Purple Coffee and Sacred Veils

You know what I’ve decided is a truth in my almost 46 years on Planet Earth? We all want to be loved and 100% accepted for who we are. I mean that’s obvious, right? But how often do we find that? We are constantly projecting our needs onto another and/or feeling like we have disappointed someone for not meeting their expectations.We all have nasty, Golem little habits. So what? What if we just decided to love ourselves warts and all while doing our best to improve on the bright, perfect, imperfect diamond that we are and never again bow down to change fundamentally for another?This is the love and understanding I felt on my recent vagabond wandering.My dear friend Melinda and I decided to go camping – she doesn’t often go. In fact, she was roughing it by not bringing hairspray. (Insert giggle). So we arrive at our campsite and it’s closed because of the government shutdown – which is silly because I paid for our site after the government re-opened.After calling the reservations company and hotels and getting nowhere, my non camping friend suggests we just hike in. Fuck it, she says. We paid. What’s the worst that can happen? They kick us out. So what?So we pour ourselves some red wine in coffee mugs, park at the entrance and hike the half mile uphill to scout out a good campsite. We are all alone in a wondrous forest. We chose site number 7, tucked into a gully of sorts, and return to the car to collect our gear. The irony is that I’m nervous while Melinda is indignant about our right to be here. Locals walk the campground with their dogs. While I look askance, she boldly pets their canine friends and if it feels right, tells them what we are up to.We set up a sacred veil of tapestries, which creates an ambiance of magic while protecting us from being seen from the road.Darkness falls fast as we set up our tents and talk about love, work and spiritual growth and drink more wine. She smokes and asks me not to judge her. I don’t.We go out for dinner and have a fabulous  time, but still can’t figure out how the hell we racked up such a bill. We stumble up to our private forest and fall into our respective tents. We rise with the sun and walk the deserted campground. We fart and burp and shit in the woods. We drum. We sing. We pray. We toast to ourselves and Mother Earth. We rejoice that we have someone to talk to, someone who accepts who we are and celebrates us, dancing in the light that we create as multi-faceted, perfectly flawed diamonds.