the waiting continued. this is Sandrock. a younger toad than the Aunt. maybe we could say a young adult age
and then, this is the Dude. he is very big. old.
the waiting went on and on and on. so i finally let it just fill all the space and began working on a cloth. just looking at pieces, scraps, colors. moving them near and away from each other.
and finally, the phone rang. they are there and they are all ok. Every Single One of Them is just absolutely ok.
i had received a call on Friday that the daughter's truck had broken down in the Mojave Desert. the temp was 115. they had waited over 4 hours for a tow truck. the goats were flat lining. the tow truck came and another Uhaul van and skip some details, they were on their way again, about 6 hours from their destination. and then, i didn't hear anything more. until today. a short, still totally exhausted conversation, but they arrived. and they are ok. goats, dogs, people. everyone is ok. when they got there, they had to immediately begin setting up fencing, and aside from short sleep times, that is what they had been doing and were continuing to do.
so i have had a lot of time to experience many thoughts and emotions. to experience my response to those thoughts and emotions. over and over. pretty much non stop. and i thought about what i'd written the other day, about Chod, a buddhist practice that by "targeting our most sensitive delusions, cuts through attachments and ego-clinging without any hope or fear". and how that is an intense statement, without any hope or fear………..and i had ample opportunity to apply these words to this situation. there was great hope, desperate hope and great fear.
and some time, in the middle of last night, i woke and thought about if this might be an "end of the world" situation. like, the worst of the worst imaginable. what if the goats died. what if the people died. the people being my daughter, my son, my granddaughter, my children's father…the end of the world. so what if this were true. and on the other hand, what if somehow they managed and were safely there. what if after a few days it would all become a memory, a story to be told on into the years. and how did my hope, my fear fit as an overlay on their experience? it Could have gone either way, it was 50/50. and which ever way it went was the way it was, would be. all the hope and all the fear would not change anything.
so….what did i have, then. and i realized that either way, what would be left would be CONTINUING
just continuing. so i have learned a lot. and while i was waiting today, i read the Black Mountain manifesto on Rima's blog. and believe it to be true. and in a vulnerable state, i thought again, What If? what to do? how to be? and the answer again is to continue. For the Wellbeing of the Whole, as best we can understand that.
windthread 
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