We spent last night laughing.  And laughing.  And laughing some more.  Silly jokes, puns and hysterical ideas tossed around the table to celebrate a birthday.  The evening flew by, time disappeared and our faces ached and we had to hold our stomachs with the muscle pain of more and more laughter.

This is, supposedly, something only humans do–laugh.  I doubt it, actually, but it is truly a spiritual gift.  It extends life, spans dimensions and defies death.  At my father’s memorial service it was clear he sent us a joke, and we sat in the front row, shoulder’s shaking, convinced we could hear his laughter at the illusion of his life ending.  We’ve all been in the middle of a God joke–getting stuck in line and seeing an old friend, taking a wrong turn and finding a treasure, opening to the gift of a mistake.

Today I rest on the laurels of the spirit of laughter.

I watched a slow harsh movie last nite about the civil war–wanton killing, vigilantes, piles of bodies of young men in huge ditches, wasted fields, murdered women and children.  I rarely watch those movies, I was taken unaware of these scenes.

I’ve lived too many lives in wars.  I’ve killed too many soldiers, women, children.  Bombed too many cities, sword in hand.  I feel this.  These images repeat inside my head like a skipped film over and over again.

Today I flood my mind and heart with gratitude.  I am thankful for the peace in this house, the silence of my neighborhood, the moonlight in the dark morning, my old dog, the sidewalks, the laurel bush, the school and everyone who goes there today, the paved roads, the tea in my mug with a handle and a straw, my big worn parka that one of my kids borrowed from a friend years ago.  I chant and chant, all day today of the grateful life I have–without any problems.

To you out there in the midst of snipers, loss, destruction, heartache, death and dying I can only say: this too will pass.  And in the next life, as me, perhaps cherishing the stillness of a quiet home, will keep the inner war from spewing onto the streets.

I keep thinking–like most humans maybe–that there’s a pot of gold somewhere here that I should be seeing along the path.  Am I stupid?  Is it hiding?  Am I on the right path?  Did I lose instructions–what?!?  But maybe it’s a spiraling yellow brick road and the path IS the treasure.

What if being human IS the pot of gold that I sought before I was born?  The prize ring that I did get–and my reward is to be human?  What if I’m one of the lucky one’s that earned and were awarded the gift to be human?  To be able to walk on the precious earth shining with sunlit love of Spirit warmth.

Why don’t I get to keep that feeling of warmth?  Why are there shadows?  Maybe it is to bounce between them.  What if the whole human purpose is to experience the different bounces?  Like a young black lab–tirelessly jumping and running for the ball. 

Pain.  Joy.  Obsession.  Serenity.  Addiction.  Love.  Heartache.  Comfort.  Loss. 

Why do I whine when I bounce?  Like my tiresome screaming windshield wipers, or the loose screeching belt on the dryer? 

Today I bounce easy. 

There is this story that “pain is a pathway to peace.”  Does that mean that I should always struggle?  Do I always need to choose the harder trek on rocks and ice, wide rivers and dark jungles?  Can’t I choose paths with blue sky sunshine green open fields all the time?  If I do choose an easier, softer Way, is that avoidance, denial or self-care?

Am I just used to trauma and drama, or can I just let stormy weather happen without judgment or running to the middle of the twister?

Do birds have paths?  And what about those who carve the paths?  Do they see a way or do they just charge into a forest blindly, hoping for a clearing on the other side?  Are they always seeking a passage to the east?  Or do they just relish in pushing through valleys of thorns?

How do you find a path in a wall of rock?  Why traverse a landscape without handholds?  What is it up there that sings you to it?

What if the earth quakes open and I lose my way?  What if the landscape is completely upside down, the river flows upstream and the sun rises in the north?

I still hear the blackbird call and let the compass inside my heart settle, pointing to the magnetic center within me.  I watch blade of grass or a sapling–they do not lose their way.  They stretch and bend up and out.  Rocks–tumbling, crashing, or still for eons–are in the Way forever.

Is it the human way to see this so clearly yet stand numb and befuddled on the path with a story of loss, confusion and pain?  Is that just our Way?

And what if there are no answers, just a game of more and more laughable questions?

I scream for my good today.  I am impatient and irritated, restless and discontent.  Is it the day, or is it the events, or is it just me?  Dunno.  I demand my good to be in front of me, behind me, above me, around me and beneath me.  Because it already is.

Like the hoard of crows squawking and yelling, fighting over something dead in the bushes beneath them, or hysterical about a hawk invisible nearby, there is a lot of noise about the invisible.  The fear of insufficient skills, applications, finances, youth–stuff– weighs on me. 

I shake it off vigorously, a wet dog thrilled at the water.  I get wet in life every day.  It slides off me like a duck with bright yellow plastic feet, wide eyes grabbing at grubs.  Breathing deep breaths, I claim my fullness now.

I’ve never been attracted to having insurance–paying for something that might happen in the future.  Depositing thousands of dollars into a fund a month to take care of my family’s ill-health that might happen in the future struck me as a good way to manifest it.  Or, if I’m paying for it, subconsciously thinking that I should get sick to use it.  It helps with the car now and again.

However, I recognize the need to pay into my spiritual insurance.  It’s not that I’m planning on getting spiritually sick, or that praying and meditating will help me not to get that periodic soul flu.  But I am aware that the more I practice the Presence, taking time to sit and tune-up my spiritual chops, the better I can breathe through the jumpy times, the achy heart days, or the moods that simply happen like rain and snow.

And there has been a lot of snow this winter.  I close my eyes and see Her dressed in soft white fur of living ermine, snuggled around Her warm golden neck.  Her hands are clasped together inside two angora rabbits circled in a muff.  She smiles at the cats purring warm at Her feet.  She has now embraced me with Her insurance with a simple smile and an endearing gaze.

“I have nothing to laugh about,” I thought, driving while crying in melancholy self-pity.  Worried about the future, hints of catastrophe looming in my frantic mind. 

And She dropped it on me.  A sign near the community center of a workshop I instantly felt competent to lead: “Disaster Training.”  Loud laughter through the tears.  I could teach a number of workshops: “Making Co-dependency Work for You,” “Putting the Fun Back in Dysfunctional,” “Preparing for Catastrophes that Might Not Happen.”

Walking on the wet muddy path in the gray-white fresh rain morning, I recognize how since I ate that nasty fruit of the tree “knowledge of good and evil,” I think I’m locked on a bad carnival ride.  I can just hold my hands up and scream out “WEEEEEEEEEAAAAAAHHH.”  I get scared, exhilerated, sick to my stomach, thrilled, terrified and when I get off, I want to do it again.

What I mean is that kind of day where the frosted rigid mind in the stubborn shadows is just inches away from the brilliant dawning of light.  The early bird is dancing the dervish song of twirling delight, the eastern horizon is an expanse of blue, coral, pale sun and deep purple mountains.

I am cold and the old dog and I walk slowly through the sleepy neighborhood.  I crave the edge of life–always have.  But some days I find myself sniffing for Her in the dark shade where only a canine nose finds Her scent.  Those human stuck moments keep me feeling futile and feeble.

Pulling in the fresh fragrance of spring birth, letting myself be led by the tiny sparrow’s operatic praise, I claim the Presence.  It is my claim today that She rushes fire through my blood, whispers Her love in my ears, snuggles my neck with tiny kisses, and laughs gently at my scared stories of dragons in the closet of my day.

“Lean on me,” She says, “and I lean into you, Beloved One.  Let me have my Way with You.”

It is a gift to walk the path on warm brown earth.  It is infinite grace of Gaia bowing to the frantic machinations of human wanna-be gods.  I yearn to merge with the memory of honored status as dirt and return to the humble and limitless power of being small pebbles and dust.  To be so intrinsically intercoursed with All That Is–to recognize that I Am That now.

Gift to walk.  Gift to breathe this spring-fed forest air.

Sage brush needle out green spikes beside the old browned branches with bare bursted seed shells.

Am I always in between seasons?  If only I could be so indulgent as mud, puddles, droplet on grass, spirited singing blackbird.

The wind is so easily wind.  The trees bust buds, so nonchalantly breaking rigid rough bark rules each season.  Birds chatter in all weather mindless of the night’s storm or predictions of snow.  Sun gifts mud and flowers alike. 

Some paths, more trodden, expose roots that can trip me up and shake the walking, though they continued to thrive and dive shrugging off dirt treasure for bright day.

I follow the Truth of the Way and the Light.  I sniff out the love crumbs of goodness and sweet feeling dropped all over the path for me.  I let the wind clear my hairbrain of doubt, let new bird calls open my heart to the purity of the automatic next step.  My tender neck connecting my heart and mind is warmed by the soft scarf of Her love.  When I stick it out, I am protected.

Yet black big screaming crows are ready to pounce on any morsel of doubt I might drop for them.  I will carry a bag, package and recycle the regular old skin, dust, shit of my past and future fears, leaving nothing for them to pick apart in the bones of my day.

Cleaning up, fresh air, stepping along the Path.