Never Again

by Heather Starsong

  Several times I hiked with friends, but soon knew I needed to walk alone. Conversation distracted me from being present with the gifts of every turn in the path, from stopping to lose myself in the heart of a tiny alpine flower or in the distant purple peaks. When Robin knew I was hiking alone, he asked me to call him before I left in the morning and when I got home in the evening. “Just in case, Mama. I know you’re strong and careful. I also know you go off the trail a lot and if anything happened…”

  “Thanks, Robin. I’ll be okay. I’m very careful. But I’ll call you.”

  All through the summer, three or four times a week, I walked in the mountains, through fields of brilliant flowers, along rushing streams, beside tumbling waterfalls, across scree marked only by cairns. Often I took off my boots and, barefoot, left the trail to find the solitude I so deeply craved. I scrambled through bogs, dipped in icy streams and lakes, stood again and again on the continental divide, buffeted by wind, exulting. I walked on days of cold rain, the colors more vivid under the gray sky, the rocks shining with wetness, each leaf and pine needle dripping jewels of water. I wandered the long loops of trails in Rocky Mountain National Park. I grew lean and strong and brown. I walked farther and higher than I ever had before.

  When Robin and his family invited me to go camping with them, it was good to play with the children and sleep out with them under the stars, teaching them the constellations, but I was impatient with the pace of the family walks. I wanted to go higher and faster, then remembered how only last summer they had slowed to accommodate me. And that they would again.

  At the end of July I drove down to Santa Fe and took a three-day backpacking trip with Greg to the high places he loved. We were both strong and acclimated to altitude and challenged each other, climbing steep slopes at 12,000 feet and above, walking miles each day. Ravens circled above us. The first night we camped in a dell nestled between rocky outcroppings. It was cold, but the moon was nearing its full and we slept out in its splendor. The second night we camped by a lake that reflected the white jewel of the moon as we sat by the water’s edge and talked deeply of the life we had shared, of the parts of our lives that we hadn’t shared, of love and death and God. We returned more deeply bonded than ever, all past hurts from his turbulent adolescent years healed at last.

  Then it was August. Only four more weeks. I started going to the high country every day, coming home only long enough to tend the garden, pay the bills, and go to the grocery store.

  One day I lingered so long by the tarns above Blue Lake that twilight caught me unaware. The moon was waning, rising late, and I realized it would be unsafe to walk down in the dark. I found a sheltered spot, a hollow between two boulders, curled up in my gray cloak, and slept, woke cold and cramped, and rose at sunrise to dip in the icy tarn.

  When I got home that afternoon, there was a message from Robin on my phone.

  “Mama, are you okay? I just realized you didn’t call last night. Please call. I’m worried.”

  I called and explained.

  Robin was not mollified. “Don’t do that again. If I hadn’t been so distracted last night trying to get the bugs out of my program… I didn’t realize. You could have died up there and I’d never forgive myself. I won’t forget again. So you come home at night and call.”

  I felt both touched and constrained by his caring, but knowing what was coming, I was grateful.

  On the last day before my birthday I hiked all the way to the point of Whale Ridge where I could look down on Sapphire Lake far below. No one was there. I lay on my back watching clouds fly on the wind, and prayed to my elusive God that however I emerged from the lightning strike, I might have the strength to complete my ulada in integrity before I was called through the dark door of death to unimaginable home.

  Chapter 10

  On the morning of my birthday, I woke before dawn. I turned on my side, seeking to sleep again, but it was no use. The immensity of the day loomed over me.

  Finally I got up, shivering with trepidation and anticipation. I looked in the bathroom mirror as I combed my thick gold-brown curls, washed my beautiful face. “Goodbye, young beauty,” I whispered to my reflection. “Thank you for the gifts you have given me, for the lessons you have taught me.”

  My hands shook as I prepared tea and packed my lunch. They still shook on the steering wheel as I drove up the canyon. I felt as I had before my hip surgery, terrified of the pain yet eager to get through it so I could begin to heal. Only now—I sought an un-healing of my body in the hope I could be whole again.

  The strangeness of this thought made everything feel unreal, even the familiar curves of the canyon, the winding road that led to the trailhead.

  The air was chill, the morning just opening when I reached the parking lot. There were only two cars there. A third car rolled up as I was putting on my boots, and three young men climbed out. They greeted me as they wriggled into their big backpacks. I was startled to see their interest, their appreciative smiles. In my mind I was already an old woman. They lingered, chatting with me. I bent my head and fiddled with my pack until finally they wished me a good hike and set off down the trail.

  What shall I do with my keys? My hand holding them trembled. I won’t be able to drive down. What will happen with my car? Not knowing what else to do, I put my keys in their usual pocket of my pack. Then I was ready, my pack settled over my gray cloak, the straps tightened, my sunhat tucked in my belt, my staff in my hand.

  Once I started walking, fear dissipated. It had rained the night before. The moist, pungent smell of the forest, the glisten of early morning sunlight on wet pine needles, the softness of damp earth under my feet absorbed my senses. I settled into the long, easy stride that had carried me many miles a day throughout the summer.

  As I walked the wide path beside Silver Lake, I came to the place where I’d noticed the dead tree that reminded me of Death the year before. It was still standing, black amid the green of the living trees.

  “Not yet,” I whispered to it. “Please not yet.” Fear shivered through me again and I walked more quickly. I passed through the gateway between the big ponderosas, followed the path along the river valley, past the little track that led to the foot of the waterfall and up the last steep ascent to Sapphire Lake. There was no one there. I looked at my watch. It was only eight o’clock. I had walked all the way in less than forty-five minutes. I recalled how I had come up the year before, slowly, taking two hours, stopping often to rest, to look, to remember.

  Grief swept through me. How could I have come so fast? I didn’t look at everything. I may never walk this trail again.

  I spun around. Weeping, I ran back down, jumping over the rocky place, hurtling down the steep place, running, running, along the side of the river valley, through the ponderosa gate into the forest. A few people coming up the trail greeted me, but I did not answer, tears streaking my face. I ran until I saw the parking lot through the trees. There I stopped, breathless, and turned around. The trail up lay before me.

  I rubbed the tears off my cheeks and took a drink from my water bottle. Slowly I began to walk. Look at everything, I told myself. Feel the path under your feet, smell the forest, breathe the air. Touch the pine needles and feel the raindrop that falls off cold on your fingers. Sniff the butterscotch aroma of the ponderosa trunk. Pick off a bubble of sap and rub it under your nose. Pause to listen to the sound of the rivulet crossing the path. Look through the trees at the reflections in the lake. Bend and touch the tiny elephant-head flowers by the side of the path. Don’t overlook the flaming paintbrush. Sit down on the bridge, take off your boots and put your feet in the stream, feel the cold caress of its swirl. Stand a long time in the ponderosa gate and look up at the peaks as if you had never seen them before. Wonder at the tiny worlds of moss and flowers in the crevices of the rocks. Trace the lichen with your fingertip. Do not pass by the path to the waterfall. Stand and breathe the a
ir off its tumbling tumult, see how the flowers in its midst bend and sway with its movement. Feel the strength of your legs as you ascend the steep place, your balance as you clamber over the rocks.

  So I came again to Sapphire Lake. I sat in the sloping meadow where I always rested, tilting my head back to drink in the peaks. Light shifted on the surface of the water, deep blues and greens merging as in the eyes of the Elirians. Soon I will be with them again, I thought, hear the music of their voices, feel their silken fur, the beating of their hearts as they hold me close. Just one more time, and then they will be gone. The thought of them brought me to my feet and I began striding up the trail.

  No. Slowly. Look deeply. You may never see these lichen-covered cliffs again, the swift shimmer of the stream as it rushes around rocks, the dark green of pines against the blue, blue sky. Slowly, then, I went on until I came at last, barefoot across the high valley, up beside the waterfall that divided around purple-pink flowers, to my special place.

  The sun shone down on the bright green grass by the water’s edge and into the deep pool, sparkling on ripples where the current swept around its curve. In the quieter part of the water, blue sky and white clouds were reflected, their images blending through the clear water with the gray-brown shapes of the rounded rocks on the bottom. The boulder rose above me, vivid with multi-colored lichen.

  I sighed deeply, slipped off my pack, dropped my staff and boots, and sank to my knees, resting my brow in the softness of tundra grass. Sacred place. I lifted my head, sat back on my heels. After today will this be only a memory for me? Am I all amiss to love so passionately an earthly place so high I may never reach it again? To love so passionately anything but God?

  I got up and walked around, looking, touching, my senses highly attuned as they had been all the way up the mountain. I climbed up the side of the boulder, past the fateful place where I had fallen a year ago, to the krum tree. The greater part of it lay brown and withered, the long, black scar on its trunk, its dead branches crushed to the rock by the last winter’s snow. But near the ground there was a short piece of trunk unburned. New green branches had grown out from it. Wonder flooded me. The tree was not dead after all. I curled my hand around the stub of trunk where it emerged from the rock it had split long ago at its beginning.

  “You will live,” I said to it, “and I will live—a little longer. You will probably outlive me.”

  I sat running my fingers through the soft new needles and felt the burden of living on and on slip off me. Only a little longer, a year or two maybe to complete my ulada, and then—

  A fleeting image came, the black robed figure, turned toward me now, holding his cloak open. Awe shook me. My hand tightened around the trunk.

  For a moment the warmth of the sun dimmed. I looked up. The sky was blue with scattered white clouds, and the one that had briefly covered the sun was already moving past. Probably no storms today. Yet I shivered.

  I climbed down the side of the boulder, shed my clothes, and squatted on the rocks at the water’s edge. “Wash away fear,” I whispered to the deep, clear pool. I plunged and came up gasping, tossed water over my head and watched it fall down sparkling around me. Let go fear.

  But back out on the grass, I still trembled. I opened my pack and pulled out my bathing cloth, a new one Anne had given me, and dried myself.

  Standing in the soft grass by the water’s edge, I began to move, stretching freely at first, then allowing yoga postures to flow through me. Feel it. Treasure it. I will never do yoga like this again. Sun salute, slowly, deeply breathing. I must let it all go, and receive whatever is given back after the lightning, gratefully, as a new gift. Cobra and bow. Perhaps I will do yoga again, even if it isn’t like this. Wheel. Hips pressed up to the sky, fingertips touching my heels. Forward bend sitting. Perhaps I will even dance tango, walk in the mountains again. I just don’t know. Shoulder stand, plow, curl down slowly, one vertebra at a time. Breathe. Trust.

  Gradually I calmed and the inner shiver faded away. When I finished my yoga I sat again at the edge of the pool. An intention for the coming year.

  May I trust. May I accept my body however it emerges from the coming change and live what life is left to me with gratitude. May I find my path to complete my ulada and then go gently, go gently.

  It was a good intention. I slipped into the water again, dropped down to the bottom, then scrambled out and wrapped myself in my cloth. This time the intensity of that icy baptism was exquisite, cleansing. I dressed and snuggled into the warmth of my gray cloak.

  A light wind came up. I pulled the hood up over my wet hair and rummaged in my pack for lunch. Bread and cheese, an apple, a Thermos of peppermint tea. Leaning back against the boulder, I ate, sipped tea, and mused. My hands holding the apple were smooth. Soon they will be gnarly, I thought, wrinkled as all of me will be. It’s all right. It’s good. I will finally be myself again. But not as I was before. I am forever changed by knowing the Elirians, by all the events of the last year.

  I know I will not long to be young.

  So strange. The Elirians healed me to express my essence. If that is so, why am I so uncomfortable in this body? Maybe because an essence belongs on the eternal plane, and I am here in time, walking the earthly path between birth and death.

  The sun angled lower in the sky. When will they come? I wondered. My hands trembled again as I packed up my Thermos and lunch box. “Walk,” I told myself, “walk while you can.”

  I set off up the valley, following the stream towards its source, weaving between bogs and tarns, walking over smooth, rounded rocks, warm under my bare feet from the long, sunny day. I walked all the way to the rock where the Elirians had set me down a year ago and sat looking up into the sky, searching. The sun had dropped behind the western peaks and the clouds were radiant with pink.

  Then I remembered they said they would meet me where they found me. I jumped up. I had come a long way, wandering slowly, looking, touching, sensing. It was growing late. Anxious tension rose in me. Maybe they were already there. Though surely I would have seen their ship descending. Unless I was looking into a tarn or bending to smell a tiny alpine flower. I ran fast, lightly, leaping from rock to rock. Remember this. I will not run like this again. I was breathless when I returned to my special place. They were not there.

  I fussed with my possessions, tucking away my sun hat, checking to be sure my socks were in my boots. Should I put my boots on? No, they were off when the lightning struck. Can I bear the pain when it comes?

  All at once a new dread arose, terror deeper than the fear I had been fending off all day.

  What if they don’t come?

  I crouched down, wrapping my arms around my knees, head bent. For a long time I could barely breathe. At last I lifted my head.

  The silver disc floated high above the northern peaks, glinting pink with the last glow of sunset, then quickly descended until it hovered over a grassy spot on the other side of the stream. The silver door slid open and they floated out, singing my name.

  We sat together on the soft floor of the spaceship, rainbow light circling around us. They had welcomed me, holding me against their hearts, warming me with their touch and their love. All fear was gone. I felt only the joy of being with them again.

  Tell me of your mission, I said.

  It has been good. Merilea’s deep voice resonated within me. We have learned what we need to know and much more.

  We have come to admire you humans, Tirini continued, her gold-flecked eyes shining. We were wary of you because of the discordance we felt across the galaxies. It is true. There is much hate and violence, much hurt on your planet. But you are also brave to live as you do on the cusp of death, to bear pain and still laugh and love and go on. Your art, your dances, your music, your poetry and stories are beautiful. Many, like you, hold a strong light.

  It is a puzzle to us, Kiria picked up the song, how you
who have such gifts have gone so far astray. You damage your planet, your mother. We have looked into her essence. She is a powerful, deep being, but she cannot bear what you do to her much longer. She quivers inside, seeking to regain her balance. There are more violent and frequent volcanoes, tidal waves, earthquakes, floods and droughts. Her poles are shifting and the oceans are rising. There have been such changes on Earth before, but never when there were so many people. Many will die, and there will be much fear.

  I felt my heart contract. Lillilia touched me. The balance can still be restored. There are many among you who care for Earth and all her creatures. There is the possibility of a whole new culture emerging. We will advise the council to send many emissaries soon, to help guide your people through the times ahead.

  I don’t understand. My thought reached out to them. How can you return to the council light-years away and send emissaries back in time to help us? You said last summer you could be back in no time. How do you do it?

  We fold time. Rosiri’s blue-tinted fur undulated in soft waves as she took the edge of my skirt and folded it. Holding it folded with one of her hands, she touched the two edges of the fold with two other hands. This edge here is the exact time and place as this one. We return to the same time and place as if we had not been away. Yet all this—she opened the fold—that we have experienced here still happened and we remember it.

  I struggled to comprehend. My bewilderment must have been comic, because their song rippled with laughter.

  Ah, Clara, Kiria’s voice floated out of their medley. Time is not as you humans see it, not a line. Possibly more like a circle, or a spiral, flexible, mutable, but actually not real at all. There is only now.