THRILLING!
WUNNERFUL!
NO TIME FOR GREEN BANANAS!
Tell me ALL, Catherine!
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ANAM CARA: Catherine / Jane!!!
Where: Jane’s living room at her home on Sunfish Lake. When: October 1998
Photo credit: Jane’s eldest son – Rob Matteson
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Anam Ċara: means ‘Soul Friend’.
Anam is the Gaelic word for soul and Cara is the word for friend.
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‘In Celtic tradition, an Anam Cara is a teacher, companion or spiritual guide.
With the Anam Cara you can share your innermost self
to reveal the hidden intimacies of your life, your mind and your heart.
This friendship cuts across all convention to create
an act of recognition and belonging
that joins souls in an ancient and eternal way.
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In everyone’s life,
there is a great need for an Anam Cara, a soul friend.
In this relationship,
you are understood as you are,
without mask or pretention.
When you are understood, you are at home.
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Love is the threshold where the divine and human ebb and flow,
one into the other.
Love is the most real and creative form of human presence.
An expression of human consciousness,
this love includes a depth of awareness and reverence for presence.
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Where consciousness is dulled,
distant or blind,
the presence grows faint and vanishes.
Therefore awareness
which brings integration and healing,
is one of the greatest gifts of this friendship.
As a result, you look, and see, and understand differently.
You refine your sensibility
and
transform your way of being in the world.
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The Anam Cara is a loved one
who awakens your life
in order to free
the wild possibilities
within
you.’
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John O’Donohue
Anam Ċara: A Book of Celtic Wisdom
I read this remarkable book to Jane, slowly,
– in her home and in the gardens of the first Dakota Jazz Club.
We wept in recognition, wonder, and awe of its beautiful truth.
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Jane Matteson was/IS my Anam Ċara.
Our wild hearts were set free with each other!
We danced!
YES! YES! YES!
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23 May 1923 was the day the phenomena of Jane entered the world.
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We would meet 80 years later
with 40 chronological years between us.
WE RECOGNIZED EACH OTHER.
I was a deer, and Jane exclaimed: IT IS THE DIVINE!!
My heart beat told me the truth. I arose.
OUR danceRISINGsonics was NOW!!!!!!!!!!!
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Authentic love sings an honest song of I SEE YOU
– calling OUT to be ALL The Things You Are!
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Authentic LOVE is victorious in Nature’s/God’s will:
BREATHES + BLOOOOOMS + BOUNDLESS!
The ENERGY is radiant and heal/THY!
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Jane was the EMPRESS of creating social connections!
Jane was exceptional – NOT the Zuckerberg FB create FICTION online avatar life
rather
face to face:
all senses was Jane’s clarion truth serum!
HONESTY is GOLD!
BREAKING FREE
TO BE
ALL THE THINGS YOU ARE
was Jane’s anthem!
No rear view mirror!
LIFE IS EXPLORING/ DISCOVERY/ADVENTURE!
Not for the timid!
We created concept parties!
Above: THE TWELFTH NIGHT!
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We co-founded The Film Roundtable
– a monthly roundtable discussion of films
where the principles of democracy and jazz were practiced.
From the members of the roundtable,
one member would step up to be the moderator
and s/he would lead the discussion.
Every month there was a new film and a new moderator
All voices of various points of view were heard with respect.
A venue that welcomed intellectual challenge,
invited diverse points of view
and
NEW prisms of seeing the world did occur as the harvest!
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My drawing for the cover of the book:
Jane Matteson, The Jazz Years
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Honesty over loyalty.
Jane and I had ONLY 6 years of being a gardener to/for each other
and
taking delight in the bloooms that opened
because of each others presence.
Blessed JOY!
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The authentic cultivation of intimacy
– telling the truth without slant or veils –
through call and response
steeped in sacred listening to/for each other
yielded to trust and to wide expansive love.
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Love that is soaring sweet harbored
in the comfort joy of nest IS freedom.
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Jane was direct. Oh, yes!
She could ‘smell’ counterfeit and deceit.
She could ‘smell’ coy manipulation tagged with an agenda,
feigned emotions,
dipped in fake chocolate statements
and
the ‘public performance’ decoy stuck in fear relationships.
She welcomed and invited.
Jane loved the spectrum of humanity.
She could discern the character of others
– the depth, integrity and magnitude.
Jane was attracted to the truth-seeker:
the risk-taker, the trailblazer, the innovator,
the pathfinder, the explorer,
those who ‘dared greatly’
who willingly entered the belly of the whale,
the dark night of the soul,
confronting their internal dragons head on,
overcame shocking challenges/obstacles,
and
came out on the other side anew
and
told their story of revolutionary
resurgence
– which inspired others to
rise up!
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She had an embedded divining rod that registered truth
– no matter how deeply it was buried.
She could calibrate the extent of an alloy in gold.
She knew gold.
Jane believed in romantic love and love’s prowess
– not for the weak or timid.
She was thrilled by the HOPE of true love stories
and
the redemptive healing of authentic love
between equals.
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Jane and Robert’s love song:
ALL THE THINGS YOU ARE.
Of course!!!!!!!!!
Jane loved stories of hero/ines
– their resilience,
their grit in overcoming seemingly insurmountable obstacles
their passion,
and
their ceaseless faith in the vision that few could see.
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Jane was raised as a Christian Scientist.
She believed in the practice of mind over matter:
transformation, resurgence and re-invention.
– no matter age or circumstances.
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Jane recognized
EMOTIONAL and SPIRITUAL STRENGTH.
She knew healthy flowing love strengthens
– an emotional bond that weakens is not love!
Jane knew the emotional strength of hero/ines
– their resolve to break through their blindness was visceral
and
their willingness to be stretched/opened
and
launch into/onto uncharted territories without a map!
(Her beloved Robert lived this way – ask any of her children!)
She loved the stories of how transformation
occurred with individuals when they claimed their own lives
– extricating from relationships that drained vitality
and
siphoned.
She was THRILLED
by stories of those
who summoned their courage,
found their heartsoul allies
and, in turn,
built ships that could dive deep and fly high!
Individuals who were the NEW BREED LEADERS
and
who possessed the courage and resolve to go into the night
and
SEE the first light which became a NEW DAWN!
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She believed that once one is awakened
from a ‘slumber’ of habit/ denial/justification,
one could not return to what they once were
without damaging their soul.
A return to what was a previous life/optic/belief/habit
one would have to gash their heart,
blind themselves,
sever their souls
from their revolutionary truth
and
a debilitating depression would follow.
She could NOT understand why one would place their own life in peril
because of discomfort, uncertainty, and fear of change.
The consequence of not ‘re-setting’ to the new realities was self-destructive
– not creative/constructive.
One was re-invented,
altered by a slow or sudden paradigm shift,
one must move forward.
We delved into the topic of being ‘awakened”
and
the cost to one’s life if one does not follow/align with the soul.
Jane loved stories of courage and overcoming fear with valor.
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Jane believed in the truth of vulnerability
and
the strength of expressing vulnerability.
She would tell me: “Catherine, I would honored to see you cry”.
She knew I was a deer with armor.
In time, with her night light of continuous love,
my armor became feathers
and
I could be naked vulnerability in her presence
knowing she could see the stars in me.
Together, in unison and in alternating solos to each other,
we located the elixir of acceptance, wonder, awe and joy
deep within each other
– the fire and water of life.
I called out her light – as she called out mine.
A luminous and challenging relationship
of hope’s light and path:
into the wilderness of the heart
where love’s freedom seeks truth,
unfurls knotted darkness
and
golden fields thrive!
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Love is not possession nor bound loyalty.
LOVE is A/LIVE boundless ENERGY!
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Loyalty is not an alive energy
– it is a conscription, an arbitrary agreement/arrangement.
It speaks of fear, taken hostage and domination/submission.
Loyalty binds by the controls issued by manipulation using:
secrecy, sabotage/undermining, shame,
guilt – binary ‘victim/perpetrator’ dynamic
where the victim holds the perpetrator
solely responsible for the victim’s happiness and welfare.
This brand of loyalty dulls and lulls the consciousness,
weakens and creates fear
– hope’s light is extinguished.
A prison is not a wing nor a vehicle of love.
Authentic love calls out the wing and breath of the beloved,
SEES the beloved in who they are
and
strengthens the beloved.
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The term loyalty loses its sweetness when free will is eclipsed
by taking someone’s life and using it as a self-serving tool.
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Jane was a bold, shrewd and purpose driven action figure
– she sponsored catalytic movement.
She was not interested in inane motion/ activity.
She was not keen on whiners, ‘pleasers’ or self-centered arrogance
even though she would smile at them
and, simultaneously,
distance herself from those negative forces.
People who baked a picture of her based on appearance
and
the way her physical self moved in the world,
were clueless of her multi-spheric brilliance
and
her internal MAY THE FORCE BE WITH YOU sabre!
‘No time for green bananas!!!’
Jane and I would speak of this.
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Jane loved the positive life force,
the integrity, the revelation, the epiphany, the radiant energy
and
the revolution of truth love
occurring/created between two individuals.
This love, this truth-telling love,
forged in the blue heat crucible of the dialectical upward spiral and cycle of:
difficulty and realization/awareness and rising resilience
was a breathing contribution
and
an agency
of dynamic social change, hope, light and justice
that served the community as both a template and a legacy.
Healthy love’s boundless radiance was a harbor and an inspiration
– a gospel song!
UPWARDS and ONWARDS!
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Intimacy cultivated in truth-telling vulnerable honesty and kindness is love
– a blooooming, unfolding, breathing, unfurling wing- a verb
Loyalty is fixed noun.
I say we soared and that is love.
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Thank you my beloved Jane for the blesSING of YOU!
DRAGONFLY LOVE
YOU LIVE IN MY HEART
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I was with my beloved friend Jane often,
frequently, and
daily as her soul was slowly
lifting away from her body.
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Our audible conversation waned to whispering
and
then solely to the vibrant presence
of our energies,
breathing together – the vigil.
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She knew I was there – for hours in communion.
I could feel her radiance gently spiraling,
ascending from her body.
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I looked out Jane’s bedroom window:
the forsythia had begun to bloom – the herald of spring!
I whispered in her ear:
‘Jane, the promised kiss of springtime is here!!!’
Her breathing quickened, her face rosed,
and
her expression roused from a faraway slumber
to a young woman’s thrill.
I knew I was calling out her love,
her adventure
with her beloved Robert.
I placed my hand on her heart
and
solemnly told her:
“Jane, you will live in my heart forever”.
What happened next is so precious to me:
Jane lifted her frail hand
and
pressed her hand on my heart.
She opened her eyes – blue.
Jane told me in her inimitable voice:
“Catherine, you will live in my heart forever”.
We both knew we were saying farewell,
goodbye to the physical aspect of life.
We knew the dance, the song, we created was always.
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In the early morning hours of 15 April 2003,
I was awakened by a sensory experience:
below a wide open clear blue sky,
I could see an expansive field of spring’s chartreuse grasses
moving in one direction to a horizon line
by a gentle wind
and
followed by the scent of Jane’s perfume
– ‘White Shoulders’.
It was a quiet, sweet caress
– like Nature leaving a room sensing the rush,
the perfumed scent,
of Her satin gown passing…
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Jane’s eldest daughter, Daidie,
called me a few hours later
to tell me what I knew.
Time and again I’ve longed for adventure
Something to make my heart beat the faster
What did I long for? I never really knew
Finding your love I’ve found my adventure
Touching your hand, my heart beats the faster
All that I want in all of this world is you
[Chorus:]
*You are the promised kiss of springtime
That makes the lonely winter seem long
You are the breathless hush of evening
That trembles on the brink of a lovely song
You are the angel glow that lights a star
The dearest things I know are what you are
Some day my happy arms will hold you
And some day I’ll know that moment divine
When all the things you are, are mine
Songwriters: Jerome Kern / Oscar Hammerstein
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ALLTHETHINGSYOUARE #5 CATHERINE L. JOHNSON 2014
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For further information on the ALLTHETHINGSYOUARE series,
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