Grieving This Holiday

"Here is one of the ways grief works in our minds… I fall asleep thinking about my new cat, and how quickly she slipped into her own night time pattern. And how different her pattern is from any of the other cats I’ve had. Had. Because they’re dead now. Bella died in June. Bella hasn’t even been dead for a year. Bella’s only been gone for six months. And I miss her. As cute as Mara is, she is an addition, not a replacement. And I want to have them both. Then I want all five of the deceased and alive cats all in one space. In one time. Right now.

And then I remember that time is a cycle of wheels and gears interlocking and pulling away. Some return to meet over and over and some gears only touch once before travelling onward. Our lives are these wheels within gears, within circles of family and friends. We need time and distance to distort the powerful emotion of feeling all that love at once or we would explode from the wonder of it. But sometimes, in the wake of the awe, we forget that these cycles and shifting circles are what our lives are made up of. And grief is part of that cycle.

I remember Bella’s night time pattern. Every night, before sleep, a kiss on the nose. If I forgot she would cry at me, kneading her feet angrily or worriedly on the bed. It was never the same emotion. And I remembered them, every one of those separate occasions as if they were a flip book of images in my mind until they became the same still. A thousand emotional moments becoming one feeling, one memory, and bringing her back to life. I could hear her tinny, obnoxious cry. And I could feel her coat under my hand. I could feel her push her face against my lips. I started to cry with a kind of grief I haven’t let myself feel for months."

I wrote that four years ago. Rereading it stings at my heart. I remember like it was yesterday. The house is decorated for the holidays. We give our cats a stocking of toys and catnip in the morning. It was hard enough when Luna died. And then, Bella... This year Zami won’t be there either. I know our holiday morning will be bittersweet, making new memories while being haunted by old ones. It’s why learning to be in the moment is important. This year, more than any other, I have a long list of friends who are dealing with the loss of a parent or pet, most of them within the last few weeks. It’s the cycle of life. And it’s heartbreaking.
             It's only been two months since Zami died. Mara is part of this family now, having found her niche. But Zami was the last of the originally babies. Her loss is still palpable. There are three boxes on my altar of cremains. At least they are together again, in a way.

It’s hard to lose someone at the holiday season. And it’s hard to be missing them when we are focused on family and loved ones. The weight of our grief directly correlates to the weight of the love we held for the lost. And when we are surrounded by family, by joyous, loving emotions like the holidays evoke, some of that grief will seep through. The most important piece of advice I can give you is to be gentle with yourself. The holidays are about compassion and you have to start with yourself.
             There’s no timetable for grief. What takes some people months, takes others years. Even then, it never truly goes away. The loss is always with us. So go easy on your grief. Allow it to flow through you.

Four years ago, sitting with friends, I realized that I would never say to Bella again, “Nobody wants your anus,” as she was prone to presenting it to people in greeting. Insistently. I cried for a minute, out of nowhere. They asked what was wrong and I told them and immediately laughed through my tears, because it was such a strange thing to miss. I said that it was stupid and my friends said, No. It wasn’t.
             And they were right. The tears gave way to smiles and funny stories and the day went on. I didn’t ruin it with my grief. I allowed it to move through me.

So who cares if you’re at a holiday party and you think about your dad and you cry. Everyone loses people they love. Everyone understands. And if they don’t, maybe we need to make them. I cry for my Grandpa every Christmas morning when I eat my orange, because he’s not here.

The last Christmas with the Original trio, 2009.

It’s when we hold our grief in that it eats at us and it hurts. That’s when keeping it behind walls until it bursts ruins our days and moods. At the holidays, it’s impossible not to think about our fresh losses. We’re afraid of our grief. We’re afraid to bring it up because of the tears that threaten to follow. But what doesn’t work through us lives within us. So those who are grieving need to be able to be sad so that we can push through the crust of grief to the happy memories underneath it. The swifter you allow the flood, the sooner it ebbs.

If you aren’t the one grieving?
             Give your friends a break. Invite them to your festivities even if they’re dealing with a loss. Remind them they still have you. Be understanding if they choose not to come. Be understanding if they show up and are not the life of the party. Holidays are not about how things look. They’re about brotherhood and sisterhood and compassion.
At least they should be.

I spend a lot of my time hanging natural ribbons on trees in memory of those no longer with me. So I both make and collect ornaments that do the same thing. I have an angel cat for both Luna and Bella and now, Zami. A hummingbird for my grandparents and an owl for my grandma. You could also get some heavy card stock and cut out suns and snowflakes. Write the names of your Recent and Beloved Dead on them and hang them on your tree.

Drink a toast to those you miss when you are all gathered together. Have everyone raise a glass and speak their name. Speak their names. Invoke them into your joy. Share funny or heartwarming stories about them. Set a favored cocktail out on a clear space as an altar and offering for them. Bake the cookies they loved or used to make themselves and share them.
Cry when you need to.

Put out a bunch of tea lights and candles, unlit. Throughout the day, as you remember a happy memory, light another candle. Literally allow the love and memories you had to bring light into your holiday. The darkness of winter seems to last forever, but this is when the light begins to return. I use the holiday as a reminder that there is joy after the sadness. Grief may pull at our hearts but love will win out in the end.

Blessings to you and yours this holiday season.



[Originally published December 18, 2013 as Grieving at the Holidays, after the loss of Bella.]

When Buffalo Brother Visits

When I was in the Burn ICU, I suffered from night terrors after waking out of my medically-induced coma. I was beyond fearful for a while. I was terror-filled and terrified. One night, when my room was maddeningly growing around me and I struggled to catch my racing heartbeat, a musky scent filled the room and I heard the familiar snorting of a bison.

A large warm body folded itself beside my hospital bed and my heart recognized Tatanka, my animal guide, immediately. (I know his name is redundant.) He laid his head down and I dug my fingers into his hair, griping him like he were the largest grounding stone in the world. I pressed my face to his neck, shutting my eyes against the mad hallucinations and the insistence of their realness. He felt solid beneath me, too. I can still hear the rhythm of his breath and I matched my heartbeat to it. 

Under such traumatic duress, I was so enveloped in spirit, trance,and  not-in-my-body-ness that a door opened and my animal guide came to me in my time of need. He placed himself between me and other doors so that I could rest. So that I could sleep.

I was told that I talked with Tatanka out loud enough that people inquired after it.

I have been building a relationship with buffalo for over a decade and we have been through some trenches together. To honor him, I want to post some previous passages I wrote about having bison as a personal totem.

Meeting Bison

When our local zoo was host to a pair of male bison, I could not resist the opportunity to observe them in the waking world. I had dreamt of them thundering across the plains. I had dreamt of running with them in buffalo skin and walking among them with human feet. At difficult periods in my life, I called on their strength to aid me in putting one foot ahead of the other, to keep moving forward no matter what was coming at me.

            But I had never seen one in person.

I went to the zoo every week, sitting outside their pen. I told them stories about their European ancestors, the ancient aurochs. I thanked them for the generations of bison who have been feeding and sheltering humanity. I told them about the bison cave drawings in Altamira, Spain that date to 12,000 BC. I told them about the drawings in the Niaux Cave of France. Mostly, after a while, I sat in silence, trying to become part of their landscape, more than a mere tourist.

I felt their strength in the sound of their footfall and saw intelligence in their dark eyes, with their beautiful lashes. When the older male looked at me, it was not with a dull gaze. He was observing as much as I was. Despite their girth, there is a grace in the way they graze the grasses. The older male began to greet me at the fence when I arrived. When I went with my visiting mother, we were in the adjacent goat pen. I turned around to find my bison friend’s face inches from mine, where he had stuck it through a hole.

Bison in the Wild

Bison are even-toed ungulates, which are animals that hold their body weight on the tips of their toes while in motion. They are usually hooved. Others among the diverse group of ungulate mammals are the rhinoceros, zebra, camel, alpaca, warthog, pig, hippopotamus, giraffe, deer, elk, moose, caribou, reindeer, gazelle, antelope, yak, auroch, sheep, goat, oryx, and musk ox.

The bison and the buffalo are both animals of the Bovidae family, but the bison is of the genus Bison, while the buffalo is of the genus Syncerus. They are related, but they are not the same creature. Their genes diverged 5 to 10 million years ago. Still, as we called them buffalo before their genus was determined, it is acceptable to refer to them by either name. There are two living species, the American bison, composed of plains bison and wood bison, as well as the European bison. There were four other known bison species that are now extinct.

Bison are the largest terrestrial animals in North America, weighing up to 2,000 pounds. The nomadic grazers travel in a large herd during the reproductive season from June to September. Otherwise, the females travel in their own herd with the young, including males under three years of age. The adult males travel together in a smaller herd; a bull seldom travels alone.

Both the male and female bison have horns, and are good swimmers, crossing rivers over a half-mile wide. Bison enjoy wallowing in small shallows of dirt or mud. They can appear peaceful and unconcerned, but they are unpredictable in temperament. Without warning they might launch into an attack. They can cover large distances at a gallop of up to 35 mph. Bison are most dangerous during mating season, when the older bulls rejoin the herd, hormones are high, and fights occur.

When there is outside danger, the female bison circle up around the young, old, and infirm. The bulls take position on the outside. When danger strikes, they come together to protect each other. The only known predators of the bison are the grey wolf, brown and grizzly bear, coyote, and human.

Buffalo Brother

My friend from the zoo!

I used to have anger issues. I began the Buddhist work of Lovingkindness as a means of reshaping that part of me, embracing gratitude, mindfulness, and compassion. I began to dream of Buffalo Brother, who gave me two options. I could snort and engage him in combat, or I could let my anger dissolve into the earth beneath me and graze quietly with him in the grasses. In our world, bison are humble and quiet and content to roam the wilds, but when provoked, they become giant, lumbering, movable mountains. I took this lesson to heart and adopted him as a guide. I connect buffalo to both my root and my heart chakra.

In many traditions, the bison is a symbol of gratitude. It represents the sacredness of life, the relation of all things, and the relation of all those things with the Earth beneath us. It is about honoring all living things, being humble enough to ask for help, and grateful for whatever help is given and offered. I’m going to repeat that: grateful for whatever help is given. That’s the point, right? If you ask for help and then are picky about what is offered, that is not gratitude. In that respect, buffalo medicine is also about prayer.

Bison turn their faces into approaching storms, standing firmly against them. Buffalo stands proud against the winds of adversity. Those called to this medicine should remember to temper themselves in dealings with others and allow tranquility and peace to enter their lives. Strive to see the positive side of all things.

Buffalo is about abundance. It’s about seeing that you have everything you need at your disposal. You do. But sometimes you have to dig into uncomfortable places to get to it. That doesn’t mean it isn’t there. Just because it’s not what you want, doesn’t mean it isn’t there. Being grateful for what you have is true prosperity. Stop focusing on what you don’t have and focus on what you do. Keep a daily gratitude list. This practice will change the way your brain thinks, and you will start to see all the good in the world. It will change you from the inside, and you will find that you no longer need to worry about storing your frustrations inside, because buffalo teaches us to release them into the earth.

The Legend of the White Buffalo

The relationship between the Native People and the buffalo was beautiful. They killed what they needed, offering prayers of gratitude to the Great Spirit before the hunt, and having ceremonies honoring the life of the buffalo afterwards. The meat would feed the tribe. The skins and hides were used to make clothing and shelter. Even the hooves were ground down to make glue. Buffalo gifted the People life by sacrificing his own. Many hunters wore protective amulets made of buffalo bone.

Many Native tribes have legends of White Buffalo Woman, who came to the People and taught them how all things were connected. She brought them the sacred pipe and taught them medicine rituals. She promised to return to them in an era of Peace, and since then the birth of a rare white buffalo has been an omen of promise and hope, marking an end to suffering.

Pida miya, Tatanka.

[Contains passages originally posted in Animal Allies: Buffalo Brother on September 25, 2013.] 

What Seal Tells Me

In my spirituality, I often turn to nature for wisdom gleaned from its patterns and creative forces. And I also look to the rest of the animal world for qualities I admire or look to emulate. Sometimes I adopt animal guides for a period of time. Sometimes they adopt me.

I have walked/swum with seal since I was a young girl. I fell in love with a stuffed, white seal at a zoo. I called my friend Sammi. She's still with me, though her skin is a dingy grey now. I have always loved water. I have always loved swimming in it. And I saw my seal friend as a guide for me as I swam through my dreams at night.

Other animal guides have come and gone, but Sammi has always been there.

Years ago, I attended a workshop designed to get me in touch with my shadow animal. I totally expected to find myself in the skin of a centipede (and I went anyway). I wasn't prepared to find myself transformed into the guise of a familiar friend, slick skin, flippers, and all. Except I was a seal rock climbing, with no water in sight. And it hurt beneath me, sharp edges cutting at my edges. And it hurt, but I kept moving.

I thought about that memory while I was in the hospital, learning how to walk again. I called out to my animal totem and asked it's spirit to walk with me on my journey. It's difficult now. My skin is different. The shape of my legs has altered. Walking still takes thought and effort. I know it'll keep getting better and someday it will feel normal again, but for the moment, I am a floundering a bit out of my element, like a seal out of water. Like a seal trying to clamber over jagged rocks, only my jagged rocks are stairs and bathtub rails.

In my dreams at night, I swim and dance, and remember two feet gliding easily across the earth. And I ask my seal friends to keep me company, so we can learn to walk together.

Looking Back: Unexplainable Things Have a Purpose

“If the wonder’s gone when the truth is known

there never really was any wonder.”

~ from the television show House

Unexplainable things have a purpose. It’s something I believe. It’s not the same thing as “everything happens for a reason.” I don’t believe that is true, as it insinuates that something somewhere is orchestrating the event. In the natural world, things just are and what matters is how we take them. I believe that sometimes the purpose of unexplainable things is just to exist and/or happen, in order to serve as a moment against which we respond and reveal how we react to things unknown. They can be teachable moments, reflecting our vulnerabilities and levels of openness. We cannot control what happens to us all the time. The only control we have is how we respond to it.

Some people think of death as the ultimate unexplainable thing. We try to make sense of it in order to find some solid ground to stand on when we face it but we also meet the stories of those who have come back from death with disbelief and skepticism. We want to know but we want to know and have difficulty accepting an outside voice as truth, assuring that we can never truly have an answer.

Unexplainable things happen but even calling them that is a misnomer. It’s not that they can’t be explained. It’s more that we lack the understanding or language to put the experience into words that make sense. Maybe because we try to put into words something our intuitive bodies just know. We have multiple senses and each of these have their own language and way of responding to and translating the world around us. We spend so much time trying to figure out if what happened to us could have happened to us, that we lose sight of the fact the experience happened at all. Some of these teachable moments are not as grandiose as death. They can be small events that evoke a larger change within us.

In the summer of ’97 on a Smoky Mountain peak, I wandered away from my house at dusk, away from the chaos of people, towards the small creek that ran along the property. I was having one of those nights of feeling like there was no place to be alone in a house twenty-one people lived in and I was looking for a little inner quiet. I must have sat on the bank of the creek, listening to the gurgling, rippling and singing of the water off the stones for an hour, unmoving, just being.

I almost didn’t notice the shadow that flew over me and by the time I reacted the creature was sitting on a low branch above the creek five feet in front of me. It was the first memory I have of seeing an owl in the wild. It was by the far the largest bird I have ever seen in nature. She appeared mostly white, with bits of grey tufted here and there. She wasn’t moving and her eyes took me in. They were large and round and the color of dandelions. She might have had horns, and in some recollections earlier on I was more sure- before my brain started telling me what could or couldn’t be possible.

I held my breath as the owl turned its head around. For the moment that we sat there, the smell of the air seemed to shift, filling with a muskier scent of moldy earth and grated wood bark. I exhaled and the owl spread its wings out and flew silently, not even a whisper, over my head. I fell backwards as it passed, watching it glide overhead, in fearful intimidation. I remember her wing span was almost as wide as I am tall.

In that moment, I felt like I had glimpsed an unaltered state of the natural world. It woke something in me and my eyes were open, seeing the wild in tandem with the modern. For years I studied every kind of owl looking for the scientific name of the one I saw. No picture ever fit the creature I saw.

One day I asked myself, if someone told me that the owl I saw was impossible in nature, would I disbelieve the experience? The answer was no. Even though I couldn’t find the correct scientific answer, my nose remembered its smell. My skin remembered the rush and blur of air as the owl swooped in. My eyes remember with artistic grandeur the unfurling of those wings. And my ears recall the kind of silence that accompanies the presence of a predator in nature. I chose to embrace the truth that my interaction with this magnificent creature woke a connection in me and served as the catalyst for the spiritual path I have taken. Knowing the facts and the science about that moment would not diminish the wonder and magic of the experience, and it shouldn’t.

[This article was originally published February 23, 2011]

"The most beautiful experience we can have is the mysterious.

It is the fundamental emotion that stands at the cradle of true art

and true science. Whoever does not know it and can no longer wonder,

no longer marvel, is as good as dead, and his eyes are dimmed."
-Albert Einstein

We are All Relations

Mara, descendant of the Little Boy.

I was at the zoo this weekend, talking to the mountain lion, when I overheard a conversation between a small boy and his father.

“He’s sleeping, like me on the couch.”

“You’re not an animal, dad,” the son said.

“That’s true,” dad answered, and they moved on.

But it wasn’t true. We are animals. I’ve always had a soft spot for other animals, seeing them as kin and cousin. We put food out when we have stray cats about. We put seed out for the birds and nuts for the squirrels. When we get mice in the house, we put out humane traps to catch them live and release them to the woods. We do this because we live on the same land they do. We all share this space of city, and we do what we have to do to survive.

We do this because when we put food out, the cats leave our garbage alone. When we put seeds and nuts out, the birds and squirrels don’t eat from our garden. We find ways to co-exist. Relationships are born from kindness, human or otherwise.

There was a black and white stray cat we named Little Boy who was the dominant tomcat in our neighborhood for over seven years. He regularly came by to get some food and show us he was alive. Sometimes he had kittens with him, showing them his route, and where the kind humans lived. He died after a street fight. One of his other regulars took him to the vet and had to put him to sleep. A lot of people missed him when he was gone. How many strangers were unknowingly connected by our concern for this one cat?

We get a lot of strays in the city. When a small black and white kitten showed up on our stoop last summer, it was a familiar sight. She even bore an uncanny resemblance to our old friend and we took Mara in. A week later, a second black and white kitten showed up, same age, though she was slightly longer-haired. A local rescue helped us find her a forever home. And then the third kitten showed up, who might have been Mara’s twin; they had similar markings and the same short, stumpy tail. He also looked just like the Little Boy. We were sure they was a family. We took one in, found a home for a second, and we were watching over their brother, who did not seem interested in people at all. But we were waiting to earn his trust.

Easter Sunday, we went for a walk. I got dressed and took out the garbage. I could hear the crying of a cat bouncing around the rooftops. I turned to see if I could spy the cat, wondering if it was a hungry Little Boy, Jr. He’s been by a lot lately. At the end of our walk, we veered back a less scenic route, and immediately knew why. There was a lump in the street. It could have been a garbage bag. It wasn’t. We both knew it, at the same time. I ran across the road.

It was Mara’s brother.

I cried out. He was dead, but it had recently happened. He was warm, still limp with just a slight stiffness to his legs and tail. The blood was still fresh on the pavement, bright against the road, and he had voided himself. I knew that he was the cat I had heard crying out.

I’ve seen a lot of animals dead in the road. But none whose faces were familiar to me. I said prayers over his body, hulking in the middle of the street, daring the cars to hit me without a word. Because I couldn’t understand why, if I had heard him from my house, the people in the houses across from his body, who came out to stare at me standing in the road, hadn’t come out to help him. Because he was just an animal. Too many people stand on the other side of a closed door before responding, waiting to see if someone else is going to take care of it.

I run to the sounds of people and animals in distress. Because I would want someone to come help me, or one of my cats. I would rather find out I was concerned for nothing than find out later I could have done something.

It could have been one of my cats I picked up off the road, held in my gloved hands, and bundled into a heavy plastic bag. Little Boy, Jr. didn’t have a home. He didn’t have anyone who loved him special and the least we could do was see to the end of his life with dignity.

I would have felt that for any animal I found dead. A friend of ours offered us his woods to bury Little Boy, Jr. in. We labored in the warm sun to carve a hole in clay and stone, digging around and under thickened tree roots. We buried him in a hole between two birch trees with a view of a wooded hillside and a creek running gently beside him. We laid three pieces of silver over his body and burned sage above his grave.

When we listen to the world around us, when we step outside of ourselves, we feel the threads of connection to everything. If you meditate on that web, you feel connected to everything, and you can’t imagine being the cause of pain or sadness in another living being. And magic happens.

We went for a walk, spontaneously. We found his body moments after his last death, before another vehicle could run over where he lay in the road. People who knew his face and cared about him, found him.

It’s not that I think things happen for a reason. I don’t believe in purpose like that. But I do believe that if we can connect to the intuitive world outside of our flesh, we will find ourselves drawn to the places we need or should be. Where we can be of the most help or in the place of being helped... that thing we call luck.

We are all relations, all animals trying to survive in this world together. I treat all living things as I wish to be treated, with kindness and compassion. May we all do the same. May it be so.

What is Sacred? The Story of White Buffalo Woman

I am an idealist. I always try to offer another perspective, granting the benefit of the doubt to an annoying level to those around me. It’s a choice. I’m not simple minded. But I found myself listing too far towards jaded, so I chose to see a silver lining until I could see how dark the cloud truly was. Hope is my bread and butter. Not in a fanatical way. I’m no Pollyanna. I see the world the way it is.

If magic is in the manifestation of energy and words, then hope is the exhalation of breath. The unfurling seed. Hope is picking your foot up off the ground because you believe the only way out is forward and through. It’s returning a stranger’s dropped twenty dollar bill when you only have two dollars in your wallet. It’s the belief that people are good at heart; that we’re meant to be good. In this way, hope is sacred to me. What is sacred to you?

The White Buffalo

One of my main totem animal guides is Buffalo. Buffalo is my earth, my grounding radiance, my Buddhisattva ideals. The buffalo is sacred to me also, in my practice. Last week I wrote about Buffalo Brother, and how I adopted him as a guide for my work with gratitude, compassion, and loving-kindness. Among the legends of buffalo you will find stories of the white buffalo, sacred to the many Native American tribes, including the Lakota, who call it Tatanka Ska. While the white buffalo is a message that all living beings are connected and interdependent, it is also considered to be a warning to the Lakota. The birth of a white buffalo is a sign that it is time to focus on creating a healthy, harmonious, and peaceful world.

The legend of White Buffalo Woman originates with a starving people; the game had disappeared. The seven sacred council fires of the Lakota Sioux were joined together in their suffering. Two men went into the Black Hills of South Dakota to hunt. They came upon a young woman dressed in white. One hunter tried to claim her by force and she turned him into a pile of bones. She told the second hunter to return to his tribe and tell them she was coming. She came, carrying a sacred pipe. She laid it down, facing east. She stayed with the people and taught them to pray, to respect the earth, to respect the buffalo for their sacrifice so the People could live, and all of the rituals and ways to share in the smoke of the sacred pipe.

When she left, she said she would return in a time of peace. She walked away, bending to the earth and rolling over. She transformed into a black buffalo, then a brown one, a red one, and finally a white one. After her visit, the buffalo returned to the earth and the Lakota thrived. The image of the white buffalo became as compelling a symbol to the People as the peace pipe. John Lame Deer says, "A white buffalo is the most sacred living thing you could ever encounter." The lesson of White Medicine Woman is that, if man can live in true harmony with the natural world, as part of it, not above it, then he will see he has everything he needs around him.

There are four reasons a bison calf may be born white. An albino will remain white their entire life, with pink eyes and, most likely hearing and vision problems. There is a rare genetic condition where the calf is born white but their coat turns brown as it matures over the next two years. A beefalo calf is more common, born from bison and cattle crossbreeding. The white coloration comes from their cattle ancestors. And then there is the leucistic calf, a buffalo born with white fur and blue eyes. The odds of a leucistic birth is one in ten million. In the last 200 years, only a handful of these births have been reported.

On May 11, 2011, a white calf named Lightning Medicine Cloud was born to Buffalo Woman at the Lakota Ranch in Greenville, Texas. I followed his exploits on-line, but not for long. Before his first birthday he and his mother died of a bacterial infection called blackleg. After his death, Arby Little Soldier, the 3x great-grandson of Sitting Bull, and owner of the calf, said, "The Native Americans see the birth of a white buffalo calf as the most significant of prophetic signs, equivalent to the weeping statues, bleeding icons, and crosses of light that are becoming prevalent within the Christian churches today. Where the Christian faithful who visit these signs see them as a renewal of God's ongoing relationship with humanity, so do the Native Americans see the white buffalo calf as the sign to begin life's sacred hoop."

An Oglala Medicine Man from South Dakota, Floyd Hand Looks For Buffalo says that, “the arrival of the white buffalo…will bring about purity of mind, body, and spirit and unify all nations- black, red, yellow, and white.” A month after the death of Lightning Medicine Cloud, a white calf was born on a dairy farm in Goshen, Connecticut. Four elders from the Oglala Sioux Tribe performed a naming ceremony for him, along with members of the Cayuga, Lakota, Mohawk, and Seneca tribes. Yellow Medicine Dancing Boy will be cared for and raised as a symbol of hope.

What is Sacred to You?

Because of my work, the image of the buffalo, white or brown, is a sacred symbol. Trees are also sacred to me. When we sacrifice them they become shelter, paper, fuel. When they are rooted in the earth they are oxygen. It makes me sad to see the human population multiplying and the tree population dwindling. They are necessary. They are life bringers. Look around your world. What in it is sacred to you? In this, world, the other thing that is sacred to me is kindness. Goodness. Those ways of being, of breathing, are their own message of hope. I walk towards them every day, my feet on the ground in prayer.

"People are often unreasonable and self-centered. Forgive them anyway. If you are kind, people may accuse you of ulterior motives. Be kind anyway. If you are honest, people may cheat you. Be honest anyway. If you find happiness, people may be jealous. Be happy anyway. The good you do today may be forgotten tomorrow. Do good anyway. Give the world the best you have and it may never be enough. Give your best anyway. Afterall, it was never between you and them anyway." - Mother Teresa

Animal Allies: Buffalo Brother

Bison bison, photo by Jack Dykinga

A few years ago, our local zoo was host to a pair of male bison. I had never seen one in person, but I had dreamt of them thundering across the plains. I had dreamt of running with them in buffalo skin and walking among them with human feet. At difficult periods in my life, I called on their strength to aid me in putting one foot ahead of the other, to keep moving forward no matter what was coming at me.

I could not resist the opportunity to observe them in the waking world. I went to the zoo every week, sitting outside their pen. I told them stories about their European ancestors, the ancient aurochs. I thanked them for the generations of bison who have been feeding and sheltering humanity. I told them about the bison cave drawings in Altamira, Spain that date to 12,000 BC. I told them about the drawings in the Niaux Cave of France. Mostly I sat in silence, trying to become part of their landscape, not a mere tourist.

Altamita, Spain circa 12,000 BC

You could feel their strength, and see intelligence in their dark eyes, with their beautiful lashes. When the older male looked at me, it was not with a dull gaze. He was observing as much as I was. Despite their girth, there is a grace in the way they graze the grasses. The older male began to greet me at the fence when I arrived. When I went with my visiting mother, we were in the adjacent goat pen. I turned around to find my bison friend’s face inches from mine, where he had stuck it through a hole.

Bison in the Wild

Bison are even-toed ungulates, which are animals that hold their body weight on the tips of their toes while in motion. They are usually hooved. Others among the diverse group of ungulate mammals are the rhinoceros, zebra, camel, alpaca, warthog, pig, hippopotamus, giraffe, deer, elk, moose, caribou, reindeer, gazelle, antelope, yak, auroch, sheep, goat, oryx, and musk ox.

The bison and the buffalo are both animals of the Bovidae family, but the bison is of the genus Bison, while the buffalo is of the genus Syncerus. They are related, but they are not the same creature. Their genes diverged 5 to 10 million years ago. Still, as we called them buffalo before their genus was determined, it is acceptable to refer to them by either name. There are two living species, the American bison, composed of plains bison and wood bison, as well as the European bison. There were four other known bison species that are now extinct.

Bison are the largest terrestrial animals in North America, weighing up to 2,000 pounds. The nomadic grazers travel in a large herd during the reproductive season from June to September. Otherwise, the females travel in their own herd with the young, including males under three years of age. The adult males travel together in a smaller herd; a bull seldom travels alone.

Both the male and female bison have horns, and are good swimmers, crossing rivers over a half-mile wide. Bison enjoy wallowing in small shallows of dirt or mud. They can appear peaceful and unconcerned, but they are unpredictable in temperament. Without warning they might launch into an attack. They can cover large distances at a gallop of up to 35 mph. Bison are most dangerous during mating season, when the older bulls rejoin the herd, hormones are high, and fights occur.

When there is outside danger, the female bison circle up around the young, old, and infirm. The bulls take position on the outside. When danger strikes, they come together to protect each other. The only known predators of the bison are the grey wolf, brown and grizzly bear, coyote, and human.

Buffalo Brother

My friend, saying hello.

I used to have anger issues. I began the Buddhist work of Lovingkindness as a means of reshaping that part of me, embracing gratitude, mindfulness, and compassion. I began to dream of Buffalo Brother, who gave me two options. I could snort and engage him in combat, or I could let my anger dissolve into the earth beneath me and graze quietly with him in the grasses. In our world, bison are humble and quiet and content to roam the wilds, but when provoked, they become giant, lumbering, movable mountains. I took this lesson to heart and adopted him as a guide. I connect buffalo to both my root and my heart chakra.

In many traditions, the bison is a symbol of gratitude. It represents the sacredness of life, the relation of all things, and the relation of all those things with the Earth beneath us. It is about honoring all living things, being humble enough to ask for help, and grateful for whatever help is given and offered. I’m going to repeat that: grateful for whatever help is given. That’s the point, right? If you ask for help and then are picky about what is offered, that is not gratitude. In that respect, buffalo medicine is also about prayer.

Bison turn their faces into approaching storms, standing firmly against them. Buffalo stands proud against the winds of adversity. Those called to this medicine should remember to temper themselves in dealings with others and allow tranquility and peace to enter their lives. Strive to see the positive side of all things.

Buffalo is about abundance. It’s about seeing that you have everything you need at your disposal. You do. But sometimes you have to dig into uncomfortable places to get to it. That doesn’t mean it isn’t there. Just because it’s not what you want, doesn’t mean it isn’t there. Being grateful for what you have is true prosperity. Stop focusing on what you don’t have and focus on what you do. Keep a daily gratitude list. This practice will change the way your brain thinks, and you will start to see all the good in the world. It will change you from the inside, and you will find that you no longer need to worry about storing your frustrations inside, because buffalo teaches us to release them into the earth.

The Legend of the White Buffalo

The relationship between the Native People and the buffalo was beautiful. They killed what they needed, offering prayers of gratitude to the Great Spirit before the hunt, and having ceremonies honoring the life of the buffalo afterwards. The meat would feed the tribe. The skins and hides were used to make clothing and shelter. Even the hooves were ground down to make glue. Buffalo gifted the People life by sacrificing his own. Many hunters wore protective amulets made of buffalo bone.

Many Native tribes have legends of White Buffalo Woman, who came to the People and taught them how all things were connected. She brought them the sacred pipe and taught them medicine rituals. She promised to return to them in an era of Peace, and since then the birth of a rare white buffalo has been an omen of promise and hope, marking an end to suffering.

Pida miya, Tatanka.

Where Grief Meets Joy

Eating in private.

In the middle of June, we lost our youngest cat, just a few years after the death of our middle cat. We were just beginning to lessen our hard grief for Luna when Bella died, and it seemed incomprehensible to hold two times such a loss. And then Mara came.

We weren’t looking. Not yet. When Luna died, it was a couple of years before we could contemplate the idea of a new cat. We spent our time watching Bella come out of her shell and revel in her new position within the house. We eased our grief by watching her come into her own. And then she faded, just as quickly as Luna, and was gone.

The quiet in the house was overwhelming and we knew we needed new life, sooner than later. But the grief was a literal and physical ache. My arms wanted to scoop our little tortoiseshell monster up. I wanted to hear her raspy, croaky cry of demand. I wanted to sing the little songs I had made up for her when she was shy and still living under the bed. I wanted to fall asleep with her lying on my ribs, head on my breast.

I can’t open a can of tuna without a moment of sadness that Bella and Luna don’t come running into the kitchen. I missed the sass and backtalk of a cat that doesn’t want to do what you tell it to do. And then came Mara.

I think I might like to be with you now.

She might have been watching me for days without my noticing. It was heartbreaking to spy her hiding in the doorway to the basement next door, watching me in the garden with the stance of an animal ready to bolt should our eyes meet. So I ignored her while I weeded. I ignored her while I watered the garden. I went inside, put some food in a dish and put it out at the edge of our yard for her, and went back in. It was ten minutes before she approached the bowl and ate her fill, rapidly.

We did that for a few days. Every morning while I was gardening she was there, black and white with wide yellow-green eyes. I would talk to her softly while I trained the morning glory vines around the trellis. I put her food out before I started in the garden, each morning bringing the bowl closer to the porch. Each morning, she waited less time before approaching it. Then one day, a week and a half later, she came running to me as I put the bowl down. I didn’t try to touch her. But I let her rub against my ankles.

My heart was torn. I could feel affection growing for her but when I went inside, it was my girls I wanted back. The as-yet-unnamed cat was not the first we have invited to shelter at our stoop. In fact, she bore an uncanny resemblance to a brother and sister pair who were dumped as kittens. They were purchased for two children, and abandoned when the family moved, left in that same basement doorway. By the time we noticed them, they had grown into sleek and feral strays. They would shelter out the rain on our stoop and get regular, free meals from us. Neither were interested in being part of our family, but they adopted us as kin just the same.

One day, Little Boy came without Little Girl. We never saw her again. He came and went on his own for over four years. One time, after a lengthy absence, he strolled up our sidewalk with three kittens in tow; a black and white, a tiger, and an orange tabby. Little Boy was showing them where he scored free food. And like good patrons, we fed his wards as well, until another neighbor took them in.  

Little Boy eventually died after a bad fight. A neighbor took him to the vet but there was nothing to be done for him. So it was heartwarming to see the young cat hiding in the same doorway where we had first seen him, with such similar markings.

I don't think you understand- I live here now.

After she decided our house was safe, our new friend was bold about running to greet us when the door opened or the car returned. Then she stopped leaving at all, and was sleeping full-time on our stoop. We put out a tote with a towel in it for her, to protect her from the storms she hated. I started reading on the porch just to spend time with her. I didn’t forget about my grief for Bella; being around another affectionate cat made me miss her more. But I was aware, at the same time, that there was a special connection happening between us and I wanted to give it a chance. She and I were building a relationship that was all our own.

I thought about my ancestor work. I sat outside with her at night, to the sound of crickets, and told her the story of Little Girl and Little Boy. I told her the stories of Luna and Bella. I asked her if she wanted to live with us and she climbed into my lap for the first time and head butted me. She went to the door and stood up, pawing at it.

You are totally gonna let me inside.

When we pulled her name from the ether, when we called out the name Mara, and she looked up at us, we knew that if we could open ourselves to the moment, we had met another animal that could be part of our family. She was meant to be. We named her Mara Silver, for she was the silver lining in an emotionally dark summer. I made the practical decision to let Mara have Bella’s food bowl, though I cried when I washed it out. I was washing out the last bits of her. But I smiled when I put it down in front of Mara, and watched her eat her first meal in a safe place.

Told you.

It was because of how deeply we loved Luna and Bella that there was enough love to fight through the grief. We had enough love to welcome a new member into our family. The legacy that those we lose leave behind is love. Let that be the light in your darkness. There is always love. Be the beacon of sharing that love with the world, and those who are gone will live on through your actions.

Shadow Animals

Photo by Christian Svane.

Like many spiritual practices, mine involves the use of animal guides for mentorship, metaphor, and personal transformation. But that doesn’t just go for the animals whose spirit I want to emulate or learn from. It also involves the ones that create a moment of true and absolute fear in me. Everyone has something that terrifies them. I am no exception. In order to live fully in myself in this space, in this lifetime, I try to face my fears, albeit one at a time.

My biggest terror is the centipede. My gut response to them is: nothing with that many legs should be allowed to live! It’s primal and irrational. It involves banging on drywall with hammers trying to smash them. I spent my childhood in a home with a dirt-floor basement and we would get centipedes in the house during the summer. I have always been terrified of them. I have woken up with them crawling on my bare flesh and I have almost ruined carpets trying to drown them. Not my finest moments.

And still, that fear is something I usually keep secret because I have always been surrounded by people who think it’s funny to taunt someone with the things that scare them. That is so not the same thing as helping someone face their fears. I once played a practical joke on my suitemates in college with a realistic-looking spider pin I had been given as a gift, because I thought it was so well done. I didn’t know my one friend was as afraid of them as I was of creepy-ninja-swift-crawlers. I have always felt bad about scaring her. She forgave me because I hadn’t known, but I have not played a scary practical joke since… because what if someone thought that was funny to do to me? I force myself to be vulnerable and reveal my cracks, because I am not perfect. That’s the point. I am human and I am a work in progress, and it is often our flaws that are most telling about where those places of fear live within us.

A few years ago, I began to work with what I had dubbed my Shadow Animal. My fear place. What was it about the centipede that elicited such whimpers from me? That drove me onto furniture in a heaving pile of panic? I wanted to know. I didn’t want such a small creature to have so much power over me.

I recommend you look to your places of fear and dive into the darkness. It’s not for everyone, but to stand in that moment, to face the darkness, to step into it... no matter what happens in between that moment and its end, when you emerge you realize that you survived. And maybe it was terrifying. And maybe you really felt that terror. But it passed through you. It didn’t remain. You survived. Which may sound dramatic when we’re talking about centipedes. But we’re not talking specifically about centipedes- we’re talking about fear.

My fear animal became a mirror to me. What is it about the centipede that scares me so? It runs swiftly, like a whisper. You almost can’t see it. They fill me with that swarming sensation, like a tsunami wave coming rapidly and engulfing everything… thousands of tiny legs skittering over flesh in a hot summer. Sweat beads up a little on my skin at the memory of it. But since my youth I have lain beneath a wool blanket in the scorching sun in meditation so deep I did not flinch at the feeling of insects crawling across my skin. I have worked through that fear. So what is it?

They move so fast… The secret beneath the mystery for me lies in the movement, feathers racing across stone. They are just walking, just moving through their world, and I see them, in my irrational brain, lunging and coming straight for me like a predator. They live in a faster world, their lifetime crunched into five years. They breathe at a faster pace than we do, in the same way that our tree friends, who breathe in seasons, breathe slower than we do. To our tree friends, we are constantly in motion and seldom still.

So it’s the pace of the small arthropod that unsettles me and pokes my scary button. It didn’t take me long to hazard a guess as to why. I never dive into anything. I never jump head first without vetting the endeavor. It’s not that I won’t say yes, but I need to weigh it first. Do I have the energy? Do I have the time? Do I have the skills? Do I have the desire? I think my true fear place is a question or situation that involves an immediate and snap decision, and that I will have no answer for, that I will feel frozen in indecision. Cue skittering centipedes.

Knowing that suddenly made the idea of the centipede a little less scary in my head. But in person? Could I face the panic? I didn’t know, but I had the chance to test the theory recently. My friends and I were cleaning out an old woodpile, scraping off the rotting bark and restacking the logs to dry. Beneath the bark were white centipedes with red markings on their heads, skittering madly up the wood when exposed. I totally yelped. I totally dropped the log. I totally asked for someone else to get rid of them. I totally closed my eyes hoping they would disappear while I wasn’t looking.

But I didn’t run away. I didn’t switch jobs. I pulled up my work gloves and took a very deep breath. I prepared myself that there were going to be centipedes. This is where they lived. I was going to see them. I had to accept it. I peeled the bark up with my (covered) fingers and used the tip of a knife to pry the centipedes off, dropping them into the rot litter below. I didn’t go terribly fast, but I didn’t stop. I made some horrified faces, but I kept going. Little by little, the white-numbing fear ebbed away, a little less each time I uncovered more.

Sometimes, the only way out is through, and not being able to push into these fear places are why we feel stuck, like we’re standing still. They are still my shadow animal. I still don’t like them, or want them in my house. But I’d like to think the next time I see one on my wall, I might not jump quite so high.

Midwifing Death. Goodbye Bella.

Bella Marie, April 1, 2002 - June 11, 2013

The death of our middle cat, Luna, was one of the major catalysts that prompted me to start this blog and share my work. I realized that yesterday, when I went back into the archives to see what I’d written about then. Only I hadn’t. This is the first time I have tried to write from a place of fresh grief.

Today, we had to put another little family member down. It was unexpected and a quick turn. Our hearts are broken for the loss of our youngest cat. Like many people, we found ourselves in the position of having to choose whether or not we could put an end to Bella’s suffering, whether or not we could decide to open the door for death.

It wasn’t easy and it took us a day of going back and forth to come to an agreement. All the while, our darling girl faded more and more, and we could see it. Still, it was hard to make that choice. It’s supposed to be. We shouldn’t ever be able to choose to end a life easily. It was a sacred choice. A human choice. A necessary choice. Bella was sick. She was only going to get sicker. It was important to us that we be able to make that choice, before she was in distress. We waited too long with Luna and her final moments were not peaceful.

This kind of grief is feral. It threatens to loosen itself at every moment of habit that you realize is suddenly altered-for-life because of the absence of a loved one. This was the second time we have had to make the choice to end a life. When we took Luna to the vet, we thought we were taking her in to get better, only to discover there was only one option left. This time, we hoped the vet would tell us there was some miracle way that Bella could be okay… but we understood we were taking her to the vet to be put to sleep. Put down. Killed. Nothing sounds right, even though it was the right choice. It was not the choice we wanted to make. It was not a choice easily made. But we had learned from the first one.

While waiting for our appointment, we put on Bella’s favorite music, Yo-Yo Ma playing Bach on the Cello. We followed her around the house and cooed over her. We sang her every silly song we had ever made up for her. We snuggled with her. We brushed her with her favorite soft-bristled brush. We told her how much we loved her, over and over.

We held her head and promised her some peace as she died. I told her she was the best girl ever. Just like I did with Luna. And I meant it again. She was our baby. To be able to stand in that space with her… it’s a strength I didn’t know I had. Luna was gasping for air and it was an easy choice in the moment. This one was harder, maybe, because that other loss is still so painful. If you want to know what your places of fear are, if you want to know what you’re made of, the first time you sit a death bed vigil, you will.

She died in seconds, maybe less. I wrapped her in the purple blanket we bought her when she was a kitten and held her to my chest. My heart needed to feel that her heart was no longer beating. I needed to feel the rhythm-less weight of her in my arms before I could leave her body behind me, in the room.

One of the last photos I took of her.

It has only been a few hours and my head is dizzy from the interlocking layers of memory, from the feeling of where the spirit world met this physical world at the moment of her death. I can look in the kitchen and see Bella where she sat just this morning, and I know that moment can never happen again. Won’t ever. But both exist for me simultaneously in this grief. She is here and she is not here. To have had such a friend that my soul is so deeply grieved will be a blessing in the days to come, I am sure.

A Letter to Bella (April 1, 2002 – June 11, 2013), from your Momma

You were the nameless one. When we adopted Zami, they were calling her Beth, and Luna was named Sandy. But you were a blank slate in a cage in a mall pet store. And we wouldn’t take you home unless we could feel out your name the way we had found theirs. You were turd-colored in your young tortoiseshell mottling. You were so sick, they were considering putting you to sleep. So, of course, we brought you home.

In plumper days.

            Your first nickname was Brutus, because of the way you slapped your feet on the floor. We could hear you coming from three rooms away. You were more bear than cat at first, very roly poly and surprisingly ungraceful. Do you remember when you were small enough to sleep across the top of my head? How many times did I wake to find you gently kneading my eyelids?

You were a good kitten. I love that you spent your formative years living under the bed, or burrowing caves into folded up blankets. I loved the unpleasant cry that we came to learn was your sweet sound, and the way I would sigh and say, “Ah, the dulcet tones of Bella.” I loved making up songs to sing to you to coax you out of your persistent skittishness. I still think “catnip-stuffed purple moo-cow” is the best lyric I ever wrote.

Bella was fluent in Squirrel and learning Cricket.

I miss the jumpiness of the days before we knew how bad your eyesight was. I miss the way you would armadillo-jump into the air at any sudden movement around you. No wonder you spent so much time under the bed. And if anything about a room changed, like a purse was moved, or shoes were where no shoes had been before, it took you forever to slow-stalk your way in, while you pieced together what was different. While I loved the fat bear-cat who would come out at night and sit in my lap, I did love you best when you stopped living under the bed, when you stopped living like a shadow in our lives.

We shall not soon forget your exploits with your Arch-Nemesis, the Evil Yellow Vacuum Cleaner and his sidekick, the Dreaded Swiffer. Who will defend the dust bunny tribes, now? You evolved over the years from Brutus to Peanut (in the very last moment, I called you Nutter). I can’t imagine my life without you.

I will miss your company, and the lengthy conversations we used to have. I loved that you were a talker. I will miss understanding every nuance of sound you made. I will miss you pawing me in the face in the morning so that I would let you under the covers. I will miss the bullying moments when you would slap my knee with your paw and demand lap, right now, mama, damnit! I will miss giving into you. It was an important lesson for me. You were right, by the way. Ten minutes of lap time a day was not a lot to ask for.

            Little girl, who will be our great Moth Hunter now?

Thank you for being part of our family. Thank you for telling us you were sick. Thank you for trusting us enough to do what was best for you. I realized you had not left the door of the house since you were spayed ten years ago. I am glad you got to see the mountains and green fields before you left us. Before Luna came to greet you. I know you weren’t ready to leave us, but you needed to not be in pain. It’s okay that you wanted out of your body more than you wanted to stay. We understand.

You really were the best girl ever, Bella-bear. I love you. I will miss you forever, and remember you always.

Cave-Bella has left the building. Good night and sweet dreams little girl.

My Grackle Friends

photo shared by Factumquintus

Five years ago, a group of birds woke me on an early spring morning, their piercing croak filling the space outside my bedroom window. I had never seen them at our feeder before, the brown-black birds with iridescent green and purple heads. They were substantially bigger than the house sparrows and cardinals we were used to feeding and they did not seem to be able to manage the cedar feeder without almost knocking it over. They were so flashy in the sunlight that I later had to look them up on the Cornell bird identification website. They were my first grackles.

Of the nine grackles that frequented our yard, only one figured the bird feeder out. He was a little larger than the other ones and he found a way to hook one foot on the side of the feeder and a second foot just underneath it. He bent his body slightly sideways to balance his weight, with his tail wrapped around the side corner. From there, he would use his beak to scrap the seed off the side, down onto the ground for his friends, feeding below.

I watched them every morning when they rolled through for breakfast. I would sit quietly and after a while, they didn’t even startle when I slid the window curtain to the side. My friend, the grackle acrobat, slowly learned some more skills with balancing on the feeder. When he spied me through the window, he would run through all of his tricks and land on the clothesline, staring at me. After a while, he even started calling to me in the morning from the feeder if it was empty, which was one thing the other grackles picked up. Still, above the din, I was able to discern his fuller rusty hinge croak from the others.

When they moved on in the summertime, I was sad to see them go, but grateful for the time I was able to spend with them. The next spring, they returned, my friend front and center, and I was overjoyed. We picked up where we had left off and shared our morning times together. Two years ago, when the grackles returned, my friend was no longer among them. Even though none of the others could manage the feeder, they kept returning, and I spread seed out on the ground to encourage them.

A week and a half ago, I knew spring was finally here when I woke to a sharp grackle cry outside. It is a small group this year, but strong. There is one among them who figured out the feeder first, a smaller female. I found her hunched over the landing strip of the feeder, tucking her tail underneath it for counterbalance, skipping seed down onto the ground for her grateful friends. She unabashedly jumped up onto the clothesline and looked through the window at me.

Over the days, others have mastered the feeder, each in their own way. There is a large pair of males who discovered that if they each land on a side of the feeder at the same time they can keep it from swinging wildly beneath them. I don’t claim to know anything about bird genetic memory, but even still, I allow myself some musings. I know that in the wild, grackles can live eight to twelve years. Maybe there will come a spring that they don’t return. And maybe the grackles will keep coming long after the ones who came with my old friend are dead. Maybe they’ll keep coming long after we move away from where we live now. Maybe the fact that our lives intersected at all have linked our journeys somehow.

I wonder if the young grackles in the group knew my old friend, or if he passed before they were born. I wonder if they remember, and if they do, if they remember him. And then I realized that it doesn’t matter whether or not they do, because I do. These grackles are here and I remember the first grackle that brought them here and found them food. These grackles are living their lives in the moment, eating sitting and throwing up leaves in the dirt. I am bearing witness to the larger journey of their small group. Their lives come and go and I remain.

It is like that with our world, we come and go and the trees in their lengthened years bear witness to our passing. Watching the grackles outside my window, I am reminded that the whole pattern I am watching unfold is what my ancestor work is about. I hold my hand to a thread of ancestral energy that is the pattern of birth, life, and death we humans keep marching through. I hold my hand to that thread, keeping it present and connected to the action of living my life now. That energy is there for all of us to connect into, waiting just on the other side of the curtain, hiding beneath the rusty creak-song of an early spring grackle.

Animal Allies: Owls and the Afterlife

“Humans are part of the animal kingdom, which is part of the vast living world around us. In earth-centered circles, we often adopt animal totems as a means of aligning our energies with specifics elements. The animal world is vast and varied and full of natural magic. Animals are helpful guides in ancestor and spirit work. Where we have lost our connection to the natural world, they have not.

Our animal allies are a key to help cross the threshold, something known and familiar, and cultures throughout history have often associated specific animals with this task. We take their lessons based on indigenous mythology and animal behavior. They represent some part of me and the way that part of me relates to the world around me. The energy of those animals walk with me in my life and when I need guidance I turn to the spirit of my personal allies for strength.”

[Abridged from Animal Allies: Hummingbird Messengers, March 28, 2012]

Interactions with Owls

In the late 1990s I worked two years doing summer stock theatre in Highlands, North Carolina. It was my first time in the south, fitting as in my spiritual life I was on the edge of opening up to something bigger than me. At the time I was lost in the internal philosophy of questing to find it. Highlands sits on the top of a mountain peak where the blue and smoky mountains meet. At dusk and dawn every day, the clouds would roll through town. No one drove during these intervals, but many locals laughed at the glee with which the girl from New York greeted the “fog.”

My true spiritual awakening happened on top of that mountain. It came in the form of an owl visitation. I was sitting by the creek near our house as the clouds were weeping through the woods. I could feel the drops of water walking across my skin. It never ceased to fascinate me.

Something large blurred past me, silent. An invisible curtain dropped over the natural cacophony of insect life at twilight time. Right before me, on a low tree branch sat the largest bird I have ever seen that had not been there moments before. It was the first owl I saw in person and I held my breath the whole time. Not because I thought I would spook it, but because it’s presence held me spellbound. In the gloaming it was mostly white with some grey and large dandelion-colored eyes which stared into me, without blinking.

We sat that way for a few minutes. Then the owl spun its head around, cried into the night, a call that shook me to the bone, and then it lifted, silent as an assassin, flying so swiftly over me that I fell onto my back beneath its shadow. Its wingspan was as wide as I was tall. It was a reminder of how small I am to this world, of how I was just one more animal trying to live among others. It was a gift of Other World touching me on a night when I felt most alone and unseen, when I needed it most. And something within me broke open in that meeting place of water, earth, air and owl.

I have walked with Owl watching over me ever since. Just last year I spent a delicious evening meditating in the woods when a barred owl starting calling out. I called back and, in the moment, found I was a fair mimic. Fair enough that the owl hooted back. We called back and forth at each other for twenty minutes. After the first few exchanges, it stopped feeling like mimicry. Even though I didn’t know what I was saying, it was clear that this animal creature and I were interacting. It was wonderful to lose myself in its world. In my life, owl delivers messages to and from Other World, and aids my work.

Meditations on Owl

Owl medicine is helpful with personal growth, something at the core of the Work that I do. The Owl is a silent and swift predator, taking in the woods around him, deciding on the path before him before taking flight and catching his prey. His hearing is remarkable and he knows the difference between a falling leaf and mouse rustling beneath it. Once an owl has digested its meal, it purges up what it does not need and cannot digest in the form of a small pellet. Owl knows when it’s time to remove what is unwanted and needed in order to make way for new growth. When they cough up the parts of their prey that they don’t digest, they reveal the bones and flesh of the animal in its simplest form. Where others may be deceived, those with owl medicine know the truth of what is hidden.

Owl sees that which others cannot, which often lends to its solitary nature, which also lends to its ability to see deeper within. This animal is a strong ally for soul retrieval, for seeing the healing within that needs to be attended to and know what medicine is right to heal it. When you feel lost, owl essence will help you find your way back to your path, to your wisdom. Owl’s senses see beyond shadows. They pierce through fear and darkness, through what stands in the way so that you might see the other side, where light, happiness and knowledge exist. The only way out is through and Owl knows this to be true.

Owls in Legend:

• Owl fossils have been discovered that date back 60 million years.
• They are one of the few birds found in early cave paintings.
• They are associated with prophecy, and their cries hold meaning: 1 for impending death, 2 for success in an imminent venture, 3 for a woman will marry into the family, 4 for disturbance, 5 for imminent travel, 6 for guests arriving, 7 for mental distress, 8 for sudden death, and 9 for good fortune.
• Mountain legends say the hoot of an owl at midnight means death is coming. An owl circling the sky during the day means bad news.
• Owl allies bring messages through dreams and meditation.
• Owls are associated with witchcraft, magic, wisdom, the unknown, medicine, weather, death, perception, deception, and dreams.

Greek & Roman Legend:

• The Little Owl, Athene noctua, became the companion of Athena, Goddess of Wisdom after she banished the mischievous prankster, crow.
• The owl was the favored of Athene’s feathered creatures, a symbol of her “light,” allowing her to see beyond half-truths. This owl was protected in Greek culture and lived in the Acropolis in large numbers.
• Owls accompanied Greek armies to war. Sighting them on the battlefield was a sign of impending victory.
• Owls watched over commerce and trade. Minted on one side of the Greek coin, they represented good fortune.
• Roman Mythology tells us that Ascalpus spied Proserpine eating a pomegranate in the garden and told on her. She was only allowed to leave if she didn’t eat anything. For his tattling, he was transformed into “a sluggish Screech Owl, a loathsome bird.”
• Romans believed that a dead owl nailed to the door averted all the misfortune its presence had caused to the household. Romans also believed that witches transformed into owls to suck the blood of babies.
• To the Romans, the hoot of an owl foretold death. The defeat of the Roman army at Charrhea, between the Euphrates and Tigris rivers, was supposedly foretold by the hooting of an owl. It is said that the deaths of Julius Caesar, Augustus, Agrippa, and Commodus Aurelius were all preceded by the cry of an owl.
• A 2nd century soothsayer, Artemidorus, claimed that dreaming of an owl meant the traveler would be shipwrecked or robbed.

Celtic Legend:

• Merlin, of Arthurian legend, had an owl as a companion.
• In Celtic mythology, the owl is a guide to the underworld, known as “corpse bird” and “night hag,” associated with wisdom and keen sight.
• Images of owls found in the Celtic Isles pre-date the Greek cults of Athene.
• The Scottish-Gaelic word for old woman is Cailleach and the word for owl is coileach-oidhche which means “night-cockerel.”
• Owls were associated with the Crone aspect of the goddess.
• The owls were guides to the Underworld.
• The myth of Bloudeuwedd, written in the Mabinogi, speaks of a woman magically created as a wife to Lleu. She tricked him into revealing the secret of his mortality and used that to take his life. He avenged his death by transforming her into an owl. The word Bloudeuwedd is still used in Wales to mean owl.
• The Welsh saw the owl as a predator whose time of power was dusk, when it was capable of defeating the falcon.
• The Welsh Goddess Arianrhod was a shapeshifter who transformed into a large owl, looking through owl eyes to see the darkness within humans, as well as the soul.
• The Welsh believed that if an owl was heard hooting among the houses, a young girl had just lost her virginity.
• A cauldron was found sunken in a bog in Bra, Jutland which dates back to the 3rd century B.C. It was broken into pieces before being deposited, most probably as an offering. The handle fittings of the cauldron were owls.

European Legend:

• In the British Isles, owls were associated with death and negative energy. Owl feathers were thought to repel those unwanted energies.
• In the Middle Ages, the owl was associated with witchcraft.
• In early English folk remedies, raw owl eggs were used to treat alcoholism. It was believed that children fed raw owl eggs would be gifted a lifetime’s protection against drunkenness.
• Owl eggs, cooked to ash, were imbibed to improve eyesight.
• Owl broth was a common remedy for children suffering from whooping cough, specifically in Yorkshire.
• In the 18th and 19th centuries, poets Robert Blair and William Wordsworth were fond of using the Barn Owl as their “bird of doom.” In other literature of this time period, barn owls were often associated with death. If an owl screeched outside the window of a sick person, it was believed they would die.
• In English folklore, a barn owl screech meant cold weather or a storm was coming. If the screech was heard during bad weather, it meant a change in storm was imminent.
• Into the 19th century, it was customary to nail a dead owl to a barn door in order to ward off evil and lightning, and protect the livestock within.
• Owls were treated with reverence in France, with several species named for dukes. The Long-Eared Owl was called Hibou Moyen-Duc and the European Eagle Owl was called Hibou Grand-Duc. In the Middle Ages, only nobles above the ranking of duke were allowed the honor of wearing a plume of feathers in their cap and it is suspected owls with ears seemed to them to be of nobler rank.
• Lore in the Lorraine region of France, tells that owls would help spinsters find husbands.
• In Romania, souls of sinners who repent, fly to heaven in the form of snowy owls.
• Poland folklore said that unmarried women became doves when they died, and married women transformed into owls.

Native Legend:

• In Native America, the owl is prevalently associated with death and spirits, though each tribe had a different relationship with the animal. Many saw owls as spirits of the recent dead. Other tribes saw them as underworld messengers who shepherded spirits to the world that comes after death. They are spirit protectors.
• Many tribes referred to owls as Night Eagles.
• Some tribes saw owls as healers and would hang feathers in the doorway of a home to keep illness out.
• The Lenni Lenape (New Jersey) said that an owl shown in a dream would become the guardian of the dreamer.
• The Hopi (Arizona) believed the Burrowing Owl was the manifestation of their god of the dead, who was guardian of fire and caretaker for all things underground, including seed germination. Their name for the owl is Ko’ko, meaning “Watcher of the Dark.”
• The Hopi believed that Great Horned Owls helped their peaches to grow.
• The Mojave (Arizona) believed that in death, everyone became an owl for a short time, then reincarnating as a beetle, until finally becoming pure air.
• The Navajo (Arizona/New Mexico/Utah) believe that the owl is the messenger guide of the other world and other earth-bound spirits.
• The Zuni (New Mexico) placed owl feathers in babies’ cribs to keep evil spirits away from the infant.
• The Newuks (California) believed that brave and virtuous men and women became Great Horned Owls after their death. Those who were wicked of heart became Barn Owls.
• Tribes living in the Sierras (California/Nevada) believed Great Horned Owls would snatch the souls of the dead and transport them to their underworld.
• The Cree (Northwest US/Canada) thought that the whistle of the Boreal Owl was a doorway to spirit world. If the person whistled back, and did not hear a response from the owl, it meant they would soon die.
• The Spedis Owl is a petroglyph found on a rock face at The Dalles, the end of the Oregon Trail along the Columbus River between Washington and Oregon. Figures of this same owl have been found in a wide area in that region, but are focally located on there. Legend says the petroglyph was placed on the rock to protect people from the “water devils” that could pull them under.
• The Dalles was the rough edge of the Northwest Coast area of native people. The Kwagiulth/ Kwakiutl (Vancouver Island, BC) believed that owls were manifestations of people’s souls. They would not harm owls, for if the owl died, so would the person who the soul belonged to.
• The Tlingit (Pacific Northwest) thought warriors that heard an owl were receiving a message of coming victory in battle.
• The Inuit (Alaska) have a story that tells of Snowy Owl and Raven making new clothes for each other. Raven made a dress of black and white feather for Owl. Owl made Raven a white dress. But Raven grew so excited when Owl was fitting the dress that she couldn’t sit still. Owl was angry and threw oil lamp at Raven, which soaked through the white dress, turning it black.

Other Legend:

• In many countries in Africa, owls are associated with sorcery and dark magic. A large owl spotted outside a house indicates a powerful shaman lives there. Many people believe owls carry messages between the shaman and the spirit world.
• The Zulu, and other West African nations, believe the bird has strong influence in spellcasting. They think using owl parts imbues the magical user with great strength.
• The Swahili believe owls bring sickness to children.
• Algerians believed that placing the right eye of an Eagle Owl in the hand of a sleeping woman was a truth spell that would make her tell you what you wanted to know.
• Owl amulets were used as protection for pregnant women in Babylon.
• Food was made from owls in India for medicinal use. Owl eye broth aided seizures in children and owl meat helped with rheumatism. Ingesting owl eyes enabled good night vision.
• In Russia, hunters carried owl claws, a tool for their souls to climb to heaven should they die.
• The Kalmuks believed an owl saved Genghis Kahn and held the animal as sacred.
• Malaysians believed that owls ate infants.
• The Ainu people of Hokkaidu, Japan trust owls to warn them of approaching evil. They believe it mediates between gods and men. They see Blakiston’s Fish Owl, Ketupa blakistoni, as their god kotan kor kamuv, which mean “god of the village.”