True Compass....

Those who know me very well, know that I am among the truly 'geographically challenged'....Do not take me on a road trip and ask me to read the map for directions. Do not give me directions to your home and ask me to turn South, North, East or West on any given street...just tell me to take a Left or Right turn, here or there. I truly marvel that people, cut from different cloth than myself, actually know the Four Directions in relationship to where they presently are. I do, however, have my own True Compass. Some call it 'intuition' or more emphatically that 'still small voice' or the prompting of the Muses. I do so enjoy how those 'vehicles' of divine mystery come unbidden. Whether those messages are something I agree with or understand or feel capable to do and especially whether they sometimes take me to 'destinations' of very perplexing or dark places, they alight anyway. My Writing Muses are somewhat mischievous...they usually start their banter when I am driving my car. Once their prolifically engaged dictation begins, it simply comes too fast for me to keep up with and retain to write down another time. I have, for years, kept a Muse Notebook in my vehicle. I have become very adept at writing furiously while stopped at lights or after exiting highways (contrary to my original destination) to just try and capture the 'musings'. Some of these field notes make it to paper. Some don't make it to the next stop sign.

As a freewheeling writer I expect these predicaments. I pretty much live my life 'left of center' so I do not begrudge the Muses their own left of center style of dictation. There is always that flabbergasting component to some of what 'comes across the wires.' Of course, there is always the potential to have my 'own wires crossed'; who can really approve or disapprove or know for certain what wants to 'come through'?

For better or worse, I mainly trust my True Compass. Hindsight, as they say, is always easy. Accepting life's quick swerving choices with cliff-hanger decisions at any given moment is auspicious at best and foolish at worst.

Fortunately, it appears that some decisions I have made--or not made--ultimately seem to make sense in the long run. Or they don't. Quite possibly, my many faceted dyslexias are my basic nature. Maybe it serves me better than I know. Hopefully, I can continue to believe that life, so lively and strange, has all the mystery in it that I need this lifetime when my emotional/psychological/spiritual coordinates seem askew.

I am sure I have gone both full-bore and half-tilted into purportedly wrong directions--when I thought I knew best--or couldn't or wouldn't come alongside of the Muses. Funny thing, with a mechanical compass you can always get back to True North. So whether or not my North is your South, my West your East, I can rest in the knowledge that although virtually lost, I somehow seem to arrive at where I'm going. In other words, I am a firm believer in my ineptitude and the Muses wisdom...as long as my True Compass goes on working, my soul will surely find its way.

Gracie Garp