It’s Easter morning, and Terry is in my arms. I tell myself I should get up and be productive, but here she is, sleeping with her little face next to mine. Her body is stretched out next to me so I can feel her breathing. She begins to twitch. Is she reflecting the dream I just had of being trampled by huge horses? Their hooves came down on me again and again, yet I was still alive. I take Terry in my arms, her body now jerking violently. Is she having my dream or am I having hers? She wakens, and then places her head under my chin. She lies back, almost in a back-bend with her little feet up in the air, completely unself-conscious, at one with herself, with me, and with the new Easter day outside. Birdsong begins to filter in through the window, along with a pervasive feeling of all-oneness.
I lie here with Terry, ruminating. Should I have had more children? Should I have adopted the children I wanted to when I was younger? Is that the impulse Terry is bringing out in me? Or is she bringing out a desire to adopt children now? I imagine what this morning would be like with a houseful of children. No, I’m too old to adopt children now. I’ve earned this peace and quiet. When I was younger, raising my daughter, my child-rearing friends and I got so bogged down in the details of life that a moment like this, lying with a dog in my arms on an Easter morning, feeling that everything is, as my mother would say, one with God, would not have been possible.
I wonder whether mothers who adopt feel that their new baby was meant for them rather than the birth mother. I think so. Certainly, when we adopt animals, they are meant to be with us. I have adopted Terry instead of a child. I’ve also adopted the other dogs on the ranch. Sheba was the first one that I saved from her fate at the pound. Then I adopted the rest. They all know it, just as they know that Terry is royalty with Egyptian blood, who is here for unearthly reasons.
I am the wind in the weeping willow by the waterfall. I am the dust blowing in from Colorado. I am the fly buzzing against the screen. Terry and I are having this life dream together. Birds chirp, the wind wafts, trees rustle, the flowers smell, dogs bark, the clouds roll by, and Terry and I are in such bliss that nothing would be worth ending this until it ends itself. Finally we get up from reality into the dream we say is real. We both stretch and rise out of bed.
Now I feel hunger. Now I need to go to the bathroom. Now I feel pain in my back. I start thinking: I need to eat and take my vitamins; I must return phone calls, and wish others Happy Easter; I have to make the most of this day. Then I regain my sanity, and remind myself that I know a happier way to live.
Is this what happens when you get older, when you’ve done most everything, when you’ve had the experience of being the belle of the ball and you discover that doesn’t provide happiness? Overachievement makes me realize I really don’t have to achieve anything at all. Am I becoming a happy, peaceful recluse? Do I not like leaving my ranch because the pace of life outside perturbs me? I look out at a faraway hill and it reminds me of the light from within my mountain that played games with me as I sat bug-eyed. It happened at midnight, when I was out walking with a married couple who are close friends. We all saw a luminescence coming from within Sierra Madre. It moved and danced before our eyes as though a spotlight from within the earth was directed at us. We watched for hours, wondering what it wanted us to know. I thought of my mother’s vision of lights within the earth.
Dr. John Mack of Harvard once interviewed a man claiming to have been abducted by extraterrestrials, who told this captive the tragic history of their planet. One of their gods was an enormous boulder, within which was stored all the ancestral knowledge of that race. Over time the citizens of that planet learned how to make genetic material and decided it was the future, choosing to move away from the wisdom they had gathered and stored in the boulder since the dawn of time. The boulder watched helplessly as the planet’s inhabitants became more and more warlike, unable to interfere with the free will of its people. Eventually civil war destroyed the planet, and now, according to the abducted man, its refugees were roaming the universe looking for a new home.
Here on the ranch I know I am surrounded by eons of vast knowledge. From mountains to pebbles, from trees to shrubs, everything has a conscious and probably cosmic energy. Nothing stays the same, not even the past; everything we see is altered by the way we see it. Even history, because it snakes back to the present, keeps growing and changing. And what about God? Is God different now than He/She was at the beginning?
If God is perfect and all creations complete, then there’s nothing to do but let God’s plan unfold. If I am peaceful, the world will be. Whenever I feel anxiety about what to do next, I open the sliding door, let Terry out, call the other dogs, and push myself out of the house into the air, sunshine, and sun-bleached colors of the arroyo. Soon the inner turmoil quiets down, and I feel myself beginning to take guidance from above, a most miraculous frame of mind. On this Easter weekend, when others remember sin and redemption, I turn to the wisdom of nature in search of peace.
As we walk away from the ranch house I check the water storage tank. In the Southwest water is gold. Here in New Mexico a drought has been in effect for several years, causing a bark beetle infestation in the pine trees by compromising their immune systems. Even though I have a productive well I’m considering also installing a rain-catching system from my roof. I think of the stream of snowmelt that runs down from the mountains, and I wonder how long it will last.
Cottonwoods sparkle in the light of the sun and I marvel at these trees that guzzle water from the ground yet exude it right back into the world around them. A sharp wind comes up, blowing my hat off, its string under my chin nearly ripping my earrings from my pierced ears. I hear there’s a tornado blowing in the eastern part of the state, which is uncommon in New Mexico, and again I wonder what nature is trying to tell us.
Sunlight flashes against the crystals littered across my land. Everywhere I look I see white and pink quartz crystals, as though a volcano of diamonds erupted hundreds of thousands of years ago, scattering its glittering treasure over the landscape. Could that have been the light I thought I saw within the mountain? No, I’m looking for Earth logic when a deeper logic drives a technology not yet understood by us.
Rising above us is my Sierra Madre. They say that because Madre is a female mountain no man must ever climb it without a woman by his side. It is also said that this mountain serves as a magnetic homing device for UFOs. Perhaps that’s why there are so many petroglyphs on this land. Usually they depict five concentric circles, which, according to the Hopi, means that in the future we will be going into the fifth world where we will be able to live among all five dimensions.
The dogs scamper ahead and I trudge up to what I’ve named Crystal Picnic Hill, a relatively high point on the property. My body has a history, as it did on the Camino in Spain. As we climb, my feet have memory, my ankles have memory, my lower back has memory, and I feel as if I’m trekking back in time. I glimpse kaleidoscopic shards of the past—of ancient civilizations and wars fought with laser light. I see earthquakes and inundation from roiling seas. I see magnificent buildings destroyed and crystal pyramids floating on rainbow clouds of light. Hovercraft take off and land, teachers address throngs eager to learn, and multidimensional beings are worshiped in gleaming sanctuaries. Everything around me comes alive, as though animated by strange unearthly harmonies, echoes of a language from long ago. Colors accompany the tones, all vibrating and throbbing in melodious synchrony that will take on the shapes and forms of future life on earth.
I stand still, awed by these precognitive memories. Will I be a mysterious memory for someone standing on this hill one million years from now? And in my future form will I recognize that newcomer as myself?
Terry jumps up on my leg, bringing me back to the present. She stops, looks, and waits, as if to make sure that I stay in the here and now. I wonder what I might have experienced on the Camino if I had had her with me. Would she have pacified the wild dogs?
I walk farther on, bringing to mind what happened more recently on this land. Here Kit Carson raided Native American villages prosperous from a vigorous trade in beads, animal skins, and horns. I often wonder what I should do with this land, and I’m waiting for it to tell me. Should it be home to a new community? Will it be the site of a spiritual school taught by beings from the stars, who once again will teach us who we really are? Did we come from the outer reaches of space to save this planet, only to go astray? Perhaps whatever is coming is truly a prelude to what the prophecies and the Bible say will be a thousand years of light. In all this speculation I only know one thing. I will be here. Perhaps Terry will too. I hope so.
I walk on, aware that I am not the only one who feels the magic of this land. Friends and visitors have reported visions of cities floating in the clouds, and encounters with strange, unearthly people. All agree that this land, marked by crystals, will play a prominent role in the planet’s future.
Daisy, the most motherly of the dogs, looks back to see if Terry and I are all right. Mountain lions live here, and coyotes, but since there is a human in our pack they won’t bother us. I feel safe until I see Spooky off in the distance. He’s too far ahead, and I start to worry, but I follow until we’re walking high on the northern part of the property. This is alpine country. I see what two years of drought have done to the ponderosa pines. They are dying from the bark beetle and lack of rainfall. What have we done to nature that she doesn’t nourish our trees anymore? What will happen to our source of oxygen if the lungs of the planet die?
Where is Terry? I turn around and see her scampering toward me. The other dogs follow. As if hearing a signal of some kind, Spooky dashes up the side of Sierra Madre and disappears into a cave. I remember seeing him shadowbox with coyotes at midnight under the full moon. He enticed the coyotes out of their lairs, and one by one they engaged in mock combat, etched in moonlight, not knowing I was watching the call of the wild.
Our pack waits until Spooky returns to his family of females. He then leads our expedition farther up the slope, stopping to smell elk droppings, bear scat, and other spoor that only the dogs can identify. Sometimes they eat what they find, and sometimes they just sniff and move on. I wonder what exactly determines the outcome. Terry partakes in none of this. She has fresh meat waiting in her palace ranch home.
We walk for hours. At 8,500 feet I feel my breath coming faster. This is a great place to exercise, because at sea level stamina becomes a cinch. I can see Pikes Peak in Colorado to the north and the lights of Santa Fe to the south.
Up ahead an elegant elk drinks from a mountain stream. He turns and gazes into my eyes as I walk toward him. He is unafraid, and has such a commanding, peaceful presence that I feel I have looked into the face of God. Terry stops, mesmerized. At my command the pack moves on, leaving the elk to his dignity.
Bears are too shy to show themselves, but I can see the dogs catch their scent.
Traces of snow linger in the spring sunlight, sparkling under the shade of the tall pines. Terry bounds ahead, kicking up snow flurries and twirling in the air. She charges at fallen pinecones, then stops and gazes at the endless spectacle of ancient, timeless beauty. I take her often to this high country on my electric golf cart. She sits beside me with her ears flattened against the wind. Sometimes I drive too close to a tree, inspiring her to lunge at its branches. Sometimes in her exuberance she leaps off the cart, and like an athlete she rolls over and over to break her fall.
A light spring snow begins to fill the sky. The dogs slow, and I imagine it is due to their delight at the gentle snowflakes. I hear snowbirds fluttering through the pines. I am awed by the show nature puts on, and am reminded once again how discerning the ancient Indians were to make this paradise their home. The snow subsides as quickly as it came. Terry shakes herself and waits for direction from me.
Whenever I am around gently falling snow I always think about love. When we love a person we dare to risk. We risk losing control of ourselves on one hand, yet on the other we dare to create a new identity, melding our spirit with that of someone else. Are we each, in truth, separate from each other as we pursue our desires and creative expression in life, or are we bound by some unknown agreement that we need each other to learn about ourselves?
I know now that the purpose of being alive is to be known to myself. Without that knowledge my life would be deeply damaged by what I see around me in the “civilized” world. Every dying person I’ve ever been around has told me that the only thing that matters in life is love. Do I have to die to fully understand that?
Sometimes I’ve had to grapple with a sad guilt when I moved on from someone in my life who I thought couldn’t keep up. Getting to that point was even worse—it was a terrible feeling to try to cope with nourishing my own progress and growth while still preserving the love. I couldn’t understand then that moving on enabled each of us to grow at our own pace.
With my human love relationships there were always extenuating circumstances involving work, logistics, creativity, and commitment based on expectations and promises. With love these problems always arose. So when one dares to love another it involves terrible, beautiful risk. Do we humans love while sacrificing ourselves to preserve it? Or must we love and trust that love will endure regardless of proximity?
I realize now that true love for me will be my connection to the Divine. That is the infinite love without worry, and the love that will last regardless of circumstances. Anything less is an illusion. All these years I have been incessantly questioning creation, and now I want to live within it.
As the snow swiftly melts around me I hope that the love I feel all around me today doesn’t meet the same fate.