New York … Berlin … Utah … Oh My!

 

I see the pictures of when I was first in Utah, and I am so scary thin. Recovering from three bouts of pneumonia is no small feat, especially with the pressures of a new company, completing the contracts with the old one for the Berlin Ballet, and just getting settled into a very different vibe of Utah.

Going from Dallas, Texas, to New York City was a big leap. Going from New York City to Berlin … an even bigger leap. And while going from Berlin to Utah was a big leap, it was a different frequency of energy in a lot of ways.

While the guides clearly told me that this was my “place”, I was trying to get used to this very different, conservative mentality after living in very liberal and highly accepting artistic societies of big cities.

New York City is a place where anything goes!

Berlin was a city at the center of the Cold War, but it had a ton of artistic and very Avant Garde cultural behaviors that pushed the boundaries and made each of us question many things while living there.

Salt Lake City was the hub of the Mormon Church, and that energy was very palpable and obvious in almost every way.

It was not bad energy. Quite the contrary. As the Mormon Church clearly controlled many legal patterns and organizations, it was very safe and secure compared to other cities. Yet there was an undercurrent that had a lot of (Whasocially acceptable rules and the mindset had a more traditional approach.

New York City was about “no rules.” It was loud and dirty and had an air about it that showed the extremes in our society. It had an “in your face” attitude for the good … as well as the bad.

Berlin was about the Allied Forces imposing rules but trying to allow Germany to regain its footing. It was a city intending not to forget the past but to recreate itself in a very new and modern way for a glorious future. But the conflicts boiled below the surface, and it was clearly a city still healing and mourning.

Salt Lake City was founded with a spiritual base and the grandiose potential of the people who traveled to “this place” in order to follow something they felt was greater than their own being.

This state was like a huge river. But a river that was fed by smaller rivers and creeks. The confluences or many different people created eddies, whirlpools, and whispers of hidden undercurrents that one could not see … but could feel.

When I got to Utah, my parents had been so kind to get me a car, a used Dodge, and my one-bedroom apartment just below South Temple and on 11th East.

I was right on a bus run that would take me right to the theater if I needed. I was sandwiched right in the area between the University of Utah and the downtown area. I was in an area where the University of Utah’s student population was also housing.

There were students my age in the building and some older women who had lived there a long time.

Right at the beginning, life required me to do something that had never occurred to me in Germany.
I had to establish credit.

The only way to do that was to go to the Bed Stores and buy a bed, as they would allow me to buy a bed on credit and pay monthly so I could establish my own credit and have proof to show creditors that I did pay my bills.
I still had some money from working in Berlin, and so with that, I bought the car, got the insurance, put the down payments for the apartment and the security deposit down, and bought some furniture.

It was all very exciting.

I loved my partial basement apartment, as it was only half underground, and I had windows that did not look out much, but at least I had natural light, and Utah had great natural light.
My personal places of comfort are all around caves or dark, quiet places inside the earth. It blocks the psychic noise that I always hear from the cacophony of sounds that seem to constantly bombard my awareness.
In that apartment, there were no dead people walking through (which seemed to happen way too much in Berlin for obvious reasons), and the quiet was so peaceful (unlike the sounds of sirens and gunshots going off from New York City).

It was soothing to my nervous system. And my bedroom was wonderfully dark.
So much can happen when one relaxes one’s eyes and stares up into the darkness of cave-like energy.

I remember my mother coming the first time to Salt Lake City, and she and I were sleeping together in the queen-sized bed because there was no other real furniture at that point in the apartment.

I was going to sleep when I heard her whisper to me, “Suzanne, do you see that? What is that?”

I sleepily look at the ceiling where she is pointing, and I said, “Oh, those are just the bleeps!”

“What are bleeps?” she exclaimed.

I responded, “I am not completely sure, but I think they are the bubbles of light that are the guides and angels. They are conscious and alive. Oh! If you ask questions … they will talk to you.”

“Ask questions? How?” she said curiously.

I answered, “I like to think of it like a game. I call it ‘Red light, Green light, Yellow light’.

I ask a question, and I say, if it is a “Yes!” flash a green light. If it is a “No!” flash a red light. And if it is a “Maybe,” flash a yellow light.

You will be amazed at how much information you can get just doing that!”

She spoke softly and said, “Where did you learn that technique?”

I said, “When I was a child, one of the guides told it to me.”

“What guide?” she questioned.

“You remember … that Asian man that I played with in the backyard and the one I sang songs with.”

Now, when I was a very small child, I had a great invisible friend that was more my size, and we would play games outside. I remember singing songs in a more Chinese or Japanese style and with foreign words.

He would make jokes and change the words intentionally, and I would laugh and tell him that he was changing the words to silly words with funny meanings again.

My mother does remember that and wished she had a tape recorder because the words I was using … were clearly foreign in origin and that they had musical tones and flows with them.
I still remember one song, and it took years before someone that was descended from Japanese lineages said, “My grandmother used to sing me a song much like that one. Let’s call and ask her.

We did, and she told me that it was a song about cherry blossoms. She said that the song was in Japanese, but the second half was in a dialect. While it was Japanese, it was a very old form and dialect that she was unfamiliar with.

I remember how fun that guide was. He was very kind, and I felt safe with him as a child.
I often was left alone because my sister was dealing with her own issues with my mother, and so I usually escaped to my bedroom or down to the creek and played with my guide.
I remember him teaching me that there are many forms of intuition and that if you can see a guide but have trouble hearing them play the “Red light” game with him or her.

It always seemed to work.

So here we are … my mom and I in the bed, and so together we started playing the game, and she was amazed at how easy and clear it was to work with as a tool. She marveled that there seemed to be hundreds of “bleeps” in the room.

Now, I know they are called “Orbs.” But as a child, that was my name for them.
I kind of like my name better. Because they bleep colors.

Many years later, I even taught my first husband that technique. He was a computer geek. He admitted it also worked for him as well.
I loved that apartment on 11th East. There was an energy about it because it was so close to the ground, and it felt stabilizing to me.
The people who lived there were very nice and friendly. They were often from other states and on their own learning adventure.

One night late, I was asleep, and I woke suddenly because I hear someone walking on the gravel outside my windows.
My bedroom had a large bush in front of that window, but I could look out and see where the living room windows were more exposed and obvious.
I see the legs of a man, and he is bending down to use a crowbar on my window to break in.

I am stunned!

I think … “What do I do? The phone was right next to that window, and I did not want him to get into my apartment.”
I quickly decide to hit the window hard with the flat of my hand and scare him away from that window.

And that does work!
He jumps back and seems to run away.

I turn on the lights and run into the living room to grab the phone and call 911.

Then I also call the owner of the apartments.

The police show up, and they take a report, but I did not see the face of the man, only his clothing and crowbar.

However, that Texas girl in me … is pissed!
I tell the police officer in a snit, “I wish I had had my gun because if he got into my apartment, I would have shot him!”

Stunned, the police officer exclaimed, “What? Wait! You can’t do that?”
I said, “Why the hell not! He was on my property, and that gives me a reason to shoot anyone on my property! I wasn’t going to kill him; just wing him!”

The polices officer looks at this skinny young woman in front of him and says, “Where are you from?”
And I say, “Texas!”

He smiles and says, “Well, you are not in Texas, and the laws are different here! You can’t shoot someone on your property; it is not legal here like it is in Texas.”

Astonished, I said to him, “Then what was I supposed to do?”
He said, “In Utah, you would have to wrestle him to the outside sidewalk and pin him there and wait for us to show?”

I looked at him like he was insane!

I was a thin ballerina that could probably incapacitate a man with a Grande Battement to the groin, but I doubted if I could hold him down to wait for the police.
Clearly, in my mind, I made a mental note … I was not in Texas anymore!

~Suzanne Wagner~