The Man with no Fingers

Good Evening Relatives

I know that this post finds you well, That even now as I am writing this note all of you are taking tobacco, cornmeal or just love and placing it out in the night sky for the Cheyenne People at Lame Deer, for all of us that pray as night follows day, for all of those who don't pray, for all of us who create the day that follows the night. Thank you for praying, for standing for the People and the Fire  at Lame Deer.

I am writing my last blog before going to the GMa retreat. We will be at a place with no internet so I will not be posting till I get back.  I wanted to give a time frame and let you know as I do my dogs that I will be back.

There will be ~52 GMa's that are gathering to create a circle to contemplate the thought : Looking in the Mirror, Remembering Who I AM.   We will be meeting and visiting, and praying, and meditating, and gathering together to take a look at this theme.  We also are rededicating the Arizona Grandmothers Council to the practice of Speaking to the Center of the Center.  We use Circle Practice to teach and facilitate good communication skills between us as well as with ourselves. Circle Practice helped prepare me for Keeping the Fire at Lame Deer. I encourage all of you to look it up (http://www.peerspirit.com).  It will be a good gathering I think.

One of my friends is working with me to present a workshop called: Grandmother as Predator; Using the Mirror to Check more than your Lipstick.   It should be fun!  We are looking forward to helping dispel fear about shadow, honest reflection on Self-predatory behaviors, and the unique position that a Grandmother has with the innocent with regards to predatory vs. enlightening behavior. We will be using storybook characters such as Snow White and the Evil Queen (disguised as a GMa), Little Red Riding Hood and the Wolf (disguised as GMa), The GMa Hoarder mentality: Vulture vs. Phoenix ( the gossip monger) you get the picture.  So our goals are to identify the Self-Predatory actions and agendas of the Victims, and how we can identify the skill sets in the Predator and transform those skills into positive or enlightening gifts that recreate the world around her in a beauty way.  it should be fun.  Writing the blog is helping me to develop the practice of writing on a regular basis. Writing the syllabus for the workshop helped me to flesh out my ideas on GMa as predator so I think it may be worth trying to write a book about it this winter. I'll let you know how it goes.

yesterday I took the bike in for an oil change and a new rear tyre.  The old one was so smooth even the tire replacement indicator ridges were flat! When my adopted GPa was bringing me back to the house we passed a couple of places that caught my eye.  One was a Indian jewelry shop, and the other was called The Artists Work.  In the window of the Artist shop were many many stain glass hands with eyes in the palms.  Very intriguing.  Both places pulled at me.

Later in the day I caught a ride back to pick up the bike and on my way back to the house meandered into the jewelry shop. Right away I was approached by an older woman, she looked gypsy, and I wandered around just looking and chatting.  Before long we were discussing Lame Deer, the prayer for the Cheyenne, the importance of prayer across all nations, the importance of women coming into their medicine, and how it mattered to do our work, Keep the Fire, Carry the Pipe.  It was a good visit.  I didn't have to buy anything  just go in and visit, check in with her. Not sure how it mattered to her  but I am sure it did.  Krishnamurti (you can look him up) said that we do our work and leave it.  Don't look back to see how it is used, or what it does.  Just show up do it and go on let the Spirits take care of it.

Today when we were getting ready for the opening Circle one of the GMa's and I were talking about setting the intention, gathering the energy.  She was trying really hard to figure out how to "make" the energy do what the facilitators wanted.  I reminded her that we had been gathering since last year. Setting our intention and the patterns, we had been placing our prayer and thought before the Spirits for one or more years for this very time.  Our job was to gather the people together  and if we did then the Spirits would do the work.  They would take care of the energy and they would manage the flow.  We just had to set our pattern, lay the fire and hold it.  the prayer would come then we would deliver it as the Spirits gave it to us.

Cool

After I left the Jewelry store, I went to the Artists at Work.  cool name huh  Artists Work   The Work of the Artist.  Do you think you are an Artist with your Life?  I think we all can be.

I went in and there were stained glass hands hanging everywhere. hands of peace with eyes in the palms.   super cool.  then I noticed a mix of mexican, turkish, persian, and mystic items in a case and on the wall.  The gentleman came out from the back and we began to visit. I told him that I came in because of the stained glass hands, he told me he made all of them.  Very cool.  Very nice work. We had a very gentle soft visit.  Speaking back and forth about different items and their meaning.  He was from Jerusalem, I had a friend from Turkey, I liked the hands with the eye, He told me what they meant, he offered me skulls because of my motorcycle, and although I like bones, I would rather have a dragonfly.  We had a nice visit.  His people are nomads  travelers.  I bought one of the small stained glass hands for the Gma house.  it was when he was wrapping it up that I noticed that all of his fingers with the exception of both his thumbs were cut off at the first digit above the palm.  All 8 of them.  I didn't stare, or remark.  Just became aware of it.  he never mentioned it.  I also noticed he had a beautiful silver hand pendant around his neck.  He also is a silver smith it turned out and he sends these hand pendants all over the world.  Nice  he is still a traveler.

He put a paper in with the hand.  It says:

Thru this Gate no harm will pass
In this dwelling shall be no sorrow
From this door shall come no Terror
In these Quarters shall be no divisions
In this place shall be only Harmony and Peace

awesome huh.      Now   I am going to ask you not to copy this down from my web-post  but to send him $10.00 for a small stain glass hand and he will send the blessing wrapped with the hand to your home.   that way his prayer comes to you from him  and his work is supported.
his shop is found at http://www.artofarizona.com/artistsatwork.htm

Later that night in the dream time  he showed up!  He and I were in a place with guitars and he was playing his guitar.  There were lots of other stringed instruments and I was trying to work out which one was for me to play. some of his friends showed up to play as well. I finally found this broken old guitar and started reassembling it. He showed me how to reset the neck and how to re attach and string the strings. It was a nice place  I could tell that he knew that I was meeting him in the dream time at his place where he used to play.  He gave me a message for my adopted GPa.  It was, that we should not let what ever has happened to us in the past rob us of our day today.

he shows this every day with creating silver pieces and with doing stained glass work.  Perhaps it was what happened to his hands that taught him to see.  Anyhow  my adopted GPa like other folks had a long successful career where he was a great leader. He did many works and got lots of accolades for it. Later in his life he had to resign from that work.  He had two major heart attacks.  His wife is one of the GMa's and she is becoming a great leader in this group.  I had watched him struggling with her becoming for GMa's what he had been in his younger days.  He was really fighting his change of roles. It isn't pretty watching someone you care about struggle with their ego.  it was also hard for me to think of approaching him to talk about my observations and to give him the gift from the hands. but it had to be done.  It was My Work for the Day.

In the morning GPa came and sat with me. I was making a little medicine bag with and eye on it for the Man.  It was to give to him for the gift he gave to my GPa. As I worked I spoke of the man with no fingers and of my dreamtime adventures.  I told him the Man had a message to give to him.  "Don't let any losses rob you of your abilities, don't worry if you do other things now, do everything with love, with peace, do so that others can go out and do more than you."

my GPa said that he was having trouble with being in a supportive role.  He didn't see the value in it.  I told him to look at a bridge, what did it do. He said that the cars went back and forth across it.  I said yes, because of its support they could complete their journey and deliver what was needed back and forth.  But no one thanked the bridge, they were usually silent workers, doing their job with no accolades.  He cried and said he was afraid to let go of that. Afraid not to be recognized. I said that in all his life and all that he had done and been recognized for, hadn't he had enough?   That it was those who could see and encourage the value in others, give so that they could go and Become that was the work that lasted.  That was the fish that multiplied.  that was the giveaway that kept on giving.  Give without thought of reward. Work with no thought of riches. Teach so that others can soar.  Find the joy in supporting the work of others.

Perhaps he will be able to invite this Way into his heart and allow it to change his life and bring peace to his present.  Perhaps he will not be able to.  We will see

I know that the Man with no Fingers will continue his work,  I will continue mine and the world will continue to help us grow everyday.  When we all begin to truly and without reservation support each other in everyway that we can with no judgements, no looking for approval, no tax exemptions, no popular vote, no looking back to see if it was used the way we think it should be.  Just give, support, work and laugh  we will definitely have changed the world.

Im off to look in the Mirror and Remember who I AM

love and light shadow and song
mary

The Trading Post

Good Morning Relatives!

All my care and stillness to you this day.  I'm in Tucson AZ. preparing for the GMa's gathering that begins Thursday.  It is amazing to have come this far ~2250 miles on the motorcycle.  Through 8 states in four days of traveling with one beautiful day of rest and rejuvenation (thank you my Friend AM I think you saved me for sure! ) in the middle.  What a trip from 45 degrees in Minnesota to 106 degrees here in AZ.
I am really really grateful to be here and be safe and dry and warm and laughing.

So many many stories and blessings showed up along the way.  There must be hundreds of ways to get to Tucson from Pipestone. I let the GPS pick which wonderful opportunities would come that would show me our Great Circle of Life and would honoring The Spirits as the journey unfolded.

One thing I really like about traveling alone is that when a little urge to turn in comes up I can just go with it. Timing is funny that way. If I stop and consider or think oh next time, then I might miss whomever is waiting for me at that exit. it kind of makes trips longer and perhaps a little zig-zag but overall a nice pattern. one stop I made was In AZ. Kind of mid way down 191 I came across an old worn out Trading Post that was for sale, the gas pumps were dry and dusty, the stray dogs looked too tired to even come over and ask for snaks, and the paint was truly old school. But it was definitely a place I was to stop and visit. There was a little neon sign in the window that was ON and said OPEN. So I turned in and parked the bike and sent in to see what Spirit had in store.

Inside the shelves were pretty bare, there were long counters that were empty. Display cases that at one time held hundreds of beautiful objects were sparsely spread with two to four things that were dwarfed by the emptiness.  While nothing was dusty it was definitely a way too quiet place that had seen more active days. I was greeted by a wonderful Navajo Gma. She was "surprised" she said, "that a girl would be riding such a big bike." I laughed and said I was sturdy and she said, 'Yes I think you are and come to think of it, I was riding horses with my dad when I was two." So She and I visited for about an hour about her life. She had grown up there. Her dad trained horses, taught her to ride.  Her parents never spoke english only Navajo, and she met her partner when she was an single mom. He was Canadian.

He had met a woman somewhere in Canada who had on a squash blossom necklace. He had never seen one before. He asked her where she got it and that very evening bought a plane ticket to go to Albuquerque NM. He wanted to go to the very shop that the woman had purchased it from.  He got on that plane the next day.  That same next day, the GMa who was then a young single mom, decided to go in a shop that she saw everyday when she dropped her kids off at school.  She had never been in it. But that particular day she decided to go in on her way home from dropping the kids. She and he met in that store on that day.  They visited, he asked her to lunch, she took the risk, then they spent the day driving around talking, looking for a squash for him. Eleven months later they were married and had moved to AZ and opened the Trading Post.  That was ~35 years ago.  She still misses him.  He died 3 years ago and she is still at the Post and still loves him.  She is so glad she took a risk, and that he did also. That they listened to that inner voice and took a chance on an improbable future and created an amazing life.  Very cool. I thought about the Spirits and the Center of the East and West Gate. What a nice affirmation that the improbable path can truly be the most rewarding. Before I left, I gave her most of my personal trip spending money that I had been saving.  She needed it way more than I did no matter how little I had, she had less, so I gave her what I had tucked away for me. LOL how great to trade for that story.  I guess that is what we are all up to with each other eh? taking a bit of time to stop at a Trading Post and make a good trade.

I hope that when my life is done I will have made good trades.  I hope that I live a life that is worth trading.  When i was younger, not so much all the time! But now its time to "Tighten Up!" as GMa Margaret would say. Tighten up,   Listen to the Spirits, Hold the Fire, Wait for the Prayer, Laugh and Witness the Beauty of Your life, Honor the Earth and all my relations, Make the prayers, offer the tobacco and cornmeal daily, Thank the Water, Turn Left when they say it's Right, and give away so that I may receive the simple joy and blessing of letting go and trusting the journey.  She trusted, he trusted and they had an extraordinary life.

Its not always been for me easy to choose this way.  I have resisted before and it can get really messy! LOL  Remember in Kung Fu Panda when OOgway said to Shifu, " One often meets his destiny, on the road he takes to avoid it." it has been quite a journey discovering what my destiny is.  Trying to learn the skills that actually result in me not getting in the way of the Spirits work. I am reminded of how things were at Lame Deer. I discovered my work while I was there, to Keep the Fire and Find and Wait for the Prayer for the Cheyenne/  it was not easy and definitely was not "fun" I whined some and even groused loudly at times I got so frustrated that things weren't how I thought they should be in the moment.  But I also watched GMa Margaret how she was steady and kept her counsel, she taught me finally to keep my counsel and what it means to wait for the prayer trust the pattern, the work from all directions, truly trust that the Spirits ARE in charge and justdo my work and not natter on.  She taught me alot, the spirits taught me alot. I wasn't perfect either before, during or after that gathering, but I am better, deeper, more developed as who I choose to be.  I appreciate all of you coming along and sharing your love and care to the prayer. Thank you.

i want to share with you part of what helped prepare me for going to Lame Deer. It was about resistance and how even the smallest bit can derail the circle function.  I found resistance in me at Lame Deer, it caused me to "blow up" when I was not focused. I had to go back and look at it and try to find what in me was not truly trusting the process and how it was unfolding. I don't think I'd ever seen or been a part of (consciously) such a large Spiritual endeavor before. I was not yet able to trust GMa Margaret or see the Spirits in my day well enough to not fight against what I did not understand. That kind of resistance I had seen earlier in the year.  But not in me it was in my truck.

This summer when I was moving everything and traveling back and forth between Pipestone and Dallas. It took alot of Work to disassemble the life in Texas, sell, giveaway, and pack and store and move all else so that the GMa house would have a good beginning. I had to slog through all of it so  that I knew I was truly cutting off my head, ridding myself of the past and welcoming the future.  Such an unknown future! But the Spirits were always there to guide, to show, to give the right thing at the right time.  I just had to trust. its a really hard thing to actually do.

Anyhow I had sold my FJ and bought a used dodge diesel monster sized truck to help with the move. After many trips back and forth from Pipestone, I was on my way back to TX and noticed a nasty smell coming from under the hood. I stopped to check and realized the battery (the truck has two batteries that work in a circle synergisticly to recreate and manage the discharge of energy that runs the system) on the passenger side of the truck had blown up and there was battery acid all down the quarter panel and under the hood.  Spirit had provided a dodge dealer within a mile so I took the truck in and had it checked. The little guy took a loook but really didn't do very much diagnosing.  I kept asking him why did it blow up?  Why?  he said well the battery was just bad.  I wondered how he could know that but I accepted that he knew what he was talking about.  Even though in all the years of driving it had never happened to me.  I just couldn't figure out why?

So I had the battery replaced and went on my way.  Just as I got to Plano I smelled the smell again and literally coasted into the street in front of the house i was renting got out of the truck and watched it die right there on the street.  11PM at night one really big really dead truck.  Battery acid all over the street, all over the truck, dead dead dead.  I was super grateful I wasn't dead.  So the tow guy came out, moved my trailer from the truck into the drive ( yea! thanx tow guy!) and took the truck over to the dodge dealer where we left it for the next day.  the next day the Dodge guys neutralized the acid checked everything, decided that the battery from the first dodge house must've been bad ( I just didn't know how they could tell that and why it made the damn thing blow up) and put in another new battery and for good measure replaced the "good" one as well, to make sure the system was balanced. They kept it and tested it and checked it out for about three days so they were pretty sure they had it right.  I picked up the truck and within 15 minutes of driving it the new battery on the passenger side had blown up.

Are we sensing a Spirit Lesson here?! LOL

So back to the Dodge dealer,  my friend who was giving me a ride back and forth was really really nice about it. I was appreciative of her sense of humor! and her willingness to go through this with me.  Anyhow when I took the truck back I had a long chat about life with the master electrical truck guy.  He was very cool.  We talked about life, about electricity and currents, about how systems function and how our lives are now after some years of learning a few lessons and adjusting our "flow"  It occurs to me now that it really depends on what kind of current you are primarily plugged into as to what kind of messages, or vibrations, or lifeworks you/ I will hear and become.  I had made a commitment early on in my life, which I kept renuewing over and over and still do to be of Service to The People. To LOVE and to give and do  I really didn't know what my GFa teacher meant about prayer when he gave me my first pipe when I was young, but I learned as I kept on praying and working with that pipe.  Right before he died he told me, " Be strong, like a Rock, not hard like a Stone." I am still learning what that commitment means, what it entails to Hold the Fire, Carry the Pipe, make the Prayer, and WAIT for IT.  one thing I do know GMa Margaret knows these things for sure.  i see it in her.  I love you GMa Margaret. Thank you for being you.

Thank you for your kindness to all of us who don't get it.  Yet

Anyhow, back to the truck.  he called me the next day and said he had found the problem and ordered the part and would have it fixed in one more day.  It was, he said, the small bolt on the drivers side of the truck, the battery that was no problem, the bolt that attached the cable to the battery.  It was corroded and the corrosion was causing a low level resistance in the system. That low level resistance caused the electricity to back feed to the passenger battery which in turn caused it to overheat and explode.  How cool is that!
wow one little bolt.
one small resistance in a hidden apparently quiet place in the circle caused enough heat across the circle to explode it.
hmm  definitely a Spirit lesson

good one huh
so I thought I would share this with you  about the trip, the journey to learn from the Gma's and to also serve them.  To continue to support and create space for GMa's as they/we every day change the world. the story of the woman and the man from different countries, different societies, different everything taking the same risk on the same day, listening to their hearts and creating a beautifullove that is still changing lives in AZ. I wanted to share about how Im not perfect, far from it, LOL but I am determined to followthrough, how I watched GMa Margaret follow through for all of us.  I wanted to tell you, follow through.  Follow through  We all of us  need all of us
find your resistance and release it. change it out,  if your heart connection is corroded then pour a coke on it and clean it off,  don't let the corrosion of what may have happened or what didnt happen or what happened in a way that you or I may not understand keep you or us from not fully engaging in our life, in each others blessing, In what we can do today. for the Fire, for all of us

I love you
take good care
Mary

Balance in the Wind

Good morning Relatives !

Im in Aspen Colorado!  One my way to a Grandmothers gathering in Arizona.  I'm staying with a friend I met at GMa Margaret's gathering in Lame Deer Montana.  She is also a Firekeeper. I drove the motorcycle down from Pipestone through South Dakota, Nebraska and Colorado.  It was sooooo windy.  The landscape was so pretty.  All through South Dakota, Nebraska, and East of the Rockies were great expanses of flat plains or rolling hills.  The majority of Nebraska that I drove through was the "sandhills." Miles and miles of sand dunes covered in tufted grass with marshlands scattered between.  I had no idea that in the middle of America was this ocean of sand.

Along the way I came across patches of sage growing wild in the ditches. When I see this sage I think of the Ancestors who have gone before. Of the Traveller's and the ceremonies and prayers that were made here long before my rubber hit the road. I think of them and accept and honor them for the lives they lived, the fires they kept, and the prayers they took the time to make.  It takes time to make ceremony, to offer tobacco, to sit alone or together and be with the Spirits in prayer. I am grateful that they did this. That in their doing they made me and made my journey easier.  I also saw a female and a young male black tail deer. The female was crossing the road headed East. The male was crossing headed West.  He was just beginning his antlers, they were all rounded and covered in soft antler velvet. So there I was traveling South from the North, between the female going East and the male going West. Very cool

the wind was kind.  it was so very strong.  but I did not get blown off the road which is good.  I stopped and gave an offering to The Wind, thanking it for being kind.  Driving the motorcycle through the wind for 10 hour days can really make me think about commitment.  Lots of thoughts go through my head. I practiced holding my intention with the bike and not fighting the wind.  I asked it what could be learned from its strength and persistence.  Is traveling across the path of the wind going the right way?  Is there a right way?  LOL. I thought of the 13 Gma's traveling around the world and the country teaching and giving, constantly giving. I wondered if they missed traveling alone, seeing the lessons in the private time on the road.  I wondered if my going so far (MN - AZ) to listen and visit with GMa's was worth the effort?  Is it? do you think that driving so far and spending the resources to bring The Pipes and the learning that has come this year to share at the fire is a journey worth taking?

I was taking a break from working on the house, I would miss my dogs every day that I was gone from them and long to come home.  yet like The Wind I had to go. I wanted to go.  I've learned so much from the GMa gatherings.  We give and receive, to and with each other. I believe that we strengthen our hearts. That we encourage each other in developing our skills in communication, listening, finding our voice, and activating in our daily lives the different way of doing with each human being, each sister brother being, each element, each life being that we are surrounded with to make a better balance.

The Wind showed me that if all I think about is the wind and me then it is more tricky, easier to flip out of balance in my journey.  Yet if i also think about the earth that the wind moves across. so steadfast in her purpose. So calm beneath the push right above her.  If I think about the earth enjoying the wind and letting her play with her skin or hair but not dissuade her from her intention her purpose then I felt more of the balance in me. Its easier to stay upright.  It is good to have the journey across America on my way to see the GMa's.  It helps keep me honest and focused in my intent.  There are great subtleties in the lessons of the open road. Many things to be seen, people to meet and signs to observe.

On Wednesday morning I got up at 5:34 and got things ready for the day with the bike. Outside in the morning sky in Nebraska the beautiful blue of the morning was interspersed with the last stars of the night and the steadfast Morning Star.  How lovely to greet them to say Thank You, for watching over us at night.  To say Thank You for the songs the stars sing in the night. Thank You for the dreams you give.  The Light of the Morning Star that I see has travelled how many millions of miles through the void of Space to reach me. To encourage me, to share her own song and to witness mine. She had no guarantee that I would be out there to greet her. But she continued on through Space, through the void and the silence, steady in her intent. I think of her and I am grateful to go out and greet her and appreciate her light watching over all of us in the night.

AS the sky changed with the dawn there appeared in the clouds a Great Angel  in the East looking North, her wings were magnificent, above her were three faces  three elders in the sky, behind her was a great bird winging with her, then I looked to the North and all along the Northern Morning sky was a herd of horses galloping to meet the Angel. What an amazing morning and great promise for the journey.

So Balance in the wind.  Balance in our work, Balance in our play, in our prayer, in our thought of how we are in our journey.  Thinking not only just of the thing that impedes or challenges us.  But of that also which supports, nourishes, and cleanses us.  When i got past Denver into the mountains all the heat and push and wind went away.  The rocks pulled the tiredness out of my mind and my arms. The trees evergreen and amazing aspen gold reaching for the sky took my breath away.  I've never seen the liquid gold in the trees captured here before the snow comes.  I drove through Independence pass which was amazing.  So much life, so much change and rock and water and peacefulness in the mountains.  So many things all together making a great visual symphony. I understand the temptation to stop here and live and never move again! ha! Then I thought of the spirit of it all. Each Spirit with its own song, its own influence, its own story and medicine. Each One Being, Being itself and could I let go of my resistance and let it Each One flow through me and keep me? That is the question the mountains gave me.  A closer thought and understanding of Being in The Circle.

I am glad I came here.  glad I made the journey.  I don't know what will come together at the GMa's. We have discussed talking about the Shadow, about Circle Practice, about honoring vulnerability, I brought the Kung Fu Panda (of course) and as well, The Pipes are making their own journey and will Hold the fire, Wait for the prayer, and then give it at the right time.  So for me; this is who I am  this traveller, balanced between home and going. Giving and Receiving. Existing in the Center of the East and West Gate, Its been important for me to learn to receive. The GMa's have and are helping me learn this important skill.  To Give... And.. To Receive.  To be in the circle.  To ask for what we need and to give what we can.  It's up to me to Find my place in The Circle and travel in it.

Tonight I will log back in and tell you the story of my exploding batteries this year.  It's a good travel story.

Thank you Relatives for your love, for receiving my love and for the honor that you give to our beautiful earth for living this Day, as you in the way that you do.  I love you, I honor you, I respect you, and I appreciate you. Every minute of every day

peace
mb

From the Heart

Good evening Relatives

I've just had the most extraordinary day. I hope that yours has been so as well.

I am enjoying a small bowl of tomato thai soup with noodles in it! Yum.  It's been a very productive day yet I am not exhausted, which is a bit odd, but I'll take it!  There is a GMa gathering in AZ at the end of the month and I was trying to get tons of things finished before I hit the road to go there.

So today the steel covering the walls of the kitchen were finished.  Very cool. that is even with me putting a screw through an electrical wire buried in the foam insulation, taking all the steel off to find the offending screw   cut the wire out of the foam  splice in a new piece to make a clear circuit then re- foam the patch, test the circuit, replace the steel, and woooo hoooo! get er done!  that was a really nice feeling to find that spot of disconnect and remove it.

While I was cutting and moving sheets of Steel  I was listening to Earl Bullhead sing the songs from the Sacred Directions, practicing the songs for an inipi.  It was cheering me up.  I grew up in a large family and miss having family around.  I like my privacy and do require tons of alone time but also enjoy sharing meals, work and getting to see and hear how others also had and extraordinary way of unfolding the day.  I so enjoyed the camp at GMa Margarets in Lame Deer.  It was like being with family  having plenty of work to do, and lots of fun, yet nice private time as well.  To all of you that I have met and visited with over the years  I missed you today!!

I was thinking about the Kung Fu Panda song this morning.  "the journeys a lonely one, so much more than you can know, but sometimes you have to go, go on and be your own hero."  It was funny to be hoisting up a big sheet of Steel and to look up and see a Spirit Being standing in the back doorway, leaning against the door jam.  I was a bit taken aback, then said hey help me lift this in.  All day after that I felt that Spirit helping me.  Funny how I never asked like that before.  Funny how seeing was believing today.  I was happy to see and to have the help.  It sure made the day smoother and we gots lots done.  finished the kitchen walls, debrided and cleaned up the final bits of plaster and lath and old insulation in the upstairs office. vacuumed it and the downstairs stair well to prep for foam.  Then foam insulated the downstairs stair well and around the front door, the upstairs office, and finished foaming the upstairs bathroom.  Swept , cleaned all up, and now am having soup  and I feel easy and not so tired.  Thats really really nice.  i think Ill ask for help more often. LOL

Remember in Kung Fu Panda when OOgway said to Shifu you just have to believe.  and Po's dad taught him that in order to make something special you just have to believe it is special.  And Po realized that the meaning of the Dragon Scroll was that there is no secret ingredient.  Its just HIM.  It's just ME,  It's just YOU    we are special  we already are our own heroes

It has been suggested to me that naming who is advisor or 'behind" this project would help "attract" more donations or support.  I am not sure that is the way to go about this.  This house is about love, and peace and trust.  About helping each person discover, understand, strengthen, and embody their relationship with themselves as an Eternal Being.  To discover their own path and their own relation to the spiritual connection that strengthens them and gives them peace.  I would much prefer that they, you, I, WE each of us find that trust and belief in ourselves from honest trust and support.  Not because others are doing it, or a person of clout is also "One of Us"!!  LOL  you are the only person who can believe in you for you and thus for me for others for this house, you are the only one who can believe in it.  Make it real, make it what it is.

To each of you this house will be a different thing,   This Project will bring a different teaching, a different challenge, a different comfort.  Or pain!LOL  I have so many times smashed a finger, or pinched my skin, or inhaled way too much dust!! Pain must be perspective don't you think?
It will bring what you want,  what you seek in it,  what you wish to find in you about it.

that is the way of the Pipe  that is the way of the Center of The East and West Gate.  that is part of the gift.  The Present

today i found support and a buggered electrical wire.  LOL  it is s wonderful house and a wonderful place to learn.

I want you all to know that I appreciate you,  I respect you,   I love you, and I honor you

sleep well
Mb

Pilgrims Progress

Good Evening Relatives
thank you for existing  thank you for showing up    

I want to begin by making a clear and heartfelt thank you to those who have made a contribution to the Project here at the Grandmothers house.

Thank you   Those donations are already in the account that the building project funds are drawn from.
Thank you for working for a day for us
Thank you for selling your used books and not buying a coffee
Thank you for giving part of your savings and your retirement

thank you for actually mailing them and following through

May all you give give to you many times over in joy, and excess, and beauty in your heart and your life, and in your family.

Thank you  for your generosity and your support

Thank you

We have now officially reached 11% of the goal to pay for the siding on the house.  That is wonderful. Once it is done we will continue efforts to raise the funds to pay for the heating system.  it is really something to receive a letter in the mail with a few dollars tucked in it, perhaps wrapped with an article on the beauty of the hummingbird, in which I can feel the hand that mailed it and the intention in the donation wrapped and sent with care.  Thank you GMa's Thank you. Everyone.

Today! today was and is an extraordinary day.  Today I got to do laundry!  Here in the house rather than down the street at the laundry mat.  Yippeeee!  When I closed my clinic I kept the washer and dryer and gas stove and brought them here to put in the GMa's house. Yesterday we got the gas lines run, the stove hooked up, and the washer in.  This morning the dryer platform was built and then we all lifted it up and hooked it in and WoW   I got to wash and dry clothes!  very cool  very nice. Progress  great progress.

Once I find my pots and pans somewhere in the garage I can cook on the stove. but right now it makes great hot water for tea!

We had a nice day of rain this week.  I worked on the foam insulation, covering the inside walls of the kitchen with steel, and sweeping up dust and picking up trash and debris. The guys worked on the siding. They are so very careful and precise with everything.  Each piece measured and fitted and cut then applied. It is slow work. Tremendous physical labor.  They are cheerful and easy with each other.  it is a nice blanket they are wrapping the house in.

Over the last several days when I get to the end of the day I find that I am weeping deeply crying when i make my evening prayers.  I have been as one GMa tells me, " wrestling with shadows".  I wondered why is that? why are there shadows?  So I sat and held the fire as best I could.  Watching calling up that fire in Lame Deer to study again and again the movement of the flame, the embers, the pace of the eating of the wood.  I let the fear and monkey mind surge up and through even in the middle of the night.  Let it come, let it go through  watch it like seeing a leaf hurry down a stream.  Watch it whip like the snow in a blizzard, threatening cold and the potential for a deep drifting of sorrow or panic.  So monkey so mindless so persistent.

I know that monkey, I know that feeling in my gut.  I knew that it had driven me for years ahead of it like a dog being whacked by a stick.  I knew that I had to conquer it here in Pipestone. to slay the dragon that had finally tracked me down from Dallas.  LOL   no hiding eh!  I knew that I could do it  that what ever fear and thought habit was trying to eat me was a habit. An illusion that I was creating or letting sit on or in me.  I knew what it was to not be that so which Mary did I want to be?  Which dog was stronger? the one that I fed the most.
So I laid in bed and looked at my assets.  Out in public rather than looking at other people and watching them watch others, reading the expressions on thier faces, absorbing stories about thier thoughts and energy exchanges,  I looked at the blank wall.  That wall was still, it was white, unmarked, blank.  It was a peaceful wall willing to reflect back to me peace.  so that was an asset.   I knew the wind was here. The prairie, the Quarry, The stone. All these things were not like that gnawing.  None of them were that and all of them were much stronger and older, and much more powerful than any conjured gruesomeness in my psyche.  I knew that what ever was trying to eat me was also trying to eat everyone else.  Im not the only person who feels this.  Maybe I was feeling part of what others were feeling.  Perhaps in Praying for the Cheyenne I had learned that I cannot separate myself from them, I am them they are me, and if I was letting this gnawing in to my night and day, then I was letting it into theirs and that was not acceptable to me.  I had to face it and find it and cut off its head.


it took me about three days to try and work out all the fence lines.  somehow if I could find the edges of where that feelings didn't exist, then i could begin to get to the core and rip out the weed.   One of the things I thought was that perhaps our prayer at night is dislodging negative energy and that like snow it can blow around until it melts or evaporates.

Like a true fear, I couldn't grasp my thoughts and tame them.  I couldn't solve all the worries here at the Project nor could I get up in the night and fix everything or work without break until it was done.  I knew that was part of what the monkey was trying to tell me I had to do. Be perfect, use my rest time to solve it all, run through conversations I had had with others to try and improve my ???? What?? what what can one change about the water that has already entered the sea?  again grasping at the impossible was keeping me from having any sense of the present in my hand. No rest for the wicked!! LOL

so again I laid there and accepted that I did know that gripping in my gut my liver my stomach  accepting it took away some of its force.  I realized then that I wasn't breathing very deeply.  My lack of a deep clear breath meant I was building up a reserve of waste air in my tissues, which meant I was not oxygenating my brain.  Well, that was easy to fix.  Wonder what kind of thoughts an oxygenated brain thinks?  I was cold also, so I got another blanket out, which led to thinking about more deep breaths, and how nice the flannel sheets felt.

Hmm I had just had two minutes of no monkey.  bingo!!  I told my mind to stop grasping at thoughts  just don't grab them.  Direct them, don't grab them.  If I can direct the energy of a prayer, or hold the energy of a fire, then I can direct my thought.  So I dived off into why was this coming up  not as a victim, or helpless being, but as an investigator, fully capable of looking without engaging. AWESOME!!!
 During the day I must have planted the seeds of those thoughts in my mind. I must have grabbed them, feed them watered them and planted them somewhere in me as they came up during the day.   I planted the thought garden that day or last week or when ever that was sprouting in my head last night, once I stopped to rest.  LOL  that meant that I could change it. and if I could change it then it was not in charge of me rather the opposite.  LIke the bankers with my old house I could simply devalue it or them and say sorry bad investment no longer interested, acceptable learning curve going on here,  we're starting fresh, and today, what was then tomorrow, we are not going to plant those seeds.  No room at the inn

so I laid in bed last night 2:35AM and let it go  all of it  I just breathed in clear crisp cool air, no judgement, no thought allowed to ride along on that breath,  and then out again   In and out.   A breath that took in the vast sky  what a big breath

try it tonight   try and breath in every star and every soft breeze,
and then that breathe went out to the trees, the Cheyenne, the water,

  In, a breath that came from the stillness and vastness of the universe,    big still calm breath, all twinkly and huge,  and back out  out to that same big universe  with me as very much a part of it  all,  but so tiny, Im so very tiney in all of all,  that all those monkey thoughts  all those "worries" seemed so very very small    LOL  so small that they were and became so insignificant that they vanished.  Within I don't know three breaths, I was asleep.
because the next thing I knew it was morning and the cat was hungry!

So as a friend of mine said to me yesterday, " Don't Natter on about things. Just do your work."  It was so clear so simple.  Just Don't natter on.   Just be who you are, do your work, let go of all the rest.

Im lucky Relatives,  I know my work.  This house, this project,  The care of the pipes I have relations with,  study and writing, and deepening for the prayer  for the actualization of the prayer for the Cheyenne.   Today that meant being joyful.  Calmly building the next needed thing for the house.  Enjoying that accomplishment and sharing the energy of that joy with all of you and all of everything else out in the world.  Directly clearly  simply just creating it, and giving it away.  How cool is that.  Pretty awesome!!  I'm pretty lucky.  I may not have heat yet  but I am so very very lucky I have a tub to take a bath in, a nice warm bed, and now ...... clean clothes!!

During the day I was lucky enough to see that a dragon fly had flown into the room ( the kitchen) where I was working,  it kept trying to continue on its flight through the clear glass window.  It did not have the perspective that I did that there was a physical barrier between it and its precious outdoors.  it kept trying and finally gave up trying to get through the window.  I could've left it there to either exhaust itself until it died, to try and wander around the house looking for an out, or I could maybe just maybe help it get to where it was going,  It knew where it wanted to go, It just couldn't in that moment get there on its own.  It had done all the work of hatching, creating, eating, flying and following its path to my window, and now it just needed a little encouragement, and a little assistance.  I began speaking to it with my heart, my words, my voice, my movements, my intention, my focus, gentle, steady, unwavering, set, and encompassing, but not grasping.  Very important when assisting another being to its freedom to not grasp it or clutch it or force it.   I tried with my hand to get it to trust but it could not.  so I covered my hand with my shirt sleeve navy blue and deepened my intention and eased up on my force and it got up on my hand and then never taking my eyes off of it or wavering in my intention or careful protection of its freedom around it I took it the 10 feet back to the open door it had flown in.  then when we got outside I said there you go   and it Took OFF!  what a joy  what a wonder of trust and love between two beings

as I said I am grateful to you   all of you     and to the Spirits   tonight I pray that the negativity that we dislodge is transformed and loosened into the vastness of creation  to resolve itself against that balance of love that we all   and I mean ALL beings  all together all at once  create, hold in our hearts and hold close in our breath  in our ease, in our thoughts for our day.  For each of us.  May we dislodge the shadow, the fear, the worrie, the pain  and may it soar out like the dragon fly and become part of the breath and part of the healing and ease that will bring another day.

you have my back Relatives
and I have yours

sweet dreams
Mary

Inner Peace

Good morning

its a beautiful morning here in Pipestone.  It will be a perfect day to spray foam insulate the upstairs rooms.  Yesterday I finished the indoor part of the dogs kennel and connected it to the outside dog world with a donated doggy door.  It only took a minute or two for them to figure out the flap door and now they are wildly happy over having options.  They slept well last night with much less barking at odd noises and or things moving through the grass. They are really good dogs. Every morning and evening we go walking on the property here at the East and West Gate. It is the plan to restore the prairie grasses, wild plum, and oak to the property.  The old railway track can be converted into a walking meditation path up to the quarries.  Lots of work yet to do but over time the project will exist and support peaceful ness here at the Center.

I would like to get back to how I got here which is why this blog was created; to tell that story.  With the possible diagnosis of bone cancer uncovered by the accident, I thought it was a good time to reevaluate all that I was doing financially and personally. My home in Dallas had been spruced up and was on the market to sell, my dogs and I had moved to a small town just south of Dallas and were renting with option to buy a nice house on an acre with what I thought then were new friends and neighbors. One of those new friends was whom I was buying the house from and she was able to hold the note for me which seemed a great opportunity. My veterinary practice was really struggling. But I was determined to make it work. things were really tight but I felt like that was normal in todays economy. What happened next changed all of that.

I told the lady that I was buying the house from that I needed to wait on closing on the house as I might have to deal with bone cancer and at the very least had to focus on finding out what really was going on in my spine. Her reaction was to tell me that if I had cancer that I couldn't buy the house and that I needed to move out.
Wow, Ha wow.  Zammo

This was from someone who had said that now I was moving there I was "family".  I wonder how her family is with her?

Then I was offered a contract on my house that was for sale which I accepted. But the appraisal was really low, way low, like 30% lower than the local market value.  My realtor investigated and discovered that in Texas appraisers are not required by law to appraise a property at its full value. My house had been appraised by a guy working for Chase Bank. Turns out Chase was paying bonuses to their appraisers for turning in appraisals at 30% below market value.  This locked the property on the FHA list at a value that insured that the bank would always get its investment back should the borrower fail to fulfill the note. What it did to the seller was put me in the position of needing a buyer who had saved up 30% of the price of the house as a down payment. My other option was drop the price by 27%, basically to come to the table and pay the buyer (if they had an FHA loan from the gov they only needed 3% down) to buy my house.

The appraisal had been registered with FHA, that meant that my house was locked by this for 12 months unless the bank agreed to our petition to change the appraisal. Which they did not. That also meant that everyone, the realtors on both sides, the bank, the title company, the buyer all would profit from the sale and I would have to pay all of them to release my house. I was pretty flabbergasted! Ha Wow Zammo

I was pretty shocked to learn that the bankers could just reassign the value of my property like that.  No regard to the work or history or care I had put into it.  No regard to the years of paying and agreeing to the system of the mortgage home owner trust.  Just, We are in business to make a profit no matter what. The bank had ensured their position and future by being ahead of me in the legal system. The loophole in the law meant that they could manipulate the value of my house, its listing on the market, to ensure their own future and profit. They had no regard for what it did to me. My future was irrelevant to them.  Truely irrelevant.  I called Wells Fargo, the bank that held my mortgage and discussed all the options with them.  Nothing that they had to offer benefited me at all.  I was going to lose my home, my credit, my investment, everything.  All of it because of the economy and the ripple effect on my business, my personal life, add to that I had no insurance to cover any medical care or diagnostics, no family, LOL nothing. LOL I was out ! I remember standing at my practice looking at it realizing that I just had to let it all go.  All the money all the investment all the work   just let it go.   Talk about  being grateful I had the Spirits. Man am I  grateful.  I had just definitely become one with the general masses here in America. I could see and understand more of why people were more and more discouraged, more and more just lost of hope or trust.  I got it.

If the straight white christians were in charge of our banking and mortgage system, and this is where I was finding myself, then where would I be if I had died and depended on them to insure that I was actually going to heaven.  Wow  big wake up call to the hand games played by those in authority in our country.  big wake up to what people are willing to to to create money now for themselves at the expense of the general trusting population who are trained by the pulpit to believe in our "leaders". What an impossible situation.  What a mess.  This was going to be a really  painful lesson! at least that was what i first thought.

At that time my practice was really screeching to a halt, I decided to sell my practice and stop trying to make it work. I had not gotten paid from it for over a year. I was really exhausted and was facing trying to work through the medical issues with my back, the move again out of the house I was in, the loss of my home due to real estate manipulation by the banks and the system (which while we were sleeping folks was taking good care of it self but not of us, the home owners). I talked with my advisors and found out that every specialty veterinary practice that had opened in Texas from 2008 on had failed. Mine had opened spring of 08. I found out that in Texas at least our area practices had lost 37% of their business. some even well established hospitals had closed. Some overnight 24 hours clinics had also closed.  things were lookin like it was time to get out of Dodge. I decided to stop. Just STOP and sell everything I could give up what I could not sell and move. I had a great lawyer friend who advised me (against what the bank advised), to NOT file bankruptcy but to just give the house back to the bank.  If I filed bankruptcy i would not save my credit, the bank could then come after all of the remainder of my personal property to satisfy any monies lacking between the note and what the house sold for.  Wow that was a good thing to realize.  If I just gave the house back, they could either take the house or the note  not both.  I would be absolved of the note and in 10 years my credit, which would look the same as how many americans today about half a million? would be back to normal.  LOL again the painful thing was the realization that I was lied to by the bank by the system, by my "friends" at the new house, by my chiropractor who assured me she had documented properly for the insurance company my loss of work following my injuries from being rear ended. (in fact she did not Ha and I lost a months income to her ineptness).  so the big lesson was that the big lie that we all hoped, wanted, worked so hard to maintain the illusion that it was not a big lie, was in fact a big lie.  that the illusion was breaking down and was going to continue to break down and that we need to WAKE up and STOP and get a grip on what we can actually do and can actually accomplish and make sure we own our home and our land and our work needs to be simple and productive rather than reaching for the pie that is constantly being moved just out of our reach.  I had worked so hard for so long to "do the right thing" to be a good and available veterinarian even though people didn't want to pay for that knowledge or expertise, to pay for take care of and improve my home, my practice property. To work hard and harder when things got tough.  To tighten my belt and keep working.  that my CREDIT was more important than the reality of my situation.  My body was crashing, my liver was failing, my back had a hole in in it, I had gained 120lbs over ten years of work and fear and loss and trying to keep up my end of the bargains, all the bargains when I found out that those at the top didn't care one hootie about me. Just about money money money.  Wow  interesting isn't it. Being in a credit and reputation Squeeze chute.

I began to see what the Spirits were teaching with the dream about the leg tattoo.  If I could find a way out of this illusion and into a home or house that could be honestly owned, be available to recover My LIFE then I could help others recover their lives.  If I could find the path then I could help others find theirs and perhaps in another 5 or 10 years instead of more suicides, more bankruptcies, more and more disheartened people here there might be a core of us who had stepped outside the box and had something that was not for sale, not for profit, not for reputation, not for credit and not for power. That is what I think of when I think of the grandmothers healing the world.  Physician first heal thyself.  Then go and teach what you have learned, endured, and become. Time to go  time to begin the work time to create in this world the grandmothers work in real visible viable tangible actualized life.  Starting with mine.  Be courageous, be trust in the pipe, be peace, be like the bear, like the water, like the wind, like the tree, like the dragonfly.  Be the future.

The first thing I did was put two of my motorcycles up for sale. the Spirit bike sold within 6 hours to a guy in Japan. After paying the fees and last bill at the bike shop on building it I had $13,800.00 left from it. (that was the bike that came from giving the guy in indiana money for his granddaughter, and that was like the one my dad drove)

I remember the Thursday night I made that decision I had a dream.  I had a dream that I was standing in  a house looking down through the floor and I could see two faces in rock looking back up at me.  They were faces of my ancestors in the stone.  I recognized the stone from the quarries. the red pipestone and pink quartzite the faces were carved from.  There was water running over their faces and they were speaking to me.

I woke up and got on line to look for a house.  i knew that I could not afford any property in wisconsin near lake Superior, so I looked in Pipestone.  I found a realty named Winter Realty. On their site was a picture of a yellow house that was listed at $13,800.00.

 I thought wow that's exactly how much I have from the bike. I could buy that house and own it outright.  Then it would be separated from the bank system and the manipulation of our credit and real estate values for the profit of the bankers. That was an important first step. Get a house outright. The listing said it was a foreclosure.  Wow imagine that!   That the value of the house was more than they were asking but that it was not in great shape, water damage in the kitchen. I thought ok it will need a little work. Just more opportunity for all us grandmothers to put our money where our mouths are and work to make it so.  To show younger folks that we can take something not in best of shape  not the fanciest   not the biggest  not the newest  but we can fix it and make it really good.  We just have to believe and do.  The Spirits had told me back in 09 that if I gathered the people together they would do the work. In the dream about my tattooed leg  the Spirit was doing the work, I just had to show up and be willing and present.

So I looked up the house on google maps. You can see it on the map just google map 109 4th st NW Pipestone, MN and there it was.  but it couldn't be right I thought.  That house is right next door to the Depot that is owned by the Keepers of the Sacred Tradition of the Pipemakers, of which I am a member.  I looked on a larger map and could see that there was nothing between the house and the quarries. That in fact, the stone from the quarries ran under the house. Like in my dream!

So I called the realtor.  I asked,"Is that house, the yellow one 109 4th st for sale?" he said "Yes."  "Is it $13,800.00?"  "Yes" "Is it next door to the depot?" "Yes it is the old stationmasters house."
He said it was needing quite a bit of work but it was a good house, foreclosed on by the bank.  I asked him, "Can I bid on it?" ( Relatives even as I said this I felt that it was not the way to go forward, the Spirits gave the money for the bike, from Japan, exactly the price of this house. Rather than try and save a bit for the repairs they were clearly asking me to give all I had and trust them for the rest.)

He said,"yes you can but there is already a bid on the house that the bank did not want. So if you bid less than the selling price we will have to re-offer it to the original bidder before taking it to the bank."  So I asked him, " If I send you the full purchase price as asked do you have to go back to that party or can I just buy the house?"   He said, " you can just buy the house. I am sure the bank will accept the full purchase price."

so he faxed me the agreement, I wired him the money, all of it and bought the grandmother house.  Within a week he had called me and asked if I would be interested in the railroad property around the house as well. It had not been for sale since 1810 and was finally up for sale.  No surprise, the price of that land was exactly what I got from selling my other motorcycle.

so Grandmothers, Sisters, Aunties, Uncles, Brothers, Grandfathers.  That is how I got this house.  that is how the Spirits provided this place and began this Project.  I didn't hold back any money for me, or for the "future" or for the whatever.  I just invested, gave it all, trusted and started making this happen.  I trust in the Spirits.  I trust we can create our future. I know that I have asked you for money to help with this Project, please don't hold back.  I didn't. Once it is ready it can give and give for generations.   Once it is going, then I can give the money and time from my work to the next home for the next person who is disengaging from the illusion of the bankers, the credit system, the myth of money and power and help them have THEIR LIFE and our lives all together  all as one.

Please give generously and often to help us take this home and this Center into the future.
love love love
Mary

Standing with our backs to each other

Good morning Relatives

It has been a really busy week!  It has been a challenge to make time and energy to come over to write the blog.  Our day starts at 6 am and I often don't get finished till 9pm with the clean up and disposal of debris and tidying of things for the next day.  It makes the choice of resting and prayers for the next day  an easy choice as opposed to coming over and writing! but I will do my best and you are never far from my mind no matter what I am doing.

Yesterday I wanted to write about paying attention to those around us who in our lives, including ourselves, are addicted. I am speaking not really of alcohol or drugs, but of other addictions.  Addiction feels to me like being addicted to a vibration. Being focused on wanting to,  or being convinced that I need to feel the energy or power of some action or force. Like getting to the end of a week, Friday Night! and what do I do?  I can feel the cells inside of me running around a like an current looking for  !!!!!????? What? for what.  For the Friday night experience.  what ever that is.  or has become. It was there inside of me trying to make me go and spend more money, go and find someone to rev me up, or something. anything but just stopping and being quiet.  Anything but me and more of just me. LOL funny huh?  I remember in the Kung Fu Panda when Po said that even when Master Shifu threw a brick at his head it was better than one more day of just being me. I know how The Panda feels when he says that.  When I was not connected to the fact that I WAS and AM my LIFE then I wasn't very careful with it and thus with others lives. Some losses of connection were subtle and took time to realize, some I was naive about how they were really translating into cause and effect, some of my actions were based on little girl fantasies I was still hoping would come true, some I was just plain greedy and wrong. Some of my actions were insensitive or egoist. It all created for me; I created for me a life I had to escape no matter what.  A life I couldn't keep and didn't want to keep. Anything but me.  Once I realized really  truly  that if I spent my day in a way that I could keep, after a very short while, I had a life that was not disposable. What a great great learning that was!! very cool

but until I committed and followed through with a daily life in which I could feel me. Until I was satisfied everyday with how that ME could look me in the mirror.  I spent alot of time and money and energy running from me, into everything that our society said would make me happy or valuable to myself and others. Some how last Friday night on my way home from hauling the daily trash, the sounds of the local football game reminded me both of when I was young and not so complexly messy, and also perhaps of when my addictions to stimulus outside of me began.

 I remember living a half a block from a high school football field. The sounds and the lights and the people all gathering together to struggle, to enjoy, to root, to drink and eat sugar, grease, and snaks. The colors, the band, the smells, the crack of the helmets hitting, the crowd lofting the energy up and down, the whistles bringing us back to focus, the seconds ticking away......... driving us on and on towards the goal of victory! and finally the last points on the scoreboard, leaving us either elated or looking forward to better times next week. I remember being awed by all of it. I remember that it was my first exposure to so many things. I remember being naively susceptible to its vibration. I don't think my parents were aware of the effect it could have on me. I certainly wasn't. It seems harmless enough. A Friday Night High School game.  But to me it was a training ground for being in the right place at the right time on the right team, with the right people, smelling, eating, helping make a great event. I felt like I really belonged in the world when I was at a game. Sounds familiar doesn't it? That subtle training that teaching through sound, smell, color, energetic patterns, time restraints, competition, camaraderie, and work, struggle, reward, effort given victory received. I was trained very well at an early age by a football stadium to seek out and covet acceptance, victory, repetition of smells and tastes, to work hard for the team so that I was a winner. It was subtle but the way my mind translated it resulted in a person only too willing to be satisfied by something other than me. Something outside of my hands, my breath.  Something that the crowd, the social game could give. It didn't even matter to me that I might lose occasionally. Occasional loss just made us stronger, more determined to practice harder. It never occurred to me until I was in my 50's to look at what I was giving up.

I lost the sense of the end of a day, which is so nice to quiet down and put to bed.  To see the stars come out quietly. Night after night the stars show up. Meanwhile every night that follows day, the moon rises silently to illuminate and reflect her relationship with the sun.  I lost the soft sounds of the night.  The soft reflection of the days efforts come to rest.

Last Friday night when I heard the footballers here in Pipestone over at the high school it was irritating. LOL It was interrupting my need for rest and quiet reflection. My preparation for the prayers I would make for the Cheyenne now that night had come.

I am grateful for my childhood. For the amazing accomplishment of our species to have created "Friday Night Football!" but I also thought how did that get so out of control? I know that I am not the only being in this world that is sensitive to that combination of vibratory events and sensory enticements that lured me out of MY LIFE into one that was so easily distracted and manipulated. I really want us to individually look at where we lost our ability to also enjoy silence and a nice hot bubble bath that soaks away the dirt of the day.  The quiet house and night sky, the soft breeze cleaning away the dirt from the cracks in the boards.  The feel of clean skin on worn old flannel sheets. And the breath,  the deep clean clear breath that my lungs still can bring in and out at the end of the day.  The carrying away of any toxins, exhausts, negative cling ons, and the restoration or filling of my cells with clear clean oxygen and rest.

We have to get up and get this back into our day. Back into our night Relatives.  We have to stand for individual centeredness.  Not centered ON the individual but IN that ONE.  We have to get this back. Take back our day so we can truly take back our night.

This is what I was relieved and grateful to find at the end of my day Relatives. That is perhaps what is lost when we all are reluctant on Friday night to let go of seeking one more text, one more email check, one more excitement. Anything but just me going to bed at night with me.

I think often of the kids in the circle those nights in Lame Deer. The small group of kids (12-22) that were gambling at night in the mystery circle there at the grandmothers gathering. The adults that I talked to about it there on the Rez were afraid to confront it. They were afraid they would lose their children all together if they asked them to stop.  How can we support them?  How can we get back to the fun of Friday night without the addiction?  I think of these children specifically when I pray at night fall.  I think of and pray that those children will remember a love of gentleness, of beauty and care, of laughter from simple joy of life. I pray they will be filled with a love for the land and the water.  I pray the adults and the elders will wake up and take an interest in love. One of the Cheyenne women pipe-carrier's asked me for help once the gathering was over and we all went home. She asked for help with the minds and hearts of the children there on the reservation. She asked that we pray for support for her people in the night. For protection against the energies or negative things that push at people especially the children in the night. This is not an insignificant prayer request.  LOL like this particular blog it is deep and takes more than one day and more than a cursory attempt to delve into it and satisfy its origin.

Saturday I woke up thinking about how I see all of us creating that push during the daylight. How we push at ourselves and each other and allow marketers to push us with what food to eat, bling for our Harley's, the rumble of a thunder road exhaust, the newest car, the drive to get up and get on with making more money so we can get to the end of the day and spend it, how cool it is to smoke, how smart we all are with the right phone, how family fun means leaving home and spending more and more money on experiences that are only available somewhere else for a price. I saw an ad on the internet for a family multi media plan. Even the dog was attracted to the circle of light from the sky, the ring of technological entrapment for a family all sharing the same access to one loop of energy and techno wizardry.  What struck me was that they were all standing with their backs to each other.  They were all so physically separated.  None of them were any longer connected as a group.  It was a bit creapy. I am sure that all of you by now have seen a bus load of kids or kids at a park tweeting and texting each other even side by side still no eye contact, no holding hands, no laughing in each others presence.  Just turned on, booted up, and hooked in.  wow talk about mainline addiction.  The war on drugs is pointless compared to the loss of human connection between texts.  No wonder the kids at Lame Deer are in trouble. And they are not the only once.  What exactly are we blanketing The Night Sky with as our intention for this world? This addiction we create in our lives daily, with our choices and our commitments to money we must spend, and thus must earn to support that spending; IS I believe is what is creating the darkness that descends not just over the Cheyenne at Lame Deer at night, but all of us. We are building days that rob us in the night. I don't think technology is bad, its how we use it. Its our focus or intention in our thought. What are we tuned in to?  I believe that the Yoga masters and the Spiritual Ancestors would tell us that actually technology is a great mirror for us to see ourselves so clearly in.  We are not our bodies or our phones or our texts  we are Beings of eternal life and light using these things to experience this time and place.  Our ability to turn off a gadget. To disconnect. is a great accomplishment in enabling us to quickly teach ourselves and our relatives that we can break our attachment to what is out side of us and just as easy look up and see each other and thus ourselves.

 I have struggled with understanding in myself the vibration of energy that wants to attach me to 10,000 things.  It is this vibration that I think in our world, is hyped, marketed and enhanced to train us to seek that steady level of input into our bodies and minds.  Here in Pipestone there are no movies, very few restaurants, not much drive by. LOL it has not taken long for This Place to help me locate and shed more of my anti-focus addictions.  The alternative is to be really edgy or unhappy here. So I have to decide who do I want to be? an Inside Mary or an Outside Mary? The only way to know that answer is to look inside myself and see. To really look and see what is driving Mary. How close the difference between still and moving. Between right and wrong. Between old and new. kept and abandoned. How small the space between comfortable and uncomfortable. And Why is that? What really is driving me and do I want to continue to be lost? Really. Is it all that satisfying? has it been?  No, not for this girl.

I want us to think of this as we make our prayers for the Cheyenne. As we deepen and explore the ways to pray every night that follows day for protection and peace for the children, young people, adults, uncles and aunties, and elders.  How can we pray night after night if we don't deepen also?  so let us think about how hard it is to resist the constant push to by new clothes, to drive new cars, to have the biggest and smartest tv and phone. To visit with someone anyone.  Look around your house at the stuff that you have.  I did. What can you take to the used book shop. What can you donate to goodwill. Can you have a giveaway, or even a bonfire? Can you let go of attachment to things and replace it with attachment to yourself and your earth right there in your yard.  To the water and the night sky?  can you do it?   So much money has gone into what when I was little was called"keeping up with the Jones". Now I think the Jones are the retailers and the corporations who have us "jonesing" for the next high. Its like the world has become a great casino. If we put our money and our focus into this clothing, or that person, or this decorating style, or that shiny new truck, or watch this movie, have that hair style, the perfect backpack, or the next smartest phone we will be happy? satisfied? Smart? thin? in the best group of friends???? what is that little nagging fear inside of me that drives the profiteers and leaves me still empty still unable to know and feel love? How am I feeding that emptiness that is loose in the night sky and floats over the Cheyenne at night? I pray relatives that this blog and this home here in Pipestone becomes for you a Center  a Center where you know we, I love you, trust you, accept you, honor you, respect you and are waiting for you to come and visit.  Here I hold the fire and hold the intention that you and I are ONE and we are TOGETHER and we are LOVE. Here each and every day that follows night and each and every night that follows day.

Some days here, rather than automatically go and look for food, or run to the post office, or check my email, or clean up one more mess, or come over and get on the internet, I specifically slow myself down, or stop and pay attention to what undercurrent is driving me inside.  What is pushing me?  Is it ME or is it fear of me?  If waiting to eat will help me actually review and select food that is good for me and my body and this project then I wait to eat until I am clear and sure.  I sometimes stop and check in with the earth or the wind or the smell of the day to see if I am comfortable with them. If I feel that they and I are One. That's when I have the ability to feel YOU Relatives at the end of the day. That's when I know its a keeper.

Why bother? Why think like that? What is the harm in fast food eaten fast? What is the harm in cheap convenient gasoline?  How small does my life have to get before I can feel it?  Who was the Mary that was driving all over Dallas Fort Worth working 14 hour days, traveling to ceremony, selling her house to buy a bigger house with more land, juggling work practice, prayer practice, life practice, grandmothers, income, outgo??? Wasn't it nice to have all those restaurants around me cooking and cleaning up for me? Wasn't it nice to just work a little harder and be able to whip in and buy more gas for my new and pretty FJ cruiser? Wasn't I being a great person of service to the veterinary community? a good neighbor  a good friend?  I was running and running and doing and using the system to maintain what I finally saw was a great gerbil wheel that was going down like the Titanic! I knew that I needed to connect my spirit work life with my daily life and I thought that I was connecting it ! I thought I was mixing it all together really well. But I felt like I was sitting on a volcano. It was getting harder and harder to feel any satisfaction in my work and harder and harder to not hear the Spirits constantly telling me to stop, stop, stop.  I didn't want to stop. I didn't want to fail at my practice. I didn't want to let go of the wheel.  I was afraid of what really was there if I let go. I was afraid to be the Being That I AM. So I was going to die trying to be good to my commitments and like a good responsible member of my profession, my neighborhood, my human family just keep on running on the next promise that if I kept going it would all turn around.

Exhausting isn't it.  I think became like a fuse that burns hot and cool and bright and strong then goes out. Over and over. I finally saw in that x-ray on my back that there really was a big hole in me.  That I was creating it. If it continued it would be cancerous.  How could it not be?  How could I take that place of emptiness and remake it into a strong vibrant life giving reconnected system that would support the beauty of my body, my life, my creation of this day and thus our world?  How?

It didn't take looking very far to see that I was like so many many others in our society. Our creation of our life that we live to support the life that we burn up like puffs of prayer paper every day was less and less free, less and less home, less and less satisfied. We weren't winning any more. We weren't really even happy any more.  I was leaving so much ash at the end of every burst of experience that I couldn't breath or escape the dust. And I wasn't creating any sustainability.  I was doing good things but I wasn't deeply planting anything for the harvest. I was leaving an emptiness that was driving me to go out and find the next "thing" that was available to try to fill the emptiness?!. No wonder I got rear ended. No wonder the Spirits said it would be painful. I had to stop what I was doing, go back through it to turn it inside out and find the lesson. and also get out of it intact so that I could create the give away. It is my commitment as a pipe-darrier to  find what in my experience would be changeable, growable. What would nurture me and thus you? What would clear the night vibration for the Cheyenne?  It is part of my commitment to help us find our way home. It's a tough commitment. Sometimes really really painful and expensive.  But the Spirits said I would be ok.

Its now Sunday Morning  Relatives   this blog took several days  but I think it is important not just to tell a story and dreams  but to review   to understand and to say outloud so that we go deeper

we have to deepen   we have to let go of the things that keep us from committing to our love for ourselves and for each other

all my best to you

love and light shadow and song
mary