I’m house/dog-sitting for some friends – just for one night until their regular person can start – but I’m thinking of changing professions! What’s not to love about a job that lets you temporarily stay in a beautiful home and play with friendly animals? It’s like a fucking vacation! And apparently, people PAY you to do it!
Here’s the thing I found particularly interesting about my overnight stay – I slept last night for nine and a half hours! Let me put that into context for you – for the past seven years, I’ve NEVER slept nine and a half hours. In fact, usually I don’t sleep more than six and a half or seven hours a night – and often only five or six hours a night. I know this because I was feeling exhausted most of the time, so I downloaded an app for my phone that recorded when I went to bed and when I got up. So, when I think about it, I realize that the time I actually sleep is probably 30 minutes or so LESS than what is recorded, because I tend to take a while to actually fall to sleep once I turn off the lights, I toss and turn during the night, and I get up at least once to pee – and then some random song will start playing in my head or I’ll start to worry about whatever stressful thing is going on just then in my life, and I’ll lay in bed for 30 minutes or an hour before I actually fall back to sleep again. Sometimes I just give up in disgust and get up at 4 or 5am to start my day.
But at my friend’s house, I fell asleep at 9:30pm (unheard of!) and slept a deep sleep, full of dreams (about dogs, go figure), and even though I got up once to pee, I went right back to sleep for another three hours!
That got me thinking – what’s different? I can’t really blame the lack of sleep at my house with the current situation going on there – because I haven’t slept well since we purchased the house – some seven years ago. I don’t think it’s the stress of home ownership – because we’ve never had a problem paying the mortgage and, while remodeling is stressful and we’ve done a lot of that, the remodeling was only periodic after we actually moved in. My bed at home is super comfy, I love my pillows (in fact I brought them with me to my friend’s house), the temperature is usually comfortable, and there is not a lot of extraneous noise to contend with. So it’s not any of that.
Could it be the house?
We purchased our house from a couple who divorced and were in financial straits. The husband was living there all alone (with furniture in only one room) and the bank was ready to foreclose when made the offer. It was an “as is” sale – so when we closed, he packed up the things he wanted and left the rest for us to deal with. Our new neighbor, Dave – a friendly guy who knows everything about everyone in the neighborhood, told us that the husband and wife often fought loudly. He added that their teenage children were sullen, rebellious, and that the parents did not seem to really care. Dave told us about an incident where the mother and the children were in the untended backyard, which was overgrown with huge, dried up weeds. One of the teenagers decided to set the weeds on fire – particularly unwise in New Mexico where there is a long-term drought, the winds blow almost constantly, and fire danger is always high. Dave, not wanting a fire to burn down HIS house, called out to the mother and gestured, “Deb? Are you seeing this?” She responded, “Mind your own fucking business!”
They must have been great neighbors. Have I mentioned that Dave was thrilled to have us move into the house and fix it up?
As we cleaned out the leftover belongings, we found several boxes in the attic – and as we brought them down, we also found several butcher knives scattered on top of the insulation, just inside the attic hatch. It appeared that someone had just thrown the knives up into the attic – but why? If they were storing the knives, why weren’t they boxed? We joked that they were murder weapons, thrown up there to evade detection. But I really wondered if they had been thrown up there so that someone else would not have easy access to them. Had someone been worried that the knives MIGHT have been used as a weapon?
As we were painting my daughter’s room, we took down the sliding doors to the closet to refinish them. On the back of one, carved into the wood with a sharp object, were the words, “I hate them!” There were also many other scratches and holes in the wood – it was apparent that someone had sat inside the closet at least once and gouged out their emotions in secret.
While I’ve had some episodes of depression from time to time during my adult life, only once did it require medication and only for a short while. But after we moved into the house, my depression became worse, and more frequent, and for the last two years I’ve been on two different anti-depressants daily. Certainly there was more stress – Doc was unemployed at one point for over a year, we did a lot of remodeling (often running into unforeseen problems along the way), and I went back to working full-time after over a decade of working from home part-time. And, of course, the marriage began to have more and more problems until it collapsed entirely last month. I used to wonder, in a light-hearted fashion and not really believing it, if the house had bad karma and was determined to make the occupants feel miserable.
I’m starting to wonder about this more seriously.
My friend (in fact the very friend I’m dog-sitting for) mentioned to me once that he felt they had some bad energy in their home, so he burned a smudge stick and used it in each room. A smudge stick is made up of dried herbs (usually sage), tightly wound into a stick. It is used by lighting one end and immediately blowing it out, so it smolders and produces aromatic smoke. For centuries, smudge sticks have been used for religious purposes by Native Americans, especially those in the Southwest. These days, some people believe that smudge sticks are a good method to help clear the psychic atmosphere.
Does my house need a smudging?
Now I’m not AT ALL a new-age type of person. Unless there is a zombie apocalypse, I’m never going to be weaving my own cloth or making my own sandals. Most of my beliefs are based on science rather than religion, tradition, or fad. However, I never dismiss anything out of hand – I have seen that some things just cannot be explained, that occasionally the craziest sounding idea is the best one, and that closed-minded people are cut off from something greater than themselves (and they generally are also super annoying). So, if smudging my house might give the place a more positive atmosphere and clear out the bad ju-ju – I’m willing to give it a shot. Hell, for nine hours of sleep, I’m willing to give ANYTHING a shot!
Have you ever smudged anything? Do you believe that places can have bad energy? Or do you think this is all just malarkey? You can say so – as I’ve said, I have a very open mind
What are the effects of Radon? Could it be Radon?
So, according to the websites I read, Radon causes lung cancer — but they really don’t have much evidence it causes other problems. But who knows? We don’t have a basement (it seems like a lot of people with Radon problems have one — I guess that is where Radon loves to lurk), but my house is contrary enough that it might poison us with Radon just to screw with us 🙂
I’ve smudged my house when the kids were really acting up out of the ordinary (But they were also really small and claiming to see and talk to people that we adults could not see) so I smudged the entire house. the kids quieted down and the atmosphere did feel different. Maybe it’s just psychological, but hey, whatever helps, right?
It certainly can’t hurt (unless I set my house on fire by accident!) Thanks for visiting my blog and commenting April! Hope you stick around!
Smudge it! what have you got to lose? I barely finished reading this before I was googling where to get supplies in my area! I think I need to do the same. I knew from the first day in our house that it wasn’t going to be home for me for some reason. Since then we have had a multitude of problems. From fires to floods, house troubles ( albeit minor ) and constant septic issues * ahhh the joys of acreage ownership :S
Apparently you can buy the smudge sticks already made — but really, how hard can it be to make them? I’ve got all sorts of dead herbs in my garden (I excel at killing plants). And you’re right, Terri — home ownership is it’s own little slice of hell 🙂
I am skeptical of all that type of stuff. But I come from a very New Age-y family. And I also feel like it cant hurt to do something positive. Besides, I love rituals. They fascinate me.
That being said, I smudge regularly. I am really into sage and an incense called Nag Champa Super Hit. I also like burning sweet grass (it’s Native American, not marijuana).
I also have a lot of crystals around my place and meditate regularly.
People always say my place has great energy so I guess it is working. None of that stuff can hurt. I say give it a try.
You know, when you think about it, incense is just another form of smudging — it smokes, it smells, and it’s all for atmosphere. And where, may I ask, do you get sweet grass? I have never heard of it!
PS, Maurna — Smudging? Incense? Crystals? Meditating? I think you ARE New Age-y (in a perfectly pleasant way!) I am totally going to smudge my house and I’ve been wanting to try meditation for a long time — so I guess I’m right there with you 🙂
I know. I’m so ashamed. But I still have a healthy skepticism.
I also do yoga and have a mezuzah. But I wrote my own prayer in the mezuzah. I just use it for mindfulness.
I buy my sweetgrass from Native American festivals. But I have seen it at Tibetan shops and head shops.
Do I want to know what a head shop is? I want to say it’s a place where you can buy bongs and pipes — but it’s been a LONG while since I’ve done that sort of thing….and I’m old now…so I may be confused. Please tell me it is that and not a place where you can buy….well…YOU know 🙂
I don’t know what you are implying. If this was my blog I would guess some horribly dirty things. As it isn’t, a head shop is a place to buy pipes and bongs, for tobacco use, obviously.
Obviously 🙂
Personally…I think it’s all silly…but I am not so arrogant to say I know anything for sure…
If my house starts fixing it own problems after I smudge, we both might need to rethink things 😉
I say it can’t hurt and very well might help. I worked in tribal health for many years and smudging was a fairly regular activity. I also heard stories about the “ancestors” visiting the children because they’re open to that kind of thing (just saying maybe Aprils kids were spot on.) Whatever your beliefs, you obviously feel that your house has some bad juju going on with it and this could be the perfect way to take care of it. That closet thing alone is super creepy. I’m not sure where you live in New Mexico, but the Indian Pueblo Center in Albuquerque is fascinating and probably has good resources for finding the sage and learning about smudging. Of course Google probably has that too but the food there is amazing and they have 2 or 3 different kinds of fried bread.
I have NEVER heard of the Indian Pueblo Center (and I’ve lived in the Albuquerque area for seven years – so apparently, I am a hermit!) I looked it up and I am SO going there this weekend! You had me with “fry bread”. Do you live in New Mexico or are you just an incredibly well-read visitor to the Land of Enchantment (I may have to pick your brains for other interesting places to visit, as it is clear I have no clue)