“I’m going to marry a cowboy,” my 5-year-old self vowed. After all, I had come out of the womb loving horses. How else would I, a city kid, be able to transport myself into the world of Horse without the cowboys I saw on TV westerns like the Lone Ranger, the Cisco Kid and even Hopalong Cassidy? Seeing images of fearless men riding magnificent horses with names like Silver, Loco and Topper, my child’s mind also saw cowboys as the gateway to being around horses. Yes, there were a couple of cowgirls on TV, too, but I couldn’t feature riding a horse in a skirt like Dale Evans, the wife of the “real” cowboy, Roy Rogers.

“Those are culottes,” my mom explained. “A divided skirt......

One day back when I was about thirty, I sat on my bed rubbing my eyes after waking from lovely afternoon nap. The sun shone through the east window of my third-floor bedroom onto the knotty pine walls, making them the color of dark honey. Some of the knots looked to me like a woman’s head or a horse’s eye or a flower. It felt like time outside of time. In the midst of my reverie I heard a voice, clear as day, firmly declare, “Love makes the world go round.” I sat up, still looking at the wall, scratching my head, taking this in.

“Wow! Love does make the world go round,” I whispered in awe.  “I thought it was a cliché. But no. Now I see. Everything is fueled by love.” I ......

Bill and I recently took off for a Sunday drive down New Mexico 337 through the Sandia mountains southeast of Albuquerque. Exploring has been our big entertainment during the pandemic. We packed sandwiches, water, chips and chocolate, a couple of lawn chairs and we carried a hope within us that we would find a shady spot in the 98-degree heat to stop and eat lunch.

We set out fresh in the morning, marveling at the breathtaking high country so close to home and all its sights: fir trees, winding gravel roads off the two lane, mountain meadows cradling tiny towns along the way, some with signs at the outskirts saying “Congested Area” that made us laugh as there wasn’t a car, or even a cow, in sight.

The landscape......

My friend Julius “Horse” Coffman, a medicine man who conducts Sacred Listening circles, called me into the circle for a year, during which I became both a participant and one of the elders of his community gatherings. Every Friday night we would gather around a fire on the land in Stacy, Minnesota, a land made sacred by ceremony, prayer, honor and attention.  One weekend a month we would stay for a day and sometimes the whole weekend.

As a teacher and coach myself, I love my work and I love witnessing the magnificence and growth of so many. Every so often, though, I need to fill my own well.  So, I took that year to nourish my soul.

When in ceremony, time slows down. What is ordinary becomes extraordinary. We see ......