Every being has an identity and a purpose. To live up to his purpose, every being has the power of self-control, and that’s where spiritual power begins. When some of these fundamental things are learned, the time will be right for more to be revealed and spiritual power will come again to this land.
- Rolling Thunder
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Tantay relatives!
This post is for the many good hearts I was lucky enough to meet and share 5 days (for me) "camping" in the wilds of New Mexico.
First, thank you to you all (and you know who you are;) for one of the most profound weeks in my life (I'm 67teen). Seriously...
I was honored to be asked and delighted that creator provided me with another opportunity for an adventure in my life. Opportunity often won't wait long for a reply so I'm glad this came together so quickly.
Way back when, I was breaking up with a woman I had lived with for years. It was a really foggy day (San Joaquin Valley tule fog) in Fresno and I knew if I headed east to the foothills I could get me some sunshine.
I know a spot that has some fine rock gardens on one side of the road and on the other side a cluster of bedrock mortars - maybe 100 or so - were perched on this fine, oak studded knoll.
It always saddens me to visit these old family sites knowing that once families lived on and near this beautiful spot. A small creek flows nearby all year and the oak grassland landscape is like home to me.
But even there that day, the fog didn't want to clear. And I could relate.
So I sat down on a rock and soon started to talking to those that aren't, but are, there. And then overhead a patch of blue opened up and a bald eagle flew through the opening and I made a mistake, one probably more than a few us have made, I asked for something.
Lordy.
My life was in turmoil, not in a bad way but just... well, tumultuous.
And what I asked for? Change.
I know, "oops."
But...
... it all has worked and here I am in a place that my need for change has lead me. I've moved from Oregon after 30 years and I'm now living in California with my family in an inter-generational household, from 1 to 71.
And it is here and the change it took me to get here that lead to my being at that ceremony in New Mexico. And it was there that almost all of y'all came into my life. From my first meeting of Grandfather Semu at Redwind until now I found myself totally at home with strangers that were almost instantly not strangers but family.
What I know of the native people of Turtle Island I know both from book learnin' and life experience.
I am a far different man today precisely because I took the step of introducing myself to a man I didn't know and found myself with another brother. I usually say 1/2 brothers because we do really have the same mother... I mean really...
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and here's the shot I was bragging on to some of you
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To ALL my relations
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A well-known scientist (some say it was Bertrand Russell) once gave a public lecture on astronomy. He described how the Earth orbits around the Sun and how the Sun, in turn, orbits around the center of a vast collection of stars called our Galaxy. At the end of the lecture, a little old lady at the back of the room got up and said, "What you have told us is rubbish. The world is really a flat plate supported on the back of a giant tortoise." The scientist gave a superior smile before replying, "What is the tortoise standing on?" "You're very clever, young man, very clever," said the old lady, "but it's turtles all the way down!"
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