THE KITTEN AND THE KEYBOARD

 

 

The windows are full of yellow light today, a carpet of yellow leaves on the ground glowing in direct sunlight with shadows of tree limbs running through it like cracks. The reflection of sunlight on the yellow leaves in the trees as well as on the ground gives the impression the air itself has a golden glow. Inside, a young cat curled up in the crook of my right arm on the desktop, kitten energy full of play having a time-out, purrs when I touch her, wants to nap in the hammock of my arms. She understands that I need hands free, yet she needs to be held too. I hold her in my arms a few minutes and use the keyboard a few minutes. As kitten learns my ways and I learn her ways, we will find our flow before long. She is already good after three weeks with staying off the keyboard. It's become almost automatic for her. I've attempted to steer her away from it, the way a mother cat would, without scolding or acting impatient. My feeling is that if I were to be forceful with her and threatening, I would unconsciously turn the keyboard into a taboo, irresistible to cat for life. I'm seeing that gently steering her away from the keyboard has made walking on it largely uninteresting to her. Sometimes she breaks out of her self-control and steps on it. I gently steer her away and she goes without resistance.

 

 

 

All my pets, one at a time over the last forty years, have taught me that gentleness is their nature already. They are made ungentle by rough people. I used to know somebody with a dog that was a cross between an Australian blue heeler and a border collie. It was a vicious, sneakin-bitin dog, a difficult dog to get past from car door to house door, even when it knew me. Somebody else I knew had a heeler crossed with a border collie. It, too, was a sneakin-bitin dog, but it didn't threaten me after it came to know me. There was no getting to know the first one. Both dogs were brought up ungently, made mean by men who want a mean dog. I raised my dogs with gentleness and their natural gentle spirit came through. I believe we  humans are at heart gentle, though growing up and living in so-called civilization makes us tough in order to survive. Men who have been in wars, especially, tend to be rough on their kids in the belief that treating kids like shit makes them tough. In my own experience, I've seen that hitting kids only makes them angry, an anger they hold all their lives believing it's natural.

 

 

 

An image popped into my mind's eye of a guy I saw in the grocery store several years ago, a tormented soul in a body bent over for protection, anger seething from his whole body visibly, back arched, head down. My mind said, don't go down that aisle right now. He looked like somebody extremely volatile and maybe just out of prison or another dehumanizing institution. I kicked myself mentally for avoiding somebody who is not going to attack me in a grocery store for walking by, turned the buggy down the aisle and when I passed him, he looked up at me with eyes gentle as a three year old's. My heart broke into tears. I felt an impulse to give him a big hug and say, It's all right, you're safe. He would have freaked out and I would have too. Like my aunt said, if you don't want it started, don't start it. I spoke in passing, hey, a small way of saying, You're ok, you'll make it. Tears come to my eyes now remembering this guy who was a human version of a dog with it's tail between its legs, humped over from fear. It was a moment I thought, there but for the grace of God go I, not saying it to remind self, rather because it's full meaning came through first and suggested it. First thought at the time would have been something like, it could so easily have been me.

 

 

 

Perhaps he was unable to find such indifference in himself as I had access to in myself. From age ten I regarded self a foster child. Indifference kicked in, became an invisible protective shield like Colgate toothpaste on Happy Tooth. Eventually, I came to realize that my own original nature was gentle and wanted to be treated gently. Every time in my adult life I've brought home a young dog or cat, it seemed obvious they were gentle in spirit. Kittens playing look like they are shredding each other and neither one gets a scratch. They learn playing how hard you can bite the other without it hurting. When it hurts, the other squeals and the one biting lets go. Kitten will never bite that hard again, until she means it. I've been training Sophia with a yelp when she climbs my legs. A couple weeks ago she had so little weight her claws poking through the sweatpants material merely tickled my legs. She has grown so much her claws hurt now. I yelp and she lets go. Most of the time. She has recently gone from climbing to my knee to jumping to my knee in a flying squirrel leap. The claws take hold when she lands, the material stretched  tight and thin, it makes me about stand straight up. I don't have to scold. Only saying it hurts is all she needs to know. Hurting is not her intent. If I were to be hurting her by pushing her off the desk, being abruptly irrational, she'd get me back. Cats are instant karma. They give back how we treat them, even plot revenge. I treat Sophia with love and grace and receive the same in turn.     

 

 

photos by tj worthington

 

 

 

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PAIN IN MY HEART

caterpillar among the wildwood flowers

 

Up this morning, took sunflower seeds to toss on the gravel where I feed the crows, the doves, the squirrels, whoever finds it, and a handful of carrots for the donkeys. They were up the meadow out of sight. I brayed to Jack. He brayed and came running. His front hooves slid about four feet in the thin mud at the gate, wet from yesterday's rain. It's fun for him to slide in the mud. His eyes sparkled. Jack has a playful spirit that finds play easily. I was especially happy to see them this morning, talked to them while they munched, and rubbed the underside of their necks. They like to be rubbed at the point on their backs where the lines of dark chocolate cross. When I want to touch them, this is the place I start. It calms them down immediately. I make it a point to rub Jack's neck after rubbing Jenny. They pay attention. Jenny goes first for carrots, for grain, for everything. Jenny shows her jealousy up front. Jack holds his jealousy such that I don't see it, but he gets back at Jenny. Feeling jealousy puts him in a bad mood. Jack automatically defers to Jenny, his babydoll, and Jenny's jealousy requires being first. I've learned their individual natures by now. As long as Jenny goes first, we have peace  in the meadow. No way could I ever change a donkey's nature it was born with. Jack adjusts his behavior to Jenny's jealousy about being first, and I do too, so we flow together smoothly. As we humor her jealousy, she needs to express it less and less, which eases her mind.

 

queen anne's lace

 

The morning I realized Caterpillar was gone, Jenny and Jack felt my sorrow. They were especially still. I saw it in their eyes. They could feel what I was feeling. I remembered the time Jenny lost her first baby, me crying with her, my arms around her neck hugging her while we both cried. I held Jack around the neck and cried with him awhile. Both were in deep mourning. I felt like I bonded with them on a deeper level that day sharing their sorrow. This time, they shared my sorrow. They knew Caterpillar lived with me in the human barn. A couple times I held her to let them smell her, one at a time, feel her fur with their lips. She pushed her face down into the crook of my arm. Their heads were bigger than her whole body. They were ok from a distance, but up close, they were frightening. I wanted them to be familiar with her scent, to understand Caterpillar belongs here so they would not hurt her if she were to walk into the meadow. I know she has. I found her once curled up in a bed of grass with wildflowers all around, fairly deep into the donkey meadow when they were in the meadow across the creek.

caterpillar walks among the wildwood flowers

 

Back to the house, I brewed some Sumatran coffee, called Carole and we talked an hour or more. All morning, Caterpillar dwelled in the front of my mind. I read some in a Cormac McCarthy novel and put on a documentary from yesterday's mail, Geronimo and the Apache Resistance. It took my mind off Caterpillar right away. I felt the people, felt their anguish, their determination. I felt like I was there with them. I wrung and twisted, gnawed a thumbnail, tied up in knots on the inside, feeling what those people went through. I'd read enough about them that all the generals engaged in their genocide were familiar names and faces. I felt a deep love for the Apache people. Throughout my childhood, I read about Indians, saw movies, tv shows, identified with the Indians. I knew early that white man spoke with forked tongue. There was no white man in my world that didn't lie to me, including the preacher. All of it was fake Indians, but I knew it. I thought it ridiculous the directors and producers used white guys with dark tan makeup and wigs. However, I lived in the white world and knew white attitudes toward the Indians I did not share, would never expect white film makers to make a film using real Indians. A few were made eventually, but nobody cared.

black eyed Susans and queen anne's lace

I was moderately devastated by the end of the documentary,  though knew their fate already from reading. I came out of it thinking about how devastating love can be sometimes, Geronimo radicalized by losing his wife, kids and mother to white soldiers. I was shaken to the core with the story of the Apache resistance. I have chosen for self the path of love. My unconditional love for Caterpillar made losing her a wound to the heart. My purpose has been to allow heart to open, to go about everyday life with an open heart. I was still reeling from losing my baby when I took in this documentary of the genocide of people I appreciate so powerfully it felt like I surely had some past lives among the Apache. I recall in childhood, a long time before I heard about reincarnation, a day when I became concerned about my white skin. I realized my people would not recognize me in this lifetime. I was born among the enemy. What could I do? Nothing but live out my life as one of the people that killed my people, isolated from my true people an entire lifetime for being born white. It is said, be careful what you hate; we become what we hate. I must have hated whiteman. I'd guess the white population has a large number of Indians trapped in white bodies for hate.

black-eyed susans and queen anne's lace

It is so very difficult to attempt to live in this world with an open heart. To do so, I allow vulnerabilities. I have come to believe shutting down vulnerabilities hardens and closes down a heart. I lived so much of the early life with a closed heart, it took awhile to allow it slowly to open, slowly from fear. I know how it hurts to lose a loved one, cat, dog, human. Caterpillar and I grew closer and closer in the recent months and years. I thought about it sometimes, when it is her time to go, I'm really going to feel some pain. That's ok. Eighteen years of unconditional love both ways is worth a few days of intense sorrow, weeks and months of grief. I've come to see grief is the last gift I can give my friend. I go ahead and feel it, unafraid, knowing from experience I come out of a period of grief with an inner clarity I did not have before. My mind was occupied today with how painful love can be sometimes. It's not all about Cupid shooting candy arrows. I've learned that real love is about engagement, not talking like an undertaker. I've even wondered if I over-loved Caterpillar, literally loved her to death. No. There is never too much love.

caterpillar

photos by tj worthington

 

 

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CATERPILLAR REAL GONE CAT

last photo of caterpillar

 

Yesterday at about this time, late afternoon, I realized my baby Caterpillar is gone and not coming back. She'd been gone two days and nights plus a third day. I had gone out earlier, walking to every place I've found to be her favorite places, and every place in between. I knew she would not leave sight of the house, but a 360 degree circle around the house has thousands of hiding places a cat could snuggle into and never be found. I had no confidence in the search, but as two days and nights went by, not dropping in for water or catfood, confidence grew that I'd never see her again. Last time I saw her go out the door she was healthy and alert in her wild mind. The last two nights I took her to bed, she was up within a half hour and out the door to stay the night outside, return at noon to refuel, then back out the door. This was when wild mind overtook her. She came into the house to fill her tank and went back out. She had a determination in those two days that became her focus. I've always allowed Caterpillar her own mind. I don't check on her to find her when she's gone several hours. She's at home here, this is her world, the only place she's ever known. 

 

caterpillar

 

Around 4am of the second night that she left the bed to go outside, I saw her in a dream standing on the floor beside the bed where she stands to wake me when I'm sleeping. She said mao to me one time. I did not wake because I knew it was a dream. It fell into the pattern of my dreams the last few years of a place I know well with something missing or something there that is not there, only one thing. Like in a dream I walked into the house and catfood bowls were missing, everything else the same. In the dream  of her speaking to me, I saw her and heard her, taking it for a dream because it fell into the pattern of my dreams lately.  And she did not say mao a second and third time, which she always did. The evening of the first day she was gone all day and came back before dark, I recall a moment of holding her up, eye to eye. We looked into each other's eyes for a long time. I saw something in her eyes that told me she would not be with me much longer, and she knew it. I wrote it off as my sentimental imagination and fixed on the beauty in her eyes, that they did not look like old eyes, yet had a weariness behind them. I'm glad, now, for the moment. When I think of her, which is all the time, I see her eyes full of her love for me. She saw my love for her in my eyes.

 

caterpillar

 

Several times a day the last two days, I expect to see her walking in the door, then remember she will never walk through the door again. My feeling now is when she spoke to me in the dream, it was her last moment. I suspect a coyote found her, maybe a big owl, but the owl would have had to be eagle size to pick her up. If neighbor's dog had killed her, I would have found the remains. Strangely, I feel satisfied if a coyote caught her.  Like burning the body, there was no grave left for her soul to cling to once it's left the body. It feels like the natural order for the four-leggeds. I understand that once an animal goes into shock, like when a coyote grabs one, immediately it goes unconscious like the soul left the body in that moment. I suspect this is the moment Caterpillar called to me. There is no pain and it's fast. Therein lies my comfort. She saved me the sorrow of taking her to the vet and holding her while she's given a shot and goes out instantly. I did not want to go through that, but would have been happy to, to keep her to the very last possibility of her natural life.

 

caterpillar

 

She seemed like she was on a mission the last two days. She walked into the house with purpose, refueling, and walked back out. When she stopped to appeal to me while I was writing, her plaintive mao tore me up. It sounded desperate, needing my attention, a depth of desperation that gave me concern, needing so much to be held. I'd hold her awhile, she'd snuggle in and purr while I sang her song to her and told her I love her. Her need was such that it made me suspicious something was up. Looking back, I can see several signals that pointed to Caterpillar knowing it was her time. She had taken to lying out in the open near the road. I wondered why she did not hide like usual to take a nap outdoors. Today, my feeling is that she was offering herself to be found by a predator. She knows the predators around here. She used to be one of them. I had feelings I called sentiment that she was ready to go on and had chosen her way. Her attitude, what I called her wild mind, appeared to have taken over her mind. She never came down out of it but for the moments I held her. I'd put her down and out the door she went. I miss my baby so much today, I'm in a constant state of sorrow. At the same time I feel so much love for Caterpillar in my heart it wells up and trickles tears down my face. I weep and sob a little bit and pull myself together. My love for Caterpillar keeps my heart billowing in love and sorrow as one. All that's left is gratitude for eighteen years with a beautiful soul I fell in love with the day she was born.

 

these are my last 5 photos of caterpillar, 8/31/15

 

 

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A RHYTHM OF PEACE

I've fallen into a continuum of being awake, being asleep, days go by and from time to time I need to know the date. This is what calendars are for. I keep one with big numbers on the kitchen wall to consult when I suddenly need to know the date. It becomes a nuisance to look up the date and a bigger nuisance to keep up with it. It seems like there comes a place where alternating states of awake and asleep make a rhythm of their own and it's all one nameless stretch. Awake and asleep become like waves on the beach; water advances, water recedes. I like this rhythm. It feels like the rhythm of the old-time days, working on the farm, working by seasons and daylight. The calendar has its place on the wall, a document that keeps us in sync with everyone around us by way of agreed upon time. The Atomic Clock is civilization's official time keeper, gives us divisions of the earth's rotation so we can coordinate time in a way that is agreed upon all the way around the globe. The clock is the closest device we have to being able to see time, as far as I know. Like gravity, time is invisible. Gravity is measured in weights. Time is the spinning of the earth spiraling around the sun, the moon going around the earth, and the bigger transit of the sun spiraling in the Milky Way galaxy. Hence, astrology, given that cosmic arrangements of planets are in a continuum of change, never two nanoseconds the same. As in our lives where change is the nature of the continuum. Like cigarette smoke rising into spirals, the spirals in turbulence, the spirals in water flow. Another vision of as-above-so-below. 

My friend Carole and I have come into a place of living by light, dark, weather. When things are going my way and I have no appointments in town, I like the rhythm of awake awhile, asleep awhile. I sleep when I feel like it, night or day, am awake night or day as I feel like it. It's not very ambitious living. It separates me from the rhythms in everybody I know. Add to the list television that separates me conceptually from everyone around me, given exceptions. I can go with the core of the religion around me, but not the trappings. That I have to swear to believe immaculate conception, I cannot. I don't care. I don't care if Jesus was born biologically or mythologically. His life is more important to me than his death. His message of love is the only reason to know about Jesus. That he walked on both land and water is cool, but love was his only reason for being. The trappings make the followers into a herd of sheep. Love frees one from the herd and sets the seeker on one's own pilgrimage, whatever form or path it takes. Each one is unique, leaving no room for s'posed-to, and no being held back by a committee. I see a headline about Joe the Plumber saying Obama girls are promoting gangs. It doesn't annoy me anymore that ignorance is front and center. When I look at the progression of American public education and the progression of American politics, I'm surprised by no extreme degree of ignorance. Our politicians are corporate stooges. They are not put in place for any reason but their ignorance, they truly do not know right from wrong, people easily told what to do and eager to go along, fame and money, glitz and glamour, face-lifts, looking like a mummy in old age. 

My purpose leaving the world of commerce and committing to rural life on a remote road in the mountains was to find a way to live "in the world, not of it." First thing, I had to define for self what is meant by "the world," which took some years. Finding the place to draw the line between world and not-world gets subtle and at once obvious. I gradually came to The World is the world created by human mind, the not-natural world. This includes everything from architecture to music to religion to spiritualism to art to getting up in the morning. Everything. Duality. Ok, this is the world I want to live in, but not of. I can see I'm in it, the playing field. Then I had to figure out what OF meant. Attachment comes to me first. Ego. It's ego that wants to attach to things, ideas, agendas, purposes, and again, everything. I took it that letting go of attachments is a way to not be of the world. I didn't know why it was important to me, but that it is universally said to be the way, the path. I had no idea of why, except figuring there must be something to it. By now after years of mentating on the issue and allowing the super-conscious to search on its own while mind is distracted by the world of commerce, getting basic bills paid, I feel like I have some insight, a little bit. It's about inner peace. Attachments of my past have fallen away due to waning interest. Turns out attachments worry the mind. 

I used to want stuff for myself, paintings on the walls, books, music. Now I have more than I want. I want to get rid of stuff, wants of the past. Like I want to keep a copy of Pinocchio in the house, knowing I'll never read it again, but love it so much as a story I like seeing the spine of the book on the shelf. It's a reminder of the story within. I like seeing the spines of books on shelves, titles I've read and remember in a nanosecond my feeling about the content. I see the poetry of WB Yeats and feel a soft glow in the heart. Three months in London in 1972, I carried a paperback of Yeats poetry in a pocket, reading in it every day on "the tube." In that way, a book is, indeed, a friend. I want now to keep the donkeys comfortable, Caterpillar comfortable, and want the well-being of my friends, want them all to have a good life on their own terms. I have to pull back from wanting a reasonable government. That hope is over. Learning from the nature of the world to step back and let it go by, the world of treachery and me-first, I let the people that want to partake of it have at it. I see news about police brutality, killings and mayhem in general, and look out the windows at the green world, the birds, the squirrels, the donkeys, the meadow, thinking, this is peace. I see the occasional car go by on Waterfall Road out the windows, the road of peace. I tell myself none of the nonsense in DC applies here, nor do the Koch brothers, except in destructive ways that apply to the future. As long as they're not bombing Waterfall Road and a SWAT team isn't breaking down my door with guns blazing, the wrong address for a meth lab, I live in peace. Waterfall Road can exist in a condition of peace because the road, like the country Costa Rica, has nothing of value to corporate mind.  

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DONKEYS LOVE TOO

jenny and jack

Jack and Jenny are in orbit right now. She's gone into heat. The last three days they have been honeymooning. About any time I look out the window Jack is standing almost straight up on his back feet behind Jenny, his front legs hugging her sides, his chin on her back, him looking like a happy donkey. Jenny stands still with her head down and her mouth opening and closing automatically like she's talking to herself. This is Jenny in love. Last year, Jenny was not in love. This year she is with her man she sleeps side-by-side with nightly and grazes with all day. They have learned each other's temperaments and flow very well together after a year, in love the second half of the year. It's funny when Jack jumps onto Jenny's back and she starts walking, Jack attached to her and walking fast on his back feet, hanging on with his front legs. Early this morning I went out to take them carrots and saw Jack on Jenny's back. He saw me with carrots and started braying with his chin on Jenny's back. Hanging on and braying, donkey multi-tasking. Later, back in the house, I saw out the window Jack on Jenny's back again and Jenny liking her part in this time of making love several times a day. After Jack hopped down, Jenny went to their nearby pile of droppings. Her feet either side of the pile, she peed a trickle and dropped some donkey biscuits. Done, she walked away. Jack had been standing nearby watching. He walked to the pile, sniffed Jenny's scent on the fresh droppings. He positioned himself astraddle the pile, contributed his biscuits, walked to the fresh hay nearby and grazed. I put their hay down separately due to their jealousy over food. Jenny grazed on her hay for awhile and Jack grazed on his. Time out for breakfast. 

jenny and jack

I'd have been interested in the sex part when I was ten, though by now, the sex part is about the same as eating hay or rolling on a dust circle. The part of it that I like seeing in this time of the life is my two donkey friends, friends I brought together, lovers, donkeys who have taught me appreciation for donkey, whose lives I know as close friends. The donkeys I love equally, happy that my donkey pets have fallen in love and live together as lovers who would rather be with each other than with anyone else. I think they are both four years old. It makes me feel good to see Jack and Jenny so close, knowing they are mated for life, will love each other all their lives. I love that. I love that I have given a couple of donkeys a chance to live their lives in love. Even when I put Jenny in the meadow with Jack I never gave a thought to donkeys falling in love. Growing up in the Western world under Christendom, I was taught early that animals had no feelings. It didn't matter what you did to a dumb animal. They didn't feel anything. Definitely did not have a soul, the life force itself. None of that computed to me, but I accepted it. It was the world everywhere around me; home, school, church, neighbors, relatives. It was the unanimous belief in my world, like white superiority. It appeared to me that dogs and cats had eyes, ears, mouth, nose, etc. They breathed and they had heartbeats. Just like us. They had head, spine, ribs, legs. They consumed in front and evacuated behind, just like us. I couldn't talk to anyone about my observation I took for obvious. But it wasn't obvious to anyone else. I continued to believe that old way about animals until I came to the mountains. My first dog here taught me animals can love, they can think, they can communicate without spoken words, Sadie was her name. She was three years old when she came to me. We were bonded after two weeks together. 

jenny

She taught me a great deal about dog nature. I learned dogs have hearts full of love in them. All they need for it to surface is to be loved. Then their love surfaces. It was the same with the donkeys. I love them and they love me. I've raised all my pets since living here with love, five cats and five dogs. Raising them with a loving heart, I never trained any of them. I would not know how to train a dog or a cat. I've looked at training books and would not do any of the training methods on a dog of mine. I love them too much to make robots of them. I want them to live by their own dog nature to fulfillment, not be objects for me to command. My next dog, Aster, won my heart the day I threw a stick for her and she just stood and looked at me like to say, What was that about? I never did it again, glad to see she wasn't interested in chasing a ball or a stick. They were always at my side, rode on the seat beside me in the pickup. They flowed with me, attentive to pleasing the one they love. And I was attentive to please them. Never scolded any of them. I scolded Sadie some at first, because I didn't know better. Once I caught on, she never heard me scold again. Caterpillar is the last of three cats that were born here. I've never scolded any of them in their whole lives. We lived together in harmony, attentive both ways to the well-being of the other. Every one of their graves represents a very sorrowful heart when whichever one left the body. Sadie left the body thirty years ago and I'm still like the song about Mr Bojangles, His dog up and died. After twenty years he still grieves. I continue to love every one of them so much it still hurts that they're gone. 

jack

Love is wonderful, but oh it hurts when a loved one leaves the body. I've known several people who won't have any more pets after one died. The pain was too hard to bear and they don't want to go through it again. I tend to think of the years of joy they gave me, the happiness they gave me, the love they gave me, day after day. Sometimes the pain is rugged. It has never stopped me from wanting another for a home companion. Caterpillar is so jealous, I can't bring another cat or dog into the house. The donkeys will outlive me by several years. A day will come that the Ice Cream man will bring them carrots and sweet grain no more. Somebody else will take care of them. I'm remembering a French film I started to watch, Balthazar, the story of a donkey's life in rural France. The donkey was bought and sold and used as a beast of burden, regarded as though it had no soul. I couldn't watch after maybe ten minutes into it, could not stand to see a donkey mistreated and regarded unconscious. I'm grateful that I've had a chance to know donkeys, to learn donkey ways, to know two donkeys as individuals, as friends, as people I care about. Knowing donkeys is one of the treasures of my life. I'm grateful I came to know dogs and cats, too, as individual beings, sentient life forms. I won't argue with anybody over whether or not a four-legged has a soul. Somebody who will not allow the essence of life in a dog is somebody I'm wary of. It tells me they would learn a whole lot more having a dog to live with than listening to a preacher who doesn't know, just studied how to sound like he knows what he's talking about. I'm glad I had no preconceptions about donkeys when I met Jack. I didn't even know donkeys were bad to kick until somebody warned me. Jack and Jenny don't kick each other anymore and don't kick me. I'm grateful that in this lifetime I have learned that the four-leggeds love too. Now I know when I see a documentary about wild animals in Africa, the lion and lioness are in love, and they love their kittens like we love our babies. 

jenny and jack

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LOVE IN THE DONKEY MEADOW

jack and his shadow munch hay

The last three days have been active all day long every day. Preparing the donkey den for winter has been the number one priority in the few days before the temperature dropped last night. I was glad to see this morning they came out of the donkey den for carrot time. Carrots done, I gave them hay in separate places and went inside to have a look at the hay for imprints of where they slept. They slept side by side and it looks like they had comfortable space. The wind was blowing a little. I also stepped inside to to see how the air felt. The air was still. It felt cozy. I was most curious to see if I might need to move the wall of hay bales out a few feet to give the donkeys more room. They appear to handle the space comfortably. The opening is smaller now, giving them possibly a sense of security with only one way in and it a narrow passage, plenty wide enough for a donkey. Before, the whole side was open. This appears to be a solution for now to help them through the cold winter. Talking with my friend Marsha today, who knows equines, she emphasized that donkeys are hardy. Horses are hardy and donkeys even more. She told me not to be concerned about them handling the cold. They can take it, and it's good for their health. It's still cold for them. This morning I saw Jack when he emerged from the den. His tail was tucked between his legs like a scared dog. The temperature was below twenty. I put a bale of last year's hay on the dirt floor to give them insulation. They prefer the dry dirt, but I put the hay in anyway. Jack left a pile of droppings in a corner. I took it for marking his new space, or maybe he would have needed to step over Jenny to go outside, which would not be tolerated. It's the same as the old space, just more comfortable in winter. It smells like home now. I happen to be somebody who loves barnyard scents. I'm glad my place smells like donkey. I drive home from somewhere, get out of the car, smell the air of home and it feels so good to be back. 

happy donkeys

My heart has been welling up with love for Jenny and Jack since Jenny's misfortune with the baby. I felt we were close before, but we went into a new zone. Before, it was like them and me. Now it is we three. I am now included in their life together. I'm not just a human that handles and feeds them. I really am their friend now. I felt a bonding with them, individually, in the time of our shared sorrow. I felt their sorrow with them, grieved with them. They know now that I feel their feelings and they feel mine. Though it is a sad time, it is an equally happy time, sorrow and joy together, yin-yang, balance. I feel we have a better balance now. Just because we are closer, doesn't mean they won't swing their rear ends to me like they do each other. It means I understand them a little bit better and they understand me better. I believe love is shown by action so all my movements around them are loving in that I don't threaten them or hit them. I talk to them and tell them I love them. I also show them. I feel a love coming from them. I've learned the four-leggeds are apprehensive of our arms and hands. They're unpredictable. At times I've taken friends into the meadow to visit the donkeys, I'll ask them not to make fast arm movements. Move an arm too fast and they jump. I keep my arms down and make slow movements with them. They learned when I roll bales of hay down the hill they are in no danger. They ran from the first ones. By the time I rolled the last bales down the hill, Jack became playful with them and Jenny curious. Sometimes in the meadow with them, when I'm spending time with them, talking to them, rubbing their backs and necks, Jack will push me with his side. It is something he gets a kick out of doing. I can see it in his face that he's doing something fun. He will push me until I take a step or two to get balance. He laughs like it's a donkey joke. 

one-eyed jack

I want them comfortable with me and see by now that they are. Giving Jenny carrot in the morning, I break a long carrot into three sections. The big end is sometimes too big for them to chew easily, as all their teeth are in front. I will hold one in the open palm of my hand and Jenny will chew it sideways. I give them a handful of grain sometimes, too, just for the fun of seeing them eat from my hand and I never feel their teeth. They pick everything up with their lips. Today and yesterday my heart has been overflowing with love for Jenny and Jack. It's love that makes our communication flow so freely. Love is also the telegraph wire for telepathy. I don't know that I am aware of anything I'm receiving from them, but I do know they pick up telepathically from me. There's no other way they could understand everything I say to them. Words we speak are pictures in our minds. I feel like the donkeys read the pictures of the words I speak to them. This makes me curious about the Chinese language where the words are pictures. I wonder about the language in relation to telepathy. I would not make a conjecture that something is better about their language than ours or ours better than theirs. A look at Western history and Chinese history, it is all human madness, men killing and conquering, women raising kids and mourning. It looks like a groove all of humanity is locked into. The madness is expression of hate, perpetually burning itself off in wars, but never being cured. Perhaps this time of major wars and ongoing wars is a time of burning off the hate to such an obnoxious extreme that maybe collective humanity will learn something important. Never has. Who can say now can be any different? 

punk jenifer 

The core of all the religions is love, yet religions are used to fire up hate, us against them, we're right, they're wrong, no two ways about it. My love connection with Jenny and Jack is far more important to the soul than any religious observance I can think of. There is probably not a preacher in Christendom who would go along with that. For one thing, it's out of their control. Making it all the better. Love was nonexistent in the first half of my life. I did the love-making, but once it was made it was done. It got me into some crazy situations and some crazy parts of town. There came a time I learned I cannot trust myself. That's when love opened up to me. I came to the mountains for attempted solitude to give my true self opportunity to come forward from the super-conscious to everyday life. It is through love I am able to know Jack and Jenny. I show my love by being a human they can trust who wants to understand them. They fell in with a human who finds all life forms fascinating. The primitive people, primitive meaning first, not stupid, called the various life forms people. They are people. What we call people in ourselves, they are too. Jack is a unique individual among donkeys, as is Jenny. I know them individually, know their personalities, their peculiarities, their love for each other. It makes me feel fulfilled to provide a home for donkeys who are in love. They are mated for life. It's the love between them that keeps them together day and night. I love giving them a place to live where they can live their donkey nature freely without expectation from a human. I feel like the meadow I now call the Donkey Meadow has become a love meadow. I feel tremendous love when I'm in the meadow with them. It almost has a dream-like quality walking through the meadow.   

jenny ears up

*

LOVE IS ALL THERE IS

barnett newman

I want to write all night. I also want to be able to function at least by noon. I want to write to you so bad it makes me want to stay up. The clock has just passed Cinderella's curfew. That's no concern to me. I'm not waiting for a pumpkin on wheels to save me from myself. Not my story. In the time when I was young, inexperienced, stupid and lonely, I hoped to fall in love with somebody who would save me from myself. It never happened. Fell in love a few times against all signs that said: don't go there. Only found turmoil of the mind and disappointment. My pumpkin on wheels turned up empty; it wasn't really love, but fantasy. I didn't know anything about love. Finally, in 1975, Meher Baba tapped me on the shoulder to get my attention and taught me over several years how to save myself from my ignorant mind and befuddled heart. He set me in the direction of finding I don't need somebody to save me from myself. If I can't find how to get in line with myself on my own, assigning the task to someone else isn't going to work. It's only real when I can find by my own searching why I think I need saved from myself. I can't trust myself? Experience tells me my mind can make up a lot of ridiculous fantasies. It's only real when I can find in self how to transcend my ignorant self by tuning in to intuition, allowing higher self to have a say in my decisions, become acquainted with higher self that seemed dormant before I saw to rational and emotional satisfaction that God Is. That was all I needed to know. I'd always been told, but never had any conscious experience of God that I was aware of. The God I grew up with was Fear. It took Meher Baba to point to the words of Jesus, God is love. By way of intuition, I already knew it, though it had been buried under a mountain of dogma, the diamond in a coal mine. 

barnett newman

I could not have found it on my own. In my years of searching for whether or not there is God, I could not see past religion. Religions convinced me a real God would not allow religionists to do to fellow human beings and the living creatures of the earth as has been done continually in multiples, like the German Christians embracing fascism in the 1930s, like American Christians, today, embracing fascism. I've never been able to reconcile God supporting fascism. It doesn't compute. Fascism is about hate. God is not in it. I could not see, before, that God is not in religion. Religion is of the human mind, not God. I missed it before Meher Baba convinced me God Is, and God Is Love. Simple as that. The preachers start qualifying: Yes, except for...Yes, except for.... God hates the sin and loves the sinner. The only thing I can say to that is bullshit. Love does not hate. The so-called sin gets balanced by karma. It takes care of itself. God doesn't need to be concerned with it. Karma automatically keeps us in balance. As for God as judge, love does not judge. I see no reason to explain. It's simple language. Love is not about controlling. Love is about allowing. There is no except. Love allows us to find our own way, make our own mistakes, learn from our own experience. Control does not allow the individual to learn from ones own experience. It's called doubting. Doubting is a sin. God doesn't approve. Really? Love can't stand up to questioning? I found God by doubting the mountain of bullshit that had accumulated in the barn of my mind. I was led to believe the same nonsense the television hypocrite evangelists dress up God in to fit the confines of their own limited intelligence and knowledge. Like old man Tom Pruitt said of them, they're just makin a racket.

barnett newman

who's afraid of red, yellow and blue?

In my own personal vision, if it's not about love, it's not about God. What's so frightening about love? I think of abstract expressionist, Barnett Newman's painting title, Who's Afraid of Red, Yellow and Blue? Alas, it was slashed in the modern art museum, the Stedelijk, in Amsterdam, by an art reactionary. He was evidently the one afraid of red, yellow and blue. Destroyed it. I'm grateful I had a chance to see it when it was living, about three years after it was painted. My response to it was to stand back and look at it for a long time. I walked up to it on the left side and walked the length of it, almost but not touching it, feeling it, walking the length of red from the vertical blue line, feeling the expanse of red all the way to the vertical yellow line. I wasn't aware that I felt anything special, though there is a memory of experience sensing Barnett Newman, himself, in his two-dimensional environment up close to it applying the paint. His presence was the only notable feeling, presence in so intangible a feeling as to make me wonder if I felt it or thought it. I take it that feeling it made me think it. My feeling about the slasher is he could not handle such an expanse of one color being called art. It was a gesture of control. Perhaps the painting became for him a symbol of modern art being out of control; modernism, itself, was destroying art. Perhaps he felt vulnerable in the face of Newman's effrontery. Perhaps, too, among religionists the word love has a great deal of vulnerability associated with it. We can't let down our guard in this world. The devil's watching you in his cross-hairs. You needta be afraid, braced against, just braced against. I recall William Blake, Damn braces, bless relaxes. He, too, had issues with preachers who skirted around the subject of love, a word too charged with carnal associations for comfort in the control department. Control does not allow. Control is about zero tolerance. Jesus or Hell. 

barnett newman

According to my mother's preacher, I'm not afraid enough of Satan. I couldn't say anything to that one. I knew there was nothing I could do or say. I don't care if they think I should be very afraid and live in fear because God wants me to be afraid. In my way of seeing, God wants for me that I not worry, thus be happy. I can't talk with anybody who demands I believe and think their way. This mind is what spit me out of Kansas as far as land allowed. They can have their Satan all they want. I confess to concern they want Satan a little too much for my comfort. Makes me uncomfortable talking with my mother, who always brings up Satan and dwells on Satan, talking to me like a preacher wanting to convince me, for my own good, to be like them. Been there, done that, not going back. Didn't buy the tshirt. When she told me I'm not afraid enough of Satan, stressing it with, "You better think about it," all I could say was, "I'll leave Satan to you." I feel sad for her. I'm not looking to control her, so I allow her to adore a preacher who tells her to be afraid. She dragged me through that mud all the way through my school years. I'm free of it. She wants it, she's got it. I don't want it. It's why I'm a thousand miles away. On the telephone, when it gets crazy, I can say, "We're not going there." She's learned that I think independently from Fundamentalist dogma, and she will never let it rest. She bred one as relentless in not hearing it as she is relentless in needing to say it; it's her duty to keep in the front of my mind that I am wrong and headed for an eternity of hell fire. Lord have mercy, how did I get here? Remembering the coal mine of fundamentalist hymn book theology I ran for my life from. Literally ran for my life. We talk on the phone across a divide much greater than a thousand land miles. Love is never an issue, except, the great except, at the end, the duty I-love-you. We have very different meanings for love. Hers is to control; mine is to allow. I learned young never to browbeat anybody for any reason. It's just ego talking. I reject control; she rejects allowing. We're stuck. I feel sad for her that she alienated her first born, but all I know to do is allow it to be what it is. An old hillbilly saying comes to mind, it is what it is.

barnett newman

*

TRAINING DONKEYS WITH LOVE

jenny

I had just picked up Henry Miller, read half a page, heard a Japanese car horn go beep, saw Justin's little Toyota slow down to stop. I had parts from yesterday's art project strewn about. Picked up the palm sander and its box from the chair just inside the door. It was all of them, Justin, Crystal, Vada and Cheyanne. It was petting zoo day. I had not seen Cheyanne in at least three weeks. First thing I noticed was her hair was longer. Vada was wearing a glowing pink raincoat and pink rain boots. The kids were lit up, big day, donkeys. I stepped inside for carrots and accompanied them to the gate. Jack was walking toward us, Jenny a ways behind him. This is their new pattern, Jack leads the way and Jenny follows, the reverse of when Jenny was Alpha. They have been a good education for me in Alpha behavior among equines. Jack is assertive now. He's da man. I like seeing the new Jack. In the time Jenny was Alpha, Jack just grazed about and let Jenny keep a lookout for any marauders crossing the fence into their territory. Jack is now the lookout, the first one to see anything moving. It felt good to see Jack walking toward us, seeing it was petting time, visitors, carrots, the human touch, perked up ears, walking in anticipation. I gave a piece of carrot to Cheyanne. Jenny's head was over the fence, her nose reaching for Cheyanne before she could get the carrot situated in her hand. Jenny's lips reached out like fingers and picked it up from Cheyanne's hand before Cheyanne had a chance to hand it to her. It scared and delighted Cheyanne. I was glad to see how gentle Jenny was being with Cheyanne. She picked the carrot out of Cheyanne's hand without touching the hand. I knew then that neither of the kids need be concerned about Jenny or Jack biting their fingers. Both donkeys were taking the carrot chunks with their lips.

 

jenny

 

Jenny was so gracious with both kids I was heartened to see her take to them with such adoration. Cheyanne put her hand on Jenny's open eye and all Jenny did was close the eye while Cheyanne's hand was there. I felt compelled to say, Don't put yer hand on her eye, but chose not to, Jenny knew how to handle it. I preferred for them to interact without me interrupting their communication. They were enjoying each other. Jenny likes Cheyanne. I was holding Vada in glowing raincoat. She wanted to hand Jenny a carrot. She was apprehensive, but I was certain by then Vada's fingers were safe. Jenny took the carrot with her lips and tickled Vada, made her giggle. She wanted to give Jenny another. Cheyanne took carrot to Jack while Vada was getting acquainted with Jenny. Jack was being just as gentle as Jenny with Cheyanne, reaching for the carrot with his lips. Donkey lips are so comic they made the kids laugh to see how they extended the upper lip like the two forefingers and lower lip like a thumb. It's comic because unexpected and it looks funny. They use the lips to take hold of things like with those two fingers and a thumb. They take hold of a tuft of grass with their lips, twist it and chop it off with their teeth. Those are efficient lips for an herbivore. I think I recollect seeing a camel's lips can extend like fingers, too. I was feeling happy about Jenny and Jack, happy to see they were so caring and gentle, dependable with the kids. I was glad to see the confidence I had in the donkeys was realistic. It tells me my reading of the donkeys is somewhat accurate. It felt like an experiential exam, a measure of how gentle the donkeys have become toward people who visit, with me. It tells me I know my donkeys, passed the beginner phase. And the donkeys were my only teachers. First hand, hands on experiential learning. It was how I learned the farm work from old man Tom, by working with him and paying attention.

 

jack

 

The kids got their next big thrill feeding jewelweed to the donkeys. They take the whole plant and munch it down the stem, bite off the roots and let them fall to the ground. It's comical to see the jewelweed plant with all it's leaves around Jenny's nose and her lips pulling them in. Cheyanne went back and forth from Jenny to Jack with jewelweed, having a great time, excited to be playing with the donkeys and them interacting with her. I was heartened to see the good vibes flowing both ways. Cheyanne was loving the donkeys and they were loving her. Vada, too. The affection was flowing both ways with her. It thrilled her out of her mind when Jenny took carrot from her hand and touched Vada's fingers with her lip. Vada was hesitant to risk her fingers again. I told her Jenny was just wanting to feel her finger, donkeys feel with their lips. I held my hand to Jenny and let her feel it all over with her lips to show Vada the lips don't hurt, and reassured her Jenny will not bite her finger when she takes a carrot. I did not want to push Vada to let Jenny feel her fingers again, just wanted to ease off the fear, show her Jenny's lips are safe. She didn't want to give Jenny a carrot again, and that was ok. At jewelweed time, Vada was ready with a new plant as soon as Jenny finished one. Crystal was picking jewelweed plants, handing them to the kids. Justin was watching, not as certain as I was of the donkeys, looking for any sign of danger or a threat. He was relaxed in his Alpha role seeing his babies were safe and happy. And I was relaxed seeing my babies were safe. This has been my ideal, that Cheyanne and Vada be safe with the donkeys.

 

jenny grazing in sunlight

 

I've learned from knowing dogs and cats how to communicate with the four-leggeds. I don't mean telepathic communication, though its included on the subconscious level, but body language, tone of voice, eyes. Eyes are very important in their communication. They read eyes. And I read their eyes. I've learned from living with several dogs and several cats along the way how to communicate with them. When I meet a new animal, like go into somebody's house and a cat comes to have a look and smell of a human never seen before, I make eye contact with the cat and say, in effect, I see you. Sometimes a cat will walk a straight line to me after we make eye contact. But all cats are different. Some shy, some not. I've trained all my dogs and cats with love. I've looked at dog training books and wouldn't do any of what they say to do to a friend of mine. I love my dogs. I don't stand over them so they'll know I am dominant, I am Alpha. I couldn't do that to one of my dogs. I could in play if we were wrestling around and being rambunctious, but not to say I'm dominant. I've loved all my cats and dogs, never trained any of them, never had to scold any of them, never had to hit them. I loved them and they loved me. They love me so much they want to make me happy. From their way of thinking, making me happy is done by pleasing me. They obey automatically. It's not even a matter of obedience. The donkeys respond to love the same. I have not trained them in any way. Don't have to. I can talk to them and they know what I'm saying. This is where our telepathy comes into play. I sometimes am tuned to be able to receive what they have to say. They don't care to talk a lot, talking isn't what they do. They pay more attention to nuances of feeling. They are way more physical than we are. They communicate physically like we do mentally with words. They pay attention to me and learn my language. I pay attention to them and learn their language.     

 

jenny's lips

 

 

*

 

HAPPY DONKEYS

jenny's wide-awake eyes

Went to town today for groceries and a forty pound bag of sunflower seeds for the birds, squirrels, ground squirrels (chipmunks), and coon that cleans up after dark the remains of the day. The coon broke the roof of the feeder throwing it off. I put a flat board on top that works even better, I can sprinkle seeds on top too. The top's only purpose is to keep the rain out. The coon throws the board off every night, gives it quite a pitch. I'm guessing it puts its head under it and throws it raising the head fast, the way Jenny nudges me with her head. At first with Jenny I took it for aggression, but she does it when she's not aggressive too. It's a fondness, a kind of play. I've been concerned for people I take to the meadow to see the donkeys that she might give one of her nudges to a kid or a small woman and knock them down. She's never done it with anyone one but me. This leads me to suspect it's a friendliness gesture for me in particular, her friend. Her eyes sparkle when she does it. One time I was out in the field, returning to the house after taking them some hay. Jack walked up behind me and pushed my back with his head. His only intent was to surprise me. Jenny pushed me in the back with her head one time, a gentle nudge. It was like she saw the chance to do it and felt like seeing if she could make me jump. I feel like my constant enchantment with the donkeys is they are powerful, powerful beasts, deadly as a bear. Without a .45 I have no defense if one turned on me with intent. No stick I could carry would be a defense against a donkey attack. When I'm down and feel like an orphan baby on a doorstep, I can bring myself back telling self, at least I am someone who can laugh with a donkey.

 

jack says howdy y'all

 

The donkeys have become important to me in this way. The only thing I knew about donkeys besides beast of burden when Jack came into the meadow was they kick. People I know who knew donkeys all warned, They'll kick you. You better carry a stick. Carrying a stick is not my style unless it's to keep my own balance. It was sound  counsel and appreciated as such. I believed from knowing dogs and cats I could get to know a donkey, person to person, well enough that I could be safe in the meadow and we'd be friends. I have this theory that the core of every heart is love. The nature of the universe and every living entity is by nature love itself. Like the theory of evolution and the theory of gravity bear out, my theory bears out. In the first weeks of getting acquainted with Jack, I asked him to teach me donkey. I told him he's the first donkey I ever met. I don't know anything about donkey personality or donkey nature. He understood. I learned so much about donkey from Jack that I thought I understood donkey fairly well when Jenny came into the meadow. First thing I learned was I don't know donkey at all. She was a very different donkey from Jack. Now that she has calmed down from her grief and the trauma of such a radical change in her life, she's quiet like Jack and not rambunctious anything like before. Several months I'd only see her with her ears back. Now I see her with ears up. It's a new Jenny. It's Jenny at home. The feeling in the movie Twelve Years a Slave was much like the feeling I got from Jenny in the first six months. She did not like having her life changed so radically against her will without recourse. I feel like her lemon turned to lemonade. She fell in love with Jack and her new human, is loved in turn. She loves her meadow. The worst day of her life took her into a life of love. She found her man and her human. I love that change in her. Every morning I am happy to see Jenny a happy donkey with her ears up and a sparkle in her big donkey eyes, relaxed, calm, munching carrot, savoring carrot flavor at home.  

 

jack walking too fast for the camera focus to keep up

 

Sometimes I think I may not be able to conduct convincing business or make money in big numbers or be popular, but I can have a bond of understanding with a donkey. Jane Goodall knew the same joy with her chimps. I believe my whole being benefits more from bonding with donkeys than knowing how to make money. Every morning carrying carrots to Jenny and Jack waiting at the fence, Jenny squealing, Jack doing a half bray that sounds like whimpering and crying, a comic expression of joy that sounds like weeping. My heart glows with love approaching them. Looking into their eyes the love flows between us. We've learned to communicate by paying attention. Attention is the channel communication flows through. Love is the seat of attention. And love begets love. Dogs and cats I've lived with have taught me love is communication itself. By way of love we can understand each other without language. Telepathy goes hand in hand with love. I approach the donkeys with love in my heart and they feel it. I love them first and they, one at a time, open their hearts to me. They feel love the same as we do. I sometimes feel anxious for Jenny to have a baby so I can see and feel the mother love in her and see their love bond like Crystal and Vada. Because I love Jenny so much I want her to have her own love experience with Jack and her own baby. It makes me happy to see Jenny and Jack in love because I love them both and love to see both my donkeys are happy donkeys.  

 

jack's eye

 

I walk out into the meadow and my friends gather round saying, Hi, walking beside me. Sometimes Jack will walk over close to me so our sides touch while we walk. At first, my own fear of the unknown took it for aggression, but it's the closeness, it's touching. They're very physical. We humans have sophisticated ourselves away from touch. It took me by surprise, their liking for bumping, standing side by side. It's how they do with each other. I came to see that their wanting to stand up against me side by side was not pushing me, but bumping making contact. They don't have hands. I can put my hands on them, but they can't touch me back. They bump me with their sides and nudge me with their noses for the touch. They are big, powerful four-leggeds. They bump each other with more force than with me. They've learned I'm a puny two-legged easy to knock over and they're careful about overpowering me. A couple days ago I was wanting to go through the gate and Jenny was standing sideways the other side of it. She saw I wanted through. I told I'd like to come through the gate. She wouldn't move. I pushed the gate attempting to push her with it. She wouldn't budge. I pushed and squeezed through the gate. She held her ground, laughing all the time at the fun trick she was pulling on me. I knew she was playing and I regarded it as such. Rather than yell at her and hit her, I laughed with her. Good trick. Once I made it through the gate, she was done with the game and walked along with me. It makes me happy that I have been able to become such friends with two donkeys, an experiment in love that gave evidence of its "power." Soft, gentle power, like water and air. I walk side by side with these powerful African herd animals that can return to their inner wildness as fast as a cat, safe, even protected by them. The only technique I go by to train them is to love them. Loved, they love in turn and train themselves. They want to please. They pay close attention to my response to their attention. And I pay attention to them the same. If I were to carry a stick into the meadow they would want to smell it and feel it with their lips to have a sense for what it was, a piece of tree limb. No fear would be associated with the stick. I've wanted them to have no fear of me and for me to have no fear of them. Love got er done.

 

jack's ass

 

 

*