Continuing a Remarkable Life

Delilah's Up date; November 11, 2004

Well. . . some time has past since the last installment and the gifting of Steve's living web biography. For it to be truly “alive” installments are called for. Many things have come to pass.

Steve's reaction to the web site was cool. He was touched, but reserved about it. I t took him a while to get through it all. In fact he was still reading it in the fall of 2003. He liked it but I told him I wouldn’t be offended if he took it down. It was a gift from my heart and he was free to do with it what he pleased. He said had come to like that it was out there in cyber space.

As Steve said above God loves her stories and this one will never let you down as for amazing life adventure and suprises.

The year that followed in 2003 was a year spent warmly with family. It was the year both daughters graduated in harmony; Laura Rose from Collage and Vic from High school. All foru in laws were able to attended from out of state. The summer was beautiful. There was much warmth and laughter . . . but by August change was also in the air.

Steve announced he decided to go back to school and study nursing (more on that later). Victoria graduated from Nathan Hale High School and started attending Shoreline collage in Seattle. She also was interested in the nursing program. Laura Rose graduated from the The Evergreen State University and is currently a video producer and editor as well as a dancer and performance artist. Laura Rose was raised in a belly dance family. She re-edited and studied the Delilah videos with a fine tooth comb. She understood belly dance and thus began her career in belly dance when she accompanied me on the Caravan tour of the East Coast in October/November of 2003 for 6 weeks with the musical duo Sirocco. It was an amazing adventure to share with her and convinsed me that I wasn't ready to turn in my dancing hip belt if my daughter was interested in a dance career!

Steve's interest in the video dance business was loosing steam and had been for the last couple of years. He was yearning for a simpler life, other than the demands and risks that go along with running ones own small business in the art world. Even though you could call your own hours and rarely miss out on any event you wanted to do that a 9-5 job would not allow, he found himself doing more internet and computer work every day and he didn't like it. He basically wanted a life with more traditional forms of security in the way of health benefits. He wanted a way of making a living that he didn’t have to take on 24/7 . There was still time in his life and he was plenty smart to retrain and start a different career. As I said, Laura Rose’s interest in belly dance reignited the fire and passion I have had for belly dance in a brand new way and gave me a second wind. I was perfectly happy to continue running Visionary Dance Productions. I mounted the Caravan Tour and the Easter Hawaii Retreat all on my own while Steve went back to school. I became inspired to get the business out of the house and the tiny Evanston studio and expand into opening a video/dance studio across the street from where we live on Fremont. By the Winter of 2004 Laura Rose would have her own editing suite and we would have a big studio to film and dance in.

Major transitions came to be realized in 2004.

Steve wanted change on many levels. He wanted to simplify. Sounds like he wants to retire but that is far from what he is doing. He's taking on a whole new vocation. While this might seem to be a turning away from his talents in music and the arts it really is not a surprising detour to those who know him. His music is therapeutic to people and he hasn’t really left it. In fact Rapture Rumi has been called music to make love and die by. While it is beautiful it is fact that people have chosen it to be playing as they passed. Impressive sign I feel. His calling to spiritual pursuits lead him to feel he could help people by becoming a nurse and he was smart enough to take on the intense program that was to be demanded of him. Certainly his life was not going to get simpler for a while to come. He enrolled in collage to get the prerequisites in the fall of 2003 and took on a ton of hard courses he managed to finish by the summer of 2004 with a 4.14 grade point.We are all very proud of him. We shall see what that may bring him. The nursing programs are another 2-3 years. I’m sure he’ll ace it!

On May Day 2004, Steve and I decided our marriage was a sucess and also complete. We had finished our projects together. We had raised two fabulous daughters, made music, art and love together for 23 + years and behold. . .we realized we wanted to explore different thing for our future now. Life is long. During our marriage we have always been supportive of each others goals and dreams.Steves persut of a nursing carrer and the life style he was entering into was truely his personal dicision that had nothing to do with me. he was very interested in spiritual practices that required alot of solitude.To support that, and my own needs I needed to let go. After doing the Caravan and HawaiiI Retreat in 2003 by my self I realized I was lonely. I love what I'm doing in my life and really don't want to do it alone so in ending our marrage on a positive note allows everyones needs to be met.

Life is long and it’s not a race of endurance after all. Time to part and appreciate the time our life's lined up to be together. A very mutual understanding was reached. Odd sort of realization that many people might not understand. Steve and I both came from homes whose parents are still married and have been for over 50 years. We are conditioned to think that staying together for eternity is an important achievment. We both just sort of realized that 24 years was a long time and an achievment. Our lives are even longer and people can begin a new life if they want. We can be proud of it and not feel obligated to stay married if we want different things out of life. I think we both had known this was coming for some time.

The kids felt sad of course, but realized over the next few months that it did not mean our family was falling apart and getting smaller. It was changing, widening and getting bigger. Steve and I were not unhappy about our decision. In fact we were mutually supportive of each others chosen paths and future dreams. We are very happy! Just because we have been together for 24 years is not a reason to continue. We are always going to be a family. Nothing will change that beauty or erase the love and the memories. . . Wow! Can we all be big enough to hold that vessel? I think so. The astounding couple are getting an asounding divorce.

So far so good. We have much work to do to undue the knot of buisiness and responsibility. We still dance and play music together, we have dinner parties and do stuff with the kids. We have different partners already and we are all good friends. We are very blessed and very happy.

Delilah November 11, 2004

PS. Perhaps my Gift of Steve’s "Living Biography" was a way of summing up my love for him and facilitating my ultimate process of letting go. He is an amazing man. When I re read the pages of this site I appreciate him all the more.
If you walk these pages, enjoy his story as I do.