My Mom died on the Libra Solar Eclipse last October (2024). 

I’ve been thinking of her a lot lately. A little over a week ago, September 7th, was her birthday. She would have been 84. It was the Pisces Lunar Eclipse. My remaining siblings and aunties and I went for a boat tour on the Hudson River in honor of Mom. My sisters and aunts shared spooky stories from after her death and agreed she was on the boat with us. We saw eagles and blue herons. The tour guide was surprised we saw no Canadian geese. She was not surprised we saw no Canadian boats.

I didn’t have any spooky stories to tell. I feel like when Mom left she was ready. She hung on for as long as she could. She didn’t have any messages for me. It’s alright, the last few days of her life we made music together – repeating sounds and rhythms, letting all of it be a song – the oxygen machine breathing her, her small moans, and me and Owl Cat repeating her sounds back to her. That was the perfect message – pure presence. I don’t need her ghost hovering near my bed (I have enough of those).

The green of the grass and trees has been goldening, some trees are rusting now, reddening, and pale browning, too. Mostly everything is still some turning slipping shade of green. Walking down the hill toward the house where I am currently living, I could feel it’s close to the time of her actively dying even though she has already died. I said out loud, “It’s not even been a year.”

Last Saturday, while waiting to perform with Bhānaka Sangha, one of my choir mates, Kafka, said to me, “You have been through a lot this year.” 

Yes.

It’s only just beginning to feel like my life is getting easier. My body is still healing from caregiving injuries. This time last year I was walking with a limp. Today I have pain in my pelvis, my knee – but often I feel no pain. Financially – I am rebuilding. Sometimes I am in depression and grief and it takes a lot of energy to be alive, but I know if I move my body I feel better – and – I also know, it will pass (even when it feels like it won’t).

And there is this —

I get to make art!

I get to talk about tarot and astrology!

I get to dance!

I get to do chi gong, yoga, meditation!

I get to write!

I get to make music!

I get to respond to what is happening in the world!

I get to choose how I live my life!

I get to have gratitude!

I get to be curious!

I get to love my life!

I get to love – period!

Over the last few years I’ve been talking about taking my time. “Take your time” is my mantra lately. I like to slow down and notice. 

Recently, I was sitting in my studio, quietly having a cup of coffee. Looking at the light. This is what I saw: 

The evening of Mom’s birthday, a few days before I made my morning-in-the-studio-video, I made my weekly moon draw video for the Pisces Full Moon Lunar Eclipse. I usually post something about the moon every week – but I didn’t do it that week. 

Mom’s birthday falling on a Lunar Eclipse this year was fitting. The in-between time of the Lunar Eclipse and next week’s Solar Eclipse already feels like something has changed for me on a deep level. I shared a little while back that I was still coming out of the underworld. It feels like now I am closer to the mouth of the cave.

Fall is moving in.

I’ll be bowing to Persephone with deepest respect as she passes me on her way down.

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September 16th, 2025
Hudson Valley, New York

image: studio in the morning © holly troy 2025