Swimming the great stream, drinking from a spring

Robert Moss has sure been influential in my writing lately. Here I go again. My ex-wife bought his first book for me, Conscious Dreaming, back in 2004 or 5. It was a thoughtful gift, since I'm sure my spending half an hour every morning writing down my dreams was a source of annoyance to her at times.

I've decided to take some time out of the normal grind. Not like I really had a 'grind' so to speak - but being in Vancouver, working, looking for more work, trying to meet people and build friendships and build a life there. Of some sort, in my fashion. I said years ago that job-hunting comes at a direct cost in self-esteem. Let's consider this a re-fill.

The month of August opened up as a time where I didn't have to have a place to live, so I decided not to - but instead to hit the road. My real travel is going to be though, crossing the great stream within that divides our inner and outer lives, selves; the River of Life. It's also the Lethe, the river of forgetting - and I need to swim it both ways, I think.

So I'm on the Sunshine Coast again. Staying with great friends on the beach.. I know, life is rough.  In a way I'm doing the same thing I did at this time last year - a wandering vagabond lawyer with car and a collection of feathers, and a collection of dreams..

This time the dreams are a bit different. Last year was so clear - I was on a spiritual journey of getting in touch with my enjoyment of life again. This year - it's not as clear if I just fell here, or if I actually have a reason for being here. So I'm going to take some time to re-examine the last year or more of my life, and let my compass reset itself.

Write. Robert Moss says. Yes, I'll probably do that too. I can't see healing or finding any clarity otherwise. He says to write in blood (my own(luckily, I've got lots;)). In some ways, that's exactly what I've been avoiding, and it has cost this blog, and my life - some numinosity: some vital power. Like a flower without sap. I've done this because - my romantic life has been a disaster and I was shy and embarrassed about it, and someone else didn't want to be mentioned here either, which is totally understandable.
Now I'm totally single and can feel moments of pure happiness returning. Pure dumb happiness. What is it? Good 'ole Guy Finley says in his monumental book - The Secret of Letting Go - nothing can make you happy. But some things can keep you from being happy, block the flow. Happiness is our natural state, and bubbles up like water from a spring - all on its own. One of the things I'm examining is what really makes me happy - and what does not. Do the times I've been happiest, in my adult life, fit with my ideas about what makes me happy?
Unclear.
As I review the past I'll just keep taking mouthfuls from that spring when I can. And see where that leads me..
As far as writing goes I haven't felt like I could write about this (but Robert Moss apparently does):

... the time in the war-torn city
when your heart was a quivering bird in your palm
and the blood pool kept filling, and you knew
no doctor could heal this wound
though the world would end if you failed
to keep the wounded lover alive for three days more.

and I certainly didn't want to write about this,

Remember the promises you made her:

"You'll never be hurt again." "Every day you'll make poetry."

Write from the night you could not keep those promises
and had to hold the young lover in you by force,
rough as a jailer's armlock, soft as lambskin,

The "her" the person in the poem made promises to - is their own heart, I think. I've certainly made lots of promises to mine I couldn't keep. But then again, as I've said before - I don't really know my own heart (but damn, I'm trying!).

If I was my heart I'd rather be restless...

And yes-  over the past few months I have held my heart in - exactly like that. My heart is naive and young, and I like it that way. But that means - it does need a jailer at times - someone to hold it in. And I think the jailer sheds a tear every time he does, but he does it out of love.

And I haven't even wanted to think about this:

And when your heart
breaks again, hold her fast, willing a greater power
to embrace and join you, and write from that.

Really not sure if I can do that one. And he finishes;

Dip your pen in the blood pool. This is the time for red ink.

Can I just use the blood from my shin where I fell on some rocks? Probably not, I know. .. I'm not sure I can do that one either. I'll try.
It reminds me again of the Open Letter to the World, which I quoted two blogs ago - "But something unexpected is happening. We have begun telling each other our own stories. Sharing our lives, our hopes, our dreams, our demons.
Every second, day in day out, into all hours of the night the gritty details of life on this earth are streaming around the world."
I'm taking some time to walk around my inner world, I'll see what I bring back and if I have the guts to write it down. I found six eagle feathers yesterday - it reminded me and helped me see, with the help of another Robert Moss blog I just read ( http://mossdreams.blogspot.com/2011/07/tarot-confirms-courage-is-fear.html ) - that the wind horse of Buddhism is not something outside of us, but - "the wind beneath our wings" that comes from living from our soul - following our bliss - when you hear the wind whipping by your ears - then you know you're doing it right. Scary. I'm scared.

Courage, it couldn't come at a worse time

I guess I'll just keep swimming these dark waters, like in Motorcylce Diaries, when Che Guevara swims the river at night to get to the leper colony on the other side - where he was forbidden to go - I'll go visit my own inner leper colony, and see what they have to teach me.

Travels on Mother Earth

I have no parents--I make the heavens and earth my parents.

This entry is pretty much a continuation of the last one. But different. I've been marvelling at the world lately, the revolutions in the Middle East, Bolivia: passing laws recognizing the rights of Mother Earth? Who would have guessed that ten years ago? Count on an indigenous government to lead the way. Not that we euro's are stupid, but we've been leading for a while, and have gotten us as far as we can.

It's a beautiful document, and statement.
http://motherearthrights.org/

affirming that to guarantee human rights it is necessary to recognize and defend the rights of Mother Earth and all beings in her and that there are existing cultures, practices and laws that do so;
...
Article 1. Mother Earth
1. Mother Earth is a living being.
2. Mother Earth is a unique, indivisible, self-regulating community of interrelated beings that sustains, contains and reproduces all beings.
3. Each being is defined by its relationships as an integral part of Mother Earth.
4. The inherent rights of Mother Earth are inalienable in that they arise from the same source as existence.
5. Mother Earth and all beings are entitled to all the inherent rights recognized in this Declaration without distinction of any kind, such as may be made between organic and inorganic beings, species, origin, use to human beings, or any other status.
6. Just as human beings have human rights, all other beings also have rights which are specific to their species or kind and appropriate for their role and function within the communities within which they exist.
7. The rights of each being are limited by the rights of other beings and any conflict between their rights must be resolved in a way that maintains the integrity, balance and health of Mother Earth.

My parents have passed on, as any readers know, so making the Heavens and Earth my parents is not a tough one for me. But in a way I think we all need to do that - like any new religion - abandon our old ways, our attachments to old things, and make the Earth and the Universe our parents.

At the same time I've started reading the Bhagwan again - Bhagwan Shree Rajneesh (OSHO), and can't escape his dictates - that the most powerful thing is to simply be yourself. We are both dark and light, mostly we live in the past or future in our minds, but occasionally we manage to just be here, as us. Meditation helps..

And watched One Week the other night - about a guy who gets diagnosed with cancer and chucks everything to drive a Norton motorcycle across Canada. A lovely Canadian film, it reminded me of my travels and so many journeys to those places - the Sudbury Nickel to Tofino to Alberta's rolling hills. But the point is - we all have a week to live. Or less.

A teenage boy heard about the new law in Bolivia and said to his Dad - "I want to go there and be part of it - to see Mother Earth." His Dad said, "really?" and looked at him, looked down at the ground. The boy looked down at the ground. Silence. He looked up, "gotcha."

Mother Earth is right here, being ourselves is right here. We have one week to do it. Whatever it is.

Dark is a way and light is a place,
Heaven that never was
Nor will be ever is always true

No, we have one moment to do it - now. I do want to go to Bolivia, and feel the energy of change, of the future. And I wish I was in the Middle East right now, soaking up revolution. But if I had one week to live, one minute, one moment, here, now, what would it be?

I am on Earth, perfect and imperfect, torn between the past and future, can I simply accept what I am?
I am that.

Go Ask Alice (why we write)

About a year and a half ago, in a moment of brashness - I asked the Universe to 'speed things up'. Every time I recall that, with a shiver, (because it's usually at a time when changes are coming quickly and slightly uninvited) I'm tempted to think or say, "ok, that's enough" but instead I whisper - "keep it up, I know I whine sometimes, but I like it better this way..." ..or something to that effect.
There have been lots of changes in my life lately.

You ride now on cobbled streets

beyond my ramparts

to the palace of desires and hauteurs

of sweet airs and embraces

where once you forgot your duty

and the needs of the people

until I brought the roof down.

Remember, falcon rider.

I certainly feel like I've forgotten my duty before. What is 'our duty'? To create a better life? Simply to live an authentic life? I don't know.. to follow our bliss, perhaps.

It's from another Robert Moss poem: The Tower. The destruction of structures we have created for ourselves. De-structure. The sharp-shinned hawk, mentioned in the last blog, that I saw at lunch while at a session on soul-recovery with Robert, I had thought was a falcon, and told him so at the end of that day. When I found this poem a few days ago it seemed pretty on-point for my life, and..  synchronous.

When logic and proportion
Have fallen sloppy dead
And the white knight is talking backwards
And the Red Queen's "Off with her head!"
Remember what the dormouse said

Feed your head

Feed your head. I was making some art based on that song, and line, when my Dad died. The white knight - means to me; the empty cup - the buddist idea of letting go of all notions of yourself and letting the Universe flow through you. Adding to that the idea of "knight" = an empty warrior, one who lets the Universe flow through him, does not have his own agenda. I didn't know it meant all this to me when I was drawing it, back in 2001.

I have no parents--I make the heavens and earth my parents. - A Samurai Warrior's Creed

 
Goes hand in hand with the Tower. Although it may not seem so at first. I think it's about the cycles of life - like crab shells we all work hard on making, and then must let go of when we outgrow them - this is a natural process. The Universe can't flow through you when you're holding onto things you have outgrown. I certainly didn't see the relationship between 'feed your head,' the white knight, and the Tower, when Dad left my life. I saw that he had always fed his head - read, learned, grown, and changed. We can only grow if we can let go.

every day new dreams must die

see what's on the other side

I started following a blog called Expotera a long time ago. Not sure why, except it's good.
After a recent career set-back (not that big a deal) I've been wondering over the last few days what role writing has in my life, and if I should do more, or less. I've been asking myself: is that, in some ways, where I'm going, where I've been going for a long time?

As I was pondering this question the other day I happened upon this entry: http://expotera-ceo.blogspot.com/2011/07/open-letter-to-world.html it's called "Open Letter to the World." You should read it. I'm not sure if Tony wrote it, or reposted from here: http://www.anonnews.org/?p=press&a=item&i=619.

"But something unexpected is happening. We have begun telling each other our own stories. Sharing our lives, our hopes, our dreams, our demons.
Every second, day in day out, into all hours of the night the gritty details of life on this earth are streaming around the world.

As we see the lives of others played out in our living rooms we are beginning to understand the consequences of our actions and the error of the old ways.

We are questioning the old assumptions that we are made to consume not to create, that the world was made for our taking, that wars are inevitable, that poverty is unavoidable.

As we learn more about our global community a fundamental truth has been rediscovered: We are not so different as we may seem.

Every human has strengths, weaknesses, and deep emotions. We crave love, love laughter, fear being alone and dream for a better life.

You must create a better life.
You cannot sit on the couch watching television or playing video games, waiting for a revolution. You are the revolution."

I took the timing to be synchronous. We are all connected. Everything belongs to you and me. AND - we belong to it. I'll keep writing. Is that my duty?

His post expresses why we all write - to change the world, to change ourselves, and to ease the pain of the pain and glory of existence - by sharing it with one another. Let's all surf the net and see how much people out there are like us. They are us.

He sees the stars and hollow sky
He see the stars come out tonight
He sees the city's ripped backsides
He sees the winding ocean drive
And everything was made for you and me
All of it was made for you and me
'cause it just belongs to you and me
So let's take a ride and see what's mine

Sharp-shinned Pat and the Texada Project

Went to Texada Island the weekend before last, and Powell River. With my pal Jesse James. We called it "The Texada Project" - from Vancouver to Texada and back, in three days. Three ferry crossings each way. Went in his little green truck. We met Gabriel there and a posse that is feeling kind of like my posse these days, although I don't see them nearly enough.

What a fantastic place! Went for a festival, and hiked through the woods, it took about an hour of heavy bushwhacking. Through beautiful forest and green life.. Past wasps and razor-bush - Gabriel's shins got scratched. A lot. Ok - cut to shreds. Not mine though. (not sure if that's because they're sharp, or because I had jeans on, but I just like the image.. ;)

This weekend I did a course with Robert Moss on Shamanic dreaming and soul recovery, here in Vancouver. It was a lot of fun. Saw a sharp-shinned hawk (I know now that I've looked it up), in the woods, while eating lunch with some fellow dreamers. It landed right in front of us on a tree, then went to another, and we followed it around a little bit to get a closer look. It was a pretty bird, strong and fragile at the same time, a hunter - steel gray on the back, with an orange and cream chest and a banded tail. It seemed a bit injured - it could still fly, but not that well, and was sheltering itself.
I wondered, "is that my soul up there?"

I had worn my eagle t-shirt, in shameless openness about what I see as my guiding spirit. When I said at the start of the day that I didn't know (anymore(after yesterday's shorter session)) why I was there, Mr. Moss said, "did a bird of prey carry you in its talons and drop you here?"

Maybe it did, my friend, I wouldn't put it past them. It takes a lot to get me where I should be.

He wrote in his blog today;

Knight, you came to this crossing before
bold and green, fired up for the quest,
and did not know that this was always the place:
this stony beach, the crabbers and fishing nets,
the wind-blown houses across the dark waters.


Reminding me again of what this is all about. That I set out to find and fulfill my quest, my personal quest, having wasted enough time in life. I set out to find and do and be what's true for me. And also reminding me of Texada and the Sunshine Coast.

We did an exercise at the end of the day. He asked us what we came for, what we truly wanted out of this. We did it in partners, and did a visioning to find each other's answers. I was lucky to be paired up with a young man with a big strong heart, and an open third-eye (apparently).
His information reminded me of these words, which I have quoted before and have carried with me for a long long time. I saw again today how much they mean to me, and what they've meant all these years, "Where many paths and errands meet."

The whole verse is,

          The Road goes ever on and on

Down from the door where it began.

Now far ahead the Road has gone,

And I must follow, if I can,

Pursuing it with eager feet,

Until it joins some larger way

Where many paths and errands meet.

And whither then? I cannot say.

The poem is, "The Road Goes Ever On", from The Hobbit, and repeated in the Lord of the Rings. I wonder if that's another reason I chose "errand" over "errant". One may never know..

Moss ends his poem with,

You drink deep, and something opens deeper in you
in the cavity of the heart, a cup is filling with light.
Light streams from the heart, pure waterfall, and you know
you have found the Grail, in the one place it can be found.

Is the heart the Grail? Is it in there? I wouldn't know, I don't really know my own heart. "Me too," she wispers.

The first thing you see upon arrival on Texada Island is a quarry. The Island has limestone and cool geology. It's very dry, the largest Gulf Island, and has a pretty unique forest for BC. Jesse and I talked about maybe buying some land there one day. It's beautiful behind it's gouged and ugly facade. Like the limping hawk, I guess it also felt like me. Leaving Texada I picked up a dragonfly on the ferry so it wouldn't get run over. It was also wounded, and it wouldn't get off me for about half an hour. Sweet, beautiful living thing. It drove with us a while, and I let her off on a blade of tall grass by the road.

I've been quite aware of my imperfections lately, although not (like Gord Downie) quite aware of check-out time. In the midst of big changes in life (again), the future unclear (again:), this weekend (and last;) helped remind me - my Grail - I don't think I'll find alone. I feel like there are compatriots out there, travellers in the desert; warriors and navigators.. dreamers and builders.

Over the weekend my question population grew a lot faster than my answers did, but... I think that's good.

The Fisher King made you
His guest, you saw the bleeding
Lance, but you couldn't be bothered
To open your mouth and speak,
Asking why that drop
Of blood came rolling down
From the point of that shining spear!
You saw the Grail carried
In, and never asked
For what great lord it was borne!

The Fisher King is the wounded King, and we are all wounded; imperfect. Like Texada Island and the sharp-shinned hawk, and the dragonfly. Like me.
Robert knows what his Grail means, and I am thankful for his encouraging me to ask (so my quest is not wasted): Whom does the Grail serve?

And whither then? I cannot say.

A year of living dangerously...

Well, it's final - Life Rocks. I left Peterborough on July 1st, "Canada Day", 2010, to do a little experiment. It was to see; if I lived full-on, balls-to-the-wall, following-my-dreams - if that'd be good.
It is.
It's marvellous. I had a home, and job, and all that crap, and - as I said in My Blog, My Chosen Lifestyle, (my first entry) - I will have them again. The difference is - now I don't give a crap.
Seriously - I've been wondering what the difference is. The difference is: Nothing, and I mean nothing - takes priority over my living true to myself. That's why I call it travel even when I have a home and a job (which I do now).

I cannot rest from travel; I will drink
Life to the lees.

Ah, Ulysses, you had it figured out, brother. It's not about moving from place to place, geographically (although that's good), it's about - moving from place to place in your heart, your soul, your life - having courage to face what life gives you, in your world, and in your inner most secret dreams.
This is the road we all travel. I have seen, in my short years, there is only one direction in life - forward. We either do that, or we do nothing. Go ahead and make mistakes, as I've previously quoted;

Let everything happen to you: beauty and terror.
Just keep going. No feeling is final.
Don't let yourself lose me.

I mean shit, we all know "you can't be fond of living in the past,
cause if you are then there's no way that you're gonna last".

No way.

I will never go back to Georgia. Georgia is, for me: Nova Scotia? or..  9-5housewifemortgagebabyretirementdeath.. probly more the latter. Fuck that.
Where have I been in the last year? California, three times. Berkeley (2 weeks), San Francisco, Los Angeles(3). Oregon, Washington, all over BC, across a lot of Canada, Cortes and Quadra Islands, tons of time in Tofino, the Sunshine Coast, Vancouver. Absolute quiet. I have been to a land of peace, an inner peace that comes from living your own truth, where there just aren't any questions anymore.
I've crossed places inside myself I wasn't sure I could, or ever would, I've sailed past reefs of uncertainty, clashing rocks of self-doubt, I guess my committment has been - to live life fully, whatever the cost. When my boat got smashed - I swam.

Cause I ain't got nowhere to go back to. Thanks to the Universe 'n I. And if I did - I'd probably go even farther away. Two best compliments ever - my bro played the scene from Forrest Gump, when Seargent Dan straps hisself to the top of the mast of his boat in a storm, it's blowin', he's screamin' - "Is that all you got???"
Once it was playing, he called us over and said - "that's my brother."

The other, Gabriel, livin on the beach at 21, he'd introduce everyone, then say.. nevermind. I told that one before.

The Germans have a saying (I picked up while hitch-hiking there): "half drunk is a waste of money." I'd say, half lived is a waste of .. I dunno, - some currency that we are created with? God-energy? Divine spirit? All the work my great-great-great-great-great-grandfather put into getting laid? (He had bad teeth). Whatever your beliefs - let's not waste it. Cripes.
I can guarantee, absolutely promise and swear on a stack of bricks - that it's worth it. I've tested it out. Leave. Keep going. Do not go home. Do not - go to your safe place.
On the other side of our fear is: Ourselves. At last. No more need to run for love, no more need to seek meaning ouside yourself.

Some journal entries from the last year:

"I just had the most startling revelation! - on fb tonight, lotsa fun, lotsa new girls, new friends, seeing how much my world has grown, and how well, and seeing why - because I'm happy" sometime..

"Today I drove to the top of Mount Shasta, and then hiked, quite high, almost to the ice. Stopped and sat and meditated. in the cold wind and spattering rain. I have been travelling for two months and 19 days. I am your father." Sept 19 2010

"Who cares? Enjoy life. Just relax + enjoy it.
Travel, Love, Make money, laugh,
two sides to everything." March 13, 2011

"October 31st - Halloween! Had a great time last night - went to a party at a friend of Gabriel's - his 50th birthday. Had some fun - Andrew came up from Vancouver. Went to the legion w Ian the cabdriver - I egged us on and we all had fun." October 31, 2010

"Homelessness + Service-
you must free yourself of all things that restrict you
in your ability to serve.
then you must create structures which enhance your
ability to serve." Dec 6, 2010.

"Love the Wind - my heart is open and running w gold. My heart is open. Follow it.
Allow it.
Be in the world with an open heart." April 23, 2011.

"I am an errand knight, and the errand is unknown to me.
... insofar as there is a single question in my life right now, it is: What is my errand?" Aug 6, 2010

"Dreams - July 13, Jasper, went out w Clyf last night to the dead dog or something like that. met some great people. Beautiful french waitress - what was her name? she ditched me"  July 13, 2010

"the babbling brooks of
my land and heart
the changing tides,
and all things in their seasons,
this land is me,
 and I AM this land."
"following one's destiny is like chasing a ghost through a forest at twilight.." July 15thish, 2010

"Your imagination's havin' puppies" July 1, 2011. Ok, that's not really from me.

"Self-realization. Isn't that what this is all about? Or is it?
is it about helping people? What is it about? Funny, it all. For me - it's both." date unknown..

"...  or, turn outward - to the world - and open to a new world, one with spots for me - a role, a woman, love -, fun - more importantly - where I can work with Justice - as my co-worker/partner - close - and possibly more - in the light.
...
I did it.
I talked to Sydne, quit." May 27, 2010.

Here I am, in Kits, in my room, it's 2:42 am, I gave up everything, everything - on the hope that I could have more, that I could find a place where I could help my fellow man in the way I can, and live, love, laugh.
Today, I am here.
I may fall on my face many times, but I do think - the Universe loves risk-takers.
I know the Universe loves me.
And so do I. I can tell, because..
I followed my heart.


And I, infinitesimal being,
drunk with the great starry
void,
likeness, image of
mystery,
felt myself a pure part
of the abyss,
I wheeled with the stars,
my heart broke loose on the wind.

And I will also, at once, quote my two most-quoted: Rilke (Love Poems to God), and: the Tragically Hip:

You, are always in view.

Squatting by the Gift Shop of Me's...

I liked the movie All the Pretty Horses. It was really good. A good rendition of one of my favorite books. Except it left out my two favourite scenes. Like Lord of the Rings, without the Forest King dude, what's with that?

One of the favourite scenes they left out was when he was down in Mexico, his gf dumps him, and he goes into town and gets drunk and gets in fights, over and over, wakes up bloody and battered in an alley. He doesn't fight to win, just to fight. This scene expresses something essentially male.

The other is early in the book, he's walking up a dry riverbed in the morning, going to do some work for his Dad on their ranch. He comes up suddenly, startled, there's a First Nations dude (the author uses the word 'Indian') really close to him, squatting by the riverbank. When he looks at the First Nations dude, the First Nations dude looks at him. He's an alert young guy, and used to the outdoors, so he thinks, 'how did I not notice someone so close to me'?
He didn't notice because the First Nations dude wasn't looking at him. He was just squatting by the riverbank, staring off into the middle distance. But he was watching him, and that's how he was watching him: by not looking at him.
He sees from the experience: that's the way to hunt - you never look at your prey. All living things are aware of being watched. I would expand that to - one's destiny is a living thing.

I think I picked it up from a Steinbeck novel, but I certainly couldn't tell you which one, although I could narrow it down to one of the four I've read. Squatting, and maybe scratching in the dirt. With a stick or something. Staring off into the distance. I've done it for years. It's not about thinking, but contemplating.. sort of..
But I never really applied it to life until reading Pretty Horses. I guess the Steinbeck must have been Grapes of Wrath.

I did the hike from Radar Hill to Schooner Cove again the other day while in the Tofino area. That's the one I wrote about in The Sea (it's still warm, and still safe, here.) That's my favorite entry so far, although I love the Objective Observer too. If you want to know who I am (not saying you do ;) The Sea is it.

This time I did it with three friends; Jesse James, Gillian Anderson, and Jane Austen. I promised I'd change people's names. ;) It had been so personal last time, and this time - so social! I loved it, but a different experience.. we stopped and ate tu'cup - sea urchin - raw. Was delicious. Like life; sweet, unexpected, mysterious. Life is like a box of raw sea urchins...

To the land conduct the roamer,
To the open air conduct me,
To behold the moon in heaven,
And the splendour of the sunlight;
See the Great Bear's stars above me,
And the shining stars in heaven.
...
   Headlong in the water falling,
With his hands the waves repelling,
Thus the man remained in ocean,
And the hero on the billows.

I suppose the last year (almost) of my life has been an act of faith, I read a thing a friend posted on fb today - the top five regrets people have on their deathbed. Leaping into the unknown too much will not be one of mine...

And then we went into the sea cave, and we went around the cliff, and took some cool shortcuts I would never have guessed about. Gillian knew about them, she grew up in the area. And in Schooner Cove I found a feather, from the daughter of my brother eagle, and put it aside for a new friend back in Van. It was the first time I'd been back to this sacred place in about 6 months, and I'd missed it.
One month is too long... as Jane said, "I'd like to do this hike every week!"
mmm - ok.

My second-first blog entry was subtitled, I Am That, yep, this period has been about being who I am. Regret number one was: I wish I’d had the courage to live a life true to myself, not the life others expected of me.

I may have risked trashing my career and finances, and I'm sure (know) some people think I'm nuts, but...  I've spent the last year living life true to myself. I mentioned in The Sea how, all those years ago when I first came to this coast, and walked this shoreline - it was the first time I really saw the limitlessness, the "Gift Shop" of Life - the fact that you can do whatever the hell you want with your life - Anything!!

In squatting by the river, the sea, my path, I've been 'not thinking so much as abandoning thought,' I 'went through open country, over water meadows streams' - across this land, across my inner land, .. envisioning, digesting, fogging the mind, stirring my soul - "seeing" what comes next.. I've had time to think about all the future possible lives I could have, directions and choices I can take or make, like I said in The Sea - 'walking by the myriad images of the future', or something like that...

What does come next??

I always felt like I was a sailor in a past life, I've always said, when upon leaving for a sketchy journey, and friends were worried I'd die - "I will die, the old me will never return, and a new me will be born, out there somewhere, and...  that will probably happen many times.."

I was a sailor. I was born upon the tide
And with the sea I did abide.
I sailed a schooner round the Horn of Mexico
I went aloft and furled the mainsail in a blow
And when the yards broke off they said that I got killed
But I am living still.

Mountain: "I Am."

I drafted this blog a few days ago, posted  it, deposted it, and now am posting it again. The Tofino content hasn't changed, although I have more to add in the next entry or two. The personal content.. I remember a night with my friend Jim at "Joey's Place" in Toronto, about 13 months ago (christ, it seems like a lifetime), I was drunk and flirting with the waitress. It was late and I was telling Jim about how my marriage had ended and my subsequent wandering, and he said, "reminds me of Springsteen - 'like a river that don't know where it's going, I took a wrong turn and I just kept goin..' "

It's true, I said, everybody's got a hungry heart. That doesn't make anything I do right. It just is.

the old knot:
cleave to this,
though faithfulness, all faithfulness,
cuts at the heart
(that wreckage carved out by choice, the heart)
& cleave this -
whatever is split
will carry its shadow, that second road,
its yellow leaves falling and falling
in the steep woods of our hundred other lives

I'm not sure about the middle lines, the "wreckage" and "faithfulness" parts, but the end.. I know all too well. The steep woods of our hundred other lives.
I was recently faced with a choice of continuing to be in a relationship (maybe I had a choice..;) or with someone else. The second someone - was me.

Cleave to this, ... and cleave this...

The poem is called Doppleganger, by Jane Hirshfield. My friend Ula has a book of her poetry, it's kind of sexy and sometimes gory, both physically and emotionally. I randomly flipped to this poem when I first realized I had to make a choice.

It eventually became clear that it had already been made, because, as my brother said about me, after being on this adventure for so long - I'm addicted to being happy. So, I'm single again and 'free' on my path. Although after eleven months of itinerance I'm not really sure what freedom means. That is, clearly, to be addressed in another entry.

And headed back to Tofino this weekend. It always comes down to Tofino, doesn't it? Seems to for me. Not sure when I'll give in and just move there. A friend once suggested that maybe loving people wasn't my path, but places in nature. Maybe.
Tofino seems to be getting set up for some sort of showdown, sometime. The provincial government in BC has a pro-mining agenda. We have a conservative federal government. Imperial Metals has done exploratory drilling on Catface Mountain, for copper. They say it's because they want to help the Ahousat, of course, not out of greed. And now they've acquired another property in the area - Fandora, an old gold mine.
This is all in a UNESCO Biosphere Reserve. And one of the most sacred places on Earth.
But really, "nothing's as precious, as a hole in the ground."
I was thinking about how depleted our forests are, how rare and exciting it is to walk in old growth forests, but really - they should be everywhere!
And we think of ourselves as being so rich. And at the same time act like a family fallen on hard times and selling off the last of their heirlooms at the pawnshop - for enough money to buy a couple bigmacs and some cokes.

Cleave to this, ... and cleave this.

Who are we? Flipping through some Deepak Chopra the other day in the bookstore, he said something like; "we never ask ourselves; who am I?" So I did, regarding the decision I had to make. Did I want to be someone who stays in a place they no longer feel is quite where they belong, out of fear or insecurity, no matter how lovely it is?
It lead me to think - what do we want as a society? Because we can't have both. We have to choose one path, and cut the other away: we can liquidate every last place on Earth, for money, and spend it today too. Or we can count our riches differently.
Can we make it so that; the steep woods of Clayoquot Sound, and all the other places that are sacred to us, as a society and as individuals, are not "yellow leaves falling and falling, in the steep woods of our hundred other lives"?

Did they get you to trade
Your heroes for ghosts?
Hot ashes for trees?
Hot air for a cool breeze?
And cold comfort for change?

We don't have to make that trade. We can be our own heroes. We can have trees, a cool breeze. We can change. This place means a lot more to me than money, I've given up a lot to be here. I'll go to Tofino tomorrow and breathe the sweet, wild, cool air, listen to the mountains, the beaches, the birds, they don't say "gracias", but simply; "I am."

And so do I.