I watched her spin and spin and spin.
A dance dangling in the air,
never tangled, never knotted,
only a graceful movement
back and forth, back and forth.
What kind of sticky did she use?
What was her way of sensing tension?
Did she picture the web in her mind? Or let the design unfold?
Maybe a bit of both.
I was amazed as I watched her work,
as I watched her create.
The strings felt like they carried communication –
as vibration traveled up and down the threads.
Did she hear music as her feet traveled along?
And then the wind or rain or someone’s head would come by and smash her masterpiece.
She’d start again and again and again.
What motivated her?
Why did she keep going?
To catch and keep that which made her come alive, that which gave her life.
I paused and wondered what I want to catch.
How do I know what to keep?
What are my webs?
How are they made?
What do they look like?
Can others really help me make my webs?
Or is it a solitary journey?
I began to remember remarkable webs throughout my life.
Some I created, some I was part of.
I saw created and being part of as separate.
Though today, I imagine, they are joined.
I can only be part of something if I am part of its creation,
at whatever level I contribute and receive.
These webs that I was part of creating and they caught what made me come alive –
Or maybe it is not what.
The who inside me came alive.
The who and what connected
and the energy exchange was felt on the strings that attached it all together.
And it’s why I keep looking for webs –
to create
to join
to witness –
Webs that don’t entangle –
And somehow set us free.
No. It isn’t about freedom.
It’s about an integration.
It isn’t an either or.
A this or that.
It’s both.
We are alive and dying.
We are animated and still.
We are always changing and yet somehow not.
We are the web and we are outside the web.
We create a way to hold space for the tension – the unfolding –
the experience of swinging from one extreme, from one side, to the other
until we are in balance.
When we know we are, we can feel it and sense it,
then we can swing and swing and swing
and always come back to balance.
And as we lay back into the web of strings as it rocks us with its rhythm…
we can also laugh when we tumble to the ground and begin the process again.
And it’s not beginning it over again.