-op recovery. My grown son, Russ, had come home and had been ill from taking some powerful antibiotics; his life was collapsing around him. We got him better and back into his life, but none of this seemed fair, and health issues and ensuing financial issues were taking a toll on my family.
I remember feeling that my heart was just breaking. It was breaking for my son, who was losing his business due to his health issues. It was breaking from my daughter, who had lost her career and the better part of any quality of life for eight years. It was breaking for even myself, as I had laid down my own life to carry out once again motherly duties day after day, this time for adult children, and I was exhausted. My heart was breaking for that same daughter who now had developing heart issues from her kidney disease. My heart was breaking for the loss of my partner, who left me when my daughter had to move home; he felt it was the best thing to do, and I truly honored that. I didn't know what to do, but my heart felt like it was being torn out of my body, and I hoped I was not about to have a heart attack. I didn't want to think that, of course, and tune that into my radar, but I could not get over the feeling like I had been closed down, and I needed once again to be fearless and to open my heart. Everything about the heart was coming to light during that time; I was certainly focusing on my heart. It was just that moment in time I would awaken at three in the morning and panic thinking about my heart.
Then one day, I got a call from Winona's assistant that why I wanted to come for bodywork and was going to bring a friend if I had time to work on both of them. I was delighted. We made our arrangements. On this particular day, I greeted Y on the front porch, and they both came into the house. She introduced me to Anne, and I looked at her and didn't know her but thought she might be some big real estate agent in our town and was so very happy to meet her; and she was a bit familiar. Sometimes I am a real idiot. I went to the powder room, and I was making lemonade for Y and Anne when I asked why what Anne did for a living; it seemed like I knew her. Winona looked at me like I was just cracked in the head, and she said, "That is Ann Wilson of Heart." I blinked. I had no words. "Heart, the band, you know," she patiently repeated. I blinked again. She repeated, "You know, Heart, the band." I was stunned. I could not believe it, mostly that I had been ridiculously nonchalant at meeting her and even put extra ice and squeezed a lemon under a water with my bare hands. It was inconsequential to me that they were clean, but now that is really treating a musical dignitary like Anne as a home girl. But there it was—informal Heart.
I had not been able to stop thinking about my heart during that time: my daughter's heart, possible heart surgery, my broken heart, everyone's heart, and Heart was here, escorted into my house. It seemed to be a theme. We had an afternoon of amazing spiritual conversation on the screened-in back porch, and I felt like I'd known Annie for a long, long time. I looked at Y like, "Why didn't you give me a heads-up?" And she basically said she thought I would totally freak out. Well, yeah, of course I would—you know me well, my darling Y. And she needed me too, and I was so grateful that I could be of service to them that afternoon. My heart began to feel much lighter. It was a gift to me for sure, in ways that I can't explain, but I do know I am thankful for all the amazing synchronicities and little fun things like that that are sent my way when I open up and my radio station gets dialed in just perfectly. Did I tune into the God station that day or that week? It seems so. Is this what happens when you keep thinking about something—it just has to show up for you in some form? Also seems so, for the incredible people who come my way in synchronicities. I say thank you because I'm always the very first one enriched by your meeting. What a grand life this is, and again I say thank you for all of these beautiful opportunities to help people and meet people as well as myself move towards our beautiful healing.