The Hawk

My last several entries have dealt w/ my dreams, but two days ago, while mowing my lawn, I had the most amazing brush with reality.  A hawk landed about 10 yards from where I was standing.  I immediately stopped the mower and gazed at the most amazing sight I've seen since the birth of my daughters and the death of my mother.  Truly breathtaking, awe-inspiring, and humbling.  I have a feeling he was after one of the many rabbits that live in my yard, and, having missed his prey, rested on the ground before flying up to a branch in the walnut tree above my head.  I was transfixed, unable to look away from his enormous size and his apparent disinterest and disregard for my existence.  From the walnut tree, he flew to another tree in another yard.  It just occurred to me that I've given him a male pronoun when it's quite possible that "he" was a "she" since female bird species tend to be larger and do much of the hunting.  Anyway, IT was incredible.

Not only do I believe in dream interpretation, but I believe in symbols.  Having a hawk cross my path in such an astonishing way had to mean something.  In researching hawk symbolism, I learned that animal totems (symbols) are very powerful.  I was honored and blessed to have had such an encounter since the hawk is the messenger and reminds us to look deep within ourselves.  One source, http://morningstar.netfirms.com/hawktotem.html, said that sometimes the hawk is telling us to take no action such as in not starting a relationship.  Maybe that's why I felt the need to break the date I had later that night after seeing the hawk.  This site also talked briefly about other culture's relationship w/ the hawk. The Celts felt the message was to look at one's ancestry to determine what should be retained and honored and what should be discarded.  The Native Americans believed that the message the hawk brought was of change.  I appreciate that interpreting symbols can be like interpreting a horoscope or an oracle; we see what we want to see.  Well, what I want to see from the Celtic and Native American traditions are that I need to discard any beliefs that I will follow in my mother's path of battling numerous cancers throughout her life.  That's where the change comes in.  Something especially interesting that I found at http://answers.ask.com/Science/Other/what_does_a_hawk_symbolize, but haven't verified is refers to the flight pattern of the hawk.  I saw the hawk land to my left and fly off to my right.  The Nordic believed such a pattern meant victory.  Yea, the obvious place for me to go w/ that one is my victory over cancer.