Mountains of Blue

(Indigo Series #2)

The color of my mountains is baby blue. I know, there is the white of snow, the evergreen of pine trees, and a myriad of colorful flowers in the Summer, but all you see there is the baby blue sky that envelops the mountains.

When my great-grandmother left the mountains, full of grief and hopes, she looked at the sky and said, "I lost a baby to you, but I keep the blue." She went on, singing in the knowing silence of her lineage.

I have been there in my dreams, I have walked the mountain's paths, and they taught me where I come from. It was dark and painful - we can not hope to find our roots without digging into darkness. But still, all I see is their beauty. All I see is that immense, open blue sky. And yet, how can I talk about it to my friend, for whom these mountains represent death? When that same landscape that nourishes my longing, my ancestral roots, my spacious sense of freedom, has taken her child from her? My mountains of Switzerland ripped her soul the way they did my great-grandmother's. No more baby. Only the blue. The indigo-deep ocean of sorrow.

Indigo is the color of initiation, the color of women who know depth. The gowns at the breast center are Indigo, and they fit every woman who wears them, no matter how tall, how old, no matter how big, healthy, or small. Now that I have worn that gown, the soft mountain of my right breast has been hollowed, a dip into the flesh, clearly visible. I know the color underneath, near the half-moon scar.

It is not peacock blue - too showy, too loud, too male.

It is not teal, for teal is nice and easy, like a birthday party with flowers on a perfect cake.

It is not navy; it is not a ship; it is not going anywhere. There are no winds under those sails.

The color underneath the valley of my breast is Indigo blue. I know it.

And the Handless Maiden knows it too. She was there and peeked under my skin when the surgeon cut open a half moon around my nipple and lifted it. The Handless Maiden smiled at the inside of my breast, and she took me to the woods again. Again? Yes, she said, it's never the same the second time.

So we went, and that time there were no dark days, no crouching under the bushes, trembling, afraid of the sound of ruffled leaves, of a diagnosis coming our way, an angry father, or the dragon of betrayal. There was no running away from pain and scratching our legs against the thorny vines, no long night waiting, weeping to the moon and wishing it all stopped.

The second time in the woods, we found a cottage. It was full of women dressed in blue and gold, wearing necklaces and ankle bracelets made of lapis-lazuli. Some had traveled through continents, others through time. My great-grandmother was cooking a soup made of nettles and celery roots, and my friend who lost her baby in my mountains was reading a book near the fire, a warm glow illuminating her curly hair.

Someone opened the door, and the Handless Maiden and I entered.

The women undressed us. They wrapped her wrists with fresh leaves and roots. They massaged my breasts with violet oil; it smelled blue and purple. They gave us gowns and sang songs from the time that heals.

In the house of the woods sisters, in the house of the blues, the Handless Maiden grew her hands back, and under my scars, Indigo rivers started to run. Again.

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Other posts in the Indigo Series:

Indigo

The Handless Maiden and the Indigo Gown.