Who is that lady?
Late fall, 1988
It had been almost ten years since Bob’s divorce when he finally understood that the gift he saw in so many others was within himself as well. Once truth is a part of your life, it’s impossible to ignore because truth has the remarkable ability to stand on its own without help from anyone or anything. We may turn our backs on it, but in the end, it’s still the truth.
I find that life is full of ironies, and mine was no exception. I had been with my wife since college. We were married for fifteen years when it finally ended. Money and success had become my pursuit, and the same was true for her. We had grown apart, and it happened so gradually, we didn’t even notice the change. Our commitment to success became more important than our commitment to each another, and we would never realize what might have been since we were divorced shortly afterward.
I have always believed that relationships like marriage take two to create them and two to end them. Once it’s over, we often look for support from people who place blame on one party or another, when the reason for the break-up should be shared equally between both people in the relationship. Life is change, nothing more. Some people grow closer, some apart, but we are always on the move. Nothing remains constant.
My ex-wife is a wonderful person, and I still hold a special place in my heart for her. She was, after all, my wife and friend for many years. We have not spoken in a very long time, but I still say a prayer for her every night because she will always be special to me, and I will always love the gift that she is.
As much as we think we know ourselves, there is always more to learn. We pursue truths to help us with our experiences, and yet, no matter how much we evolve, we are always prone to the human condition. Sometimes we think we’re better than we really are, and that’s one of the conditions that keep us from evolving further: the human condition!
I had to learn that truth much like Bob did. He had moved on beautifully, and I needed to do the same. I felt the need for change, and the divorce was just the impetus to make that happen. I left the financial planning industry and began to simplify my life. I started painting houses, which was a pretty drastic switch from anything I had done previously, but it was necessary to clear my mind. I had moved away from the simpler things I cherished earlier in my walk and replaced them with things supporting the lifestyle that took me off track. I also learned it wasn’t the lifestyle so much as the choices I made during that time that distracted me from the truths I had learned early on. I made many mistakes that impacted me as well as others, and they all were the result of bad choices made by me! It was time for me to remember the gift I was.
I hadn’t thought about The Boys for a long time. I had taken them for granted since a few years into my marriage. At the time I had the mindset that I didn’t need to do anything else to continue on my path. I even thought I could find The Place without their help, and that was my biggest mistake—letting my ego dictate my walk. I needed to get back to nature and walk a simpler walk with fewer distractions. I needed to begin my quest for The Place once again.
I had a friend living in Florida who rented me her home while she was away. It was perfect. Her house was just a few miles from a farm a friend of mine owned, where they grew hydroponic tomatoes and boarded horses on the side.
I decided to stop by for a visit and ask if I could exercise the horses for the owners. I had a love of riding I got from my dad. Although we never had a chance to ride together, I had been taking people on trail rides near my home since I was twelve. I just loved horses as well as the feeling of being outdoors. As a young boy I had bronchial asthma and couldn’t get within a hundred yards of a horse without having an attack that would leave me in an oxygen tent for a week, but it was always worth it to me. If that was a price I had to pay to love them, then so be it, and I never looked back! It was about a week later when my friend at the farm called back regarding the horses.
“The two owners would love for you to exercise them as often as you like!” she said, and thus began my time at Gateways Farm.
Gateways Farm is one of the oldest family farms in New England. The old red barn built in the 1700s still houses horses and cats and hosts the occasional barn dance. It is a beautiful place that’s as pretty as a postcard. My life was becoming simpler, and once again, I was the happy spirit I had left behind so many years ago.
Being around horses returned me to a simpler time I had forgotten. I came to know them as friends, and they came to know me in the same way. I had often heard that animals are not intelligent, hence their need for our stewardship on this plane. Yet I continued to be amazed at just how intelligent they really are. With each passing day we became ever closer as I learned a whole new respect for them. While I continued to tap into my old ways, I began to think of The Boys. I remembered the words of the voice those many years back, “We are always with you!”
I was ready to pursue my quest once again.
One night, several months after I started riding, I decided to meditate. I remembered that The Boys told me it was no longer necessary since they were now one with me, but I felt the need to reacquaint myself with them in a place I enjoyed visiting when I was younger. As I sat down and began to focus on my breathing, I experienced a calm I hadn’t known for years. It was much like the feeling we get when we have been away from home for an extended period of time and then return. There was a comfort there—something we knew we could always depend on—and it wasn’t long before I began to remember.
As I traveled to the mist, I found myself happier than I’d been in a very long time. I floated there for some time, not expecting anything but simply enjoying the moment. I felt free! The anchors and weights were gone, and I was simply being me—the conscious spirit without the distraction of my body. As I continued the blissful experience, I saw a familiar light coming toward me, and I immediately felt my heart begin to sing.
“Welcome home,” the voice began. “We have missed becoming with you on your conscious level.”
I knew exactly what it meant, since I had been too involved in other things to acknowledge them over the many years that had passed. It is good to be with you again, I found myself thinking.
“Sometimes it is good to visit old places,” came the thought from within the light. “One simply needs to ‘remember’ the places and the feelings within, since it is in the remembering that allows for the experience to live on.”
I am grateful I did not forget, and yet, I am disappointed it took me so long to return! I thought.
“Remembering is the key!” came the answer.
As I continued to bask in the light of the moment, I found new solace in the truth of the thoughts I was experiencing. I think I always knew the secret to becoming one with them was in the remembering. After a time of much sharing, I returned to my physical plane. I sat there for the longest time, relishing the fact that I had not forgotten the gifts I learned about earlier in my life. I was happy in a deeply spiritual way. I was hesitant to return before this because I was afraid I might have lost the connection that I cherished so very long ago—my connection to The Boys. Thankfully, that was not the case, and I promised myself I would never turn my back on them again!
I had been dating a friend for a couple of years now when she asked me to attend a pow-wow on Cape Cod. It was my very first, and I was looking forward to it. The drive to the Cape was a beautiful one. The scrub pines that bordered Route 6 made me realize I wasn’t in Boston. When we arrived, we found the place crowded. There were license plates from all over New England and beyond. Parking was delegated to fields of grass, which made the walk to the pow-wow even more exciting.
My younger brother, Richard, heard I was heading to the pow-wow and told me to look for a book called The Wisdom Keepers. It was a compilation of thoughts and sayings from the elders of most of the indigenous tribes across the country. He told me I would really enjoy it, so I decided to keep an eye out for it.
As my friend and I began the walk past the twenty or so booths that lined the grounds, she decided to venture off on her own. I saw a quaint non-descript book stall standing in line among the other vendors’ booths. The woman tending the booth was a small elderly Native American woman with snow-white braids flowing down past her shoulders. She wore a deerskin dress with colorful beading around the collar. She was one of the most unusual people I had seen in a very long time. I could not describe what was so different about her, except that her energy reminded me of the spiritual presence I encountered in the mist.
I leaned toward her and asked, “Do you have a book called The Wisdom Keepers”? She looked into my eyes and just stared at me. She had a gentle smile, and her eyes held mine in a somewhat trance-like state before I found myself thinking she couldn’t hear very well, so I spoke louder and repeated the question.
“Do you have a book called The Wisdom Keepers”? I asked, but she simply smiled again and didn’t say a word. I looked around for someone else who might be working there, but she was clearly alone. As I was about to ask her a third time, she reached beneath the counter for a small doeskin bag. From it she withdrew a book and handed it to me.
I read the cover: Mother Earth Spirituality, by Ed McGaa, Eagle Man. I smiled at her, and with all the respect I could muster, I said, “This is the wrong book. I’m looking for a book called The Wisdom Keepers.”
She continued looking into my eyes, smiling gently the whole time. I felt like I was held there, captured in her eyes for the longest time. It was like looking into a pool of water in that it was impossible to look away. Her eyes spoke of beauty and life and a walk that had taken place over many years. Finally I snapped out of it as she began to speak.
“You are supposed to have this book,” she said.
“But this isn’t the book I am looking for,” I replied.
She smiled once again and said, “But this is the book you’re supposed to have!”
I was never one to argue with someone who apparently knew more about my needs than I did. I asked how much it was.
“This is my gift to you,” she replied, as she took my hands in hers and smiled once again. Her hands were warm and comfortable, like a mother’s hands when she holds her child.
Her eyes were as gentle as a sunset, and I would never forget the absolute sincerity of her manners. I didn’t want her to let go of my hands because they were so familiar and comforting. I wanted to spend time with this person, and I had no clue as to why. I was in the middle of writing my own book, so I didn’t question her gift and thanked her for her kindness.
She continued to hold my hand and said, “It is I who thank you!” Then she gave my hands one final squeeze before turning to help another customer, smiling back at me as she moved away.
That woman’s face is as clear in my mind today as it was the day we met. She was the epitome of kindness and understanding, and yet, she was authoritative in her own way. She knew I was supposed to have that book, and she made sure I took it.
I began to look for my friend to relate the strange sequence of events that had just occurred. “I couldn’t believe it,” I told her. “I was looking for the book I told you about earlier. Obviously she didn’t have it, so she gave me this one in its place.”
I showed her the book. “Let’s go see her,” she said, anxious to meet the woman I described. She took me by the hand, and we walked back to the book stall. When we arrived, there was a young Native American girl working the counter who was not older than twenty-five.
“Can I help you?” she asked.
“Yes, please,” I began. “I was here a few minutes ago and was given this book by an elderly woman. I’d like to speak with her. I was looking for a book called The Wisdom Keepers, but instead, she was kind enough to give me this one. Is she here?”
“May I see that book?” she asked.
I passed it to her. She looked at it then handed it back to me. “We don’t carry that book,” she replied.
I smiled and said, “But she gave me this book just a moment ago!”
“I am sorry, sir, but we do not carry that book, and I’m the only one working this booth. It’s my booth!” she answered, somewhat emphatically.
“You didn’t have someone standing in for you just a few minutes ago?” I asked.
“No, sir. I work the booth by myself.”
I was somewhat frustrated. Then I remembered that the woman retrieved the book from her bag, which would explain why they didn’t carry it.
“Do you have a book called The Wisdom Keepers”?
“Yes, sir,” she replied, picking up a copy from a stack of books behind her. “How many would you like?”
I was completely puzzled. “Thanks, but I think this one will do for now. Can I ask you one more question? Can you tell me if there are any other book stalls here at the pow-wow?”
“No, sir. This is the only one.”
I thanked her and left. I looked at my friend and said, “I’m either losing it, or something very special just happened here.”
She smiled and said, “Don’t look a gift horse in the mouth.”
I agreed, placing the book under my arm. I didn’t read that book for almost two years. Ironically, I decided to read it after I broke up with the girl I was with at the pow-wow.
I had been spending quite a bit of time at the farm since it was a great place to experience life. I was completely immersed in nature, which was what I yearned for more than anything else in my life at the time, and the horses had become my most faithful friends. While continuing to enjoy farm life, I began to write again.
I had finished my first novel a year earlier and was excited to get back to it since I enjoyed the process of writing more than anything I had undertaken in a very long time. It was amazing to be immersed in my own thoughts so deeply that it became hard to think of anything else.
I had begun writing children’s books and sharing them with my mother. She spent her entire lifetime loving children, and it seemed natural to share my love of them with her. We spent many occasions laughing at my bizarre sense of humor and the characters I created in the stories I wrote. It brought us together again in a way we hadn’t shared in some time. She passed on several years later but is always with me, as I would realize later on. She shared so many wonderful things with me during her lifetime, and I will always be grateful to her for that. I still speak with her every day, and I know she’s listening, even though this plane is not the focus of her attention.
The children’s books led to other writings, and I soon realized that we are not the authors of our works; instead, we are listeners. I think those authors—or artists, for that matter—who take complete credit for their work deny their ability to listen to what comes through to them. It’s like a dancing relationship, and our success depends on how closely we pay attention to our partners. I think most artists realize the truth of this concept, but some have not learned to shed their ego to the point they can understand that truth. I simply enjoyed the whole process. It gave me time to spend with myself, and I’ll always be amused with what was sent through.