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