2007-04-29

The day dawned sweet and fair. I awoke with my tummy in a knot which refused to budge all day. Fortunately I had plenty of nifty items in my day to divert my attention from that sad truth. I did, however, have to pass up my usual Sunday morning treat of doughnuts.

The service at St. Luke's today was a bit challenging, as I needed to leave the chancel for an emergency run to the bathroom in the midst of Holy Eucharist, and the anthem we sang today, Ye Choirs of New Jerusalem, was pitched high for this newly assigned soprano. However the sermon, on how we hide from the Creator, was just excellent and I was glad I was there.

Jim and I had decided to go up to Avalon right after church and it was a spectacular drive. The whole area’s new leaves had been bitten with frost, and so most of the leaves are just fledglings, some barely able to be seen yet even at this late date. The oaks especially were all pink and blushing. The access road was banked with fire pinks, a stiffly stemmed yellow flower, a much smaller, drooping and multi-blossomed yellow flower, a lovely frail lavender flower and a royal purple flower that looked a bit like a hyacinth. I have never seen such a good year for wildflowers on Avalon. And the hoary mountain mint was out! Yum! It makes great tea.

Jim has done wonders on Avalon. All the debris is gone from the meadow. All the stones which had been strewn around here and there to no obvious purpose have been gathered up by him on previous trips and used to strengthen and improve the outdoor fire pit. There is still a massive amount of scrub to burn, as a big area of serviceberry bushes and many trees had been downed by Bruce and Vara and then left on the ground as they were.

And I have to say that, if the volunteers there thought these bushes and trees were somehow holding negative energy, which was the myth bruited about at the time, I am very puzzled to know why they did not feel it necessary to burn the offending bushes and trees. Removing evil spirits or whatever they thought was occurring is done by burning them to ashes, not by leaving the downed material to rot in place.

Jim is healing all those scars, little by little, and he worked again today to better the meadow and near forest. But before he did anything else, he showed me how to herd cattle with a pickup truck, which I had not seen before. When we drove into the meadow, it was liberally dotted with cows. Before I even had a chance to react further than to register surprise and note the charm of the scene, Jim had started tooting his horn, gently, while driving slowly at the nearest cattle. They knew their part and headed towards their home pasture, belonging to our neighbor, Brett. For a while the kine clustered at the fence, but Jim kept tooting the truck's horn and, sure enough, they showed us where the hole in the fence was by going back through to their rightful place. Mick mended the fence on the spot.

Jim’s truck has front seats which he had installed just for me when he bought it. They are very comfortable bucket seats, which recline a bit to ease my back and which are equipped with good chair arms, so I opened the truck to the meadow air and the sound of the creek and read my book. Once in a while I would stop and just sit and drink in the moment. I had some good prayer time, asking Jesus to come into my life more and more - no hiding from the Creator here! I LOVED that sermon! And every once in a while I would watch Jim at work for a while. It was a most lovely and peaceful sojourn.

We came home to settle down and watch a film which Mick had rented, Blood Diamond. It was a tough movie to watch, with its utterly ceaseless violence, and I believe perhaps four or five of the dozens of violent scenes could have been cut to good effect to tighten the film from 2:20 down to perhaps 1:45. None of the impact of the truth of the film would have been lost. Even violence palls if it is unremitting.

The resolution of the sad tale reminded me of the end of an Ingmar Bergman film, The Seventh Seal, where the innocent young family manages to steal away from Death while the anti-hero is distracting death by engaging him in a game of tennis.

I did not previously know anything at all about the illicit diamond trade which is tearing up Africa as smugglers take diamonds across the border where they may sell the stones which are gotten at the expense of much slaughter, for they are mined in the midst of various small wars. Among many other horrors, these countries have the habit of taking young boys from their families and making them boy soldiers.

I have never purchased a diamond. I had some inherited from my mother’s side of the family and my present wedding and engagement rings use stones taken from them. Were I ever to contemplate buying such a gem, I would definitely insist on seeing the proof that the diamond I bought had a conflict-free provenance.

Another thing I had never realized was the extent to which the price of diamonds is artificially driven up by the industry, which hoards millions and millions of stones, letting them become available only a trickle at a time to keep them being perceived as rare.

I was deeply impressed by the production, which was lucid and tight; by the marvelous cinematography and by the excellent ensemble acting of the able cast, mostly unknown to me. Leonardo DiCaprio’s screen presence reminds me of a young Michael Caine in this film. The film was intense enough that I asked to take a break in the middle, just to decompress from the constant on-screen violence. We had a whirlpool and I restored my nerves!

Gary came home from a day of serving at Cracker Barrel just as the film ended and we shared a good supper and conversation. Gary promised me to get together a blog for Avalon Journal entries, just like my Camelot Journal blog. I am looking forward to making entries in it each time I visit Avalon from now on.

Gary also brought good news from Romi, who told him that Traveller Too, my new ThinkPad laptop, is now predicted to arrive May 4th. Ah! The joy of getting back to work on creative things! I hope I can make it through the rest of this catch-up list before it comes. It looks possible!

As is our habit, after watching Planet Earth on TV and offering the Gaia Meditation, with Gary praying at the end, we called Jim’s Mom and then came upstairs for our bedtime snuggle with the cats.

2007-04-28

After Morning Offering Jim cooked while I continued on my letter to Papa. Later, Jim set out on a vast array of errands and arrived back at the house for lunch. By that time Gary had surfaced and was working hard in the office, making up some time. We enjoyed a luncheon together and then Jim spent the afternoon making our yard look pretty. He trimmed up everything, which is a huge job in our yard because of all the plantings, bushes and paths, in preparation for Gary’s mowing later and then weeded throughout the yard.

Meanwhile I continued working on my letter to Papa and eventually finished it! It is only 12 pages long; rather shabby compared to his 200+ pages which I was answering, but my best offering. It was a splendid day spent with a good teacher with big ideas!

I got some news today that makes me feel sad. The Lenovo people, from whom we are purchasing my laptop, sent a notice that they have not yet shipped my machine! It was ordered on April 8th! Three weeks have passed. This is just silly. Yet I am boxed in here. Short of going out and buying yet another laptop – and when we looked around, what I wanted was not out there – I am out of luck on taking up my writing again.

If this is a psychic greeting, it is a good one! I am very used to pressing on towards the goal. And I cannot press! However, fortunately I am blessed with a plethora of other, less important work. I still have a list of seven remaining to-do chores to complete before the office is officially cleared of back work. Indeed, I have additional chores awaiting my attention all over the house, as do most householders. And when that list runs out, I can power down on the Aaron/Q’uo Dialogues, which up until now have gotten only intermittent attention. i have about 2/3 of that A/Q editing work ahead of me.

My usual routine is to do old editing in the morning and write on 101 in the afternoon. For three weeks now I have been off my routine completely! I will probably continue to work off-routine until the office is caught up. Then I will answer all my e-mail, which I have been allowing to accumulate somewhat. And then it’s A/Q time. It is all good work! It’s just not what I intended to spend this month doing.

I got a set of three scans from Elihu E, whom I asked for material concerning Dana Redfield. He had very kindly sent me copies of portions of the letter he wrote her parents. Gary also dug up my old e-mail files so I can go back and get some good quotes from those old letters from Dana, which will add a lot to my article. Or it could be articles, plural. I sense another series coming on, as her life touched many interesting topics.

Bishop Gulick has still not sent me his comments on A Book of Days. He promised them “after Easter”. So I sent him another begging letter, beseeching him to write me that blurb. Ian says he has another project coming up in May that will take all his time for the next month, so if I do not get him that last bit of text from the Bishop by next Wednesday or so, I will be unable to see the Book of Days published until June.

These all seem to be lessons in patience, do they not? And in resisting not evil.

Jim and I spent a delightfully quiet Saturday night enjoying each other, reading and catching some junk TV. We offered the Gaia Meditation and came upstairs, after Mick cleaned the kitchen, for a good-night kitty-snuggle.

2007-04-27

Today was the pick of the week for glorious weather. The maple trees are finally convinced that it is safe to spread their leaves to the sun, and the lovely, off-pink cast to their budding forms is exquisite.

After Morning Offering, Jim and Gary mounted up and mowed. They had a very full day – eight yards to cut and all the attendant gardening to spiff up plantings and trim around trees and posts. Thank heavens it was the best day in the world to do that! The temperature reached 70 late in the day and there was a brisk breeze, so conditions were ideal for working outside.

I got to item 38 on my list of things to do while waiting for my new laptop, a list which is getting shorter all the time. And it was a joy. I spent the day with Papa’s letters. I had reached the first page of the latest letter Papa sent, about two weeks ago now, in my evening reading. So I took the morning and the early afternoon to finish reading his thoughts. He writes long letters indeed: this one ran 66 pages, and these are dense pages.

Papa writes a mixture of diary entries and teaching units. He lets the spirit move him. I have to read quite carefully and deliberately, because he often creates a brilliant exposition in the middle of his daily weather report or the discussion of local zoning issues. And I don’t want to miss a thing!

He is struggling, as am I, with physical health issues, so we encourage each other to live strong and remain on task.

I had a wonderful time reading through his work and am most pleased that Papa did what I asked – he gave me more of a consolidated summary of the cycles of empire on our planet. He is far more accurate at historical detail than am I. Thank you, Papa! I will be using his material in 102, when I talk about the outer work of living well on planet Earth.

The remainder of the afternoon was spent starting a letter to Papa responding to things in those 200 or so pages of letters which I am answering. I never would have the wit or time to write such long letters in return! But Papa does not care about that. His joy is in teaching me, for I am the only student he has now, despite the breadth and depth of his knowledge, which ranges from shamanism, religion and spirituality through the humanities – history especially – to economics and politics. I am a lucky one.

Papa is so funny. He’s a curmudgeon of the best kind and liberally lards his often militant prose with puns and Edward Lear-like nonsense which makes you stop and grin and lighten up with him.

Knowing that I will likely finish up my letter responding to Papa tomorrow, I asked Gary to collect a CD of my journal entries, channeling sessions and UPI articles since my last letter to him for enclosure. Papa no longer has access to the internet so he needs these sent to him snail mail as well.

I got the first letter of his four answered and decided to wait until tomorrow to go further, as it was quite late. So I collected a couple of recipes from a favorite on-line source, a feature of the Louisville Courier-Journal’s web site called “Fix It Tonight”. I love that source because my guys like vegetables a lot. It is not that easy to find interesting new recipes for veggies. But the CJ site has a veggie recipe daily. Today I collected a recipe for Roast Asparagus, a simple, garlicky recipe that sounds delicious.

I got a request off to Elihu E for any material about Dana Redfield he would like to share with me. I am gearing up to write a UPI column remembering Dana Redfield next week. I have the feeling this will end up being a series, as her life embraced some interesting issues for the spiritual seeker.

And that was my day, a very satisfactory work day which felt like a vacation.

Jim and I had a truly magnificent date after our bath and then lounged and talked until supper time. We joined Gary for a good meal and enjoyed a block of Star Gate episodes with him until the Gaia Meditation. Our evening ended with Gary going downstairs to read while Jim and I came upstairs for our bedtime kitty snuggle. We turned out the lights at midnight.

2007-04-26

The weather was all over the place today! At mid-day while I was driving, it was pouring rain while the sun was brilliantly shining. It was a stunning effect!

After Morning Offering Jim set out to do what he could do, being quite uncertain how far he would get as the weather promised to be heavy. In the event, high winds blew away our heaviest clouds and Mick came home triumphant at the end of the work day with all his gardening done and even the one lawn he still had to do for today mowed.

Meanwhile I busied myself with writing memorial services. I corrected the service I had composed for Mick to reflect his preferences. Then I worked on my own service, choosing the music for prelude, postlude and hymns, choosing the service and the prayers to be used. I envisioned an evensong service with Holy Eucharist for me, so that people can attend without having to lose work time and also so that everyone can go from the service right into a good party with food, drink and good times, a real Irish wake. I do have one Irish ancestor!

I had the best time selecting hymns. I love so many of the ones in our Hymnal! I was singing all the afternoon.

I also prepared all the material Mom McCarty had given me on scraps of paper by amalgamating the various bits into one document. Her service will proceed along fairly certain lines according to the practices of her parish church and the funeral home, so all I really had to do was type up her hymn preferences, her choices for pallbearers and the little poems she liked, which in her neck of the woods are placed on the left-hand page of the attendees' opened brochure. Different strokes for different folks.

In the middle of the day I went on an errand run, as my new glasses were ready. They are terrific! Much lighter than my last pair, they come with a magnetically attached pair of polarized sunglass lenses. When you want dark glasses, you simply let them snick into place. I love these specs! It does help to have an up-to-date prescription for my weak eyes.

After Jim and I had a whirlpool and got all spiffed up, we motored downtown and attended Glenview Trust’s annual reception at Vincenzo’s, one of the nicest restaurants in town. It is rather grand inside and out, but the effect is softened by beautifully conceived lighting and appointments. The servers looked way better than the guests, being resplendent in tuxedos. I got a chance to wear the jacket-dress I bought with my Christmas money and felt quite posh.

We canvassed the place and discovered that the sweet spot was outside in the now calm evening. We snagged the last table on the patio and watched the gloaming steal across the sky from east to west while we enjoyed the vast array of elegant foods and viands. My favorite items were the Brie, the herbed tomatoes and tiny petit fours colored inside with the Italian flag’s tones of green, red and yellow.

We offered the Gaia Meditation on the way home, with me praying at the end, and spent the rest of the evening chatting and patting kitties before we said good night at 11 PM.

It is to be noted that, after a long series of Saturday afternoons where Jim scraped all around the eaves of Camelot and pulled a zillion staples that had held plastic over our windows in years past, Gary inaugurated his paint-under-the-eaves campaign today. Between the two of them, we’ll have some freshly painted eaves soon! That’s the kind of maintenance that is no fun, but having it done will be very satisfying. This old house, built in 1923, is an elegant old lady, a craftsman-type bungalow, and we want to keep her all trim and fresh. She’s worth it! It is a very clever design. The house is listed as 1 ½ stories, but we have an amazing amount of usable room in our 2300 square feet. And we use every inch!

2007-04-24 and 25

Sometimes I do wonder about myself! Not only did I miss writing in my journal yesterday, I did not recall the omission! So this is a two-day entry.

Wednesday was dedicated to continuing on with ticking items off my list as I wait for Traveller Too, my new laptop, to arrive from the factory. It is taking God’s own time, literally, to get here. I sense that although it is aggravating at the worldly level to have to wait so long for this machine, there are three factors that are positive here.

One is that doing these personal chores is easier mental, emotional and spiritual work than either composing new text for the 101 book or editing the Aaron/Q’uo Dialogues and I have rested up a good bit.

The second is the boost I get from touching in to the energies of so many good friends. Love is reflected in love and I soar like a hawk!

And the third is that I suspect there is a specific psychic greeting going on from our old friend of negative fifth density from the days of the Ra sessions, who would really like to see me get frustrated and angry about either writing and losing the text or choosing not to write but being angry about that, so that my vibration comes down. With this computer in its dying phase, if I did try to compose I would be constantly upset. For instance, one of the three-page letters I wrote today disappeared. It showed up in the Sent file on Outlook. I was composing in Word. I lost considerable time just finding my work.

On the contrary of being irked, let alone enangered, I have used the time to delight myself by doing this other, more personal work. I am chipper as can be.

And I really, really look forward to getting back to work cmposing and editing. Hopefully with a new machine, and one designed to be very sturdy - the IBM ThinkPad – such shenanigans will not occur.

Ruthie M, a psychic in Florida who has long been a friend and a fan of the Law of One, sent me a charming poem. It goes

Counting our blessings, we realize smiles cause nicer lines than frowns,
Friendship is a wonderful thing,
Goodness mostly outweighs negativity,
Time marches on,
Attitude changes everything,
Sharing begets sharing,
Hope is a special flower,
Love heals.
I love sharing with you, dear Friend.
May your day be Sweeter than you expected.

That was such a pleasure to come upon, first thing! So I wrote her a thank you. She wrote back to say that it just came out of her fingers when she sat down at the computer to write me. Talented fingers! It is Reverend Ruth Ann now, as she finished a course to receive the degree.

I worked for quite some time on three thoughtful letters to my two brothers and my cousin. They were thank you notes, however belated, for their generous Christmas presents. But in the letters I also went into a few reasons why I feel that perhaps the Rueckert Christmas Gatherings could usefully be updated to suit the way we live now. I got the impression last Christmas that my brother, Tommy, and his family especially were not altogether happy campers. And what’s the fun of getting together if people are uncomfortable?

Mail had piled up again on my desk and I spent some late afternoon time clearing that. And I had another planning meeting with Gary at which we talked more about the possibility of creating a new spiritual activism site with Steve E. We will invite him to visit so we can powwow in person.

Today was a banner day! Jim left after Morning Offering to mow and mow some more, as heavy rains are predicted for tomorrow. He got all the mowing done for Thursday except one small yard, no more than a 30-minute job. So if he cannot mow tomorrow at all, he can pick that one yard up on Friday, which is supposed to be fair and sunny.

I came upstairs and wrote three thank you notes – one to Don C Sr., who sent a generous donation to help with our equipment crisis –we have to get both a new laptop and a new scanner – one to Jill S, who sent me a healing crystal and all her best wishes and one to Aubine K, who sent me a packet of information on her daughter, Ariane’s, mission in Africa, so that I can write about her for my UPI column one week soon. I completed a Publisher’s Clearing House entry to sew up the day’s correspondence and voila! For one brief, shining moment, I OWE NO ONE IN THIS WORLD A LETTER! Well, not a snail-mail letter! The e-mail is piling up. Oh well! Whoopee!

I spent the remainder of the day getting set up to compose a Memorial Service for Jim along the lines we had discussed on our trip to Nebraska last February. It sounds ghoulish, but really, it is a great idea for all of us to prepare for our demise. We are only renting these bodies and our leases' terms are uncertain. When the time comes for us to move on through the gates into larger life, a clear list of our wishes is a very thoughtful thing to leave behind for those who shall need to carry on here below within the veil on the Earth plane.

I got the service written up, typing out all the readings so that when the time comes, the service will be able to be printed out into a brochure. It took a while to get the three group hymns copied without all the black on the copies which you get when you are copying from thick books. However cutting and pasting onto blank paper and re-copying did the trick.

I asked Gary if he would prepare the two music CDs we need for that service. We need one for the music during the service. Jim asked for Jessica, by the Allman Brothers, Angel by Jimi Hendrix and The Wanderers, by Lacey J. Dalton. The other CD is going to be an hour-long mélange of Jim’s favorite artists’ work which shall be played before the service. I figure people will want to come early and socialize. When he gets that done, and I make one change in the service Jim requested, that work will be complete and I can tuck it away until, hopefully, sometime in 3007! Next up: my own service preferences for when I stick my own spoon in the wall and dance to the skies.

The remainder of my work day was spent reading Papa’s letters. I am now finished with all but his latest missive, which arrived in my Inbox last Saturday.

Gary was home for supper and the Gaia Meditation. We enjoyed a quiet evening together, all three of us reading for a good portion of the night. Mick and I turned out the lights at 11 PM.

2007-04-23

“It’s a lovely day today” was the theme song today. The frozen trees have relaxed their budding leaves now, and the grass is growing again. We have waited long for shirtsleeve weather and it is very nice to experience it again. After Morning Offering Mick was off for an over-full day of mowing and landscaping. His customers had solved the edging problem in their landscaping project by picking tiles intended to make patio floors. Silly Mick! He only brought them edging samples! He thinks he can make their choice look nice!

I drove off for my Monday appointment at 21st Century Medicine. Liz J gave me another very generous session of cranial-sacral work and then osteopath Steve J did the modified acupuncture using Rudolph Steiner’s homeopathic sera. This time he was all over the place, injecting my jaws, neck, points along my belly and across my back at trigger points. I enjoy these treatments, and I believe I do feel more psychically balanced and lighter of heart. There is no physical change yet, but these things can take time to mature into the physical world.

I eyed the Great Lawn down by the Ohio River as I drove back across the I-65 Bridge from Indiana to Kentucky and miraculously, it was immaculate! Supposedly 800,000 folks had partied on that lawn while watching Thunder Over Louisville on Saturday night. The cleaning crews had done a great job! The traffic was jam-packed all the way there and back because of the various Derby Festival events that crowd our city’s tourist-catching schedule from now through Derby, causing a permanent traffic jam. Naturally, Louisville natives stay home and well away from the crowded roads if they possibly can during these few weeks of Derby madness.

I came home, eventually conquering the traffic, and enjoyed another of Mike P’s delicious corn cakes from The Cheesecake Factory for lunch, along with Gary’s superior slaw, before coming upstairs to write my Christmas thank you notes. Call me goofy, but it is sheer delight to do the pretty at last for all those most loving and kind friends and strangers who gave me gifts at Christmastime. I finished all but three notes from my non-family list, and broke the back of that job. The remainder will be far easier, as I can write family letters to my folks, thanking the whole family unit for their gifts instead of having to write each person separately.

Jim arrived and ran our bath, which ended my work day, except for a fairly extended conversation I had with Gary after we shared our Gaia Meditation, with Jim offering the ending prayer. He had received a long and thoughtful letter from Steve E, a fan of the LOO who would like to undertake the hard work and persistent effort needed to create a new forum web site. We have kept the domain name, www.bring4th, and he will develop that.

After reading his 12-page missive, in which he explored his whole attitude about our work and how he wishes to help, I felt that it all sounded good. There were directions he is looking at which do not appeal to me, as we are not hucksters nor are we concerned to proselytize, but overall, the fit is excellent. I asked Gary to ask him to come visit us. I think we need a couple of days when Gary, Steve E and I can focus down and brainstorm the start-up plans. Gary said he’d write Steve E tomorrow and get that ball rolling. Fortunately Steve lives on the east coast and is only an 8-hour drive away. He is in his early 30s, just a pup, and should find that drive do-able in one day. It is better than our going to him, as I am not a good traveler these days, though I still love to be somewhere else!

Jim and I missed Amy Goodman after our bath, as we were ancient teenagers instead, having a great time canoodling! I sing a song of praise for the Creator’s plan. Pleasure goes hand in hand with the most illuminating play of light energy two people can create in sexual sharing, and after almost 20 years of marriage – our 20th anniversary is May 30th –Jim and I have the privilege of coming together sexually in perfect trust and faith. It is a blessing for both our lives and hopefully an honestation to the Creator as well.

We came downstairs after our tryst, had supper and enjoyed a block of Star Trek Enterprise, with Link TV\’s World Music during the commercials. After the Gaia Meditation, Jim went to his computer to work on letters to his customers on various matters while Gary and I talked over many items. We bade Gary good night at 10:30 and said “Sweet dreams” to each other about 11:30.

2007-04-22

It was a honey of a day! I went to church and sang the Easter music feeling very lifted up. It was good to have a guest in the congregation. Mike P visited for the service and said he enjoyed the smallness and hospitality of the church and the quality of the programs.

After enjoying some of Mike’s gift of food for lunch, Mick settled in for a nap while I wrote the Camelot Journal entry for yesterday and then had a good round of solitaire, which I decided would be better than napping to rest up for the channeling. Jim and I had a bath and then welcomed Mike back for the session, along with Romi, who set up for the broadcast.

We had a good talk around the circle and then formed a group question after a good deal of conversation as the group came together on the focus of the topic. It was an interesting question concerning how we know when we have balanced our catalyst and when we have simply stuffed it down into our deeper mind without balancing it. I will be interested in their response when I edit the transcript.

Mike left soon thereafter and Romi set to work trying to fix Valerie’s laptop. After working with it for the remainder of the evening except for a supper break, he declared it a goner and said Windows would need to be reinstalled – that’s the only fix he knows. So Gary will attempt that with Romi’s direction.

After the Gaia Meditation, Jim and I called Mom McCarty and I came down from using my upstairs phone to find that Romi had left. I was sorry not to say good bye and thank him for his great work on these broadcasts.

A block of the Planet Earth episodes was on TV and we spent the remainder of our Sunday leisure enjoying that beautiful series. We snuggled with the cats and bade each other a fond “sweet dreams” at 11 PM.

2007-04-21

What a delightful Saturday! After Morning Offering Jim went to pick up his repaired mower and do other errands. I enjoyed the sensation of being completely alone in the house. There is a special quality about the energy in the house when you are alone. I love that feeling!

I made rough weather of getting Mom’s suit packed to send to her. Supplies had vanished – I suppose in the Christmas rush of three families wrapping their presents here. No tape. No proper scissors. No pen. No packing tape. I kept discovering these things one thing at a time, and got myself so worn out clomping up and down the stairs that when I realized I needed to come up to my office and get a card, by the time I got up here I was winded enough to sit, JUST sit, for while and catch my breath. That was where I was when Jim blew in, full of good energy and our Saturday fast food treat.

We had our lunch and stretching together and then Jim went into our yard to plant a good deal of phlox we had ordered. We used to plant “Wuthering Heights”, a rock garden Jim built in our front yard, in impatiens. However our weather has changed. Now, the annuals burn. It has gotten too hot in the front yard for them. So we are switching to perennials for all the sections. It should be gorgeous when the plantings mature.

I napped for a while, resting up for a channeling session for Mike P. later in the day. Then I took on the delightful chore of ordering some good music for Mick’s iPod. I had $200 worth of amazon.com coupons to cash in and so ordered that much of a selection, only to find out that they do not allow more than $150 worth of those coupons on any one order. Hmpf. It was a pleasure to choose some truly fine things for his musical enjoyment. He listens while he mows.

I started on another project that has been hanging fire for months, writing up the funeral services for Jim, Jim’s Mom and myself. I barely had begun that when I realized I needed items I did not have, so I wrote to Mom and asked her for them – the hymnal and prayer book from her church. I set that project aside and went back to the basement wrap center with my card for Mom instead. I finalized Mom’s present and wrapped two other presents for Mick. His birthday is May 10th, so it’s time to get all in hand for a special day for my sweetie. He wants to rent a video and have pizza. We can do that.

I BARELY finished the wrapping in time for Jim’s and my bath – thank heaven the tub takes a long time to fill, as it is double the area of most tubs, so that we can comfortably bathe together. We got dressed in time to meet Mike P, who arrived from out of town for his private channeling session. We talked around the circle after I satisfied myself that his questions were phrased so as to maximize his chances of gaining useful information from the session. I tuned and then Jim, Mike and I had a good session.

Mike had most thoughtfully brought us a treat from the Cheesecake factory. He had read in my journal that i loved a certain dish they serve, and he picked some up. We will enjoy those for a couple of meals to come!

Mike and I sat and conversed for a while after the session while Jim cleaned the kitchen. He left just as Jim finished his wonted Saturday chore with a triumphant mopping. Jim and I ascended the stairs to my room for a good kitty snuggle before lights out at midnight.

2007-04-20

It was a terrific, warm and winsome Friday. After Morning Offering Jim and Gary sailed off to dance with the devas, mowing and trimming up yards all over Anchorage while I continued my campaign to catch up all the loose ends in my office. I began by collecting three recipes, for Chicken Fettuccini, Spicy Fried Chicken and Avocado and Mango Salad. The first recipe is for me, as I need to eat a bland and smooth diet. The other two are for St. James and Gary, who use a ton of chicken recipes as Gary is not fond of red meat, nor does he like most seafood, especially shellfish. And they both love avocadoes and mangos.

Then I got out the rough draft of the letter Jim and I had composed yesterday, sending it back and forth between our computers until we were satisfied with the text. It is an invitation to four extremely faithful and energetic friends of the Law of One, Bill H, Jean-Claude K, Tiffani M and Steve M, to join L/L Research’s Board of Directors. I fiddled with the letter and our L/L stationery and got the copies printed out on the stationery OK. However I could not figure out how to use the envelope-printing feature. So I hand-addressed the envelopes just in time for Gary and Jim to arrive home, their mowing all done. Jim and I signed them and gave the batch of envelopes a kiss for blessing.

After lunch, Jim set out to do his weekly maintenance and switch out his mower blades. He ran into a snag – one of the blades had apparently struck something and the impact had sheared one of the hexagonal nuts which hold the blade in place, so that the blade could not be removed. Jim had an unplanned trip over to Louisville Tractor, where they promised him a repaired mower by tomorrow afternoon.

Jim spent the rest of the afternoon touring greenhouses in the area searching for edging for his current, large landscaping job which both the husband and the wife like. So far that has been the problem! He found several good candidates but had a bad end to his afternoon when he drove all around eastern Jefferson County looking for Boone-Gardiner Nurseries. It has just moved. Jim suspects that they have moved to another dimension in space and time. He shall have to have another go at finding that worthy source of good edgings tomorrow. We keep talking about acquiring a GPS. It would have come in handy.

Gary went hunting and gathering, buying the food and other materials needed to make our food for the next week. He then cooked for the rest of the afternoon, sending wonderful aromas up the stairs while I continued to bat away at the backlog. He finished all but the main chicken dish! Go Gary!

Lorena, a fan of TLOO, had become aware that we were going to shut down the broadcasting project as of the end of this May. We had paid $700+ for the chat room for the six-month period starting last December. Our usual listening audience is small, but that is not the problem – remember, the Ra group suggested we forget the counting. However we had hoped that the program would be self-supporting, as we cannot afford the $100/month – plus on a regular basis. And no one has ever sent in any contributions for the broadcasting.

Lorena offered to stand behind a matching funds campaign to raise the money for next season’s broadcasts. That is a nine-month period, September through May. The total cost will be about $1100 to reserve a private chat room on line for that period. It is a most generous offer! We shall put up an announcement on our home page immediately. I hope we are able to receive enough donations to keep the project going! To me it seems a worthy effort, simply because there is something magical about the energy that comes through my voice when I am channeling. One can truly feel that love and light vibration from the Q'uo group beneath and surrounding the words.

I took some time to write Jim and Maxine P, who have begun once again to offer a study group for the LOO material in Wisconsin. Jim’s an excellent teacher of the material and has created a curriculum that takes in all the main principles in an orderly way. He taught a couple of his topics to one of our Homecoming gatherings a few years ago and we all loved his teaching and found it most valuable. I caught up on our family news, as they are long-time friends, and asked them to give us periodic updates on what their group was studying.

I e-mailed Romi to let him know that it was fine for him to visit Avalon tomorrow and also to invite him to join our channeling session Saturday evening for Mike P, who is coming into town to sit in the circle of seeking personally. It is always a special session indeed when the seeker puts his heart and soul into getting here for the session. It carries that intensive energy of dedicating the effort of making the trip to seeking the truth.

Karen K at MacDuffie wrote to let me know that my former liaison, Sara B, has flown the coop because of a good job offer elsewhere, and Karen will now be my liaison. We exchanged cordial greetings and she OK’d my plans.

I had several insurance forms sent to me with refills of a compounded prescription from a pharmacy which does not send in the forms themselves. I had no idea where to send them and surfed around on the net trying to get the information, to no effect, before looking at my membership card. Sure enough, the address I needed was in tiny print on the back of my card. Success! I also filled out a long Medicare survey which had been hanging fire for months.

By this time Jim was calling bath time, and my working day was at an end. I felt victorious! I know these sorts of chores are not as important overall as my creative work, but it feels lighter and brighter in this office with every old project that I clear away. I consider it a great step forward that my remaining chores are now on a list that takes up only one sheet of paper! Perhaps by the time my new laptop comes, i will be caught up!

Mick and I bathed and then enjoyed playing in the fields of the Lord together, sharing sexual energy and all the love in our hearts for each other and the Creator before descending to the first floor for supper and a block of Stargate episodes. Friday nights are so great! Jim’s hard work week is done and he can fully relax. I think he stays in a state of tension all week as he races the rain, plotting how to work around the raindrops and get all his lawns mowed.

Gary bade us good night when we came down, as he was heading off to spend the weekend with his girlfriend, Valerie. He will stay overnight with her and tomorrow he will take Valerie and Ocean, her daughter, to see Thunder Over Louisville. That’s a massive, half-hour-long fireworks display staged from a closed bridge over the Ohio River and preceded by a day-long air show, which this year will include helicopters. I went, just one time, with a girlfriend, Jane W, and her then-young kids and it was a marvelous display seen in person. However the 90 minutes we then spent getting out of the municipal parking garage offered a festival of toxic odors and various drivers’ bad tempers and I vowed that if ever I went again, I would use the shuttle buses provided. I know little Ocean will have such a ball! Gary and Valerie both work on Sundays, serving at Cracker Barrel all day, so we won’t see him until Sunday night.

Jim and I ate supper and offered the Gaia Meditation at 9 PM, with Jim praying at the end. We turned out the lights after our usual snuggle with the cats at 11 PM.

2007-04-19

After Morning Offering, Jim donned a jacket, as it is still chilly here, and set off for a full day of mowing. On top of that, he was still finishing up a landscaping job which has dragged on because the husband and the wife do not always agree. Mick was about to finish up – as he thought – when the wife stepped outside to ask him what edging he would use on their new plantings. Mick replied that the husband had said, no edging. Half and hour later, the husband had changed his mind. So Mick cannot finish until he’s rounded up an edging they like – both of them. He spent the last of his work day going to four different nurseries looking for the right edging.

I spent all my time today on one project – getting a shout out to my MacDuffie classmates, asking for their news so I can write a good digest for all of the class come June. I wrote the news-begging letter itself in the morning and by lunch time I had e-mailed thirteen versions of the letter to the thirteen people whose e-addresses I have from the class. Then in the afternoon, I set out to snail-mail the other 43 classmates the same letter, with an added paragraph asking them please to share with me their e-mail addresses. It is way easier to do this by e-mail!

There were two glitches, besides my basic lack of technological expertise – both databases I was using were arranged randomly with regards to alphabetization. The MacDuffie database is alphabetized by maiden name. Almost all of my classmates have a married name and go by that. So the order of married names is random. And in the database Gary made for me so I could print out address labels, he had not typed in my classmates' maiden names, so when it came time to be sure I had a letter going out to each classmate, it was slow going.

To make things worse, I used a yellow highlighter to mark off names and halfway through I saw that the color was bleeding from line to line. I had to begin over! However, I did succeed, finally. I spoke with Gary later and he will be glad to alter his database to include all the ladies’ maiden names so that the next round of letters should be a whole lot easier. He will roar when he sees the two pages of the MacDuffie database table I was using. Talk about a marked-up list!

I keep thinking to myself these days, what would I have ever done if my computer hadn’t bonked? I have cleaned up an amazing amount of details in this office during my down time. There is still some to go, so I will keep hustling and hope that I am all caught up when IBM sends me Traveller Too.

After a lovely whirlpool, Jim and I settled in for a night of movie watching, as Gary had lent us The Good Shepherd. Matt Damon plays a good cold-hearted anti-hero and he had a solid ensemble backing him as the film told a somewhat fictionalized story of how the CIA got started. We paused it for the Gaia Meditation, and Jim had his supper during the watching.

We said good night after a snuggle with the kitties at 11 PM.

2007-04-18

What a lovely day greeted us as we made our Morning Offering. Jim sailed off on his round of mowing and landscaping while I wrote the UPI article for this week, ending the series of ten columns on the subject of dignity and worth. It felt good to be able to draw that series to a hopefully good ending.

That just about covers my good work for L/L Research today. After lunch I fell asleep in my chair. Gary woke me almost immediately as he had some items to run by me, and I thanked him as I wanted to get some work done! But sleep claimed me again almost instantly, for I remember nothing until being awakened by Jim’s homecoming, as he ran bath water and talked with Gary downstairs.

I offered the prayer at the end of the Gaia Meditation. We enjoyed supper together and eventually a snuggle with the kitties before snoozing around 11 PM.

2007-04-17

The weather is finally yielding a bit and letting spring’s usual warmth back into the area. After Morning Offering I kept working with my poor Traveller and finally got the Camelot Journal entry for yesterday posted before I had to leave for The Cheesecake Factory, where I had an appointment to meet Sydney S for lunch.

I studied and went to many classes with Sydney in college. She and I had both taken a test which allowed us to enter the school as upperclassmen, which meant that instead of having to take the same block of core classes as other freshmen, we could take any undergraduate or graduate courses we wished. We both took full advantage of that privilege. Our common interests were Russian and International Studies. We studied Russian for three solid years, until I sometimes would dream in Russian.

Syd and I developed a close relationship with our Russian professor, Dr. John Broderius, a very tall and broad mountain of a guy who spoke 42 languages, although he pointed out that he only spoke twelve of those well enough to pass as a native. He was kind enough to teach us extra languages for free, and each semester we would meet, off the record as far as the University was concerned, to learn about a new language. We studied Swedish, Turkish, Polish, Erse and Old English during that time.

Syd went on to graduate school and stayed within the groves of academe, getting her doctorate in languages and teaching at U of L for 35 years. She recently retired. Her passion is travel, and she saves systematically until she can afford to buy the tickets for a new trip. She saved for ten years in order to take the whole family to China. Now she is saving for a tour of India.

Syd and I were as compatible now as we were in 1962, which was a most pleasant surprise. We had a ball and stayed long at table. It was hard to leave the conversation of a woman who agrees with my point of view on so very many issues. She’s got the prettiest white hair now, and it suits her. It was swell to be with her.

I came home to find it was almost 4 PM, so worked at a few things only before quitting time. I got all the quotes together for writing my UPI article for this week and talked further with Ian, getting various matters organized on the Book of Days project. I sent a request to Gary to add a couple of people to the send list for my UPI articles – Sydney had asked to be added, as had my nail tech of many years, Tracy.

Then I took a good look at Jim’s rough draft of our letter to the four people we wish to ask to join our Board of Directors. I had asked him to write the first draft because he is so much better at being terse than am I. He had done a great job, and I did not change anything, just added a few thoughts and sent the letter back to his computer downstairs.

Then it was time for our bath and a romantic tryst as the sun set. We napped briefly and then rose and came downstairs just as Romi joined us for an evening visit. Romi was up and down working on all our computers, maintaining them. He has a remarkable record: 15 years taking care of our computers, and never a crash or real loss – only some data lost once during transfer – I lost about a year of my counseling letters. However, I do a whole lot on my computer, and Gary burns his up as well, so hats off to you, Ro-Man! it's an enviable record!

Jim offered the ending prayer at the Gaia Meditation, after which we enjoyed an episode of House and a late supper before saying good night to Gary and coming upstairs for a bedtime snuggle with the kitties. We turned out the lights at 11 PM.

2007-04-16

A bright morning greeted us today, a welcome change from the brisk, chilly days of late. It was still quite cool, in the high 40s most of the day, but the sunshine warms up the heart.

After Morning Offering Jim set off for an extremely full day of mowing. I fiddled with my failing computer, trying and not succeeding in getting on line and publishing my Camelot Journal entry for yesterday before it was time to go see the Johnsons, husband and wife. Dr. Steve, an osteopath, had prescribed seven sessions of homeopathic injections, in a technique developed by Rudolf Steiner, along the Chinese meridians to help heart and vascular and to help the bladder and GI tract. He wanted these done weekly along with a companion cranial-sacral therapy treatment, which his wife, Liz, does. I will go each Monday for seven weeks. The hope is that this will reset my body's balance and relieve all the myriad of symptoms which i have experienced of late.

Liz, the cranial-sacral therapist, is a most generous care-giver, working far past her allotted time with me simply because she felt that the energy with which she works wanted her to do so. She is psychic and was able to channel through to me a proof that I feel sure Dana R sent me to let me know she had made it OK to Paradise.

Liz told me there was a bright being, a particular person, not just an energy, visiting me. She asked me to tune in, which I could do only slightly as I was not properly tuned. What I received in what I considered to be a safe way was that this was a positive and angelic spirit who vibrated to the name of Jesus the Christ.

Then Liz began getting an image. It was of two pyramids balanced on their points in a sort of hour-glass formation. Gradually she saw that the point where the two triangles met at their points was a point of balance between all male and female energies. And then she saw that a cross was centered at that point of balance.

Dana was, as am I, a mystical Christian. We used to e-mail each other the single word, Jesus, on Christmas Eve.

Further in evidence is the fact that Jim and I do the Banishing Ritual of the Lesser Pentagram each morning as a systematic, daily cleansing of our home’s metaphysical atmosphere. A major image within that ritual is the Star of David, which is the two pyramid or triangle shapes superimposed, one upon the other, making a Star of David shape. That image symbolizes the nature of our third-density time/space, our metaphysical environment while in incarnation here, in the High Magic of the Western occult tradition. Taking the two triangles apart and balancing them on each other with a cross to mark the joining is fairly clear code for Dana’s life here ending and for her ascension to larger life via the cross.

These things are very subjective. However, I believe she communicated with me to let me know she is fine. I am very thankful for her thoughtfulness.

The therapeutic session went well. I could not feel much effect, consciously, from her work, but it felt good. It felt a lot like the Reiki sessions Connie M, Jill S and Nancy G have given me. The injections were done along my spine, where the meridians are, and were nearly painless.

I scooted to the local Mickey Dee’s for a bite to eat after finishing at 21st Century medicine and then shopped at Value City, which was quite handy, just across Eastern Boulevard, for needed things, mainly a computer tote. My old computer bag for airplane travel is no longer a shape allowed on the airplane. They gate-check the bag and then I have no computer or other books and things to enjoy during air travel. Plus, my old purse, a faithful friend for many years, is an ergonomic teardrop shape which does not hold a diaper without squashing it. These days, diapers are a constant carry-along for my life. I must have looked at 1,000 bags and looked carefully at two dozen totes. The last bag I picked up was their one and only computer tote. And I got that beauty for very little, about 1/10th what I would have spent to get the same amenities in a tote bag retail on-line.

I also found a peasant skirt and a couple of larger pairs of jeans. No matter how lightly I eat, or even if I fast, my body seems to want to accumulate weight. Most of my other jeans are now too small. I am not thrilled to accommodate this weight gain and make it official with new clothes. However practicality wins out here. I would rather be comfortable than be a size 6!

And to make the hunt even better, I found some really nice collections of bath goods for gifts marked down about 80% from retail, so my birthday box material is growing!

I came home amid only light traffic, an easy drive over what can be a horribly crowded bridge, and addressed a bit of e-mail, having finally gotten on line in the late afternoon. Mostly, I dealt with notes from our web guy, catching up on all sorts of things.

Then too, I wrote Sydney S agreeing to meet tomorrow for lunch.

I wrote Elihu E thanking him for an excellent article he had written on prejudice, in the wake of the Rutgers incident. I believe that in fact Imus’ ignorant and rude remarks would have gone unnoticed if he had been black. His crucial sin was that of pride, in believing that he was so universally liked that he could talk “black” while not being black. If he had just said the Rutgers team members were ugly in a honky kind of way, saying “Get a load of the face on those jobs,” or some similar red-neck thrust at rough humor, and had avoided the racial slang, the stupidity and discourtesy of his use of offensive language to get a cheap laugh would never have been noticed. Black rappers and hip hop artists use exactly the same vocabulary as did Imus, but the media let that ride, as being a "black thing". It’s a goofy old world. I think I will write an article on words of power one of these days, after I finish up this dignity series for UPI.

I called Gray Towers Florists and asked them to send flowers to Dana’s parents from Jim, Romi and me and organized a sympathy card for Jim to sign when he got home, and then greeted him as he came in, weary as he could be. He drew a bath and we enjoyed a quiet evening after that. He was home too late for us to catch Democracy Now, but we lucked into a block of Star Trek Enterprise and saw several episodes which we had missed the first time around.

Gary offered the closing prayer at the Gaia Meditation. Jim and I said good night to him and came upstairs for a final snuggle before our own bed time at 11 PM.

2007-04-15

My Mom, a fan of San Francisco, said that she loved the city, among many other things, because it was always suit weather there. She would have loved this day, blustery and climbing slowly to 50 F amid uncertain sunshine. There was no official choir today, so I could take my time with the Sunday puzzles. I attended the service while Jim attended to the housecleaning, our usual Sunday morning division of activities. I was able to do a favorite thing – wear a hat to church! It is useless to wear one when singing in the choir, as it resides in the dressing room throughout.

We had a quiet lunch and I began the editing on Terry H’s channeling session from Thursday evening, which Gary had transcribed. Then Mick and I had a bath before welcoming Carmen and Romi. Romi busied himself with computer maintenance while Carmen and I conversed until it was time for our silent meditation.

Tom F attended today, after being gone for the last few weeks for various reasons, mostly his taking his grandson by marriage to swim meets near and far. We were delighted to see our Tom, who has been a campaigner with our group since 1974, surely our oldest continuously attending member. Now “old Tom” is my age, so of course I think we’re both just kids!

We had a good talk around the circle before offering a silent meditation. It was a sweet and powerful time, but there was a flaw in the ointment! The tuning song we chose had the word “sleep” in it numerous times, and two of our number quickly obeyed the prompt and struggled mightily to keep from dozing off for the whole time. We’ll have to avoid playing that particular Donovan song before a silent meditation in future! I finally closed the meditation a bit early, when I found that I, too, was starting to nod. That’s quite unusual for me. I am usually an alert meditator. So I do think it was the hypnotic, “Sleep, beloved, sleep” in Donovan’s song that got us all.

Romi served a delicious Love Tea with shortbread, my favorite, after the meditation. We conversed until time for the dinner feast, all of which Gary had cooked. After the meal, Romi checked his e-mail from one of our computers and found a note from Moab. Dana Redfield died yesterday evening after a series of bouts with cancer. The first two bouts, with lung cancer and cancer in an organ, she survived. However this last cancer was in her spine and had metastasized to every place in her body which they checked. She had only a few months to live after that diagnosis.

Dana filled her time by completing a brilliant project, her Alphabet Mosaics. Because her publisher, Hampton Roads, has refused her project for their publication, she has asked L/L Research to publish her work. She sent me careful instructions and I will enjoy doing this for her.

Dana was a remarkably eloquent writer and a UFO experiencer of great range. She was visited in her lifetime by all sorts of beings, some ETs and some angels. Sane and grounded, she observed and wrote about these experiences in ways which offer ways to help seekers discover the truths which her life has held, and those pithy truths have been many.

We talked about death for a while when we got the news. I was ecstatic for Dana, thrilled for her that she’d got through the difficult part of dying so rapidly. Having died at age 13, briefly, I can assert with confidence that dying is easy. It is the part before you pass through the gates to larger life that’s the fiddly bit. Romi was very sad and said that he was glad he was with me when he got the news, as he was considerably cheered by my perspective.

There is no use in fearing death. We might as well fear our birth. Both are markers in a long journey and constitute the beginning and end of a mysterious side trip into heavier illusion than the main road of consciousness. We wrap the veil of forgetting about us and set sail in our ship of faith, blinded to the oneness in which we abide. And what a journey we blind sailors make! Side trips do end, though, so that we can get back to the main journey. That is all that death is – a transition from the by-lane of an incarnation to the larger road in our soul’s journey, from which this incarnation is a diversion, a learning experience and another way to learn to love and be loved.

Jim and I talked with his Mom on the telephone and then Icame back downstairs to enjoy episodes of Planet Earth and converse with the gathering. We offered the Gaia Meditation, with me praying at the end, and said good night to our guests before coming upstairs for our kitty snuggle and our own bedtime at 11 PM.

2007-04-14

It was a rainy old Saturday. Fortunately both Jim and I were either working inside or doing errands in a nice, dry auto, so we could enjoy the gentle sound of the fitful rainfall and the occasional startling flash of blue sky.

After Morning Offering Jim worked on his landscaping project, coming home from a tour of wholesale nurseries in the area with some beautiful things to plant for his customer. Meanwhile I spent the morning working to finish the article I was writing for the Noyes Rhythm Foundation Newsletter. That is a dancing camp and I am the third generation dancer to attend there, having gone there from age five to the end of high school every summer.

The part I had left to write was about me and Noyes. It was great fun harking back to those olden, golden summer days under a Connecticut sun, dancing in a tunic and bare feet on the sprung board floor of the Pavilon and out into the soft grass of the greensward surrounding it. The Pavilon was situated in a large clearing with woods all around; a perfectly beautiful place to be, to hear the classical music accompanying the dance and to move in rhythm with the whole creation.

Romi joined Gary, downstairs at the L/L admin helm, and me at mid-morning for the purpose of installing a new router for our home network system. Jim brought back lunch for us all when he returned from his errands and we sat and enjoyed a conversation and some good fast food. Jim and I stretched and then I was off to have a manicure and pedicure. I treat myself to one every sixth week, when my toenails are ready to be groomed. I can no longer do that for myself well at all. My hands are too weak and my toenails too strong.

I sent Gary the database of my MacDuffie classmates which Sara B had sent me last fall, because I wish to create a MacDuffie mailing list from which I can print labels. I got a poor rate of reply from the last batch of letters I sent out via the school and I think it was because the letters came in a MacDuffie envelope. Alumnae get inured to begging letters and a lot of people probably just tossed my little note. So I shall use my own envelopes this time. I want to get a letter out asking for updates from my classmates so that I can write a good report for them all in June. Gary will type those names into the mailing list for me, which will make my job ever so much easier. I am class captain for our class of ’61 and my goal is to keep a sense of community growing until our 50th reunion, which will be in 2011. I’d love to have a big and happy turnout for that significant occasion! Visualize it and it will happen!

Jim and I watched a film Gary had recommended, Stranger Than Fiction, starring Will Farrell as a man who starts hearing a voice in his head as someone writes his life story. It was a sweet film and a very good way to celebrate Saturday night. We ate supper during the film and paused it for offering the Gaia Meditation. Jim prayed at the end.

Then I read more of Papa’s letters while Mick cleaned the kitchen. I only have one large letter to go now in order to catch up to his output. Papa is a prolific teacher and a funny man, tossing off really tasty puns at the most unexpected moments. I adore puns. And I love to take in Papa's teaching, which is very helpful

Jim and I said good night around midnight after a happy snuggle with the kitties.

2007-04-13

Friday the 13th is always a thrill! Just the idea of such a magical day sharpens one’s attention! In the event, with the exception of Traveller One, which is still offering me catalyst aplenty as I try to work with a failing machine, all went very well.

After Morning Offering, Jim tugged on his winter underwear and bundled up for mowing on Avalon. He was there most of the day, tidying the land we so love. The mowing went well and he reports that the meadow has begun to recover from some of Bruce and Vara’s unfinished experiments, which is good news. Bruce had tried to plow with our tractor, but did not know just how to set the blade and he tore up the ground badly. Vara and he also decided at one point that there was a patch of negative energy in that innocent meadow and had ripped up a lot of sod. Last fall, Jim worked to smooth the surface of the land, and now he reports that fescue is now growing there again.

The thing about Avalon is that it is an energy collector, being a valley surrounded with high knobs all around it. Whatever energy you bring to that magical valley, its signal is enhanced. Because both Bruce and Vara were going through difficult passages in their lives when they were on Avalon, they experienced difficulty and said Avalon was not a good place for them. I would agree. They were not ready to look at those truths which Avalon intensified for their focused attention. That’s OK! We need to progress along our own time lines. I think both Bruce and Vara are in places that nurture them better, now, and as always we wish them well.

However for Jim, Gary and me, Avalon is perfect, glorious and helpful. The energy there seems wonderfully electric and alive. Avalon is alive! And she welcomes us so sweetly. I doubt we will be able to move there any time soon, for our finances are not up to paying for the needed building of our home there, but we’re headed that way!

I spent my work day on one piece of the pile of snail mail, which is quite slender now. Barbara L had written to request that I do a series of articles on the summer camp I attended. I have put off writing those for months. I danced, from age 5 through 17, for two months each summer at a dance camp called The Noyes Rhythm Foundation. It is located on two beautiful farms which verge a pretty lake in Connecticut’s countryside near Middletown, Connecticut. My grandmother, who was one of Florence Fleming Noyes’s original students in New York in the early twentieth century, was the accompanist for the children's camp's dance classes, which were held in a large Pavilon in a clearing in the forest rolling down to the lake. The open-air structure, with its sprung board floor, was perfect for dancing.

Barbara asked for an account of my memories of my grandmother, my mother and myself at Noyes. Since all three of us had extensive experiences at Noyes Camp, there is a lot to say. Because of this delay with the new computer, I have finally excavated my way down to it! During the morning I completed the writing on my grandmother and in the afternoon I wrote about my mother and Noyes. Tomorrow I hope to have the time to finish with a memory of my own years there.

Jim arrived back home, having finished his mowing, in mid-afternoon and spent the rest of his daylight work time maintaining his equipment and putting it to bed for the weekend. We descended into a most pleasant evening, bathing and catching some good TV - Democracy Now, Jon and Steve’s political satire and a block of Stargate episodes – a new episode and also a behind-the-scenes look at the Stargate mythology.

As a scholar, which I have not actively been for a long time, I was appalled at their casual and smug assumption, on that mythology show, that their use of mythological characters’ names, like Ra, Thor and Merlin, makes people know more about the myths. In fact, it has twisted the various mythical characters until there is no recognizing them. They’ve simply looted the world’s store of mythology for recognizable names and then changed their story to suit Stargate.

Now I like Stargate, but I do not think they have done anything admirable with the myths of these older cultures. In fact, they may have misinformed a whole generation of kids to the point where the children will become adults who think that the Egyptians worshipped the Ra of Stargate who, in their story, is evil and cruel.

I offered the closing prayer at the Gaia Meditation after supper and said good night to Gary, who had put in a gargantuan work day doing the shopping and then the household cooking for the whole of next week. Jim and I came upstairs and snuggled with the cats until lights out at midnight.

2007-04-12

In the midst of moody weather, overcast, close to freezing and with a following wind of 25 to 30 miles an hour, Jim and I made our Morning Offering. Jim dealt with his customers for the day, for the most part discovering that their grass had not grown enough to mow and doing what gardening he found to do at each place, while I continued on my round of clearing away ancient stacks of mail and notes to myself.

My first chore was to track down an order from drugstore.com which had gone awry. It’s a small bit of business, but aggravating! I had ordered a nail brush, which item Mick uses religiously to keep his hard-working hands in a decent state of cleanliness every day. His old one is about worn through. In order to get free shipping on the nail brush I clicked on their clearance items and ordered enough skin lotion to make up the amount I needed to spend. I slather gallons of the stuff on my dry, dry skin so I can always use more lotion. When the package arrived from drugstore.com, however, it had everything in it except the nail brush. I sent an inquiry letter to them.

It was recipe-gathering day, and Jim had chosen some recipes before he left to mow. As is my custom, I took the recipes which he chose for the first time from my database, which were not yet in our usual format or edited to get the right number of servings and healthy ingredients, and corrected the recipes, also finding a nice pineapple curried rice dish to add – Jim had simply requested Gary to fix rice however he saw fit. I am always educating Chef Gary, encouraging him to try new combinations. At this point he is a better cook than I ever was! But my life experience is richer in having tried more international recipes.

Ian had written to say that he was ready to finish the covers on the Book of Days at last, so I wrote a hopefully persuasive e-mail to Bishop Gulick, asking him for his review so I can put his blurb on the back cover along with Fr. Joe’s. It appeals to me to have my parish priest and my Bishop commenting on this group of channelings from the Holy Spirit. I think it makes a good finish for the back cover to have their quotes there.

My last project before lunch was to write Steve T, who is the best channeling student I have ever had besides Mick. For a long time, he firmly intended to move to Louisville when he had retired from teaching and pursue his study of the art of channeling with our circle. I had geared my own timing on offering a new channeling circle to his schedule.

His schedule has changed. And for a wonderful reason – new love and a new bride have generated those changes. Gary and I have talked a bit about how to create this channeling circle and I realized I really needed to know where he was on attending such a channeling circle periodically for intensive work. So I wrote to ask him.

Jim and I shared lunch together and then he worked to clear his e-mail while I wrote one more letter, thanking Janusz K for his beautiful CD, which he calls “trancepiano”. It is a meditative piano suite, a very beautiful and most articulate long piece. I wish he had a web site to which I could refer you, but he does not. So we are most pleased and privileged to have a copy of his CD for our Library.

Then it was time to meet again with our architect, Gary W. We loved what he had done in fleshing out our previous discussions and offering precise blueprints. We added a toilet to the mud room, since often the guys will come in for a quick whiz while doing yard work, and it’s nice to have a place they can visit for which they do not have to clean their shoes or hands. We also requested an outside door to Gary B’s bedroom and bath so that he can enjoy more privacy as he comes and goes. It was a good meeting. We told Gary W about the delay we expect in starting the actual construction, because it will take us more time to save up for paying for this house, and he was fine with that.

Our taxes had come via messenger from the tax preparer, a thick envelope with all the needed forms for the household and Jim’s Lawn Service. We signed everything and then made a quick appointment with Debbie R at Glenview Trust and traveled over there so that we could drop off the forms which needed to be sent in with money attached. they will take that money directly from the trust which Don left me. It is glorious to have that detail taken care of for another year. Why it should be so hard to give the government money I don’t know, but it’s a hassle every year!

L/L Research’s taxes are not due until May 15th, so our preparer will finish those during the next month. We are non-profit and never owe money, but it is important to keep a good reporting record with the IRS in order to maintain that charitable status.

Jim and I enjoyed a good whirlpool and I took a nap while Mick watched Democracy Now. I was getting ready for the channeling session which Terry H had requested. Romi came over for that, so I tuned up and we had a good group indeed, with Romi, Jim and Gary sitting for the session. I shall be interested to edit the session, as the questions were interesting.

Romi stayed for dinner, working with all three office computers to back up their contents and otherwise maintain them. We all shared the Gaia Meditation after enjoying the antics of Steve Colbert together. After that the party broke up. We bade Gary and Ro a good night and came upstairs, turning off the lights at 11 PM.

2007-04-11

Storms swept Kentucky all day. In this cold weather, Jim says the grass has stopped growing, so after Morning Offering he had only one small job to do and then spent the morning working on a landscaping plan for a customer. I greatly admire the way he turned this “off” day into an opportunity to generate some good work for himself.

I spent the morning clearing one detail after another from the desk. I am considerably closer to clear of old details than when I woke up this morning! In my own way I also am making lemonade out of the lemons of my computer being down. I cannot compose new text on this computer as it is so dotty now that it loses and misplaces text constantly. However, while I wait for my ThinkPad to arrive, I am getting to the bottom of some very deep piles of things to do and it feels terrific.

One of the items in my paper mountain was a note to give Lindy T a call. She recently moved to North Carolina from Florida, where she had lived for twenty years or so, raising two children. Now they are gone from the nest and she is enjoying the beautiful scenery of those mountains and time at last for herself. Lindy is very psychic and was part of our Mind Link in 1977. She was at that time a teenager and she lived with Andrija Puharich, as did several other young people, for a couple of years during that period. We have stayed in touch ever since. Lindy is a little pint of sunshine, pretty and blonde-haired, but decidedly not “blonde” of mind, being very sharp. Her sweetness and serenity have always been notable and as she ages, she just gets better.

In the afternoon, Jim and I set out for the osteopath’s office. Dr. Johnson is treating me for hormone replacement and it was time for a new lab test to see where my levels are. However, when he found what was going on with me now, he suggested a regimen of seven weekly visits where I will receive homeopathic materials developed by Rudolph Steiner and made now in France, injected along the meridians for heart and GI tract and also have a session of cranial-sacral therapy.

It is his opinion that my basic health challenge is system-wide and involves helping the body regulate itself. He feels it has too much information streaming in from these various sources of discomfort and the body is reacting by missing the boat, just as a computer does when it is overloaded. Turn it off and then reboot it and usually those symptoms of overloading are gone. Supposedly the combined therapies will do that for my system.

It is worth a try!

Jim was driving for this trip, and was I glad on the way home! It had been steadily raining, but the heavens opened while we were at the doctor’s office and I could barely see ahead. It was the kind of rain that pounds down hard enough that it bounces, so there were nearly whited-out conditions on the road. And Johnson’s office is across the Ohio River, in Indiana. The only way to get there is across a bridge which is always jammed with traffic. There is only one lane, coming back to Kentucky, for those wishing to get on I-64, so it’s slow-and-go for several miles. Jim made it all look easy, and I had the chance to gaze out the window at the utter beauty of the natural spectacle. Driving over the bridge and looking downriver was especially gorgeous, mist on the water; thirty different shades of gray and brown in the roiled Ohio and in the rolling clouds overhead, layer upon layer.

Jim worked more on his landscaping plans when we got back while I shopped on-line for a computer tote bag. I need a new purse and instead of going the old route of just-a-purse, I would like to have a bag that can carry Trav2 when he arrives, as I often take my laptop with me if I am going to be waiting a while. No luck yet – there are a zillion models out there, but I am looking for the right one!

Jim called bath time and I abandoned the search to enjoy Jim’s and my evening together. After our bath, I spoke briefly to Gary about some L/L matters having to do with the creation of an L/L Research forum site, giving him the OK to go ahead with the discussion he is having with a volunteer who wants to undertake the job. The guy’s letters indicate a loving and dedicated LOO student who really wants to offer a labor of love and hopes to be a web-master for us. We’ll take that one slowly and let things develop organically. We already have a volunteer willing to moderate the forum, Monica L. We shall see what spirit brings!

Jim’s and my evening was relaxing and pleasant. Amy continues to have great information on Democracy Now, facts that no one on the corporate TV stations is mentioning. She really is a national treasure. Today she was focusing on Israel and Palestine and as Papa says, she has a completely different and far more realistic view of Zionism than most, who are afraid of disrespecting the Jewish faith. However, Zionism itself is not religious but political, and their politics in Israel now regarding Palestine have an ugly resemblance to our politics regarding Iraq.

After supper and the Gaia meditation, for which Gary joined us, Jim and I bade him good night and came upstairs for our bedtime kitty conference. We turned out the lights at 11 PM.

We began the day at freezing temperatures, 32 F, but by mid-afternoon we had come back into more seasonable weather – 50 and cloudy. After Morning Offering Mick headed out to accomplish a large, almost day-long job, clearing and trimming up a 200-year-old farmhouse with its immediate few acres of yard, plus doing some repairs to the building and grounds there.

I came upstairs and tackled the writing of this week’s UPI article. I have had to begin writing it on Tuesday, even though my deadline is Wednesday noon, because they have had incredible trouble receiving my sends. Here’s hoping it worked this time. I checked and as far as my sent folder knows, the article got there OK.

I wrote about our Refinery of Souls today. Worthy is the Earth!

Gary was kind enough to bring me back some burgers from White Castle. These “belly burners” do a good job of clearing away any sort of blockage in the GI tract and I was most grateful for the help.

I came back upstairs and tackled the speech Don gave in 1981, The Spiritual Significance of UFOs, which we have previously sold as an audio product but which had never been transcribed. Now we are attempting to get on line all of our offerings, so that if people cannot afford their own home copies, they can at least use the material on line. There were a few DOZEN places where the volunteer had been unable to hear, and I worked all afternoon tracking down references and getting the text smoothed out. By the time Mick came home and announced that our bath was ready, I had finished the editing and sent the work to our web guy.

Mick and I had a romantic time together and a short nap before coming downstairs to greet Gary and Romi and have a communal meal. Gary was getting ready to baby-sit his girlfriend’s young daughter for the first time ever and was apprehensive. I assured him that in cases of emergency, he could always send her to her room. In the event, I am sure all went well. Ocean is a lovely young lady, spoiled but reasonable. Par for the course these days.

Gary left for Valerie’s after the Gaia Meditation, at which Romi offered the closing prayer. Ro, Mick and I watched an episode of House together before we all called it a night. We bade good night to the Ro Man and came upstairs for a bedtime snuggle with the kitties before turning out the lights around 11 PM.

2007-04-09

It was 28 F when I arose! We are starting to see blackened leaf buds and bitten dogwood blooms from this extended cold spell. The locals call it “linen britches” weather. The tulips are struggling but are still alive. And we set a record here in Louisville for the lowest temperature on this date ever. Knowing that we are all interconnected around this globe, my suspicion is that we are getting the deep freeze while some other areas balance us out by raging with unwonted heat.

After Morning Offering, Jim layered himself with warm clothing aplenty and set out for a very full day of mowing and winter debris control. I found a note from Paul C in my Inbox with Don’s speech on the spiritual significance of UFOs transcribed, attached in rough draft form, so I decided to spend the day working on editing that. I spent the morning writing a beginning commentary for his talk and in the afternoon I edited through about two thirds of the text. There were many blanks to fill in and footnotes to place in the work to explain Don’s comments so the work was slow. It was good to “listen” to that speech again. He gave it just four months into the Ra contact. He’s such a good speaker!

I met briefly with Gary and we set up a channeling session for this Thursday night. Terry H has asked questions on everything from the time lateral the Q’uo have mentioned in previous sessions to ways to build faith. It should be an interesting session.

Jim’s and my evening was quiet and pleasant. We took in Democracy Now and then relaxed into a block of Star Trek Enterprise for the evening. Democracy Now was in fund-raising mode and featured a two-hour presentation of an interview with Dave Zirin, author of The Muhammad Ali Handbook. Ali is Louisville’s own and I have long been a fan, not of boxing or his boxing, respecting his excellence at that brutal and savage sport, but of his very tough stand on not fighting the Viet Namese, back in the day when men of color who had some success in sports kept their heads down and their mouths shut. Zirin was very good at bringing out the solid strength of Ali’s point of view.

Gary joined us for supper and the Gaia Meditation. Jim offered the closing prayer, a most eloquent one tonight. We said good night to Gary thereafter and to each other around 11 PM.

2007-04-08

Easter Day dawned sunny and frosty. I abandoned all plans for a springlike Easter Day appearance and dressed warmly for going to St. Luke’s. I also packed three diapers since I would be at church during the most intense daily period for laps to the john. Blessedly, I made it every time without incident and without having to walk out during a service.

I enjoy doing the extra chancel work on Easter Day, as it makes the occasion more real to me. I have good memories from childhood of Easter Sunrise services sung by a very sleepy choir, waking up to the Good News. This morning we sang the Billings Easter Anthem at both services. And I learned a hymn to which I have often heard references, “He Lives”. It’s a stodgy tune, but it has a wonderful chorus and a great hook in the sixth compassed between He and Lives. It gives the words the kind of surge you feel in the theme song to Love Story.

It was terrific to have completed a good Holy Week. I did miss one noon service due to being stuck in the bathroom when it was time to leave for it, but other than that, it felt very cleansing and strengthening to spend the extra time in confession, penitence, silence, prayer and ritual. Jesus the Christ is my perfect subject for meditation as He plays out His passion play during the readings on these days.

Jim and I had a good lunch after I finally returned from church. We stretched and bathed. Then he watched Tiger battle the golf course - along with everyone in the prestigious company, of course, but Jim was watching Tiger – while I checked my e-mail and played a little solitaire. We bathed and greeted our guests, Romi and Carmen. Romi set up for the channeling broadcast while Carmen took a bit of volunteer time to work on the poetry database for my poems and songs.

We gathered at 4 PM for the public meeting, had a good talk around the circle and chose a question for the session. It was from Dana R, who has experienced strange time distortions lately and wondered what that was. I imagine it will be an interesting session. It felt very choppy to me – but then it always does. I get little or nothing out of the sessions which I channel during the actual collection of the material. I always look forward to editing the transcript and discovering what the Q’uo principle said.

The rest of my day was pretty relaxed. Romi and I did order the ThinkPad, but other than that it was time for conversation, Romi’s Love Tea and then supper and episodes of Planet Earth until the Gaia Meditation. After that our guests said good night. Jim called his Mom and Gary, Jim and I bade each other sweet dreams around 10 PM. After a most pleasant bedtime snuggle with the cats, Jim and I hit the sack around 11:30.

2007-04-07

Snow fell this morning, just a flurry that only lasted a few minutes, but signaled the extent of the chill of the day. It looked so peculiar, sheeting down past the dogwood and redbud blossoms.

After Morning Offering, Jim cleared the driveway and walks for a customer who was having a party later today and then set out with Romi for Avalon. Romi wanted to help with our tractor. We had charged the battery and he wanted to get it installed and get the tractor working again. Meanwhile, Jim wanted to dump a huge trailer-load of branches into the side of Avalon’s feeder creek, where erosion is occurring. The technique has worked well at other vulnerable spots along our steep access road, and Jim is continuing the erosion control at this new place.

They came back, very satisfied with the morning’s work, with fast food for everyone! I had spent the morning on snail mail. I joined them and had a stretch with Jim, doing our mat exercises. Then Romi and I sat down to initialize my new laptop. Before we got far, both Romi and I noticed the high reflectivity of the screen. We could see ourselves as well as in a mirror. Ro says they make them like that because people watch DVD movies on their computers and the shiny screen shows truer colors.

The problem is, I never watch movies on my computer but I do use it all day, every day except Sunday in the week and my office is blessed with four windows, each of which is a yard wide and two yards high. The room is delightfully full of light. I now have a matte screen on my old laptop and still have problems seeing the screen on bright days. We talked and decided that Romi and Gary would go back to Best Buys and trade the machine in for a similar model with a matte screen.

They came home later most dejected. Best Buys did not have such a machine. They could not order such a machine. And they were charging us 15% of the cost of the computer for opening the box, even though I could not find out that I did not like the shiny screen until I got it out of the box. Best Buys will receive a complaint from me!

Romi looked around at the available models on several web sites and recommended that we go with an IBM ThinkPad, which is recommended on-line by many businessmen as being the most sturdy laptop available and which has a matte screen. We did that. Now I must wait for it to be shipped, delaying me further on the book and other creative projects. However I feel we made the right decision. That shiny screen would have bothered me from now on.

My stack of snail mail was reduced to about half a dozen actual letters and some thank you notes by the end of my day. I got tons done. This delay is a great opportunity to catch up on things and I shall continue to complete tasks which have been left undone of late while the new computer gets mailed out to us.

Romi took off for his own evening after that, while Jim and I had our bath and then a sweet and sensual date. We came downstairs at 8:30 or so and encountered Gary, who was just getting ready to have a bite to eat, so we joined him for supper and the Gaia Meditation, after which Gary took off for his girlfriend’s house. He had left his departure till late because his girlfriend has a young daughter and the daughter was having a sleepover at her house for her birthday. He wanted to avoid some of the noise!

Jim and I said good night after a great kitty-snuggle around 11:30.

2007-04-06

Frost was on the grass when I went out for the newspaper this morning, and the day stayed cold, starting around 20 F and rising only to about 40 by late afternoon. After Morning Offering Jim recruited Gary, as is their Friday habit. Since so many people want their lawns cut on Friday. Jim asks Gary to be his right hand man on Fridays. Gary’s aid speeds up the mowing/trimming/weeding/blowing process and they do good work together very quickly on Fridays, making Anchorage beautiful one yard at a time.

I enjoyed the day. Although I am temporarily not writing creatively on this computer, I can still compose letters and I spent the day doing just that, reducing my snail mail pile by quite a good bit! Compared to creative work, this sort of work is like a vacation! And it is super to see my backlog disappear. I hope I can catch up completely by the time Romi and I have the new machine ready to go.

I also did just a bit of e-mail, writing to Ba and to Judy about the Aaron/Q’uo Dialogues. The energy between us three is just astonishing. It is such a pleasure and a privilege to work with them and get this A/Q text edited. It needs to be Out There!!! It is very helpful material.

The guys came home a bit before 2 PM and we all had a good lunch together. Gary made Jim and himself some very righteous wraps with all sorts of goodies in them, while I enjoyed Gary’s homemade quiche and slaw. It can safely be said that Gary is now the best cook in the house.

Aches and pains aplenty made me feel right in synch with its being Good Friday! However I soldiered through in much joy and peace and after bathing, went to St. Luke’s to offer my Good Friday oblation. We sang some lovely music, notably “Bow Thine Ear”. The service was splendid, a new creation of a British vicar who created a “Songs and Carols” sort of service, with readings, hymns and choir anthems all mixed in with prayers, versicles and responses. All parts of the service were knitted together by silence, far more so than is usual for services in the Anglican Church. I loved it! Seldom have I enjoyed or been uplifted by a church service more than tonight.

Romi visited for dinner and the Gaia Meditation and we agreed to begin the work on Trav2 tomorrow afternoon. After a most enjoyable evening of conversation and some TV, we all said good night about 10:30 and Jim and I called it quits around midnight.

2007-04-05

We were in the deep freeze today! After Morning Offering, Jim headed out to mow in 22 degrees – with the wind chill from a 10 mph breeze plus the draft from the mower’s moving forward, Jim was probably experiencing a 10-degree day. Brrrrrr! But the grass grows, so Jim mows!

I worked on e-mail and snail mail, back and forth, all day. It feels great to be knocking out some of the backlog, and were it not for this unplanned hiatus in the creative work, I would never have gotten to it.

Tobey W wrote with exciting news. He has been re-listening to the original Ra session tapes, checking for accuracy. He come quite a ways through the sessions now, and is continuing to pursue the listening as he has time to volunteer. The Wiki database he has created was on a site we have closed and Tobey rescued the work and set it up independently. If you wish to look at his work, his work is at http://wiki.lawofone.info/. It is a good resource for the scholar.

It is to be noted that no listener gets every error! Terry H recently wrote to say that he could not understand why my unworldliness would tend to dim my indigo ray. That sentiment was in a sentence Tobey had found that Jim missed typing back when he first transcribed the sessions. Well, it makes no sense that way, but if you substitute the word, unworthiness, then it makes perfect sense.

My cousin Carlos is working on the Rueckert family tree, which pleases me greatly. I am not particularly interested in tracing my roots, but my Aunt K – now deceased – was, and she did a lot of work on the Rueckerts of America and back into northern Germany. Finally the information she so carefully gathered will be appreciated. I’ll bundle K’s material up and sent it to him.

All three of us – Karlynn, Carla and Carlos – are named after the same man, K’s Dad and Carlos’s and my Grandfather, Carl Theodore Rueckert. I barely escaped being Carla Theodora, my Pop’s choice, by Mum’s having a favorite relative, her Aunt Lisbeth Roubaud. I was named after her and I do love that name, though no one ever calls me that except my sweet husband.

I felt much better today, a relief after such a rugged day yesterday. Jim was able to join me for lunch, which is a rare treat in mowing season. Then after the afternoon’s work, we bathed together and relaxed until time for Maundy Thursday service. I sang for that service, and when I returned I found that Roman had come over. We had our supper together while I started reading a book Vara L had given me for my birthday, a biography of Lance Armstrong. I am enjoying it and recommend it.

After the Gaia Meditation, Romi and I sat down with Trav2. I will need to get used to its design, for it has interiorized the numbers within the letter keys. There is no keypad for numbers only. This, I suppose, enabled the machine to have larger keys and renders it easier to type on, although I am sure I will have a learning curve until my muscle memory kicks in, learning where the numbers are.

Romi and I talked about the installation process. He does not like teaching me anything because I have a tendency to break out of his careful, slow process and do things he has not requested. I do not mean to be a poor student, but I am. My mind races forward, I get distracted by an inner question and before I know it, I have stopped listening to Romi, regardless of the fact that I know nothing! He and I made a pact that if I inadvertently did that during the installation, he would say, “Carla, stop!” He was relieved to get a code he could use to get my attention before I drive him nuts!

Jim and I ended the day in our usual sweet snuggle with the kitties.

2007-04-04

The night had gotten icy cold and after Morning Offering Jim went off to mow bundled up for a wind chill factor of about 25. Meanwhile I came upstairs to continue my farcical attempts to use poor Traveller. My hard-working, much traveled laptop is biting the dust. I have really appreciated this great machine and I guess I wore it out! My working life is spent engaged with creating, editing and corresponding on it. Not to mention playing solitaire!

Bless their kind hearts, Romi and Gary came to my rescue and got me a replacement laptop this evening. A donor had just sent in a thousand dollars saying, "I hope this helps." Well, boy howdy! It certainly and specifically has helped! One hard-rocking chorus of "Rescue Me".

I look forward to getting everything installed on the new laptop, which I have dubbed Traveller Too, and getting back to writing creative projects and also doing the editing of my older work, which I count as creative work in its way, part of bringing my babies to full birth. I have several older creative works which are not yet completely edited by me. Anyway, I am not putting anything on this machine which I would mind losing! Fortunately, these Camelot Journal entries can be recovered from blogger in case I lose the material here.

Romi feels we should uninstall the Vista program which comes with Trav Too, and install XP Pro. We all use XP in this house network. He will also replace our present router to take advantage of aspects of this computer that the others do not have.

My internal health situation was unusually severe today, and as a result I went very slowly. A couple of times, I napped. But I did work some, responding to Ian’s request. He is bringing his computer back on line after a mishap involving this same Vista program, which swore with his machine badly. He asked for a re-send of the last month or so of my letters to him, and I was so pleased that my software lets me go into my Sent folder and use the “Forward” feature. It made the job easy, if long. I had a good deal to send, as we talk a lot, naturally.

I also found a Sunday channeling session missing, which his computer had eaten as it lay dying, and sent that on to him. Our site was fully backed up, Ian said, so all is well. And that was good to hear. Go, prudent web guy! But I am thrilled for him that he was able to resuscitate his beloved Apple.

I spent most of the rest of the working day on snail mail. I can use the computer for that as these are not letters of counsel. They are letters to my girlfriends, friends from L/L and relatives. I doubt they are worth keeping in terms of their metaphysical value to seekers, which is what I am interested in preserving of my own work.

I wrote long letters to Connie M and to Dana R. it felt great to have this luxury of spending real time with these two wonderful beings whom I am honored to call friend. What energy they both have! Angels on Earth, both of them.

Then I sorted through the four inches or so of remaining letters, putting them in alphabetical order so that I knew what I had. The cats all wanted to help with that, so I had a merry time of it! It felt great to get a handle on the snail-mail job as a whole. I am hoping I can catch this up while Romi is creating the time to come over and help me with getting the transfer to TravToo made. Then I can say I lost no time! Which is kinda neat.

I checked my e-mail at end of day before retiring to the bath and found that Larry M had not yet published my article for this week. I had gotten it in to them a day early, so I was especially puzzled. Interestingly enough, every single article I have written in this Dignity series has balled up in the sending, either not being received at all or being received corrupted initially. I know my poor Traveller is in his last throes, but still, that is one heck of a coincidence. Nothing else from Trav has balled up in the sending during this time except anything to do with writing on 101. I have beaucoup glitches with that always! I feel sure some negative non-incarnated pests are taking potshots at all light-intended projects and the people with the will to pursue them. And computers are easy targets.

I sent Larry a query on that missing article before descending to the evening ahead.

It was a pleasant evening, if a still distinctly uncomfortable one physically. After a good whirlpool, I was off to choir practice. I was sorely tempted not to attend, but in general it’s better to suffer and rehearse than to coddle the body and then be unprepared singing the lovely and demanding music for 4 services before the end of the weekend. We’re doing a pilgrim-era American anthem.It is sung a capella and has a forthright sturdiness missing in most Anglican pieces. Also on deck is the Thompson Alleluia, among other pieces, for Easter Day, and some lovely, very contemplative things for the Thursday and Friday services. Ubi Caritas and Tantum Ergo come to mind.

Jim had kindly rented a copy of the film, Casablanca, as I have been wanting to see it again for a while now. He, Gary and I sat down to it when I got back from rehearsal, and as they ate their dinner we had a lovely late evening immersed in that fine story, those elegant clothes, that witty script, the carefully nuanced production and the stunning stage presence and ensemble skills of Bogart, Bergman and company. Yum.

We paused during the movie to offer the Gaia Meditation, with me praying at the end.

We tumbled into bed almost directly after the movie, saying good night about 11:30.