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Holy fucking shit you guys.
I built my own cathedral and I resurrected myself in it.
There is only one song that could complete the seventh point of the pattern - Wolves by Down Like Silver.
This is the song you want to bury and bring yourself back. This is the song you want to thank the tired parts of yourself for the work they've done to keep you well, and let them rest. This is the underdark road through the black forest that leads to dawn.
I asked, "why do I get these headaches?"
And the answer I got was, "It's because you don't sing. You have (too much) song and you don't let it out. You should sing. Why do you think bodies exist? They are an instrument."
I didn't make a full playlist of the songs I picked for the points, but I had most of them, and hot damn it was the best to play it and sing along. I am not a "singer" but it felt like that didn't matter, it was the physical manifestation of sound that mattered, like Tibetan monks chanting Om. Creating the sound and feeling the full reverb of vibration in the throat and sinuses is the important thing. Humming is good, even. It is not enough to listen to other people's "approved" music, you must add your own voice in whatever way seems best. That is the gift. Creation.
It would be tedious and incomplete to talk about everything. I thought I had everything set up just right and playlists and stuff, and then I ended up realizing that I was creating a limited experience by being fixed on a certain way and a certain music, so for most of it I turned the music off and laid in silent dark. Nothing super dramatic happened, like the things I read about other people experiencing. But the answer was, if all you do is read other people's interpretations and decide that's what you'll have, you're just going to get someone else's recycled experiences and not your own. And that goes for so much - we all sit around reading about other people's actions and thinking we're being so smart because we know what's going on without the investment of personal experience. We think we know what's going to happen, we think we know what's a sure outcome, because we're "educated" but all we do is show up with a full cup and we can't appreciate the real life we live. Maybe it's not so good to be so "smart" and do what we think all the smart people do.
At one point I "talked" to my cats and it was awesome. I was lying in bed with the kitties curled up near me and I thought, it would be neat to talk to them, and a male voice with a hispanic accent starts muttering, "Why would you want to hear us, all we talk about is pooping." and then a low woman's voice says, "You talk about pooping. I do not poop." "You forget you poop. You poop." They are hilarious. Cat has a pronounced accent somewhere between Antonio Banderas and Cheech & Chong. I'm like, "Oh yeah, spouse got you in El Paso and you are Texan," and he got all offended because he believes he is an ancient Mayan, or perhaps Toltec, cat deity spirit. NOT texan. Apparently he likes spouse because spouse is an hombre with balls and does not listen to him, as it should be. Then Cat gives me this sly look and says he talks to spouse when he is sleeping and tells him what to do. "I tell him, you need a woman. You should get THAT woman. And then you get me the chica (Other Cat). See? I tell the man, you should be brave, like the jungle cat. And he is brave. I tell him, you should get me a place to be my home. We will get a home. See, I am a god. I have traveled farther than a cat can imagine. I have flown. I am a god." And in the background, Other Cat grumbles and then starts pointedly cleaning her butthole.
I asked Cat what happened when he lost his leg and he says in an insulted tone, "The people were very rude. They did not appreciate my gifts/presence."
Other Cat thinks she is some kind of northern spirit. Perhaps a wild cat or perhaps just of the wild itself. She wasn't specific. Maybe a seal? Cat has been around human civilization a long time, but Other Cat is more feral and of the land. I asked her why she was here and she just looked at me with her large, bright eyes. "You called, and I answered." She seemed dissatisfied with her little cat body, like it didn't suit her true self with the missing leg, and I asked her why she chose it, and she said, "This is the form you would recognize me in. This is how you would believe."
Other Cat says she likes the name we gave her, and she thinks she will keep it. We named her "friend" in Mando'a, the made up mandalorian language. She seemed really pleased.
I got myself some rainbow sherbet because I had this massive rainbow sherbet craving and Cat came up for a taste. I let him lick some off the spoon (this is spouse's fault, he's always letting Cat have a taste of his food if he wants). "See? You give me offerings. I am a god."
Anyway I had a great time talking with them. They are happy and they like being our little spirit companions. They like each other, despite not quite agreeing on philosophies.
Lots more happened but not much that would matter or I could explain in crude written words. It was a really good deathday. Again, it wasn't what I expected, but it was exactly what it was supposed to be. What I like about the grey project is that it's not "better" than reality. There is some unpleasantness where it feels like too many rides on the merry-go-round and you can't get off. When it's over, it feels good that it has ended, and you get to take the nice memories and little connections back into normal reality and work with them, until you are ready to learn a little more.
Totally worth it.
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I'm jumping through the hoops to cash out my old 401k from my respectable office job. I know, I know, my precious retirement. How will I afford my beach front mimosas in 30 years. Throwing all those future doolars away. But I really hate the damn thing. I hate feeling like I'm a hostage to the stock market. I hate feeling bound to the machine. I think now is a good time to shed those ties. We could use the money in hand - the move and the house and buying a new car - and it makes me feel like a useful contributor to help with that monetarily. I joke that it's my dowry. It's not a fortune, but it's respectable. It feels like the right thing to do, and the right timing.
I'm just not interested in being tied to the machine anymore. That seems paradoxical because we are about to commit ourselves to a whole new crop of machine shenanigans. Plus spouse has all his government retirement stuff (assuming things don't go mad max in a decade). I guess it is more symbolic, like a snake shedding a skin. It's part of the old life that isn't me anymore. My old life is "dead". I feel like I have the freedom to let go of what doesn't fit, in preparation for the new.