We All Make It Home

I was walking down to my spot on the river -- Actually "shuffling" is a more accurate description, kicking up the leaves and listening to them crackle and crunch. As I crested the little hill down to the bank I paused at the sight. The river was flowing very high, swollen with the rain that has deluged us in the past weeks. None of the normal, sandy beach was visible and, in fact, the place where I normally sit was about 20 feet out into the water.

As I approached the water’s edge I couldn’t help exclaiming, “Oh there you are!” I had had a small paper bag full of loose sage that I’d misplaced, having combed my apartment looking for it and having no idea where it could possibly have gone. It must have fallen out of my chanupa bag in the dark when I left here a couple nights previously after another pipe ceremony. And here it was, almost intact but for a small hole, despite the heavy rain that had soaked it. As I reached down to retrieve it, I realized I wasn’t alone. Right next to my sage bag, camouflaged in with the color of the leaves and earth, was a dead salmon. I felt honored that my unintentional offering had apparently been reciprocated by an offering from Grandfather Salmon. Picking up some of the sage that had spilt from my bag, I sprinkled it on the departed fish, saying something like, “I honor you Grandfather Salmon and thank you for the gift of your presence. I am sorry you did not make it home.”

Instantly I heard Grandfather laughing in my ear. “My son, we ALL make it home.” And I witnessed the image of this beautiful salmon swimming right out of its body and into the realm of spirits.

I found a spot just down river from where Grandfather lay, and made a comfy place to sit, spreading my blanket on the colorful leaves and wrapping my cloak around me. I had hoped to see some live salmon swimming upstream but the water was dark and rough so, other than just a couple feet out from shore, I couldn’t see beneath the surface. I performed a pipe ceremony, sending smoke blessings to the salmon lying on the bank, and calling out, “Grandfather Salmon come smoke with me!” Hoping to entice a live salmon to join me nearby in the river.

I smoked, and prayed, and cried, and sang, for a good hour or so until I noticed the clouds darkening, not only because of the encroaching night, but from the density of the water they held. I closed my pipe ceremony, thanking Creator for my life and my path, but then instead of releasing the directions as I normally do, I began to go right in to wrapping up the bowl and stem in their separate little cloth bundles. As I was doing this I happened to look into the water and there, just a couple feet from me and directly in front of me hovered a salmon, pausing in his swim. I almost burst into tears. It was such a blessing and honor to be visited, especially after I invited him to smoke with me. It was perfect.

After thanking the spirits and releasing my sacred space, I gathered my things to beat the rain. As I passed Grandfather Salmon lying on the beach I whispered, "Thank you Grandfather and welcome home!"

Gator Aid

A few months ago I took a few days to myself at a friend's little cabin in the woods. It was a wonderful spiritual retreat and I spent the entire weekend meditating, napping, and connecting. I worked quite a lot with my chanupa, performing several sacred pipe ceremonies each day, and probably the most thrilling thing that happened was the introduction of a new Power Animal during one of those ceremonies.

Power Animals are those Animal Spirit Guides that usually come into our lives at a specific time for a specific purpose, to guide and help us in a particular direction or with a particular task. It is especially exciting to me when they pop up of their own accord rather than my journeying to seek them because there's a certain amount of validation that comes with a guide showing up before you even knew you needed someone to help you in a certain area. If you weren't looking for someone in the first place you don't have to be concerned with the whole "I'm just making this up" mind set. 

Of course with new Spirit Guides, especially ones that just pop up, it's always a good thing to double check and make sure they've got your highest good at heart, so I always run them past Nathaniel, my stalwart reindeer companion, for his approval. Another fun way to do this is to ask them to tell you joke. If they really have your highest good at heart, have no other agenda, and are of a higher frequency, they are going to have a sense of humor, so if they can tell you a joke you're pretty safe. 

The joke this guide told me:

Why can't ducks ever be experts?

Because they're always dabbling!

(In case you don't get it -- non-diving ducks are called "dabblers")  

But I'm getting ahead of myself... So there I was one evening in the middle of a Pipe Ceremony, negotiating a deal with the Mosquito Nation in order to keep from being bit (which they mostly upheld) when I became aware of a presence. Whatever it was I knew it was reptilian. When I am in Non-Ordinary Reality, things tend to look similar to what the world looked like to Frodo when he put on the ring and became invisible (between the worlds) in the Lord of the Rings trilogy, so it sometimes takes time for the shadows of figures to solidify into recognizable shapes. Even then they can morph back and forth between different forms. 

Then it raised its massive head and began breathing fire. "Mike?" I asked, referring to my dragon power animal, "Is that you?" But there was no immediate answer. Another dragon perhaps? You can never have too many dragon friends! But as the flames faded the form solidified into a giant albino alligator. Leave it to me to have something as unusual as a fire-breathing alligator as a spirit guide. As he stood there looking at me he began to glow from the inside. (...Make that a giant, albino, fire-breathing, glow-in-the-dark alligator). While we sat there staring at each other, the name "Ansel" floated through my thoughts. Really?! What is it with my power animals and alliteration?!

So I had a nice conversation with Ansel, asking what his message was for me, and how we were going to work together. Seemingly building on the insights I had earlier gained from my meetings with Sekmet about anger, Ansel was to help me learn when it's appropriate to 'breathe fire'.  And he was to help teach me how to dial it back to keep just enough flame burning inside to radiate the light, my inner light, to be a beacon. Again the message repeated through my spiritual history: I am meant to be seen.

With that, Ansel turned, very smoothly for his great size, and, with barely a splish, dove into a river I hadn't previously noticed but from which he had apparently emerged earlier. He sank quickly beneath the dark waters, his radiant white silhouette, propelled by his gracefully weaving tail, in stark contrast with the black currents as he descended, diminishing in size until swallowed by the darkness. It was one of the most beautiful things I'd ever seen.

It wasn't until I'd returned home and was doing a pipe ceremony down at the river that it occurred to me how appropriate Ansel's appearance was. Taking a long drag into my mouth, holding it for a second, then blowing it out, I suddenly realized I was literally breathing fire. Clever gator! The fire-breathing wasn't just about expressing anger, it was working with my pipe. He was here to help teach me how to work with my chanupa! 

Then another insight hit me that caused me to giggle out loud. Alligator is actually an exceptional mother. She doesn't just lay her eggs then disappear. She regularly tills the nest, turning the soil and stirring the eggs so that they get equal portions of warmth from the sun and coolness from the earth. Then when the babies hatch, she takes them in her mouth and carries them to the river where she teaches them to swim. Here I was, at the river, being taught how to swim, so to speak, by an alligator. 

It still amazes me how these things build on themselves, how something that seems relatively mundane at the time (at least as mundane as an albino, fire-breathing, glow-in-the-dark alligator can be) continues to unfold with deeper and more profound threads of meaning and connection. 

For instance - Even as I was writing this it occurred to me that Ansel is modeling the fact that I am the chanupa. I watch Ansel breathing fire and keeping his inner flame lit in the same way the breathing back and forth through the pipe keeps the embers in the bowl, the heart of the chanupa, alive, and just as it is my smoking the chanupa, breathing in and out, that helps keep the embers of my own heart lit, staying in alignment so I radiate more of my inner Divine light. 

I am finding that the more I work with my chanupa, the deeper I go (another river metaphor) and the more I'm walking in my own light, not afraid to step into the darkness and face it, or light it up. Like they say, "You can't be a beacon if your light don't shine."

So I now have a Spirit Ally ally-gator...  An animal spirit guide to help be my navi-gator... A power animal to help discover my deeper mysteries as my investi-gator...

Okay. I'm done. See you later...

...never mind...