A Dream Need Not Explain Itself

My dear Mermaid Darlings, and the ladies of Stillwater,

I have been thinking about how much time we can spend explaining something we might otherwise be quietly bringing to life, especially when the people about us cannot yet see what we see, and we begin to feel that we must make them understand before we carry on.

In 2019 I remember Sawyer coming to visit whilst I was in the middle of a cottage renovation, and how readily I began explaining where everything would go and what I intended to do, as though I ought to account for the unfinished state of things before he could possibly enjoy being there.

He looked at me and said, “Mum, you don’t need to explain everything. I see what you’re doing, and it’s going to be so cool.”

I have remembered those words with such affection, partly because they were his, but also because he gave me the lovely feeling of being understood whilst everything still stood a little crooked and unfinished about me. He could see that I was making something, and he trusted me to find my way through it without requiring a defence of every decision. 

Nowadays I rarely if ever catch myself explaining and, I think of him, and now I might put that same care into the work itself instead of trying to persuade someone to believe in what I have not yet finished.

Of course, we like the people we love to understand us, and there is nothing unreasonable in wishing that someone might look at our little beginnings with affection. Yet there comes a point when explaining the same dream again leaves us weary, particularly if each conversation attempts to bring us back to the same doubts, with scarcely any time left for the thing we had hoped to accomplish that day.

I learned some time ago to let those conversations rest, and to accept that a person may care for me without sharing my imagination, just as I may care for them without asking them to approve every turn my life takes. I can listen to thoughtful advice and still return to my own work with my judgement intact, allowing what I make to introduce itself in its own time.

The people who feel at home with it have a better chance of finding me if I continue, and I should rather spend an afternoon making something lovely than rehearsing another explanation of why I wish to make it at all.

Even so, I have had to learn that giving my time to a dream does not require me to hurry through the rest of my life, although for many years I behaved as though everything pleasant waited somewhere beyond the next completed task.

Before my dear boy chap Sawyer died, I was forever trying to get things achieved and finished, imagining that I would feel settled once I had caught up, put everything in order, or worked quite hard enough to deserve an afternoon of ease. Somehow, whenever I approached that promised afternoon, I discovered another job that seemed to require my immediate attention, and the rest I had intended to take slipped politely out of reach.

People would tell me that I needed to relax and enjoy myself, and although I understood what they meant, I scarcely knew how to begin when sitting still left me feeling that I ought to be useful. I had carried from childhood the belief that I must earn my place by making myself useful, and with so little faith in my own worth, I scarely knew when I had given enough; I would offer more than I could comfortbaly spare, then search my pockets for some last little kindness, as though I still owed something for the simple priviledge of being there. 

I could sit in a chair whilst mentally working my way through the house, finding things to mend, rearrange or improve, until I had quite exhausted myself without moving very far at all.

I had become so accustomed to earning my keep each day that I struggled to imagine feeling worthy of kindness when I had little to show for my hours.

I suspect some of you will recognise that feeling, particularly if you learnt early to be helpful, undemanding, or very good at getting on with things, and carried those habits into a life where nobody quite knew how much they cost you.

In my own case, keeping busy also spared me from spending much time with feelings I did not know what to do with, because there was always a cupboard to sort or a project to begin whenever an uncomfortable thought approached. I could give my hands something to manage and postpone the quieter business of admitting that, beneath all my efforts, I felt deeply unhappy.

After losing Sawyer, I began to understand how much of my life I had hurried through whilst trying to make it satisfactory, and how easily I had postponed the ordinary pleasures that might have sustained me along the way.

I still love making things, and anyone who has seen the cottage will know that I have gathered enough projects to keep myself occupied for a considerable while, but I want to enjoy living here whilst the work continues. I want to notice a cat settling beside me, hear the ducks conducting their afternoon affairs, and admire the zinnias without immediately deciding that I ought to weed beneath them.

There is something rather lovely about drinking a cup of tea whilst it is still warm, especially when one has spent years setting it down beside a task and remembering it only after it has gone quite cold.

Perhaps this is part of what draws me towards the older rhythms I associate with Britain and parts of Europe, where I have so often admired the willingness to linger over a visit or give an ordinary pleasure its proper time. I would not presume that everyone there lives this way, any more than every American rushes about as I once did, but I feel an affection for that unhurried manner and the respect it seems to offer the day.

I have also noticed how easily we can turn slow living into another undertaking to perfect, filling our hours with all the things we believe will make life gentler until we scarcely have a moment left to enjoy the gentleness we set out to find.

I say this with affection, for I can still catch myself making a list so ambitious that the woman expected to complete it would have very little opportunity to sit in the garden she has worked so hard to create.

I do not imagine that anyone will read a few words from your dear ole razzie and suddenly know how to set aside habits she has carried for most of her life, especially when there are people and animals to care for, bills to pay, and work that truly does need doing. I only hope that sharing a little of my own experience might make it easier to recognise the moments when we ask more of ourselves than the day reasonably requires.

Perhaps there is one harmless thing we could leave until tomorrow, or a small pleasure we could enjoy without first completing something else, allowing ourselves to discover that the afternoon holds together perfectly well when we loosen our grip a little.

My Alchemy of Mermaidology subliminals belong to this same wish for a gentler and more joyful life, and if you enjoy listening, I hope they offer a quiet companion whilst you practise allowing kinder thoughts to become familiar. I speak of these things because I remember how unpleasant it felt to live beneath my own constant scrutiny, always trying harder and finding fault whenever my efforts fell short of the impossible standard I had set.

These days, I would like to give my dreams the patience I give something growing in the garden, tending them faithfully whilst allowing myself to enjoy what has already taken root.

When I think again of Sawyer standing amongst the renovation, I remember how easily he let me feel hopeful about it all, and how little he needed me to explain before he offered his encouragement. I should like to carry more of that kindness into the way I speak to myself, especially on the days when everything takes longer than I expected and the finished picture remains mine alone to see.

If you are making a life that others do not yet understand, I hope you will give yourself that kindness too, and leave a little time amongst the making for the life you are already in.

Most affably yours til my next enchanting swim, Lady raquel

A Letter from the Hedgerow; On Finding Our Footing and a Place to Belong

My dear Mermaid Darlings, and the ladies of Stillwater, A Petticoat Society,

I have much yet to write, though I had hoped to place some of it between the covers of my book by Michaelmas. Part autobiography, part spiritual guidance, with the various threads of a life woven through it, the book must wait a little longer; certain passages still require something of me that I cannot hurry.

I keep a reasonably firm appointment with my work, but I have learnt to allow Father Time a chair at the table. He has a habit of arriving whether one invites him or not.

As of late, I have felt troubled, and I spoke a little of this on my YouTube channel. The telling eased some of the pressure, though the circumstances I last wrote about continue, and those earlier words still hold. What I have learnt, however, is to let a difficult feeling pass through without furnishing an entire room for it.

So I read, quite fervently at times, and return to my writing and painting; these familiar occupations help me find my footing. Our big blue marble carries a great deal of bleakness, and a tender heart can scarcely look about without finding something to grieve. Yet, in the quiet of meditation, I keep returning to the same small mercy; after a proper, deep cry, I find that I can rise and attend to life again. I think of Lady Mary on Downton Abbey assuring Carson that she never remains down for long, and recognise something of that resolve.

I owe much of my own steadiness to Spirit, and to the daily practise that grew into The Alchemy of Mermaidology, the subliminals I created under that guidance. In my experience, this work has helped me gather myself, stitch by stitch, when life has pulled at the seams.

Before I began tending so deliberately to the beliefs I carried, I spent far too much of my life answering old hurts. Many childhood lessons followed me into grown rooms, and I scarcely settled one disturbance before another demanded my attention. That keeping watch over every feeling left little strength for the life I wished to make.

I suspect some women recognise this exhaustion, even when they have very little to say about it.

Within our little Stillwater, there may be ladies who feel deeply troubled by what they see in the world, yet hesitate over how to speak.

I understand the hesitation. Once one steps forward, others may expect an argument, an allegiance, or an explanation for every word; a woman can find herself defending a position when she had only meant to open a conversation.

I should like our conversations to leave room for thought, and for the gentleness that allows a person to remain at the table. I intend to keep using my platforms to encourage honest reflection, spiritual growth, and the integrity I understand through Christ consciousness.

These things ask something of our conduct; they reach into how we speak to a woman whose beliefs differ from our own, how we receive her confidence, and whether she leaves our company feeling that she must conceal herself to belong.

That matters very much to me.

It lies at the heart of The Carter Settlement, which I founded with the hope of giving this work a place in the world; somewhere for workshops, small gatherings, useful learning, and the pleasure of women encouraging one another. We have yet to secure a permanent home on land, though I continue to hold the vision of a door we may one day open together.

I imagine a lady arriving with her sewing, her questions, or simply a tired heart, and finding that someone has put the kettle on.

A woman of religious faith will be welcome there, as will a woman still finding her way. No lady should have to borrow another’s convictions to earn her place amoung us.

After many years within two organised religions, I came to understand that I could no longer remain within certain expectations and keep faith with my own conscience. That belongs to my journey; I have no wish to prescribe another woman’s. I do, however, intend to take care of the spirit in which we gather.

I have known circles of women where an unspoken examination seemed to begin almost before one sat down. I have also recognised, in myself, the anxious wish to arrange everything and everyone until life felt sufficiently safe. Fear can make control seem useful for a time; eventually, one discovers how much effort it takes to keep a hand upon every door.

I speak of this with some tenderness because I have spent more than a decade questioning what I once accepted, and loosening habits I once mistook for protection.

This is part of why I share my subliminals, and why the work remains so personal to me. I wish to help a lady hear her own thoughts again, consider what serves her, and recover the parts of herself she put away while managing all that life required.

I have little appetite for fastening a label to a woman and deciding that the matter of her character is settled. We rarely know the whole history of the person before us. I am quite prepared to stand by that conviction, even if I find myself keeping a solitary patch of hillside for a while.

As the book has waited, small portions of these thoughts have found their way onto Instagram and YouTube; others I have shared only with my beloved gardener. The fuller telling belongs in the book, and some pages must remain private whilst I find their proper words.

Meanwhile, I am grateful for this little blog. I keep it quiet, unhurried, and free of advertisements, with no subscription required to open the gate. I should like it to remain here for years to come, carrying something of those earlier golden years of blogging, when one visited a familiar page and lingered over the words because one cared for the person writing them.

Women need places where they may arrive without having to make an occasion of themselves. That is how I think of our Hedgerow Post.

Helen Allingham, my favourite artist, painted Witley Post Office, and I chose it for the lovely correspondence it holds with the little post office in the hedge in Little Women.

That image has long expressed how I feel about meeting one another online; we leave a comment, a thought, or a small confidence for someone to discover, and return to find that she has left something for us.

I first knew that pleasure through my blog, and I recognise it amoung the dear souls who gather on my YouTube channel. A few thoughtful words can make the distance between two lives feel remarkably small.

Come to think of it, much of what I create begins with that same hope.

Our dear Letterbox-in-the-Hedge remains rather quiet, but I have a good feeling about the company it may gather. You are also very welcome to leave a little something here if the sentiment strikes you.

Lady Raquel’s Letterbox-in-the-Hedge

9089 Carter Road

Brooksville, Florida 34601

or email me here, darling,

Raquel@RaquelCarter.com

I tend the blog comments myself, making room for kind conversation and quietly attending to unpleasantness when necessary. It may seem a modest task, but a thoughtful reply gives another woman somewhere to begin; in time, we come to recognise one another.

I intend to keep that gate open, free of charge.

My hope is that these exchanges will lend a familiar warmth to the day we finally meet at The Carter Settlement, having already shared something of our lives across the hedgerow.

If you feel inclined, perhaps you might include our future home in your prayers, or hold it in your own quiet imaginings; a place made possible through a generous benefactor, a gift of land, or several helpful hearts bringing their means together.

Until then, I shall keep writing, tending this little corner, and leaving the letterbox within reach.

Wishing you a lovely autumn, my dear hearts.

Most affably yours til my next enchanting swim,

Lady Raquel