July 31, 2010...A Day of Chocolate, Rain & Clarity

My day began from peaceful slumber and indulgence from the one I love the most.

Thank you my love for the decadent Saturday morning: breakfast in bed and the movie Chocolat. :)

*****

Then a friend despaired and fussed that she wanted Out. Out! OUT! Of her house but lamented that she had no money and no one to go out with. I thought "Pshaw! Live! Be!" and so I told her the following, which really is good counsel for any one of us...

Just get in the car and drive--somewhere local you've always wanted to see or to one of the parks. Take a book and if you have a couple of dollars stop and get a drink or some cookies or a treat. Take a notebook and sit. In a park and write some thoughts down. Blast the radio--sing along. $0 to few dollars. Go breathe in the wild air and live.

*****

I always want to open up a Chocolaterie after I watch the movie Chocolat. In fact chocolate has been on my mind since going out on Thursday with my grandma and sister, two fellow chocolate adventurers and connoisseurs. 

Chocolate rooted and related words are just fun to say, especially if you put a little twist of flair into it. Go ahead--say it out loud...with gusto and delight. 

Chocolat!!! 

Chocolate!!!

Show-Co-Lah-Teh-Reeeee!!!

I know, I know... Ridiculous and silly but so what? It's fun, and in order to truly be cut free from the fray, sometimes you've just got to let go of the fuddy duddy and just be joyful and let your inner child out for a minute or 25.

I bate being called or even referencing "Chocoholic" it just sounds so boringly adult and negative and it's just not my thing. As a caveat to that statement--dont get your panties in a twist if its your kind of word--embrace it--own it--make it yours. No offense meant its just not for me. To me it makes it sound like you can't control yourself and are going to end up naked rolling around in it in public. Maybe appealing to some, but public nudity, chocolate covered or not, is not for me. So I am no chocoholic..but I certainly am a chocolate lover. :D

I love chocolate covered caramel, turtles, petit fours, truffles, cherry cordials, chocolate covered bing cherries, chocolate dipped strawberries, chocolate chips, chocolate cheesecake (particularly the Black Tie Mousse Cake from The Olive Garden) and I could go on.

Dark chocolate, milk chocolate, even the prejudiced against white chocolate. Peanut butter and chocolate, chocolate covered nuts, chocolate dipped toffee, honey and coconut...so many delicious delectables to try and to enjoy.

In fact I was at a wedding reception for my cousin and his darling and winsome wife, in 1992 was it?, and it was there that we had the most AMAZING injected and chocolate dipped strawberries. To this day they remain, hands down, one of the most decadent strawberry experiences of my life. And I thank them heartily for it. :D 

Now despite my fabulous list of deliciousness and delight---I really am not a maniac about it...I've just liked it for a really long time. 

From the time I was a little kid and we got the chocolate Easter bunnies that you'd bite the ears off of, or the hollow chocolate turkeys at Thanksgiving that my grandparents would send, or the gold coins that you might be lucky enough to get or the See's box of candies during the holidays or on special occasions, I was convinced it was a definite perk to being a human with taste buds. Of course when we lived in Brazil, at Easter we had huge hollow chocolate eggs, filled with Bon Bons, candies and little toys all wrapped in beautiful, brightly colored, delightfully crinkly cellophane. 

With this lifelong love affair that has never done me wrong, aside perhaps a tummy ache at Halloween or at Christmas time due to enthusiastic overindulgence...why would I ever turn away? Chances are even the orneriest and strictest of vegans finds a way to their secret chocolate fix no matter how refined and purged their standards may require, so as you may know from personal experience, most of us will find away.

So, no doubt about it--I am a connoisseur, though no snob, of this tantalizing treat. I relish it, I celebrate it and rarely do I ever reject it. 

Viva le Chocolat!

*****

I then felt a random bolt of pure joy during the course of the day and felt inclined to not down this surprising moment of clarity...I've been somewhat muddled more often than not this year. And these were my thoughts...

I feel the lightness of my life returning. It is like I am on the cusp of an answer to the questions I have been a long time asking. 

All of the things I love, all of the things I want and all of the things I need, seem to slowly be converging. I do not have the final picture--I do not even have the proof--or the sketch, but I feel it swirling around me. This is a time of change.

*****

Then came the rain...

After being enveloped and embraced, after wrapping my arms around my favorite neck and kissing hotly on the stairs, after passion-induced butterflies in my stomach, I said "Goodbye" and I came out of my air conditioned house to thick summer air and stormy clouds against a partially blue sky. It was fantastic.

As I pulled out of the driveway the clouds cracked open and water came pouring down. I could vaguely smell rain through the air conditioning vents in the car and I thought "This is crap." and I rolled down my window and I flung my arm out the window, cranked the Silversun Pickups and went on my way.

I could smell the hot asphalt, scorched by the sun and now drenched and steaming from the summer rain. I could smell the dirt in the fields and corn and wet hay and water. Huge drops pounded my windshield and zipped and stung along my skin. My arm goosebumped with the change of temperature as the wind whipped across my wet flesh. Drops came in volume dripping through the open window and down onto my jeans, but I didn't care. In fact I was the opposite of caring and hoped for more.

Why do we run from rain and wind and sun? Always running and hiding from it? Not for me right now. Not for me this summer. Not this year. I want to dance in it. I want wet shoes and tanned skin. I want sweat down my back and between my breasts. I want wet, sun bleached hair, drenched by the rain. I want joy in this planet, on this earth.

It's possible the person in the car behind me thought I was a lunatic to have my arm waving and riding the wind and the rain out of an open car window, but I didn't care, because I was in a beautiful sensory overload. 

My ears, my nose, my eyes, my skin, my mind--all of them throwing information into my brain for a supremely stellar moment of existence. I am alive and I can feel it and smell it, hear it, see it and know it. If this is a dream well then it is electric and vibrant and I wonder what could I possibly wake up to if life is not this?

I waited for the rain to start falling and then took the longer way into the store just to smell it, be enveloped by it, get rained on and to enjoy it.

Let your blood pound in its vibrance. Breathe deeply taking in all the scents around you. Let your heart pound so hard you feel you will pass out. Open your eyes to colors and textures. Touch. Smell. Hear. Taste. Look. 

See and hear all of those common things that you overlook because they are always there. See them again with new eyes. 

Be a Phoenix from the flame, bursting forth out of ash and doubt, flinging your wings wide, neck stretched out and head thrown back calling out the joy of your life's song. Be! Exist!