Beth Bornstein Dunnington
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A Circle Of Women

February 2, 2018

Something extraordinary at LAX today… (writing this on the plane). I was at the gate, waiting to get on my plane to Portland. Flights to two different cities were boarding on either side of the Portland fight. A toddler who looked to be eighteen or so months old was having a total meltdown, running between the seats, kicking and screaming, then lying on the ground, refusing to board the plane (which was not going to Portland). His young mom, who was clearly pregnant and traveling alone with her son, became completely overwhelmed… she couldn’t pick him up because he was so upset, he kept running away from her, then lying down on the ground, kicking and screaming again. The mother finally sat down on the floor and put her head in her hands, with her kid next to her still having a meltdown, and started crying.

Then, this gorgeous thing (I’m crying just writing this)… the women in the terminal, there must have been six or seven of us, not women who knew each other, approached and surrounded her and the little boy and we knelt down and formed a circle around them. I sang “The Itsy Bitsy Spider” to the little boy… one woman had an orange that she peeled, one woman had a little toy in her bag that she let the toddler play with, another woman gave the mom a bottle of water. Someone else helped the mom get the kid’s sippy cup out of her bag and give it to him. It was so gorgeous, there was no discussion and no one knew anyone else, but we were able to calm them both down, and she got her child on the plane.

Only women approached. After they went through the door we all went back to our separate seats and didn’t talk about it… we were strangers, gathering to solve something. It occurred to me that a circle of women, with a mission, can save the world.

I will never forget that moment.

The Deeper Meaning of Color

12/28/2018

 
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A moment from today. At Foodland in Waimea, Hawai’i.

A stunning woman with wild, curly silver hair and chiseled features... a goddess... was standing next to me in the organic produce section. We were looking at each other.

"I'm admiring your hair," she said. "Really?’ I answered. “You're kidding. Because I was admiring yours."

We laughed.

"My hair used to be your exact color, when I was your age," she said.

I had to laugh to myself. When she was MY age. I don't know how old she thought I was, but I'm in my late fifties. I figured she might be ten or twelve years older than me, at most.

“I just turned 85, she said, and I'm not coloring it anymore."

(Knock me over with a feather. She was 85.)

"I'm embracing who I am," she went on. "I'm embracing the crone."

She said THAT. She's embracing the crone. This woman I'd never met.

(An admission)... just yesterday at the hair salon I said to Layne, who cuts my hair, that I have a thing about my hair someday turning gray. It's still red, but I know it won't stay red forever, and there's something about being associated with a color your entire life. The thought of losing the color feels bigger than just losing the color.

But this woman, today, with a mass of silver curly hair, once my "exact color"... owning that... was something for me to pay attention to.

I have a long way to go till I'm 85, if I make it to 85. A ways to go until I earn the rank of crone, those elders my friend Lisa Levart photographed so beautifully in her book, "Goddess On Earth," calling them crones as a title of honor.

In the meantime, maybe I'll color my hair someday, if I feel like it, when it turns gray... or silver, if I'm lucky.

But this woman wasn't any less colorful than me, and the only color was her lipstick. (Which was red –  almost the same color as mine.) Do you wonder if you could meet your later self? At a place as innocuous as the grocery store?

Ahh, this day. Still thinking about her, and the word "crone."

And the deeper meaning of color.

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  • Home
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