She walked out the door.
I stood there, taking in what had just happened.
“Holy crap…” I thought…. “HO. LY. CRAP. This is all real.”
I stood there in my living room, marveling at it all and feeling chills at the wonder and magical mystery of this crazy beautiful path; rivers of joy and peace came flooding down my cheeks, and I stood there alone, aching for the sole, singular presence of the only other human being on planet earth who would be able to share this moment with me.
I turn and stare at the place on the floor where AJ once sat.
I try and imagine her face. Her presence.
But she is not here, and the pain of enduring all of this alone falls fresh upon my senses.
It hurts.
I miss her.
I need her.
———–
As soon as Yessica left the house, I promptly saged the entire place.
H.E.’s presence was thick and heavy in my awareness. I sensed a sort of pastoral urgency ~ the holy man and his medicine are needed now.
Starting at the front door, and methodically going from room to room, I stayed connected with Holding Eagle and surrendered myself fully to his guidance and our connection ~ especially after having EVERYTHING validated to me with proofs beyond proof ~ and so I flung myself into Holding Eagle’s care, which seemed to me like calming, peaceful, mystical waters of divine mystery calling me into its stream and flow like a river, only asking that I surrender to its course and flow.
And as I surrendered I sensed Holding Eagle’s presence with me, even tough we were outside the lodge now, deep in my chest. And I felt the joy of relationship and the joy of submitting to him as teacher and guide, and me the learner and disciple. he filled my mouth with prayers, songs, blessings, protections, incantations and anything else that intuition placed in my mouth ~ some in English and others in a language otherwise unknown.
I finished saging the front door area, and moved to the sword. Then I saged the altar, the sacred items, and charlie’s memorial. I saged the guardians and the 4 winds, and then my entire lodge. And using the feathers I found, as guided and instructed, I opened my mouth as I sang, and I lifted up a sage song and dance to the 4 directions.
When the song was over, Holding Eagle prompted me on: He urged me to finish the job, helping me see what was still unfinished.
I walked throughout the other rooms, the fingers of my left hand locked in the colors of the medicine wheel and simultaneously holding The Staff; my right hand carrying the bowl sacred fire and burning the incense of The Great Mother.
I finished saging all areas, except for one.
My bedroom was last.
As soon as I walked in, I heard Holding Eagle speak from out of my mouth. “There is evil in this room…..” I paused, and felt. An erie darkness in the room; alive, and watching. Even though nothing happened between Yessica and I sexually here in this room (or anywhere else ~ see 2/13 part 1), I was still surprised to hear Holding Eagle say what he said.
I didn’t understand. So, I breathed and tapped into/connected with him and his emotions/feelings a little deeper in order to understand what he was seeing and feeling.
And when I did, room became dark. Heavy. Oppressive. “Evil in this room…” he said again. I sensed Holding Eagle’s fear and concern ~ a rare feeling to intuit from him. It suddenly felt like the Dark in this room was something beyond even him, and far stronger. Thoughts came to my mind of The Witch, Dionesius, Horus and Set, and many other “gods” (whom I had no personal prior knowledge of) that have “visited me” in my sleep while sleeping in this room.
And I sensed H.E.’s anxiety at something greater, larger, and more powerful in divinity than he. Even though mighty Hidatsan holy man (who is physically “dead” but who yet nontheless came to me and into my life in the most insane, bewildering, beautiful, and psyche-splitting of possible circumstances) has limits. As a “keeper”/owner/possessor of several sacred ancestral Rites and “Holy Bundles”, Holding Eagle is a holy man ~ apart from the fact that he also became the husband of a powerful Mandan holy woman, the last and final “Corn Priest” of her people (and the first female Corn Priest in their people’s long history). In other words: H.E. is one “powerful” Native American ~ the genuiness of this man’s faith and heart is undeniable. But, compared to the forces in the room, he by himself was not enough to purge whatever forces had been brought into the bedroom.
As I stood there in the room, looking around, I could “see” Holding Eagle looking around the room, wide-eyed and turning slowly. The fear in his face…. Was difficult to describe. It was like he was seeing something he had never, ever seen in his time – a reality beyond him, coming into view now. I sensed his fear as he looked around him, and the source of it: inadequacy, and the inability to come against whatever was here.
I felt so much empathy for him (for I remembered the graveyard, where I experienced the same).
“Evil… in this room….Danger….”
I assured H.E. I could come back later, after meeting with the Big Chief in the sky and asking Him for the medicine needed to purify this room.
This contented Holding Eagle and the relief was immediate.
I closed the door, purified the frame with sage, and sealed the entry with my mouth. Nothing allowed in, and nothing allowed out; and I reminded whatever was inside that I will be back to face it later: by myself, without my guide and without my lodge.
——
By the time I finished saving the house, I heard Holding Eagle speak to me loudly from the lodge: “Come, young buffalo! I have much to teach you.”
I turned towards the direction of the lodge – and now I could see Holding Eagle even better. He was standing outside the Lodge, wearing a headless full of feathers and in his hands, stretched out to this sides. His clothes were tan skinned leathers, with intricate quill and bead work displaying meaning, identify, and personal rights & claims to the very specific ancestral rights and sacred duties of ownership and responsibility for continuance.
He lifted up his right hand, holding an eagle in his right hand. The eagle was wild, and gorgeous. Its eye stared at me, its beak razor sharp. The eagle’s wings spread open, flapping – I looked to Holding Eagle’s left his left hand but it was hidden from my sight, and I could not see what was in it.
I stood there, marveling, taking in what I was seeing. His appearance was absolutely stunning.
And then, suddenly, Holding Eagle shouted, and began to dance.
He sang and sang and sang, twirling around and spinning and dancing, the tan-skinned leathers a flash of light brown with flashes of white, yellow, red, blue, and black beads ~ and symbolic design work whose meaning I did not understand.
I can’t describe how beautiful it was, watching him dance; the celebration in his chest, the joy, the PRIDE – I could feel and intuit all of it.
Holding Eagle ceased his dancing, his arms now resting at his sides. He stood still, looking at me with a smile, breathing heavily from his dancing. There was a spark of light in his dark eyes ~ he was excited about what was going to happen next.
And a large red clay pipe was suddenly in his hands, and he lifted the pipe a loft in his hands towards the heavens, intently and with heart-felt and holy purpose ~ it struck me as he did so how much he looked like a priest lifting up the eucharist host.
The pipe was beautiful, wide, and straps of leather and beads and stones …. ancient, holy, and remarkable. I saw some kind of design of purpose and meaning upon the face of the pipe – and I knew intuitively, right then and there, that the meaning of the markings on this pipe could not be fully understood, as it were, with some mere Rosetta Stone of translation – but rather, that the meaning is personal and only understood with FEELING, apart from words. And as I felt this, I heard Holding Eagle say, extremely emphatically “We hand it [meaning] DOWN” – as its true meaning (and thus, its true medicine and power) can only be given, transferred, held and owned ~ and only by those with the rights hold and own it. To them is meaning given; meaning only comes with ownership.
“We hand ours DOWN….” I heard him say again, his high extended arms holding the pipe now descending and lowering down to me.
With each inch, as the Pipe came lower and lower and closer and closer, I realized two things at once: (1) This was being given/handed/transferred to me (2) the weight of the Pipe is heavy, holy responsibility (and a burden to be taken seriously)
“We hand.. it DOWN….” He said.
With the pipe now resting in his hands at chest level, he urged me closer.
I stood in front of him. He looked me deep in the eyes. And, for the first time, he felt like family.
“Take watch,” he said. He slowly laid the pipe in my hands. And I looked into his eyes…. and intuited all his feelings…. of sheer pride and joy, hope and passion, love and longing, and, fear.
“Would you like to proceed?” a voice somewhere said.
And it was one of the heaviest questions I have ever been asked in my life (even though I’ve been asked it before) for I knew that my answer at this juncture would determine the overall shape and form of my entire life. And that, if i said “yes”, nothing after this point would ever, ever, be the same ~ and that I would lose even more connection with those I love because of the driving forces behind it.
“Would….you….like…. to proceed?” the voice asked again
I looked down at the pipe in my hands. So heavy.
I looked into Holding Eagle’s eyes again, for a final time before answering. He didn’t know how I would answer; but he was resolved, ready to handle to disappointment, as if his history was full of disappointment and soul-killing, ignorant savages. I saw a resolve in his eyes, and a hidden peace in the “Big Chief of The Sky” , The Great Spirit he has known and called to since childhood. And as I looked in Holding Eagle’s gray eyes, they seemed to spark with light as I bridged the connection and remembered the words of The Teacher who sent this Hidatsan sage to me in the first place: “Follow him exactly like you follow Me.”
Oh what a weight of burden it is to follow your own soul….. truly, it costs everything.
But oh the joys of love, light, truth, and peace….
“Do you wish to PROCEED?” The presence behind me grew darker.
Holding the pipe, I turned around. A dark, churning, swirling void now facing me. It felt alive and foreboding. With Holding Eagle behind me, I took out my medicine wheel, placed my fingers in each color and direction, and spoke my answer into the void.
“Yes.”
[Fish/cross]:
You are Warrior
???:
Red Feather…
Where is He?
꩜:
This
[drawing: thoth’s staff symbol]
Use it wisely
[a river stream coming from the staff]
Do you see?
I:
Would you help me see more clearly?
꩜:
Crystal doesn’t exist.
∞:
Faith…
Hope…
Love….
exists.
The Right balances the Left,
and holds them both in check.
Continued in 2/13 Part 3….
