The Wildness Within

I've been reading my Wild Sisters blogs, Tara, who runs barefoot in the dark to feel the night and learn from geese, Kiva who becomes one with the river and the moonlight she swims in....and I'm feeling this awful sensation of suffocating. I was once wild...wandering through rocky trails by moonlight to swim in a mountain stream, becoming one with sunny rocks like a lizard, breathing with Grandmother Oak and Juniper trees, singing to the cliffs in my sacred canyon at sunset with the hawks....
Maybe I should say I was learning to be wild, the wild plants my teachers and friends as I wandered the sacred earth...
But now, I am so civilized, so meek, and suffocating. Something about Colorado has made me stuff that wildness deep inside. "There isn't time for wandering, I've homework to do..."
"I can't stand the uncertainty that homelessness, even temporary, invites."
It's frightening that one of my deepest callings in life, to be wild, live wild, on the earth, of the earth, and with the earth, is so far removed from my daily exisistance here. I could make excuses about giving my energy to school, since I came here to learn from an amazing healer/herbalist. Yet even he finds time to sit in his sacred wild spot weekly. I go from posh home to car, to tame little Natural Living manager job at the local market, back home to eat, study, sleep.
My sweetheart shakes me every day, to break me out of this rut of tame acceptance of this rather miserable existence. Yet I insist on finishing school....out of what need? what desire? security for the future-NONEXISTANT. Fear of uncertainty? Possible regret of NOT finishing a program I've been lusting after for three years, with a mentor who is darn near a perfect fit philosophically? Fear of debtors prison? Fear of not "doing the right thing"? Fear of freedom from this convienient little cage society fits you into, lock the door and hand you the key and say "enjoy your life."
Why I can't pick up that Damn key and break out of the cage of civilized tameness/lameness.
Why have I given up my wandering in the sunlight for flourecsent lights, my plants for books, my wild senses to the soft comfort of houses and cars and tiled buildings.

But that wildness isn't forgotten, or too far below the surface. She breaks free fairly often, and sends me into such a state of dispair, depression, and sickness with this cage I've built. Oh she begs to be let out to wander, to howl at the moon, to swim naked in the river, and sleep under trees. I try to tell her to be patient. Just nine more months....nine more....sounds like gestation. What sort of pregnancy is this? Nine months of clinical healing work, nutrition classes- only to move into a van, hit the road, and head north to disappear into a wild, untamed and vast land/home we envision. Where we pick berries and and fish for food, sleep when we're tired, play when we feel playful, live...actually live, be real, be wild, be home. Is that what this is? Gestation? Can I grow and nurture the wild one within to be birthed again in 9 months? Am I just trying to stave off the inevitable. I can't take much more of this...

I'm tired of financial straps and chains, I want to bathe in moonlight, I want to be dirty again- hell, I even want dirty feet...my poor city feet, they hardly even touch the ground.

Where did my wildness go? Why, oh why, have I stuffed it into the cage, with promises of soon, just a bit longer, why do I yet insist on staying to finish school, when I want to finish, but yet I want to be free now.

I slept for a week in the car, in the moonlight...I felt terrified ,and thrilled, uncertain, but knowing somehow it would be ok. Then I moved all my possessions. Too many THINGS. Must be gotten rid of, things that tie me down to civilization. Who needs a crockpot when you cook on the open fire, or in a pit. Who needs a fridge when you can lacto ferment, dry and find fresh wild food every day....

I'm jealous and envious of my wild sisters. I was once wild too....