Luna at Best Friend's Window

The Toltecs speak of using Death as your Advisor. I sometimes imagine Death standing behind my right shoulder whispering gently in my ear, “Don’t forget to pay attention to the small things as you move through this time and space as you will not take on this exact form or timeline again.” While in my very personal beliefs I walk somewhat parallel to Buddhist Traditions, I dress in very Pagan clothes. I try to be present to the delicate structure of a tree leaf and still know that its roots carve themselves unseen by my eyes into the dirt of Mother Earth. That the rain-mist falling on Luna’s back made itself from mountain tops and oceans foam while carrying the breaths of Savannah lions, the melting snows of Kilimanjaro and the stilled breath of Galileo.

Daily I spend only a few minutes reminding myself that the energy of living things constantly display themselves in ways so magnificent that they burn into my heart permeating my spirit-blood so that when I turn to dust someday it will travel with me as a part of my never dying energy. The human Kim and the Redwood tree, the roadway of moon diamonds across the ocean’s skin at midnight, my Mother’s scent, or the sound of the ocean kissing the ironwood shore. All separate and then sometimes together, in just one spot, to be together forever more.

Once connected, always connected. Pink sunrise on Taj marble burned into brain and heart cells. Starlight so thick across the rent of the Grand Canyon it allows for envisioning the rituals of the Ancients reflecting back the constellations in feather and footwork. The rising smell of horse sweat and wet leather mingled with desert sage and desert sun. A hanging drop of water at the tip of a cave Straw someday to become a standing stalagmite in the heart of the earth.

These knowings of this Earth Planet are but a few of the energy-makings of me. I am also blessed in the knowing of the humans that surround me. Good and fair of heart, brilliant of mind, full of humor and some good mischief of thought, the people that invite Luna and I into their homes and hearts are irreplaceable. They are unique unto themselves, continually developing souls that share their ever growing knowledge of the best and worst ways to walk this planet, to live a life, to leave an imprint for the seventh generation. Strong of will….or not, always with an opinion – wanted or not, all of varied experiences in education and knowledge, some subtle in their touch and footprint…… or not.

All are teachers in the truest sense of the word. Reminding me to ‘not forget’ how to live life to its fullest before this life-experience shifts to the next body-mind-spirit event. From the youths with unblemished skin that still delight in warm dappled sunlight and chilled river swimming waters to my same-age peers that share gaining knowledge while shedding the useless things, I become what they teach me. And while my wandering foot-path may travel different Nations, my Elders keep watch to make sure I do not wander too far off the edge of my Spirit-Path without a correction. Whether by humor or reprimand, gifts of story or a parable crowned with food, Elders are the light-keepers that guide and guard the way to the future. And I become all that my friends and family, my 'people' teach me.

And so it goes. Everything I see and do, every living thing…..I carry its energy and I become what it teaches me.