Surfacing into the yellow leaves

Our household has been alive with swirling energies, as my bodyworker cohorts would say. The winds these days seem to mirror the movement of furnishings inside our home,necessary to make way for our flooring re-dos. Is it just coincidence that as our household foundations have been renewed, I've been experiencing the need to reaffirm my inner grounding?

I work with the ones close to the end of their lives by choice. The past week has brought transition for more than one of them, and today I am feeling the grief. I know it is an expectation of working with this population, yet each time it hits, I am awed, amazed. How incredible the quality of connection these ones have, despite the body's weariness. I am overwhelmed with the preciousness of the time I was able to get to know them and be with them, not because it has come to an end, but with the experience of how deeply even this short time together impacts me now.

I know that, for my own inner protection, I could choose to distance myself from these people as I work with them, but I deliberately choose instead to meet them with the same vulnerability and clarity with which they greet me. Yes, it pains more deeply that way to say good-bye, but I would not want it any other way. They receive the gift of presence that I offer with no reservations. They inspire me to do the same.

So today I turn inward, seeking quiet to better hear all they taught me. I'll walk and let the golds, yellows, reds, and greens minister to me, drawing me back up again.

Holy smokes:doing unto others

The fires are burning outstate, but we are safe here. I know none of us are alone in our experiences, and am more convinced of that lately. To explain, here are some excerpts from recent emails between me and another soul searcher:

This one is from me....
"Last night I went to a neighborhood dinner, and found out that a poacher (uncaught) had slain and taken the head of our only resident bull moose several months ago. I was feeling anything but considerate and gentle! So I told BiL last night that I was going to put my will out there, that the poacher be blinded and crippled to 'correct' this human flaw to the earth. I knew I could not bring the moose back, but I wanted to do what I could towards stopping the poacher from ever doing such a thing again. BiL tried to talk me down from my high horse, saying that teaching is another way of correction and that anyone can learn a new way; anyone can change their ways. I doubted there was hope that such a person could really change their ways.

This morning, I talked with Phillip our minister while we were setting up the booth ... and I asked what his response to all that is. He said I was right in asking the earth (that's where I got the 'correction' idea vs the 'justice' idea that originally vexed me when I first heard a rumor about a moose killing a couple weeks ago... I went out and stood barefoot on the ground and asked it what the answer was, and in its way it said "correction, not justice").

He also said wisdom I ask is wiser than us, and to stipulate the details of the correction is probably not gonna help. In fact, he said, and this is what really got to me and I'd love to know what you think about it..... What I would be stating to the universe with my "blind/cripple intention" was the belief that learning can only be done in the most maiming and excruciating ways. Hmmmmmm..... so even tho I was stipulating that I would want no harm be done to anyone but the perp, I would still be setting something into motion that I really would not want to happen. I think he's right. I never thought about it that way.

So tonight .... I am putting forth the intention of the correction being done, as soon as possible, in the wisdom of the earth.

Now, if you choose to put any time into this, what do you think about the story above? What are your views? I have a feeling I am gonna get some teaching about right and wrong being illusions, after all, and yet, we are here by choice, and aren't we supposed to know some rules that apply to all? Or is it all really about letting go? But come on, how can you let go of everything yet still say you love the earth and all her critters???? And the biggest trick of all is to love the poacher and not his actions, right? Or is it?? "

My email guru responded:
" This is just my observation, coming from me where I stand these days. The first answer is, this Moose killing is not about what it says about the poacher, but what it says about you, especially your response. In other words there is nothing going on outside of you/us, the reason we are here is not to love and protect our mother earth, but to become fully conscious. In other words your killer instinct has been revealed, part of the real you has been revealed, so you are not only this sweet loving, kind, helpful, considerate little girl, but you are also this witch who casts evil spells upon people you dislike.

This is not even about you loving the poacher and hating his crime, this is about your true nature being revealed and seeing that in the grander scheme of things, there is really no difference between you and the poacher, no separation, you are one and the same person in that you both have unconscious sides to you where you do things without really understanding the broader implications to your actions.

I don't think we are here to become good or enlightened by choosing the correct path, join the right group, practice healing arts, we are here to experience. I put a period after that word for a reason. We are here to experience. We are here to experience.

Has that line sunk in yet? Through the natural process of experience we become enlightened, but never good. Enlightenment is the perpetual learning process we go through until eternity. Good and bad are just earth bound polarities, they do not exist outside of each other, they are one and the same thing.

The poacher did nothing bad on the cosmic scale, he/she experienced the poaching and learned and still is learning from that experience, it was supposed to happen so that he/she could see a part of themselves and so you could respond and see a part of yourself as well as countless others.

.....Oh and how much of your curse would be revenge? and if you go through with it be sure to dig two graves after enacting it. "


Me again.... so while I was feeling like I'd just been given a breath of understanding, he flies this next one by me:

Again Rox, this is a great lesson for you and just for a new perspective for you I took your paragraph about the curse and changed it for you to see what it would feel like to read it that way, here it is,

So I told BiL last night that I was going to put my will out there, that me and the poacher be blinded and crippled to 'correct' this human flaw to the earth. I knew I could not bring the moose back, but I wanted to do what I could towards stopping the poacher from ever doing such a thing again and from me ever wanting to put a curse on anyone again and I knew that this would do just that, teach us both a good lesson. And the great thing is that after we are both crippled and blinded, we can both get electric wheel chairs, meet in a clearing and have a demo derby, trying to find each other so we can crash into each other to show which one of us is ultimately right. Bil could film it and it would at the very least win top honors as the America's funniest home video. If one or both of you were killed, it might even win the Darwinian award.

We have to laugh at this kind of thing Rox, because we humans are such wingdings in our humaness sometimes. If we take it too serious we end up creating even more karma.

See, there is no separation. Putting a curse on a poacher is like putting a curse on the entire world.

I think about all the mental pictures I created over my lifetime, secret mental pictures of people who I think have wronged me, getting their just deserts. This was done in my subconscious, secretly in the back of my head. The thing is that that's no different from what you were contemplating. It's just another atom bomb being tossed into the cosmic pond to see what ripples it makes, thinking we are not living in that pond, but we are.

Try not to get down on yourself or the poacher, because he/she did you a big favor revealing a side of yourself you were unaware of before. I don't try to be good or right anymore, it's futile. I just watch myself closer to see what other side of me I was unaware of.

Wow. I wasn't thinking of my 'correction intention' as a curse, but really, what else is it?

I know that every reader of this blog does not agree with the principle of 'experience' being the point of life, but I tell ya, what my friend wrote rang SO true for me! I have always had the idea in the back of my mind that whatever I do or think will come back and affect those I love.... and I think he is right. I mean, I would be fooling myself to think that I could 'will my way' out of what my intention (you can certainly read that as blessing or curse) would do in the big picture. Like the pond, if it affects part, it affects the whole. There is no getting around it.

This really brings home the Do unto others as you would have done unto you" teaching of Christ. Have I ever thought of myself as having a killer side? A curse throwing side? Nope, but I do believe the power of thought (Christ spoke of people committing adultery or murder in their hearts being as potent as the deed itself, and I've always thought that statement applied to the validity and power of thought). And now I think I get it. I think my friend is right. It really does matter that I pay attention to my response to what is going on. And I can truly thank the stupid moose poacher for bringing this all to light. He is not the first individual that has shown me my sharp edges, and I doubt he will be the last. I just am thankfully not in daily practice of coming up against these people, so I loose track of the bigger vision of things.

As my minister Phillip said, I can agree with the wisdom of earth to make her correction in a gentle way, and I can safely add, "expedient".

This feels better to me. What does this have to do with fires? Well, I will not add my intention to potentially make them worse.

What do you think? I'd love to know.

Too much for one life?

These days, I feel strangely inadequate to hold all the things I'd like to, emotionally. I mean, I know I must be missing people. I write letters and send stuff to people voraciously when I miss them, and I made several trips to the post office in the past week. I've been writing like crazy, too. Nothing serious or marketable but blogging, catching up on my commitment to share our travel stories with folks. I have a marketable idea, but it seems the hardest thing in my world for me to send the query letter.

Perhaps it is this feeling of my world stirring up and me being part of the great wooden spoon. Or shall I say, oar? Anyway, before BiL got here, there was a massive interior repainting that we both are very happy to view each day. But once you make an improvement everything else begins to beg its shoddiness be revamped. The carpets are really looking frayed. My breathing does better in a rugless environment. So now we are looking at replacing the carpeting with wood flooring, and with that, replacing the bathroom carpetings with porcelain (in a stone finish). And the garage cannot be neglected. Its conglomeration of boxes and tools is patiently asking that we put in some shelves to tidy IT up.

I could just say no. But then we'd have that awful un-feng shui thing going on.

Well, BiL at least, seems to be happiest with his life in a sense of evolution. So the house is going along with that. I will, too, for the present. I like to think that a more organized garage will give some of the un-fs features of my glass working room a place to go, too.

I have heard "As above, so below" and in my life it is often "As inner, so outer". My body has dealt with congestion for years, and now that is clearing with wiser diet and clearer air. Is it any wonder that my home is following suit and coming into a more creative order?

I keep reminding myself of that on the days when I feel so overwhelmed that I don't know which contractor I should be calling next.

And all of this comes back to the fact that I cherish it all, every moment of it, really. It's not just the evolving of the household, but the growth and development and downright blooming that I see in all my loves. BiL is facing and managing tremendous changes in his personal and family life, my grand kiddos are each immeasurably beautiful souls, my kids who are no longer kids blow me away with the way they live their lives, the challenges they meet with more grace than I ever thought I had myself after many more years. Even my dad is handling the not so kind things his age has dealt to him with patience and resolve that surprise those of us closest to him.

We have more hot days than we should this time of year, but the nights offer reprieve and when the rains come they are that much more precious and instill thanks in everyone. And Thanks is a great place to be, to pray from, to love from.

The Future Pays a Visit

Well now.

Not one candidate or rep responded to my queries, except for blanket invitations to join the email lists. I tried that, but found that all I got were pleas for funding. So I am left to peruse the webpages, looking for a spark of inspiration from Obama, Hillary, Edwards... well, anyone alight out there. So far, I am less than impressed.

In the meantime, Tomorrows paid us a visit this week in the form of my darlings from Nebraska. I will leave it to 'Kip' and Julie to fill you in on their entire trip, but here is a bit of what I saw and savored:

The little crew of 5 sailed in late Sunday night with tales of their previous days n nights at the Tetons and a day of Yellowstone. Grizzly and black bear, moose and elk seem to have been drawn to them along the way. I saw pioneering hearts in Julie and DJ to bring the ever moving young ones so far, to set up camp and all that goes with it, giving the kiddos a safe place to rest and play. When I began taking my guys on solo camping journeys, the youngest was, maybe, 9. DJ and Julie's kiddos are 10 months old, 3 and 7. Wow. And their camps are tidy, well stocked, and warm on cold nights. But now, at our house, they could have a break, breakfasts each morning, laundry and showers and baths whenever they wanted. All they had to do was put up with this adoring gran'ma and remind me of the baby proofing I had missed. (I had forgotten to put away my rock friends.)

After a night's sleep (we'd given them the roomy loft for their lodgings), we gave them a breakfast of waffles and other fixings to stoke them up for an afternoon trip to the children's museum (for me, Bre, and Ashton) and a shopping venture for the rest. Breanna used the art table there to create signs for a 'surprise' dinner for her mom and dad and BiL when we went home. We visited the Co-Op before coming home to one of my stir fry meals, and then it was bath and story time. Loving the water so much, the giggles and squeals that come from the bath end of the house are healing to hear.

BiL had a double shift of teaching each day at the U, so was not able to join us as much as he liked. He and I took the (very cool, even on these unusually hot Montana days) basement guest room while they were here, and slept well despite my tendency to stay up too late, enjoying every last minute with the Lincolnites. He was only able to join us at the very ends and beginnings of his days, except for one, and I'll get to that in a paragraph or two. But despite his neverending academics, he always found at least a few minutes to give loving attention to everyone. BiL delights in the endless curiosities of the kiddos, and really regretted not being able to hang out with all of us more.

One of the things I got to do was reacquaint Bre and Ashton ( and introduce baby Riley) to our cat, Mo. They seemed fascinated with her little ways, and once I told them about guarding that she didn't get stuck outside in the heat when we would leave, they were keen on making sure she was inside when she should be. Ashton was so sweet in learning when not to follow Mo, and when to indulge in petting her. Breanna helped me with the bird feeders, alerted me when a bird hit the window, and Ri Ri simply did what a baby does and tried to keep up with everyone, wherever they went. We wonder if Mo thought Riley was a furless cat. She has never seen a crawling baby here before. She gave a few warning meows but she never struck out or nipped, even when a little hand grabbed a fistful of skin. So here was the animal world saying hello and welcome these bubbly ones.

Tuesday rolled in, still balmy and warm. After breakfast, Breanna, Ashton and I worked on some necklaces made of 'crow beads'. I added a tiny brass bell to each one, and the family wanted to hike, so we went up to the meadowed slopes of Bridger Bowl. Breanna, still getting her 'mountain legs' took it slow on the road up to Deer Park Chalet. Ashton and Riley rode in Mom and Dad's backpacks. Tenacity and love for the outdoors overpowered everyone's weary legs and took us to the base of Alpine lift where we headed back down. 'Must have been the mountain air that got to him... DJ opted for a very quick pack up back at our house, and we all set off for Yellowstone, to camp at Indian Creek. We pulled in there around 5:30 or so, and got one of the last 3 sites left. Whew! The tent went up, Julie and Riley laid out the sleeping mats and bags inside, and DJ made us all a taco dinner. Julie's s'mores and hot chocolate followed and then, after counting 37 or so bats overhead, we all tucked in to sleep. Poor Riley had a rough night, though, as did David (a case of hives), so next morning spirits threatened to droop. And still everyone was ready to jump in a river.

DJ has been re-examining his diet to resolve the hive issues, so we were having good times sharing food wisdom, preferences, and aversions. This is why you are not seeing many references to desserts (I love to make em, can't eat most due to gluten, though). I tried to keep fruit on hand and in the course of the visit Ashton (no dairy) and I discovered frozen fruit bars and so did everyone else. David thinks he may have reacted to the beef in the tacos even tho it was from the Co-Op.

So after breakfast and packing up we walked a bit of the terrace by Mammoth and then went to the Boiling River and spent the afternoon amazing ourselves with the pleasure of the hot/cold waters there. We got back to our house and cleaned up, and I had to leave on a last minute call to give a massage at the hospital, so I missed out on the grilled Boca Beerbrats but BiL was able to make it. After my appointment I joined our guests for a private (only us in the theater) showing of 'Evan Almighty' and then it was home and bed. They were so understanding about the nature of my work, supporting me in every way.

Thursday after breakfast everyone under 40 went to Pallisade Falls to picnic and hike. Of course, BiL was teaching, and I had hospice obligations. All but BiL were done in time to meet at Howlers where we got to see wolf pups close-up and touchable, and then we headed into town to meet BiL for dinner at the Aleworks. Following our delicious food, we parked nearby and walked over to the Music on Main event. We would have loved to build something at the Kenyon Noble tent, but the KN people never showed, so facepainting was all Bre and Ashton could do in the kids' activity areas, but they danced in the streets to Music on Main, bluegrass style. Our neighbors were here and there, and the ones with the horses invited us to give em a carrot or apple when we got home.

The last day of the visit was Friday. Between breakfast and the final baths and packing, these brave and strong hearted 5 followed my lead up to an overlook a half hour's ramble from our house. Julie claimed a ridge there (Julie's Ridge now, to us) and everyone between 1 and 40 created an artwork of that majestic view. Riley and I sat on the ground and tried not to eat dirt, getting in extra cuddling time:) Have I mentioned just what a treat it is to embrace just a tumble of pure love and energy? Well.... after adequate time to let the presence of that place soak into our bones and souls, we headed back down, changing our return route slightly. DJ visited 'David's Bench' (he had last snowshoed up there a couple winters ago) with Julie , Riley and Ashton. Breanna (she of huckleberry vision) and I sought and found the first crop of hucks this season, along with ample whortleberries and a couple tiny wild strawberries.

We all joined up again at the house. Everyone who would be traveling took their bath and packed up and when they were done packing, Bre and Ashton took turns having cold foot soaks in a bucket on the deck. Riley fell asleep in my happy arms. And just before leaving, we all took carrots to the horses (I should have brought more carrots) next door, and Ashton said he'd like to ride the black one someday. Julie took a last photo of DJ and me as I fought off tears.

I always cry when they leave, and I know this is a part of the letting go. And I wander the house, sometimes burying myself in housework and laundry, sometimes just letting my feet wander as if tracing little paths of energy and light that they left. When I went to put the laundered sheets on our bed upstairs I found their last gifts to us... the art they made on Julie's Ridge, and a precious note of thanks that we posted in our guest book... the book I was too busy (enjoying myself with the kiddos) to put into their hands while they were still here.

I also have gifts from Breanna... stones she found before coming here, and the art and sign she made at the children's museum.

And I have the gift of their being here.

Thanks to the angels that keep them safe all the way home.

Calling out

I percieve politics in a way of small landmarks rather than a network of meaning. So this is the approach I am taking in making my inquiries. Today I sent an email to each of the candidates. In essence, it requested action on addressing the causes of chronic disease in our nation, rather than how best to finance treating the symptoms. I'll post any responses here as I get them.

I see that Obama is initiating a campaign for local action towards change. It reminds me of the
Ask Not speech of JFK.

Not much developing from Romney.

In comparison of each guy's approach to health care, Romney promotes ideas that will grow insurance, medical, and pharmaceutical industries. Obama promotes healthier community design programs.

When the last presidential election came around, I had trouble believing that there would really be much difference in what came forth from Washington after election day, no matter what anyone was saying. What happened since then, really educated me.

I believe there can be a difference. I continue to hope.

How to make politics interesting

This time, BiL and I decided we did not want to let the media pundits filter everything that comes to us about the 2008 election. Or maybe it was a very long drive back from Nebraska and we needed something to keep us awake for a few minutes of sandhills interstate between crane sightings.

Anyway, we each took on a potential candidate from both parties. I chose Obama and Romney. BiL chose Edwards and Rudy G. I am ahead, so far, with three facts on each of my possibles:
Obama:
1. Endorsed by Sarah Carter (Jimmy Carter's granddaughter)
2. Has been openly against the war since 2002; Has proposed a plan for troop withdrawal from Iraq.
3. His wife, Michelle, works with hospital community and diversity programs.

Romney:
1. Endorsed by Orrin Hatch, who besides being a Utah senator, writes music Pat Boone might like.
2. Great grandfather was a poligamist and was living in Mexico for that reason, before the Mexican revolution during which the family relocated to Utah. His wife, Ann, has MS and has been really active with programs for kids.
3. Is credited with saving the SLC Olympics from going bankrupt.

It's a start.

What I really want to know, and have not been able to find, are answers for both candidates such as:
1. What kind of car does he drive?
2. Is he oldest, youngest, or middle child of his siblings?
3. Does he go for prevention or cure?
4. Who is really his personal hero? His mentor?

I'll keep ya posted.

Changing faces

Sometimes life zooms along at such a blur I hardly know what to put down into words. So I choose a random point to begin, hoping the trail it starts will include the most important piece of the whole. Having never offically studied philosophy theory, I haven't a clue as to what that statement indicates about mine, but I bet son #3 would have some opinions. And he just had a birthday. #26. When someone I love that much adds another solar circuit I think the world is that much better as a result.

I was lunching with him the other day, sharing my stories of braving skiing on 'fast' skis for the first time this season, and listening to his own tales of mentoring a couple alpha-type adolescents. I am a great listener to such talk, having little advice to offer. When you enjoy observing all sides, it is impossible to choose one. The absence of an answer might be mistaken for not caring, but I do care. I am just amazed as I witness my youngest, a young man now, walking in the shoes that his life has brought him. He is the first to admit that he 'doesn't feel like he should be teaching anyone.' I think that his humility and transparency make him one of the best.

We live in a world of movement and transformation. The roads that I walk are changing daily now. One day the snow is nearly gone, the next it is foot deep powder, sculpted into drifts on the third and a thick glaze of ice on the fourth. Time seems to be as solid an entity as ever. The teacher I have been listening to lately quietly asserts that time is an illusion... the only reality is now. Past and present are projections that we pretend are 'now' when we recall or worry about them. Well, there you have a quite incomplete and simple version of it, anyway.

The scientist in my world states that such ideas might bear a sliver of truth. He also says that the way of the world is towards entropy.... chaos. If you drop a plate it fractures into many chards. It moves towards the chaos. The singularity of our distant past keeps expanding, blowing outward, into more and more pieces.

The events of our household have taken on a plasticity of their own. We both notice it... little upsets that seem all out of whack perforate otherwise smooth n easy days. Last night a very warm wind mixed up all sorts of things outside of our house, and perhaps this was part of the stirrings within, too. Physics acknowledge that all is connected. Why should human beings, with our intricate play of neural chemistries, be isolated from the airy ocean that is home?

As I rode the ski lift on Valentine's Day, snow was falling steadily, and I could watch the individual flakes land and ride on my sleeves. Is every flake really unique, I wondered. What if two were identical. Would this be the beginning of a reverse of physics.... the opposite of the tendency to chaos that we are told exists? What would be next? Would I meet myself?

Would I like her?

Closing the door

As this month comes to a close, I am combing through all the events since last posting... BiL's physical therapist gave me some helpful direction in working with the scar from his surgery, BiL is driving on his own now, freeing my schedule up considerably, I have begun visiting my hospice client again, I'm exploring several blogs and their various tweakabilities, and I finally have gotten back to my stained glass work! On the 'still pending' list is my massage office site. Some things need their time to work out. Well, there's always my own table in front of our woodstove in a pinch.

After too many days of 'melt n settle', our locale got blessed with 4-6 inches of powder last night. The pitch of conversation where I volunteer at a local coffee bar was measuably excited today. No one was jumping up and down.. the base depth at the local ski place is still not good, but any measuable snowfall gives everyone hope. I got a very nice photo this morning which I will attempt to post with this entry. Something about light coming through grayness just revs me up inside. Rainy days do that. Snowy mornings do that. :) They weather powers are forecasting snow tonight and tomorrow, but when their predictions rise, our actualities fall. For now, though, it is looking more as it should: a soft, white blanket, and pine branches clasping perfect rounds of virgin white in their green needle tips. We even got to see some new winged visitors, pine grosbeaks.... in their first year, by their russet heads.

I've enjoyed (with envy) knowing that my NE family have gotten their good share of white stuff. I am told that my grandson squeals when he sleds. Heck, I squeal for real, saucering down our driveway, never knowing where I will end up. This, of course, brings our neighbor dog (her name, I found out, is Abigail, but I keep wanting to call her Isabelle for some reason). She rambles beside me, smiling in her dog way.

Today, she followed me as I snowshoed up our west slope. I had seen her an hour earlier, 2 miles down the road with my other neighbor, so I knew she had been on the run nearly constantly, and was surprised at her abundant energy! Only on the way down did I see her occasionally collapse into the deep snow and slide rather than leap through. It was nearing late afternoon, and I was happy to have her with me to discourage any human despising cow moose. I'd love to see said moose, but not face to face.

As usual, my exertion into the white left me somehow energized, and I launched into more wood splitting and snow clearing until dark, once I got home. BiL made dinner, I started a fire, ate and cleared dishes, and now the flakes are just starting to fall again.

Yay. (not too loud, now).

Snowshoe

Today we both agreed to stay home. It's MLK day, and while the guys on the radio debated the meaning of the day, we had our own discussion and finding agreement, decided that was that. I determined that I would not spend the entire waking hours getting lost in housechores. BiL has been doing a little sorting of his goods every day, is getting around in the house without crutches some of the time (watch it, BiL, don't overdo!), and is managing more of his own needs. I still get the meals, do the laundry, make the fires, etc, but his healing is coming along so that I feel ok leaving him on his own for several hours at a time if need be. Yesterday and the day before I did just that to complete some needed tasks in town. Today would be different.

After I did just the right amount of organizing my own wayward papers and catching up on cleaning after our waffle breakfast and chili and couscous lunch, I brewed my traditional "hiking" thermos of jasmine tea, strapped on my Atlas snowshoes, and beelined up the slope west of the house. The local dog has run off the day population of moose, elk, and deer, so I didn't have a worry about surprising anything bigger than a breadbox. The snow was a foot deep at minimal, the hiking steep, slow, but delightful powder all the way!

The air might have been 12 degrees or so, the sky, 3pm winter blue. Even tho the snow depth is not enough to complete cover the generous alderberry, raspberry, and serviceberry shrubs, it is enough to be shoe-able without getting hung up. It is so freeing to the heart to find one's way through the thickets of pines, across logs, past pockets of snow crystal growths like window frost gone three dimensional. I gained altitude til I was up on the old logging road, too high to see our house. I took the road downward to my favorite huge log on the west slope. In the summer the log is inviting, but must be avoided as it is home to a myriad of 6 leggeds that would just as soon sample your flesh as they would enemy colonies. In the present season, they sleep and the log is a place to lean against, a snow blanketed sanctuary of silence. I paused there, letting my fingertips feel blood in them again, downing my thermos of tea (sharing a cup with Earth Mom), feeling the shadowed cold kissing the back of my sweating neck.

After checking in with BiL on the walkie talkie, I began the descent back to the house. Midway down I saw the snowshoe tracks of my neighbor, Marion.

Popular place.

Settling in

The night we got home, the temperature was -19 as we came up our drive. This is a more typical Montana winter night, I am told. Nebraska feels frigid to me at far warmer temperatures, I suppose due to the more moist air there. But here, it's hard to believe the temps are so low, unless you happen to be out in them for a length of time. The still air is deceptive to the skin, so you have to be careful about bundling up.

After so much time in Nebraska, and then on the road, it felt surreal to be home. Our cat remembered me quickly, but took a little longer to warm up to BiL. Josh had the house wonderfully clear and clean, but I undid that as I unloaded the car. Pretty soon, the living room was blooming with boxes and suitcases, clothing and books from BiL's temporary digs in Nebraska. The boxes we had shipped would be picked up in town later, so we could focus on going through each box we'd brought with us anytime we were ready. For this night, though, we just enjoyed visiting with Josh, catching up news of his stay since coming back several days earlier.

I was really surprised to see BiL traversing the stairs so readily. He wanted to see the colors of the walls that had been painted since his last visit home in October. He loved them. :) He also decided to sleep upstairs for the night!

In the morning we went into town, taking BiL to his pt appointment, and taking Josh home. BiL got the good news from his therapist that his knee is coming along very well, and Josh got a pleasant surprise of his car starting even in the subzero temps. While BiL was in therapy, I made arrangements to have his snowtires put on his car next week. After the treatment, we both enjoyed cruising around Bozeman, getting our roots back down in the town.

It is always wrenching to leave all the folks we love back in Nebraska. Their faces, the sounds of their voices, the feel of their hugs remain very tangible to me all the way home and after. When I get home, it is like waking from one dream into another. This time, I found that I had to relearn some of the cupboard space in my kitchen to find certain cookware or dishes. My mind has been occupied first with BiL's pt appointments, then with the 'coming home' tasks like emptying suitcases, putting things away, getting the mail picked up and delivery started for that and for the paper, and stocking up on perishables. All these little chores serve to help bring me home in body and mind.

Roadies

Two and a half weeks after his surgery, BiL braved the long trip back to Montana. We reclined his seat as far as we could, brought the trusty ice packs, packed the car as much as it could hold, prepared an easy to reach (for BiL) basket of goodies, and departed on our thousand mile plus way around 1:30 pm that day.

Routing ourselves to circumvent the worst of the latest snowstorms, we took a slow journey, stopping every 90 minutes so he could stretch and move that knee (doctor's orders). As the sole driver, I must admit that the frequent rest stops helped me stay alert. The roads were nearly empty, and dry as a bone through Nebraska and most of South Dakota. We found lodging in Rapid City for the night, and continued the next day into heavy winds and blowing snow. The road was mercifully dry and safe till we got into Wyoming. Reduced to single lane travel, I90 wound it's way along the higher altitudes with intermittent snowpack and ice. We stopped in Gillette for lunch. By the time we got to Sheridan, I was very happy to take a long break at the Java Moon, where BiL had a latte and I found just what I needed in a pot of honey lemon ginseng tea.

Almost at the Wyoming Montana border, the ice cleared and traffic returned to normal speeds. That is, until Billings, where the pavement sported a steady layer of ice. Another rest stop there, and then we continued slowly enough to keep our track steady. Things improved greatly after leaving Columbus, and we rolled into our little neighborhood around 9, I think.

Josh had the driveway cleared for us, a fire in the woodstove, and ample wood to get us through a couple days. After two 11 hour days on the road, what a welcome that was!

Stones in the path

Yesterday I packed and lifted (4 times) 265 lbs of office books and teaching materials from BiL's office at the U... toted and shipped them home, as we'll have no room to take them ourselves. Tons (well, really, pounds) of effort, but it felt good to have it done. We still have several more boxes worth of stuff that will come from the room where he's lived for the past season of teaching which will also get shipped. BiL's mobility and stamina is returning as his pain decreases. Today he gets the 20 staples removed. I think we are both eager to see what changes he experiences when those are not restricting his knee movement. Last night we celebrated his last anticoagulent injection with his favorite frozen yogurt dessert.

Small works with great love has been the theme this week, and we are both doing better, I think. I use the web and my emails to monitor the weather at the house. Movement seems to be a constant, whether keeping joints limber or setting boxes in motion towards home. Even my son's family is moving today... going on a ski trip. Inertia is a constant and needs to be overcome but then it's amazing to experience the changes that happen.

BiL is now eager to get on the road, too, to go home. This is a tremendous step of recovery.