Freedom (Art of the Road Trip)

To this day there are few things that I anticipate with more enthusiasm and freedom-seeking fervour than a road trip.  Of Glasser's basic human needs this F ranks high for me. I am buoyed by the prospect that is coming up in my near future, 3 weeks to Baja and back, climbing, surfing and all the other wonders that inevitably arise when there are fewer boundaries on time and movement. It is short one on the scale of road trips, and I still pine for the year of wandering with boats and boards and climbing gear that is a recurring dream of mine. But  while short, it is something, and has a different feel to other times away, other ways of getting to a destination.

In anticipation the road trip south feels different from the 10,000km flight that looms before it on the calendar in  the coming weeks. It was free for me, but flights in general, or any mode of travel where time is of the essence and efficiency is paramount feels hemmed in, constrained by structures outside of my influence. And I am tired of investing in things that are outside of my control.
Air travel is a numbers game, designed for the mass movement of people, computer-screen schedules flashing their updates in a rotating and repetitious pattern. Flight numbers are not unique, and whatever I experience on my flight to Hong Kong on flight JA17 will likely be a carbon copy of the next one and the one before that. It is travel by rote, undeviating, though there is no doubt that embarking on the plane to much needed vacation time for many has some vestige of wildness and freedom. Trace amounts.

When you fly from point A to point B there is also an urgency; time is money and money is made of time spent in many cases, in a work-life bondage. In road tripping, most often these diversions are part of the gift, an expected and celebrated aspect of moving across country the long way. In the ethos of the airport the sandals, shorts and quick-fading tans of the returnees are overshadowed by the besuited business class mover and shaker. Freedom and lightness fade quickly upon re-immersion. Both time and finances are finite, lashing us down to travel without much possibility of looseness and little hint of liberty. To afford the flight away in the first place, we most often bind ourselves to more hours and days and months spent under someone else's  control, our lives being defined by the abstractions of external economic factors. We can't afford to meander anywhere, we need insurance for a quick arrival. The finite destination is arrived at swiftly, with no funny business or side trips or distractions.  Our departures and arrivals  pre-ordained, hemmed in. 'Vacation time' is steeped in scarcity and controlled by responsibilities, shoulds and obligations. We bracket it carefully in a bed of efficiency.

The luxury of the  road trip is formed by distraction, whim, cadence, and interruption.  It is not always necessary to arrive at one destination, but it is inevitable that you reach many. Bad snack food and good snack food, opening the windows in sub-zero temperatures to stay awake through a nightlong drive. Smelling the sea air again after a long traverse of the landlocked states that it cost us to get there. Heeding the call to adventure, even for a few weeks can reopen the clogged valves of our freedom mechanisms, our basic human wanderlust, and the nomadic underpinnings of our falsely settled life are daylighted for a time.  When on the road we plan a route and a timeline perhaps only partially adhered to. Opening ourselves to diversion if it serves a purpose or even if it does not. Taking the time to stop and notice the canyon overlook, a subtle change in the landscape or some aspect of an imagined place discovered in real time. Stopping to visit, rather than flying over those friends now spread over this continent, disparate, but connected by roadway geography.  We are constantly faced with the generosity of friends, bed and floor space. In return, our visitations at times can provide interruptions to the mundane; we arrive wafting small clouds of spontaneity so that others can smell it on our breath, feel it drift off our clothes as they open the door. Points A or B while road tripping are moot, and more clearly parts of a serpentine continuum, stretching into vastness and open space.

So when I asked myself last week where to spend my time next month...far off destinations found briefly by air, or an adventure-punctuated drift south by car, the answer was clear.

Freedom (Part 1)

I have been having many dreams of late, full of imagery, perhaps messages from the ether, or from the underground of my mind. There is a lack of control, an inability to eradicate or escape some creature of deep imagination, leaking up from the floorboards of my rustic dreamland home. This is about staying put, and perhaps being bitten, or caught, or absorbed and digested by the thing that i fear most. To risk happiness, despite its transient nature.
I have pondered my own freedom of late, am learning to understand that the desires i have to twist free of the grasp of anything is grounded in entanglements of my own making. The only person to hold myself still is me. Someone I love has repeated the phrase 'you are free' enough times that I see that it is not others that hinder that feeling. I am held in the warmth of an open palm, leaving me safe but free to move if I so wish. If I would allow myself to range and be and say my own piece.  I have never been less sure of my own waywardness, and how it is formed and dissipates under tighter or looser holds. I notice that I have not written for a time and that is part of it. The fear of being exposed as the charlatan I am - an imperfect being rife with unclosed wounds and still hanging questions. Waiting for the river to wash these sharp edges down over time.

Watershed

I have been gifted with this magical life. It is not that I have not worked for it, or struggled, or waded through dark confusion and felt the pain of loss and emptiness. Perhaps it is because of those things, and that I have not shied away from them that I find myself steeped in gratitude and magic now in this moment. I have traversed the steep slope of it and have found myself everywhere, not just in the resting places. I have stayed put, and looked up to see that I have gathered a storm of light around me.

A few days ago on the tail end of my last 'work' trip of the summer season (the word work does not do justice to the ease and flow of this past week), we were short on water. A couple of leaky droms* early on ensured a tight supply on that last night, morning coffee becoming a fading possibility. It was no emergency but I knew finding water, if possible in this oceanic archipelago, would be a bonus. We landed at our last campsite, a white shelled midden isthmus connecting two small islands, unloaded the kayaks and moved in. I scanned my chart for possible water sources in proximity to this rocky island group and found a few dark lines winding their way down from the steep slopes of Guilford Island. Not far. A nautical mile or two. A small thing to paddle alone and unladen, an empty drom tossed into the cockpit of my boat. 

For me it has been a summer of dry creekbeds. Even in late May it was a struggle to siphon enough brackish water from a normally copious source. I had followed similar dark watery lines on charts and maps all season to places devoid of moisture. So I was not expecting much, or anything from my chosen drainage. And either way, all would be well, water rationing on this last night and morning a small inconvenience or discomfort rather than a dire matter. Though I felt the drive to smooth this wrinkle from our last night in the islands. 

Getting back into my boat I felt it's buoyancy, newly emptied of it's homemaking burdens, hammock and sleeping bag, no small amounts of gear left at the beach with the rest of the group. It felt light and responsive as I paddled away, unburdened and unaccompanied for a time. A small act, but no small thing, and I became aware of a pressure; the desire to provide juxtaposed with the near certainty that I would return empty handed. Paddling on towards the sloped shoreline across the channel I left the shelter of the campsite islands, out in the open, exposed and temporarily alone. I became aware of a feeling of insignificance, the knowledge of my own smallness pushed up against mountain and ocean and wind. A risk, though small and not new to me, to travel solo in this way. 

I pushed on towards the steep rocky shoreline, making a beeline for the creek I had chosen, discerning it's location based on chart and topography, for now invisible and inaudible against the slow lap of waves on ungiving stone. I doubted the existence of the creek even more, or at least it's productiveness, and had accepted the possibility that my mission would be fruitless. But at least I tried, and could say I had explored this shoreline, deepened my understanding and knowledge of this place. Something of value. I had let go of the idea of adding the weight of fresh water to my return trip, satisfied myself with the effort for the most part when I saw it, the jumble of dead branches and  broken rock cutting through the steep cliff shoreline. A moment later the sound that had been made of wind and lapping salt water against rock gave way to the lush gurgle of falling fresh. 

I had a physiological response. It was as if I had been wandering a desert and dehydrated for days, those in my charge about to fade into oblivion due to a lack of water. My gratitude for this creek was palpable, hell-bent, tear-jerking. What a gift. I felt it in my bones, this wonder of nature emptying it's unsalted life generously into the undrinkable sea infinitely. I took my time, tied my boat off and walked carefully on slippery river rock, filled the water bag slowly with this boon of drinkable water. It was a beautiful thing. Not for the sake of the morning coffee or less stretched cooking water needed for the next 12 hours of this trip, but because of this moment of joy and purest celebration of the simplest of things.  

In this I have found the elusive...the 'what is this life about' question answered, resoundingly and in a simple moment of focus and mystery and unbridled gratitude. To experience all of it, or as much as we can, as if it was an oasis in an endless expanse of desert. And then to look around and realize that the desert itself is rich and full of life. 

* A "drom" or dromedary is a water bag designed for carrying in areas where there is no water supply.

Two

It is August 14th, 2 years to the day when my young dog Piper was shot and killed by a neighbour. Last year at this time I remember being in a state of much more strife, residual angst still alive in my bloodstream. The trauma of finding him warm and dead on the man's property the year before minutes after exiting my house palpable. Feelings of responsibility, failure and remorse as well as the type of anger and grief that comes with such events overwhelmed me. His death occurred mid-way through a difficult time in my life, and a year ago I was still neck-deep in the complicated tangles of my inner landscape. Trace amounts of loss and trauma lingered, many still unhealed and unresolved. This year those feelings have waned some and I remain grateful to have had this wild little creature and all his patience-testing ways as a brief companion.

Pipers' presence in my life was a watershed, inviting me to learn more about how dogs think. I signed up with a trainer in an effort to find a direction for his hell-bent energy and met with many successes. It was akin to magic this ability to tap into the hidden motivations of another creature, and all that was needed was for me to notice all the things he was doing right. In the time since, I apprenticed with the same trainer and have become someone who works with dogs, work that has become woven into an eclectic but satisfying mix of things that I do with my life.

In the past year I have worked with a number of people and their dogs, and a recurring theme has been people struggling on a decision point. To keep or not to keep; what to do with a problem dog. The ones whose unpredictability needs both management and special training to make them viable as a creature that can exist in this human world of ours. And we have a habit of becoming hooked, emotionally strung out on a cocktail of guilt and anthropomorphic reasoning and a drive to 'rescue'. It is almost impossible for most of us to remain objective for fear of seeming callous, but I have come to understand that there is nothing black and white in this reality. I can see now how the 'kindest' approaches can be the more destructive or futile, and how the 'callous' ones can really be the most compassion-filled. Sometimes the best decisions are the ones that end a life but free an animal from a lifetime of confusion, fear and the trauma of a more violent end, although the best of us may never find absolute peace in this conclusion. We try to figure out what the dogs would want/need, striving to be accountable in the best ways, attempting to do the 'right' thing for both ourselves and the dog. In all of it I am struck by it's challenges - torn between a reverence for life and other, more mundane but critical realities. I do believe we live in a world which does not always make it possible to choose perfectly or with absolute clarity. Perhaps part of our penance is to always doubt ourselves, even if it is only in small ways, and to know that we did truly love despite our imperfections.

With Piper, my choice was made for me, though I will admit here that there were days with him as he bolted away from me on the beach to steal a picnic (or worse) or suddenly went ballistic on my other dog for some imperceptible eye contact infraction, that I wished for an easier animal. One that was less Tasmanian devil and more placid, obedient, pliable. But he was none of the latter, and while his feral nature was probably what cost him his life in the end, it was also the thing about him that taught me the most about what I still need to learn. About how I cannot change other beings to be what I want them to be, how I must find the ways I can to step in with their wildness, to walk or gallop alongside them in an effort to understand. To see them and work with the materials I am given, to listen deeply, and learn how to let go if need be.

Hubris

This is an admission of guilt. Not that I am doing too badly at this art of being human, but there is always something to learn.

I am gathering by now that one of my most slippery life lessons is to be humble. In relation to others I have not always been as light handed as I could be - I can't know their pain, their joy, what drives them and what does not (or perhaps not unless it is offered and I am listening without ego). I am not responsible for anyone else's choices and yet I continue to hold myself accountable for things out of my control or influence; which in itself is a pernicious kind of hubris. I sometimes even have the audacity to think I know what is going on for other people, to try to assuage or predict it, but really I don't and can't. The best thing I can do for them and myself is to be self responsible and afford them the respect and space to do the same. And not be so quick to judge if the way they do that doesn't fit with my current ideal - to avoid objectifying, to give the benefit of the doubt. Let them unfold in just the way they are unfolding.

Sometimes I push without knowing the surfaces upon which I am applying this wanton pressure. Maybe this is alright as it is a way I have of seeing in the dark, of expressing myself in a sometimes unresponsive void. Like sonar, it is how I locate myself in dark places. And if nothing else, perhaps the purpose of it all is to illuminate my blind spots, through the reverberation of this still small voice against these fathomless walls.

Maybe this is what matters, the rest be damned as I blunder my way through this. I am not sure. Of course I could be continuously getting everything wrong. A very real possibility.

I have struggled with patience, even though my deeper intuition has told me that more time is needed, I have tried to press my palm into this unfeeling mystery that surrounds and engulfs. Begging it to give way, to access the light so desperate to burst through the cracks that I have no power to create. I have no influence here, at least none that I can perceive. At times I feel I have done poorly at allowing things to emerge, although I also know I have done my most imperfect best.

I have needed more time to absorb and contain and become all the things that have arrived in my life.
To transmute them into beauty if they did not arrive looking all that beautiful.  Especially if they were painful or difficult. Because these pieces are verdant, laden with things that have the  capacity to transform, enlighten. And to fully receive the unmistakable gifts that I have been unable to see, laid at my feet like rose petals, offerings.

Even if the things I say or feel are heartfelt, it does not mean they are true for anyone else. If they are that is a great gift, but it is not to be expected or assumed. My words are only shots in the dark, a crude method of echolocation.

I have, and will continue to do the best I can, and keep my spirit journeying through this human experience. I am allowed to come back and apologize, or rethink, or see the truth unfold in some new and completely unexpected way. Because that is the nature of things that emerge naturally, blossoming slowly but arriving suddenly, leaving us breathless and cracked wide open.

Choices

I am at a juncture where things are slowly emerging, small shoots sprouting up from the cracks in increasing numbers. Each new one provides another marker by which to navigate; these are clues for  me to follow into a larger mystery.

I have choices to make. I aspire to make them with clarity when I am able, and not before. I wait, watch, and pay close attention to what is happening within and around me. Information is gathering like a slow storm, ethereal and made of wind and cracks in the air. Vibrations of things held secret for a time, glimmering invisibly like the pre amble to a lightning strike. It is an electrifying time, but in it I aspire to be still, to stay put.

I will not hold you or myself to anything said or done in error, in incompletion, in retrospect. Not now, not any longer, and not in the future. I will stand here and look you in the eye and know that you can see me, even if you are unable to form the words to explain yourself. Explanation is not needed, and is made of dust and whispers, often just a distraction from the truth we know in our bones. The task is to listen and hear deeply what we have to say to ourselves, and never to lose that connection again. There is a mainline running between your heart and the unknown vastness of the universe - this is a know all, tell all kind of place. From this source I will know my own choices, clearly and without ambiguity. If you are brave enough to know yours, it is there for you but I will still make my own.

It takes courage and faith to stand in my own truth unwavering. Here I risk loss and loneliness, though the rewards of this high hard road are greater prizes. If you do not have it in you to know your own heart then you are not able to meet me here, in this beautiful windswept and sunlit place. Not yet. Perhaps not in this lifetime as there is a timeline to this beauty - it is a growing living thing made from the green heart of the world.

My choices do not hinge on you or what you see in the dark blue vastness, they hinge only on the song line that is meant for me, the translucent sound gathering it's harmonies behind the light of my own eyes.

Wisdom in the Bones

This thinning but clear spine of a lifeline that I am following is drawn on my palms and etched in my bones.

I have been amazed at myself of late. Not my conscious self, the one that wonders out loud and pays attention to the shoulds and the shouldn'ts and all manner of mindly things, but another part of me. It is my physical self, wordless but visceral, which carries a wisdom borne of the blood and bone that makes me human, that has held me fast to my own truth this past while.

Travelling for most of a month on the sea and beside it, I have been plugged into earthly cycles, my body giving me little choice but to abide by my own rules. There have been handrails to guide my progress, signposts and gateways made of cedar and polished rock. My feet have propelled me forward; poised, balancing, placing themselves upon the unseen path from one moment to the next. Attending to this and paying close attention, it seems almost easy not to wander into temptation or veer off course into carelessness and desire. It is not that I am not being challenged, as I am, though more gently than before. And I am still, as always, left wondering and not knowing a great swath of things of the past and the future, not seen and unknowable from where I stand. But that seems acceptable for the time being, bearable if somewhat mysterious.

This past week feathers fell from the sky and the ocean rose and fell to meet our needs as I shared a coastal walk with a now-dear friend.  Ask and you shall receive, but do not step out of yourself in order to pick up what falls all around you. Wait until you can sense which items were meant for you, and which were meant for others, or just themselves. Remain steeped in your own skin, alighting only when your body moves in step with your soul. Remembering always that this is a slow pace, one filled with pauses and moments of wonder.

It is in this that I have truly found the 'art of wait' (http://artofstaying.blogspot.ca/2013/12/the-art-of-wait.html).

Staying Put

“I am rooted but I flow.” ~ Virginia Woolf

Getting close to two years ago I had a revelation. In order to do the work that I wanted to do, I needed to learn to 'stay put'. I needed to choose a home place, and stick with it. At the time that realization had to do with ceasing my wandering, at least in the geographical sense. But as I have moved through this phase of physical stillness I have been learning that this art of being in place has even more to do with the ability to heed inner stillness. Learning to listen and pay attention to the details of life, and not get pulled off course by every butterfly and squirrel that crosses my path. And many do.

I have built and rebuilt communities in my life in different places, most of them have been steeped in quality, people I love and who love me in return. My soul sisters and brothers - most know who they are and will recognize themselves in reading this. And by staying put, I have learned that those people are still with me, even though they may or may not reside in the same place.

Each time I left, I had the sense that I was just on the verge of something, some great opening, or landing. But then I left anyway; I got itchy feet, wandering eyes, and an urge to move and find greener pastures, something 'better', something 'more', and at times just something different. What I have failed to do time and time again is to ground, pause, grit my teeth and steel myself against the discomfort of the squirming escape artist within. What I know now, without having the luxury of the whole and complete picture - that truly I will only get when my body dies and my essence merges with the green soul of the world - is that in staying put all the things I need will arrive. In their due time. Part of this is about learning to be patient and having faith. Another part is to allow myself to sink more fully into me, to take up the full space that is mine to inhabit. In this way becoming a more hospitable planet, complete with my own atmosphere, soil, sun and moon and stars, I will either nurture or draw in all the things and people that are needed. Just by being myself.

I get that this sounds idealistic, but that too is a big part of who I am and I am not apologizing for it.

Of late the lessons that have emerged for me have been about going against the grain, listening to my ability to discern the best route, and honouring and protecting myself. Not being a martyr on the altar of others' messes, lack of diligence or inability to attend to their own fires first. This has made me supremely unpopular in some circles, I have no doubt. But it has also given me no small measure of self-respect and a necessary sense of self direction. I am placing myself, one small step at a time, on the path of my own best interest. I am not looking for it anywhere else but here and I am resisting the urge to extend outwards, investing my energies instead in calm and focus. "If you build it, they will come", so to speak, even though sometimes I hear crickets.

I have also been unfolding, and have attracted a number of amazing things into my sphere, deep friendship, opportunity, the comforts of home, offerings of love and kindness. In this realm there are also pitfalls, in that by unfolding and showing up more fully, I can be more seen more clearly by others. Part of the benefit of my wandering lifestyle is that it prevented me from blossoming in full view, it allowed me to remain hidden and out of reach of grasping hands. Movement was a safety net, because I have never been very good at saying no, something that often brought up feelings of guilt and unworthiness, although I have been practiced at pushing away. I have acted more like an escape pod in a zero gravity world and less like someone who knew what I wanted and what was good for me. More recently I have been less of the former and more of the latter, which is an improvement.

While staying put I have noticed that things come and go, and I am faced with even more temptation and challenge. It has been so very alluring to run, and run hard, away from the sorrows that were born here, in the early months of my staying. The unseen ghost of these early times flitting between shadows, sensed lurking at certain street corners. Disappeared, but still there in the air I breathe and the tilt of my heart.

Some days I find myself imagining something big and worthwhile, something that has been worth waiting for, is coming down the pipe, but I also imagine that it is the small details that matter most. The dip of ancient cedar boughs, cool sea air, the gifts of friends and the moments of silence and space I give myself. It all adds up, and perhaps one day I will find that it has substance; a shape and a name.

Signposts

I am looking for signposts. I have come to a point in a question where I am graciously requesting answers, from within. I am asking them to come forth, because I do understand that for all the questions that seem to emerge from events external to me and my control, there is an internal clarity, a yes or a no. Resounding, crystalline.
As much as I am able I am ready to hear the scalding or uplifting truth now. Perhaps it will be both of these things. I have circumnavigated this question, backed off many times in getting closer to the source of it, feeling the heat of this truth too close for comfort. Letting go of attachment is juxtaposed with a sense that I am clinging to something that has no or little substance at this moment. At other times it has seemed to be unquestionable, but I have not had the courage to believe either answer and so have arrived at this place of continued mystery. I am ready to be deeply uncomfortable. I think. As best as I am able. Ready to receive.

I found these flowers living in the clouds. Above treeline, deep in the alpine, in a place of rocky footfalls, cairns, and the cries of ptarmigan. Mine are island mountains, often shrouded in the west coast vapour that rises from the confluence of sea and slope. The cloud flowers started coming up in tenacious clumps near the summit I was climbing last week, after a stretch of stunted heather and ground willow gave way to nothing but rocky outcrops. It was a short time to go on faith, but it told me that some time walking  without cairns, signs, or anything that validates your location in the world is a necessary thing as it forces, or enables you to keep going. You learn to pay attention to different things, things that you may not have noticed or known existed before.

In this silence and place of focus you put one foot in front of the other, shift down into the present moment, and discover the truth that blossoms beneath you.

"Don't turn away. Keep your gaze on the bandaged place. That is where the light enters you." 

~ Rumi

Solo

The simple things are also the most extraordinary things, and only the wise can see them.

~ Paulo Coelho, The Alchemist

I have taken some risks of late, the sort that can have the effect of making one feel more alone, isolated. Ironically I have, as a result of the choices I have made, felt more supported and less alone.  I have paid attention to my own discerning abilities, heard my own heart over the cacophony of social pressures - the desire that I have to make things ok for others, to 'fix' things, to take the path of least resistance and simply do what others need or expect me to do. There is no doubt a time for compromise and sacrifice but this most certainly has not been it. I have also been more than fortunate to be surrounded by people who have listened, heard and reflected valuable perspectives, and helped me to follow my own wisdom.

Not that doing unpopular things is ever simple or clean, and ultimately it is I who must live with my choices. I have had experiences in the past two years that have shaken and changed me, there have been losses and departures, and through my recent actions I have invited more of that. But I have listened to the intuitive and intelligent voice that knows the path with the most integrity; although I now understand that there is not always a 'clean' line...not through some things. There are messes to be made when we make 'right' choices, and I am imperfect at this, but I do the best I can and I think, as my dad might have said, 'that is nothing to be sneezed at'.

This past week, finding myself suddenly at loose ends, I went on a solo trip into the mountains. An amazing thing to be able to do, lucky as I am to be blessed with time, a body that can do the work and a lifetime of accrued skill and backcountry experience. In travelling alone however, I expose myself to the real risks of the environment, terrain and a remote wilderness place. There is an important distinction for me in this version of 'risk', visceral and real rather than perceived, concrete rather than abstract. It is a context where I can see clearly the consequences of my decisions and actions, there is no social grey zone, no he said she said, no one else present to worry about. Just myself, my own fears and the real possibility of harm - much more intimate when unsullied by the distraction of other souls. There are clear consequences to any misstep or lapse in concentration. But my survival mechanism is strong, I want to emerge from this alive and whole for the sake of myself and those who care about me, so I measure my risks as best I can. I watch the thresholds constantly and carefully as new challenges arise.

It's early June and so there was some snow, excessive in some parts of the route, that made travel and navigation tricky, even hazardous in some areas. I avoided over committing to the obvious sketchiness of the high alpine terrain, but still found myself on day 3 half way across a steep scree slope, staring down at a 1000 foot sheer drop into nothing with a large snow field looming in front of me. I should actually amend that...in the end I decided not to stare down, instead willing my wandering mind to 'point positive' and focus on my slow and tenuous progress across the rotting vestiges of the winter season. One foot at a time, digging in my heels with each step, sometimes twice before adding my 130 lbs to the steep unprotected slope. Trying to tame the fear surging up in my gut by focusing on the minutia of each movement. I make it across and experience waves of relief which are tempered by the awareness that tomorrow I need to traverse this again to return to the safety of the valley.

As is often typical, the aesthetic rewards of the high, remote and less travelled route are powerful. Waterfalls careen into the valley below me, and somewhere above and to the right of my current vantage point I sense that there is a pristine and sublimely beautiful place awaiting me, that this route, suggested to me by a friend, is a gift of sorts. It was the answer to a question, a first response, I suspect emerging from some divine intuition. There has never been any doubt in my life that wild places can be the most profound teachers and messengers. It is here that we come home, and find ourselves again.

In the treed rolls below the alpine lake that was to be my final campsite, I lost the trail to snow and wandered for a time seeking the best route upwards. It was late in the day, and while I was far from the edges of my limits, I was feeling impatient with the process, ready to arrive. I noted the terrain carefully, saw the rocky headwall above me that signified the edge of a watery bowl; there was no way to really be lost as hemmed in as I was by clear handrails and backstops. But my boots were damp from an hour of wet snow, and my packstraps were starting to drag on my shoulders. Instead of seeking the 'correct' path I simply went up, scrambling a bit to attain the elevation I had worked all day to arrive at. Within minutes I was standing on the granite edges of a high alpine lake, looking downhill towards the milky cascades of the river beside the campsite. A stunning place by any measure. Unsurprisingly, no one else was  there that night, I had seen no other human footprints.

The following day I was up early, anticipating the return journey across the gnarlier portions of the traverse with no small amount of anxiety. Descending into the trees I lost the trail quickly, finding myself again bumping through thickly vegetated and rolling micro-terrain. I was mildly annoyed at my longer than necessary progress towards the looming crux of my mornings travel, already half an hour in and seemingly no closer to the scree. But as I negotiated another crease in the landscape, through densely packed and stunted evergreens, I paused, looking to my left and right in an attempt to choose the best route. After four days solo I suddenly noted that I had never felt lonely or alone, always accompanied, loved, held. I had sung songs as I meandered through grizzly country, encountered almost no one and worked at my own pace. I had read two books in my tent in the afternoons, both of which had made me cry and think.

I wondered at the feeling of accompaniment and simultaneously made a silent request for guidance, some sort of directional arrow. Before me two gaps in the trees were clear, one to the left and one to the right. In the gap to the right stood a larch, now in full leaf, which seemed significant as I had noted some at the previous campsite whose needles were just starting to emerge. I also have the sense that larches have some meaning to me, and to some of the people who have populated my life of late, although I will let that meaning sit to emerge in it's own time. Or remain a mystery. The bright green needles of the tree met my criteria for an obvious 'sign' so off I went. Within seconds I noticed my own footprints from the day before in the snow a few meters away.

Many beings accompanied and protected me on this journey, and it was my own tracks which led me home. I am grateful for both.

Vargas

It is possibly an overused and misunderstood word; magic. But there are times when it emerges unbidden, clear and obvious and not to be ignored, lying prone in our path. We are well served to observe it's presence.
This past two weeks I have been in the company of a large group of teenagers, and two good men - a silversmith and a wayward irish mystic, wandering the shorelines and beaches of Vargas Island in Clayoquot Sound.
Objectively, Clayoquot is a magical place. It is made of cool air and fog drifts, and ancient cedars that speak of the soulfulness of the non human world. It is one of my home places, and I was lucky to be part of these trips where the objective was not to accomplish distance or challenge or push the participants so much as it was to be. Be together, in place, play, and align with the currents that run alongside the island of our dreams.

The three of us adults kept and made good company, drinking tea in absurd amounts and at every opportunity, telling stories, laughing, moving at a slow pace, never hurried. Ravens battled crows overhead, eagles squeaked like clotheslines at every campsite. The wolves circled the island daily, leaving new sign for us to inspect after each departure into sleep or day trip away from our camp. Ghosts.

On the north side of Vargas there is a cabin, cedar trunks for posts; build by a shipwright it is all windows and cedar shakes and nautical lines. It is a destination for many kayakers, and a recent home for one of the legends of this coast. John and his wife Bea and their dog Lolita left almost two years ago and the cabin and it's surrounding garden had fallen into disrepair. On our first weeks' visit to this place on the beach, the silversmith returned from an inspection of his old friends' cabin, known so well under the loving care of it's former occupants. He was disheartened - inside the floor was littered with debris, outside the garden was overgrown, neglected, untended. Perhaps there had been squatters, people who did not care for the place, but simply reaped its shelter and resources, not seeing or acknowledging the obvious and kindly spirit of the place. Not honouring its unique magic. Over tea at the campsite two beaches over we discussed the former energy of the place as it was tended with diligence and detail, the shell pathways and garden borders, the herbs, the chickens, the fish in the pond, the woodstove lit and kettle always at the ready. John's daily walks to the far end of the beach through the fog, fishing gear in hand, finding salmon off the point. Lolita the Australian Shepherd's visitations to each kayak group that alighted there, sometimes spending her days lying in the sand next to their tents, adopting each new visitor like a long lost friend. We lamented the changing ways of the world and people, and wondered how such a rare and magical place could be unlived in, unloved. Its energy dissolving into the forest. It is for sale. $1.2 million, or some such figure. A sadness lingered in the energy of the week, but also a wonder at the possibility that such a place stands waiting for its next caretaker.
During week 2 we camped again at the small pocket beach a few rocky points away. On our second last evening we decided to take the kids for a campfire and the more expansive soccer pitch offered by the unbroken sand beach. The silversmith, the mystic and I wandered up to the cabin so I could have a look this time, leaving the students to create their space on the beach.
We were met by a sea change as we came up the path. In the boathouse was a surf board, beside it a kayak. Someone had arrived. Nearing the house we sensed a shift, care and attention to detail appeared to be encroaching into the fractured space. Peeking in through the windows we noted the floors had been scoured, order restored, the paw prints of a human life showing up through a few loved objects placed on sills. A richly colourful stained glass depiction of a Raven set against the forest window, photographs on the wall. Six days after our first visit someone had moved in and leaned themselves fully into re-establishing this as a home-place, cleaning its kind spirit back into being.
A familiar face soon emerged from the rich depths of the cabin, recognition dawned on me as the tall regal figure approached. He named me first, helped me remember the connection, a number of years ago when I was living in Tofino he was one of our winter tenants at the guesthouse. German-Indian, a photographer, eking his way into life on the far west coast of Canada. Living the dream. Residency papers now in hand he has landed himself in this ethereal place on Vargas, facing away from town and into the islands of the Sound, finding a place to stay put, be.
As we left it seemed all was now right with the world, for a time at least. We emerged onto the beach to find the kids around a fire of their own creation, a fine west coast mist surrounding the warmth of their circle. All is not lost.

Once

It has occurred to me that there are things we only get one crack at. People, dogs, times in our lives come in and then pass away. Some are easy, lovely, flowing, perfect.

This is Tarka. She was my daemon, my familiar, the canine twin to my human soul. I realized then and still know that she was one of the great loves of my life. A friend, a quiet but present companion over 12 years, in times of trauma and intensity, she was there for some of the worst and best stuff of my early adulthood. She was the bright side of my shadow. I doubt that there will be another creature to match her, or the still point of connection we inhabited as a pair.

If you knew her you will likely understand. You would if you happened to be one of her other friends, as there were a few who loved her as I did, and probably many who saw her for the magical creature that she was. Tolerant, funny, kind beyond measure, she was the softness to the hard edges of life. She made me more empathetic, loving, compassionate. She helped me to understand the pure fire of loss and grief. For months after she passed I looked for her daily in the back seat of the car, heard her breath, and found myself thinking I had forgotten her somewhere.

I waited years to get another dog after she died. Perhaps thinking the magic confluence of genetics and circumstance would conspire once again to produce another like her and usher him or her into my life in some similar way. I searched and scanned many horizon lines once ready for another Tarka, but of course there was no such thing. Not yet, and not to be found under my earthly gaze.

I now understand that she will simply remain, her dark spirit in step with mine, howling across the frozen lake in time with the huskies and wild wolves of our co-existence. I have become her, or at least all the gifts she brought to me have become mine, and this has made me better than I would have been without her.

I have a wondering, a lingering idea, a faith that grief is just a pathway, an unfolding of the heart into infinite possibility. If we allow it, feel it and meet it with kindness.

The Bridge

"Our deepest fear is not that we are inadequate. Our deepest fear is that we are powerful beyond measure. It is our light, not our darkness that most frightens us."

~ Marianne Williamson

 This is my path; the secret to all the pain I have ever felt, and all the suffering that I have ever inflicted upon myself or others. My failure to see myself. Mind blown. Universe officially reorganized, turned on its head, and emptied out onto the floor in a tumble of broken glass and bent metal.

I will expand on this idea. More than a fear, it is what prevents me (us) from arriving here, now. From being who we are. From accepting all the gifts being offered, constantly and from all sides. From seeing all the beauty without attachment or possessiveness. From letting go, allowing people and circumstances to change and move. Welcoming things in and allowing them to depart as they see fit. Honouring the paths, chosen or not, of all those who come into your life. Trusting everyone to be engaged in the journey they need to be on, regardless of whether it suits your purposes or ego. Perhaps helping them trust themselves a little more than they did when they arrived. 

I have hidden behind the illusion that I am somehow lacking. But I now understand the opposite to be true. I have made choices based on the wrong information, caved too quickly, settled too soon. Bent myself in an effort to fit. I have also not had the courage to choose the things I did want, assuming that I was not worthy of it. Fear of losing, of being wrong. I missed the point that this is always a possibility regardless.

I have held myself still and let others do the same. And this revelation is terrifying. And electrifying.

"I have no never again, I have no always.  In the sand Victory abandoned its footprints."

~ Pablo Neruda

Spirit

It is the blowing of this nights' storm across you,
Your skin ablaze with wind and tree leaves,
Wet, plastering you with (their) life blood.
You fall apart and come back together,
With me, without me.
I will remain, still.

A moon scattering this horizon line with errant cloud cover,
Veering and backing with each swipe of your coastal hands;
Violent, stinging.
Remembering and forgetting with each shift.
Impervious to force.
But you asked me for salvation without words.

This fog bank you are enshrouded in
On a trajectory only you will ever know.
Unless you expose it, like the black rock coast in a storm surge.
There is always that choice remaining open,
Possibility.
You can be awash and still be whole, complete.
Drowning, but breathing into it.
Noticing.
There is no never, or too late,
These don't exist at this tideline.

Spirit erupts regardless,
Of you, of me.
It is moved by a force woven out of dark salty matter;
Grey cloud and ocean waves,
Sun coming in shards.
The strength of mountains and the silence of trees.

The Still Point

"At the still point, there the dance is." 
- TS Eliot

I started writing about this a few months ago, after making a connection with someone and becoming aware of this 'still point', which in that case took the form of calm company in the social storm. It was an echo of something I had not yet realized I had fully lost, and had not yet released into the ether.

This week I became aware of another type of still point. I was seeking, and did not honour in the moment, the calm quiet place that lies at my centre. I am not weaving metaphors when I say the seas were churning around me, in a place called 'the snake pit'. An amphitheatre of swell engulfed rocks, body and boat breaking forces, confused seas. I ended up there because I allowed the quiet voice to be stifled within me; my feet moved, my hands gripped the paddle shaft as I launched myself and 5 others into the surf; I left my soul behind and blinded my senses for the sake of a test. I was trapped by my own inexorable movement across transition after transition. Tent to beach, beach to surf, surf to swell, swell to boomer-choked maelstrom. I crossed the threshold of my tent that morning riddled with anxieties borne of a poor nights' sleep and bad dreams, and 10 more thresholds later there I was, still ignoring the silent scream of resistance, better judgment and fear. Whatever vision I normally possess lost in the struggle. I labeled my misgivings as irrational, dream-bent perception, ignoring or putting aside my own truth in the matter. Paralyzed myself in the process. The quiet truth of gut instinct and good sense clamouring in frustration, straining to be released. Vocalized.

There is no doubt that there were earlier thresholds crossed, that I don't yet recognize.

The pressure was behind, in front, all around; external and contrived, but internally it felt real, compelling, almost inescapable. There was an exam to pass, money spent, an ego to protect. There were people I wanted to prove wrong, to revise their understanding of who I am. Other people I wanted to prove right, about me, and what I am capable of and who I am supposed to be. I had even forgotten that I never really expected to pass, had heard others' assertions above my own. An un-winnable battle on many counts. Playing by the rules of others can steal the truth from our lips.

Escape. I say it was almost impossible. To utter a refusal, or a change of plan away from the directive of the examiner, would have been a simple enough act. Just the opening of my mouth, the loosing of the voice that I own, the utterance of what I knew was the right thing to do. What I would have done in any other situation. But I remained locked up, unable to explain the dream, to validate this gut of mine and what it was telling me, loud and clear. Not to mention the intelligence and training and perspective that I know I have. While I paused numerous times, spoke up, timed out, my attempts were small, muffled, uncertain; requests for help rather than clear divergence away from a set plan. And I was blinded to the right line in the confluence of fear and stress.

In retrospect, I know that either way, into the pit of snakes, or away from it, would have had the same result on paper. I would not have been heard or admired by the ones with the pens and the power; a failing grade, a number written in ink below my name, a file filed, a retest. A judgment confirmed. But I would have voiced my own truth, heard myself out, respected and known myself perhaps a little more for finding the still clean line in the raging seas.

How strange is it that we can drift away from ourselves so efficiently? As if our lives didn't depend on finding, listening to and honouring the still points that lie within us.

It is not nothing. Our gut, fear, instinct and intuition is there for a reason. I need to hold myself more accountable to it.

Examination Rapid

There is a river in Quebec called the Dumoine, and it is one of the places where I cut my teeth as a younger paddler. It is known as a great 'teaching river' for the progression of difficulty of each subsequent rapid. It starts gently, giving you places to practice basic manoeuvres, figure things out. Like the way the canoe moves when fully loaded, the balance and strokes of our paddling partners, the effect and synergy between river current and hull. As it moves downstream, the Dumoine river gets increasingly technical, forcing you to up your game; combining whatever skills and water sense you have accrued. The last major rapid on the river has been named "Examination", a set whose overlapping features require more finesse and precision in boat manoeuvring and teamwork. This is a river that teaches us as we go along and presents new challenges usually just at the point when we are ready.

I find myself wondering this week that I am being tested. I have sunk deeper into myself of late, remembered who I am more profoundly. I have been learning how to love things with less attachment, and have the courage to leave my heart open despite the risk. I am learning to turn shit into fertilizer, to put it another way. I have felt...happy. At peace. Despite the mystery that yawns before me and the broken path and burned bridges behind me. And I am being presented with a challenge this week.

Bridge Rapids on Beaver Creek (not the Dumoine).
As a friend said recently "We'll burn that bridge when
we come to it."

It is my real work: To stay put in myself despite what swirls around me, or threatens to pull me off my line. To see the obstacles ahead and what came before and take note, but not stare into them. To not get pulled into the maw of that recirculating wave that looms ahead. To thread the needle when necessary. And to love the beauty and intricacy of the river, despite it's hazards. To be myself, as graceful or clumsy as I might be from moment to moment.

River paddling is often about finding the quiet water that lies in the midst of the maelstrom. To hit the glassy black tongue between rooster tails and standing waves, however narrow it might be. At times, often when we are paddling more challenging rapids, we end up off line, in a place all our scouting from the shoreline did not reveal. We are faced with the need to execute "plan B". Here we are required to be fully present in the flow and pay attention to what is emerging from moment to moment, and respond with whatever skill and precision we have learned on our journey.




If I have hurt you I see that, and am sorry. If you have hurt me, thanks for the shit, it's proving to be rich ground for growth.

On the Loose

There will come a time, a month or so from now, when I will be loosening my grip on this home place for a time. A longer absence, most of a few months with only short breaks.

I have gotten used to this staying put thing, especially so this winter. I have revelled in it, become attached to this way of being still. Although I know the anticipation of the departure is worse than the actual doing will be.
It worries me, makes me uneasy; this looming period of being on the loose. I have gotten used to my temperature controlled existence, the comfort of my version of 'routine'. The time I have had to be within myself, the pauses I have built into my days. Down in there somewhere I also worry that by pulling up anchor, I will be forgotten again.

But I am about to be unleashed upon the wild places. Mountain, ocean, river will become home once again. I will forget the patterned safety of the day to day in favour of something magical. I am supremely lucky. Privileged to opt out, at least in part, of this modern existence. The rhythms of wind and tides and currents will reshape my senses, and loosen whatever plaque has built up in my mind. I will reset my internal clock, sink into a quieter way of being, forge new connections with myself and others. I will relearn what it is to be me, and the true meaning of 'staying put'. I will have permission to unplug and be accountable only to the here and now. I will walk beside those who may or may not know they have come to do the same.
We will be washed clean by this wildness, find space to breathe more fully, and will leave distractions and  trivial concerns behind. We will remember what matters and heed our own truth, which is simple and elemental. It can be found in wind sculpted stone, in the confluence of salt water and sand, and in the potential energy of a building storm over mountain passes.

As I approach this transition, I may sometimes crave the safety of the harbour, but this ship is made for more than that.

The Impossibility of Knowing

I embrace my elusive nature.

There are times when I have felt understood and helped others feel understood. But these moments are impermanent, and flit away quickly under fingertips. To be known is a gift, but to really know someone is to see their eternally changing nature. To watch them move and shift with the light, and accept that for what it is. Them for what they are, and are not in any given moment.

I have been guilty of seeking to define and see clearly with a direct gaze. By staring, I have hoped to illuminate the truths I so desperately sought. In myself and in others. But the eyes play tricks, and these days I need reading glasses. I am finding that it is only by looking away that knowing comes to me, lands in the depth of my gut as a moving, breathing arrival.

As human beings we like contracts, structures. The scribing of paperwork and a hammer and nail help us believe that there is something still and unchanging in this world. Helps us cling to the river washed stones of security and certainty. We try to write ourselves into each other's stories, tack ourselves to the living tree of someone else's existence. We also do it to ourselves; pinning ourselves up against some previously held reality. If we succeed, we are killers, crushing the life out of the magical element of what we are. More often than not though we come to see that the real person has left, leaving only an earthly husk, dust in our hands.

I aspire to look away more often, let my hands fall from your shoulders and mine. Breathe out. It is hard to look away from such beauty, but truthfully we can only have what we let go of. And that is a sometimes painful process of unhooking and unhinging ourselves from objectivity and guarantees. From promises that could not be kept. Again and again, over a lifetime.
Hold me, but not still.

Risk

About a year and a half ago, I posted a 'crowd-sourcing' question on Facebook. Something to the effect of "wisdom on risk taking - go." I remember it clearly and some of the answers that came, and not because I tend to remember everything I post. I remember it because I was in the process of taking a real risk. One that was emotional, exciting and scary. And although the initial result of that risk was hands down balls out positive, the ramifications of what ensued have embroiled me in a yearlong process of loss, ambiguity and disappointment. And have caused other people pain and strife, I have no doubt.

Now I return to this idea of risk. I have shied away from it a lot this past year, but at times I have expressed my truth, been more brave than at any other time in my life. I have risked seeming like a fool, and in retrospect perhaps that has been the result from a certain perspective.

I am an innately cheeky and sometimes irreverent person. I enjoy whimsical banter, but I am also serious and tend towards deep thinking and profound idealism. And I have spent a lifetime feeling that some of the aspects who I am are, well...'a bit much',  in addition to a fairly healthy dose of 'not enough'. As a result I moderate myself, from being too silly, or too serious and quiet, too sad or too brazenly gleeful, especially in the company of strangers. For the most part, it's the impish part of me that hides away - most often with people I know less well, and more so when there is something at stake - something of the ego to be lost or cracked into. I unfold slowly, though in some cases I transcend that tendency.

I work with people for a living, and while I feel one of my gifts is authenticity, I also know there is a part of me that needs to chink the mortar and limit the doorways people have to who I am. I need to stand up in the watchtower and see who's coming, so I can decide whether or not to let you in. If I find myself being too funny, or too serious - a bit much - I might withdraw. If I inadvertently drew you in too quickly then thought better of it this withdrawal is a way that I avoid a painful conversation later. It gives me some time to regroup and reassess, but it is also a form of pre-emptive cowardice. I am as afraid of disappointing as I am of being disappointed.

So what if I was just myself, whatever that means at any given moment? Would the right people just show up and the wrong ones steer clear? And what about that...I expend energy tamping down the fire of who I am, assuming that I am right about who is 'right' and who is 'wrong'. Perhaps my impressions are incorrect.

What if the real risk is the one that I have been so energetically engaged in? I have risked being a smaller version of who I am in order to exert some imagined control over the outcome of my relationships. Perhaps the real measure of who is right and wrong flows organically from all of us simply being ourselves, moved towards or away from each other by the grace of authenticity.

What the Heart Knows

Take a seat on this blustery March day.
Ink the screen with thoughts alone, black on white, the illusion of words made real by their emotional bones. These scripted shapes have weight and truth when infused with the light of feeling. They are steeped in it.
I have discovered, or am discovering that when the mind has found no explanation or solution to life's mysteries, it is time to give up thinking. All the questions will continue to go unanswered because the answers are not sitting out in plain sight, they are not earthly perhaps. They cannot be grasped, or held at this time.

So it is up to the heart to understand, as it did in the beginning. In every beginning I have ever known. I knew what was up and what was happening long before the mind got hold of it, and will continue in this way. I knew there was a wait in store that could span lifetimes. Knowing that the heart acknowledges no timeline and has a wild tolerance for ambiguity. Trusts the territory where reason and logic have no hold, where intuition and the body's wisdom are paramount. The only truth tellers.
Now to learn to listen.
Hold off on conclusion, 'understanding' and any certainty that seeks to inhabit a physical form.
I knew all this in childhood, before that. I was infused with a connection to what is light and good. That despite everything, and all that was to come, all would be well. I knew too that there would be darkness.
Now I need to listen more carefully at the beginnings, and honour what I know to be true, despite the internal or external pressures otherwise. And always be open to getting it wrong.

The Sound of Otter Feet on Wet Pavement

The darkness of a spring rain night in an oceanside city. For a city it's a modest one, short on skyscrapers, long on driftwood strewn beaches and greenery. And pinkery for that matter. Spring was upon us in February. Blossoms and all. The air is soft, and damp.
There is a final walk of the night for those of us who live with dogs, a short trip around a block or two, finding grassy sidelines, a last bit of sniffery to be had. The humans as well get to breathe some of the outside air before bedtime.
We live beside the water here, from my door less than a minute trip to the salty edge of things. The wood of the trestle bridge and pavement were freshly damp this evening. Emerging from one side of the trail came the humpbacked twosome, in the dim light hard to see. Cats? Coons?
Neither. The strange slapping of compact webbed feet on manmade substrate, a loping and slightly lopsided gait showed them up for who they were. Heads raised, always. Optimistic. River Otters in transit, looking for better fisheries, or a bankside home to hole up in. Perhaps this was their pre-bedtime stroll. They looked to me and the dog for a moment before completing their sidewalk crossing and we looked back, saying nothing.
Before this evening's dark rainy dog walk, I have never known the sound of otter feet hitting wet pavement. And in the smallest ways I am stretched by it, welcomed into some tiny but significant secret that I did not even know existed.

Idealism

Words will evade me if I try to capture this in a linear, sensical rhythm. Instead I give you this, perhaps it makes no sense. But perhaps you will find some truth in it.

Magic is all around you. It is the black dog bounding in the snow. The same bird, reappearing, and appearing again, bobbing on riverbanks and low tide beaches. The swan, trumpeting as it flies overhead, in that particular opening in the trees where are you standing. Insisting upon your pause, awareness. Noticing.

This bit is spiked with anger, or passion, or just some formless emotion. Indignance perhaps.

We are blind if we choose not to see the magic that lies in the wake of all things. The ether-tipped feathers of the spirit that fly through and over and around all of this earthly stuff, living and non... we often ignore it. Choose not to see. Too afraid, or paralyzed by logic to believe in it. Burying our souls in the quicksand of duty, or expectation and rule bound 'reality'. Too cowardly to do what is truly right or be accountable to ourselves and what it is our heart sees and desires. To not even be able to see it. To remember the flow of truth and not be lured back into the safety of illusion.

Wake the sleeper. The job here is not to pay attention to the rules and facts, but to sometimes ignore them, willfully seeing the shimmer of the mystical that pervades this world. Honour love however fleeting it may seem. Trust Impulse but don't lose yourself in it. Let it awaken you to possibility, and choice, but don't fall into it simply because it arises. Impulse came for a reason, but it may not be the one that you think.

It takes courage, to step off the beaten path of what is known. I dare you, and I dare myself to do it. There is magic on all sides. Light a fire on this mountain, even when it seems no one is there to see the light or feel the heat of it.

Tidal Missives

Sometimes I forget things. Like the fact that in this dark rainy and snow-deprived winter we are having, there is still solace to be found in the presence of the ocean. Not just in the urban harbour of semi-polluted saltiness I live beside, but within a quick drive from here. Crashing surf (on the good days), the sounds of shifting pebbles and sand, salt and kelp smells. Sometimes on spring tides a veritable treasure trove of ocean emissaries arrive as well, washed up temporarily for inspection. Oceanic serendipity.

Yesterday I had planned a forest walk with my dog-friend. I have been feeling tired, low, confused, unsettled. The laziness of a five-minute shorter drive tempted me, but instead I continued on, out from under the dark canopy of firs. The road opening out into the grey bluster of the west shore. I stepped out of the car into the soft damp feel of beachy air. Driftwood, seals, Scoters and Goldeneyes bobbing in the surf just out of reach.

Sometimes I am looking for signs, without knowing it. Often I find them and my body knows, even if my mind doesn't, what they mean. The beach at Albert Head is a place of memory for me, but also a place that is clean, cleansing, ever renewing itself through the winter storm cycles. On this day there were some treasures.

The first, on the walk up the beach was this adult Harbour porpoise, a chunk of skin and blubber flayed from it's body. The dog found it first (note paw prints pictured below) but thankfully made a decision not to try to eat it. Tomorrow it may be gone, or it may remain for weeks to be absorbed into the sand, to be picked at by scavengers and sink into it's rotting self. Soon enough what is left of it will get washed away, scattered and dispersed. It will become part of the liquid particulate of the sea, and be borne into the air and earth by whomever makes a meal of it's parts.

Harbour Porpoise with some interesting injuries...Orca or propellor?

Almost back at the car this little treasure appeared. Chitons are a marine mollusc often found in tide pools and stuck to rocks around these parts. They are often hard to spot, unless you know what you are looking for, living in a drab and furry little articulated shell, something like a seagoing armadillo. I had no idea that beneath their dull and prehistoric exterior, hiding on the underside of their shells was this vivid turquoise. Revealed after the departure of their fleshy lifespan is this blast of colour.

Inside of a chitons shell. Who knew? Not me.

Back to Basics

I have this growing sense that despite everything, all the complications and complexities that seem to riddle this human existence, life is, truthfully, simple. I found myself in a moment today feeling deeply sad, only to suddenly realize that it was because I felt left out - not part of something I expected and wanted to be part of. And for me, as an adult, feeling left out sucks as much as it did when I was 6. In that moment I realized that this simple fear or yearning has been part of much of the suffering I have had in my life and relationships with others. I don't know what to do with that yet, but there it is. A piece of a larger puzzle no doubt, but it's pretty basic stuff.

Resoundingly I am coming to realize that the 'answers' to life's unknowns reside in the simplest things. To be loved and love in return without reservation, to trust that things are as they are meant to be, and know that regardless of how much time it seems to take sometimes, all things pass on, and perhaps return to us in a different form. 

I am going to posit that when the shit hits the fan in life, we are not being called to 'figure things out' with another layer of complication. I can retell the same story a thousand times, or come up with a new one about what I or someone else did wrong, or wonder about past lives and chakras and which rock to place on my mantle in order to ensure the optimal Feng-Shui-ness. I have no doubt that all these things are worthwhile and have their gifts. But maybe I just need to learn to pause more often, and find the still points where the rush and grind of life is quieted. To understand that there is nothing unreasonable or overly idealistic about the things I want in life, but that I need to learn a few things I missed along the way. 

I need to learn how to choose (because I often let others or circumstance choose for me).

I need to learn how to (sometimes) walk away and (sometimes) stay put and wait, and to know the difference. 

And to be ok if I got it wrong.

I need to learn to stop trying to imagine all the things that can go wrong and all the things that can go right. Because something else is taking care of that, and it has a much better imagination than I do.

I went skydiving once, and after the chute opened instead of being buffeted by wind and noise I found myself engulfed in a windless silence. Last week I found the perfect surf wave and I experienced something similar, sitting weightless and loose in the moving, careening rush of river water. What I am looking for is that silence, the suspension of control and surrender to the forces that are beyond me. Seeking the answers or explanations or understanding of things past and present and future will not bring me closer to this.

Mystery

There are grand rewards for those who pick the high hard roads, but those rewards are hidden by years. Every choice is made in the uncaring blind, no guarantees from the world around you.

There is an art to this life.
And a tolerance for mystery is part of that artfulness. Acceptance of not knowing. I think we (I) try to understand everything as best I can, get all the details, ask for all the truths.
But the real truth is that there are myriad things happening at once, in the hidden acres below the topsoil. Things that I don't and can't see. They are unavailable to my comprehension, and made of vapour and shards of moving sunlight and dust.  Real truth is not within sight, and out of the grasp of words. I find this untenable, often, and try to force things into shape, and sense. Get clarity.

But clarity and certainty could well be the trap. The things I am sure of will continue to turn cloak.
I would be fooling myself to think that I understand or have any control over what comes next, what is becoming. In seeking that I am probably paying attention to all the wrong details, the wrong signs. The important things are hidden, quietly cloaked in mystery, flitting away at the slightest touch of the thinkers' mind and the graspers' hand.

To remain still in the midst of this mystery is the task, not transmuting the stillness into stories, annoyance, frustration or fear. But I struggle to live life in the uncaring blind.