THIS IS MY LIFE
Tuesday, 6/18/2002
Copyright (c) 2002, Michael (Dickerson) Deluno. All Rights Reserved. Reproduction or quotation is strictly prohibited without permission.

Hi, y�all ~

�What�s this repeated �y�all�?� you may be asking. Cassandra is a native Texan, and I got used to �y�all� during the time we were traveling together. Now it feels like just a bit of a connection with her.

Here�s part 3 of my �Cassandra story.� I�ve had a significant breakthrough with all of this, so it isn�t feeling so difficult to write now. I'm being flooded with information from Spirit.

Before I get on with the story, though, a word was delivered to me this morning in a sermon illustrations e-mailing that I get (of all places) that is relevant. Glibido is a word created to mean �all talk and no action.� That was me with Cassandra. I expressed lots of glibido.

In Seattle (6/4-11):

We stayed at Parker�s house, and Parker and Cassandra obviously liked each other. He was only the first of my friends who connected with her.

On Wednesday we spent most of the day going through all of my boxes of paper and sorting out what I wanted to keep. I found her offer to help me with it very touching. In the process I found some newspapers from the Ken Keyes Institute in Coos Bay that were produced after she left. She found information about and photos of people she knew, though. (More of that synchronicity that just kept happening.)

Thursday morning I went to my Awakening group. At that time I said that I was confused about my relationship with Cassandra because I loved what was going on between us, but neither of us felt spiritually called to be romantic life partners. (She and I had talked about that on our way to Seattle.)

On Thursday Leap of Faith began. I was on staff, and Cassandra was a participant. By completing the Leap, she fulfilled something that feels very important to me in a romantic partner. She liked it a lot � another thing that makes her attractive to me. (And, by the way, I think her saying that it was one of the best things she�s ever done is no small compliment for someone who�s done 25 years of intensive spiritual, psychological, and healing work with some very well-known people.)

Sunday night Cassandra and I went for a walk and got into our first (at least overt) conflict � based, in my perception, on each of our unhealed issues hooking the other�s unhealed issues. Largely the difference was that she felt pressured, and I experienced myself as being remarkably restrained. I was impressed that it only took us about 10 minutes to stop focusing on the other person�s input and for us each to begin focusing on our own (another of the many reasons for me to feel attracted to her). One of the important unhealed issues that came up for me is my old sense that my loving or feeling sexual for women drives them away and that somehow there�s something about me that�s unacceptable that I don�t know about. Cassandra also said that it looks to her like I have a hole inside that I want a woman to fill. That felt like one of the ugliest things anyone could possibly perceive about me. At that time I wasn�t fully aware of how much that�s another of my unhealed issues. We were to return to all of that during the trip back to Santa Fe.

Monday we had lunch with Ginny. I was fascinated by how much they connected and by some of the assistance that Cassandra was able to offer to Ginny. During that time I looked at her and discovered that I was rising (not falling) in love with her. Maybe I always had been. I finally acknowledged it to myself then, though.

Later that afternoon I had an appointment with Keith, the healer. Cassandra wanted to meet him, so I asked if she could come into the office with me during my session. Keith said that he�d talk with us and decide. He and Cassandra spoke for a few moments about a large crystal he has, and he said that she was holding a space for healing for me and that she could stay. At the end he walked over to her and said, �Where do we know each other from?� She replied something like, �Not from this lifetime. Maybe from another one.� Later she told me that she thinks it�s really from another realm.

While we were in Seattle (Hobart, actually), we spent nearly all of our time together except during the Leap, when I went to my group, and at night � and a couple of nights we slept beside each other � though separately - because it was cold and we both wanted to be near the fire. I continued to feel beyond comfortable with all the time together and with how much it was like we were a couple.

Her trip to OR (6/11-13):

Tuesday morning I took Cassandra to the train station for her to go to Portland for a 2-day reunion with some of her Cornucopia/Ken Keyes friends � some of the same ones we�d seen in the newspapers I�d found a few days before.

While she was away, I definitely missed her � not in an �I can�t stand to be apart� way, but more in an �I�ve felt really happy with her so intimately in my life, and my life feels less rich when she isn�t around� way.

Wednesday I got together with Mary O�Malley to talk about her coming to Santa Fe. Instead we spent a lot of time talking about other things and just a little about our plans. What was happening with Cassandra and me was one of the main things we talked about. I really wished that the 2 of them had met. They have a lot in common. I told Mary that I was still confused because, even though I was aware of being in love with Cassandra, I still didn�t feel the mad, passionate, love at first sight kind of love that I had with Wendy and Valerie. Mary suggested that maybe that kind of love is partly coming from somewhere else other than love. She said that her impression is that I need to go very slowly with Cassandra (which has never been one of my strong points). And she was very definitely focused on my pursuing it. She suggested that her perception is that the deepest loves grow out of friendships, not out of love at first sight. I came away from our conversation wanting to go for it with all due lack of haste.

That evening I got together with Tammi, one of my friends who�s in a love at first sight � or nearly so � relationship. Cassandra and me was again a major topic of conversation. Tammi seemed more on the �go for the immediate passion� side of the issue.

By the next morning when I went to Mary�s Awakening group again, I was experiencing a wild mixture of feelings and sensations. After talking a bit, though, I ended up resolving to just follow the process (as Mary says) - or to follow Spirit without hesitation. We would see what happened, and I created the intention to discover what was right, to follow Spirit, to remain as much at peace as possible, to extend love, and to have the best relationship with Cassandra that I could.

Then I was off to the train station to pick her up and make our last preparations to return to Santa Fe.

The part of the story about the return and its significance is coming in my next letter.

Namaste,
Michael

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