Since I was invited to share my story on a radio talk show about other dimensions and how I fell into sharing fair journeys, I was excited! No one had ever asked me about how I got there and it was fun to be recognized. The show was on a Sunday at 5pm and on that same weekend, I was teaching Sunday morning during the Rose Heart Retreat in Austin. The retreat is an annual weekend full of conscious activities like Ecstatic Dance, Circling, Sound Healing, you name it. I loved it! And this was my second year to be there so I offered to teach a segment before dance on Sunday morning. Plus, as the timing turned out, it was Easter.
That weekend I had started out camping on Thursday when I arrived early before I met so many friends who had offered their guest room for me to crash. Even though I love camping, I would always rather spend time with friends in community than alone. So, I accepted and spent the night with a friend who is an amazing cook and caterer on Saturday night.
The weekend flew by and I was just as elated as I was exhausted, but I knew I had to leave around 2pm to get home in time to be settled and online for the radio interview at 5pm. I planned to be calm and in the silence of my office so that I could focus on the conversation. What happened was not in the plans.
Before I left Austin, my host offered some Indian food before I got on the road. I should have said No, but I adore Indian food. Quickly, we sat down as she reheated the curry. I can hear her now, when she commented that something was just not right with the coconut milk. She thought maybe she had opened a can that was a bit funky. This information flew in one ear and out the other as I visited with the other guests seated at the kitchen table getting ready to dig in.
Fast forward and now I am driving home and noticing all sorts of traffic as I continue. It’s frustrating. I am constantly looking at my watch, checking my speed, planning ahead if I will need gas, and talking to google about when I will arrive to my destination. Google says 5:19pm.
Stressed out, because that is not what I intended, I speed up and then try again talking to Google trying to change the trajectory to no avail.
Around 4:40pm the host, my new acquaintance calls me to see if I’m ready to go and I finally tell him that it’s been a SNAFU sort of day, and with traffic and my stomach feeling upset, I am not sure if I am going to make it home like I had planned. He giggles to himself and tried to hide it, but I heard it and knew that the universe was just playing with me as usual when I didn’t listen to my intuition and left promptly at 2pm as planned.
He says, “No problem, I will be on the call with the program and when you get home, just call me back and we’ll start your interview then.” Thinking to myself, Great, I can now leave this random place I had found behind a gas station trying to find a place that is not so noisy so that I could talk on the phone clearly for the radio interview. Mind you, the air conditioning in my aging Kia was not cooling and with two dogs in the car, I was battling the sound and heat by rolling down the windows, to which we could all get some air, but then we couldn’t hear a thing! So when he called, I had to roll up the windows to answer and hear him audibly, while this triggered the dogs to go into major panting mode. It was a mess.
So when he says, No Problem, get on home and get settled and call me back. I put the girls back in the car, and sped out back to 290 since I was about 15 miles away but it was almost 5pm. I was determined to make it home quickly and as I got on the highway, and I am checking my blind spot to make sure I could get on safely because of all the construction and crazy traffic, I turn to accelerate and get on the highway when one of my pillows that had been bouncing around the back seat because of all the wind just blows directly in front of me and for a moment I can’t see where I am going. Instinctively and with a bit of rage, my left hand grabs it and snaps it out the window with one swift move. It happened so fast. I couldn’t believe what had just happened. And it was the perfect side sleeper pillow with a cover… As I looked out the rear view window I could see it disappear under the cars and then it made me laugh. WTF. This just goes along with my drive. But I will get there, I told the world, don’t you worry!
I’m about 10 miles from my house, driving pretty fast when my stomach starts sending shooting pains throughout my gut. The pain had started once I turned onto 290 in Hempstead but I’d ignored the little rumblings. But now, the pain was imminent. Something was happening and it was not happy. Again, I had to rationalize stopping to use the bathroom before getting home and as I stared out the front window keeping an eye out for traffic, I thought, which bathroom would I use? To the left was a nice gas station but that would add minutes to my drive getting there and then getting back on the road, nope can’t do it. I must stay on course. OK then, I thought to myself, there is a nasty old Exxon to my right, that I know I’ve used because it’s on the cycling route when I used to ride years ago. I remember that place. Immediately, I pull over, get out and go directly to the bathroom while I am pissed off and thinking, let’s see just how nasty this bathroom can be, just show me!
I think it’s about 5pm now and I am hustling so quickly, I hit the bathroom within seconds. I locate the larger stall and go in. Quickly I survey the seat, clean it off and line it with paper before I am urged to quickly sit down and let it all out. It was one of those religious experiences with my eyes rolling up in my head, my mouth is open and the relief just keeps coming and I can’t believe this is happening in this place, OMG, look at the air filter on the ceiling, do you think they’ve changed it in the last ten years? NO!
Then, I hear the bathroom door open and two young girls talking as they come in. At this point, I quickly flushed the toilet and as I look down, nothing has moved in the toilet. The little water came and went, so I flushed again. This time getting up to look at the funky design of this toilet that doesn’t actually get water to the entire bowl. And the smell has already penetrated the entire stall to my horror. So, I flush a third time and personally will the water to come into the bowl and take the excrement away like it was designed to do. That’s when I hear the young girl say, “You can’t flush THAT smell.”
As they are standing outside my stall, for some reason, and I am cleaned up and ready to exit when I just stop and look at the little silver sliding lock in complete acceptance of what is happening. The world slowed down for a mili second for me as I caught my thoughts and for a moment I always never wanted to leave the stall of embarrassment, but then I knew I had to go for my interview. I unlocked the stall and within a flash I came out and saw what looked like two high school aged young girls huddling together outside my door looking at each other in dismay, as I turned to the right and headed straight to the sink to wash my hands saying, I am SO sorry! OMG That Coconut milk did NOT like me!
I washed my hands trying to avoid making eye contact, grabbed a towel to dry my hands and left the bathroom with these two girls still huddled together in horror staring and talking to each other as I wafted out.
I quickly walk/ran out of the store and as soon as I exited through the door, I saw a car with young parents obviously waiting for their kids to use the restroom. I quickly turned to the left and got into my car and left. Knowing that those two girls would come out telling their version of the story and then their parents would say, “We saw her come out!”
I’m not done.
I get in the car feeling so empty and nauseous and relieved that I stopped for myself or I would not have made it home in time for that explosion. I am thinking to myself, Note to self: you ARE averse to funky coconut milk. This has happened before and you didn’t need to eat when you should have been on the road at that time.
Then, I get a call and there is no one on the other end until I hear the coordinator say, She’s on hold and we are going live soon! Completely in over drive by now, all systems are code red, I roll up the windows so that I can hear what is happening and put on my nice voice when I really want to blow a gasket.
Speeding to my exit, I am hot, we are tired and wind blown, down a pillow and having dropped off ten pounds of coconut crap, I come flying in the house with the dogs and my hair is crazy from the wind, I am sweaty and already talking on the phone for my interview hoping that all the back ground noise is not noticeable. When my dad looks up to say Hello and I just put my hand up with an angry face for no one to talk to me as I raced to my side of the house.
In my room, I have finally made it and I am excited when the radio host asks me about my own journey to host experiences for people that include coming closer to their own intuition. I am now by my own sink talking about how fairy’s decide if you are worthy of communicating or not, so it’s best to set an intention to be clear and honest with yourself so that you can use all your senses to be available if they choose to come to you. The conversation keeps drawing me in as the information just starts coming out and there are stories and ideas and experiences that no one has ever asked me about and I know exactly what to say and how to respond. It was thrilling. All this to get into the zone.
Until my stomach signaled another visit to the toilet. Without skipping a beat during the interview, I drop my yoga pants and go to the restroom and strategically use mute on my phone to do my business when I am not answering a question. I seem to have become a pro at this skill from working throughout my days and responding to friends and clients no matter what I am doing at the time. And this makes me laugh.
From being so sweaty and nasty from the drive, I decide not to pull up my tights because the call is almost over and I need to take a full on shower. So, imagine me now finishing up the call from the sink with my pants down and sharing beautiful stories of how we can pierce the veil different ways including by waking up at 4:30am to pray or meditate and this is called the Amrit Veil.
Then, the hosts are thanking me for such an interesting and exciting call and I am happy that I was invited and thrilled to be there to respond yet again, obviously no matter what the circumstances.
When I hung up my phone I immediately let out a huge sigh of releif that it’s over and it feels fantastic! I am exhausted as I look at myself in the mirror but I still smile at myself. You’ve GOT this Sandy!
Now GO and shower your Nasty self!