Introducing the French Fry Oracle

:)

For several years now, I’ve been working with my dreams as a portal for communication from my soul. I ask for a message and do my best to capture it and decode the meaning. It can be tricky since they often arrive in the middle of the night, as dreams are wont to do. My priority is getting quality sleep, but I do my best to scribble some notes in the dark to help me remember in the morning.

I’ve found a dream tea from Mountain Rose Herbs that is supportive of the process. I’m not sure if it stimulates dreams or makes me better able to remember, but I do notice a considerable difference in the results when I’m regularly drinking it.

The tea was out of stock for several months and I was really feeling its loss. I was able to acquire some last week and now have this magic buzzing in my veins again. I think it takes time to build up to full steam ahead, so it’s hit or miss for now.

On the mornings when I have nothing but a big fat question mark to record in my dream journal, I turn to a practice I learned from Robert Moss in his book, The Three “Only” Things. He takes note of the first unusual thing to cross his path when he leaves the house. Again, it’s hit or miss with me, and I often discount oddities and lose the opportunity to benefit from the clue they might be carrying.

Yesterday I was determined. I asked for a message to find me when I went outside to greet the dawn. I bundled up as it’s gotten quite chilly here and headed out to the porch where I found a french fry on my chair. I tossed it over the railing (ew!) and got busy with my adapted open-eye meditation, drinking in the sunlight, and running my internal town hall meeting.

A squirrel scampered up onto the ledge in front of me carrying… yup, a french fry! Maybe the same one, I can’t be sure. It sat there, not 6 feet in front of me and nibbled nonstop. It really went to town on this potato, whittling it away to nothing. Well, that is definitely unusual!

I had many thoughts. How squirrels are really just rats with bushy tails. Why are we so much more accepting of their presence than their rodent cousins? How that fry was likely cooked in terribly unhealthy oil and sprinkled with way too much salt and possibly even sugar. (Yes, that’s a thing.) How this critter was totally focused on its meal and looked rather like me when I’m snarfling cookies when nobody is watching.

So many thoughts! But none that seemed particularly interesting or important.

Later that morning I was telling a friend about this incident while we were hiking. I wasn’t doing a very good job of explaining my practice of looking for the first unusual thing. Perhaps because we were on the uphill slope, and I was huffing and puffing a bit.

Luckily, she figured it out and said, “Like an oracle?” Exactly! I went on to share that as per Robert Moss’s suggestion to give dreams a headline, I labeled this encounter, Squirrel Chows Down on a French Fry.

In a gentle and kind way, she noted that the fact that I found a fry on my chair was actually the first unusual thing, wasn’t it?

Wait. What? She was right! And I just threw it away. The universe, in all it’s wonder, gave a second opportunity, a more sensational one that I could not ignore, to grasp this message.

I hope you all have friends who are willing to listen to your inner machinations and point out your oversights.

I then tried to dissect the meaning of this fry waiting for me, in the exact spot I sit every morning. She suggested that rather than using this approach of trying to figure things out intellectually, I could sit back and watch, wait and see, what else the universe might have to tell me.

Bingo!

I still don’t have a meaningful interpretation to share. But I did change the headline to, “Woman asks for a sign and ignores it only to have it return in a bigger form.” I suspect this is the key- how I often overlook the mundane messages and how life still supports me despite my sloppy observations.

There are times when I feel utterly alone and adrift in an unfriendly world. Like, a lot. So much of what is considered normal in our society is utterly bonkers to me. So when I notice the times when things seem to go my way or a mysterious force has my back, I really try to drink it in fully.

Last week an event I planned to attend got moved to a different day, very last minute. I was so annoyed. I’d taken time off work so I could participate and now I was going to miss out. I was irritated on multiple levels. Then a client rescheduled her appointment and I was able to attend.

Yesterday I planned to take a nap but felt an urge to pick up a few things at the store. I’ve learned that these urges often lead to something productive, so I got dressed with only minimal begrudging commentary. I ran into TWO friends who I haven’t seen in ages. Even more magical, they each shared a bit of information that when combined together was incredibly helpful.

This happens all the time, but I probably miss a lot of these synergistic connections just like I threw away the french fry. I’m not going to waste energy lamenting all the messages I failed to receive, but I have renewed my desire to play closer attention moving forward. And to use my mandoline slicer more often to make my own fries. 😋

Unrelated, I was out taking photos of my favorite trees. It’s an absolute riot of color here this time of year. This one seems to have captured some extra magic.