modern prophetess...

in my culture when a person leaves this place and moves on we don't speak their name for a year...for a multitude of reasons.

i want to mention her though because upon remembrance, she was a large part of the lives of my family for a long, long time...

when pregnant with my first son, she was the one who came up to me with the first congratulatory hug...while in labor with this son, she faithfully came to the hospital to pray with me and kind of do crowd control (our church was very family oriented).

she and her husband adopted a young boy from south america...this boy became close friends with one of my sons and we were connected throughout the youths of these sons...

i moved away, she moved away but she often reconnected with me and sent me many encouraging and uplifting emails; when she could she spoke powerful truth into my life and forever her gentle yet firm grasp of honesty in the Spirit will stay with me...

i'm happy for her to have moved on, she's now in the place she always longed to be...i will miss her and am grateful to have had her in my life.

blessings and hugs to you my sister.

stones singing

bottom line is this...if you keep your eyes and ears open you will see the most astounding beauty and hear the most profound stories!!!!! and here's one, on our way to celilo and on to the Big Place of Bright Lights and Beautiful Songs (PDX) there are so many stories...one such story starts like this:

long ago when the stones were light and walked around like we humans do today they dressed themselves in sunsets and rainbows, with spray from the dancing waterfalls along the columbia gorge; the stone women sang strong songs that wove from colors in the sunset huckleberries and fruit like you've never tasted before. at night they would hum gentle songs to the baby stones and from these lullabies came warm bread from pounded grass flour...

even the young stones had their chores and they would laugh joyously bounding from hilltop to hilltop gathering dew from the juniper trees to make tea for their grandmas and clover tea for their baby brothers and sisters.

the men would stride about with their important business and they roamed about from far south into the icy north gathering woods and animals and plants for the future world for as all stones know, change happens and time passes - they would not be singing forever...

mama stone sat singing along the columbia river...auntie columbia hummed happily along below her and they harmonized with such beautiful songs that many busy with projects stopped to listen...the young stones gathered around her and she sang more songs - joyful songs weaving together such trees as apples, juicy and colorful. pears grew with these two singing and also cornfields sprouted up...as the singing continued the valley began a dance and two large mountains squatted down to listen...Mount Hood remains still as she listens intently...you can see her, she proudly flaunts lacy snow shawls and holds her head high with her garland of fog...

mama stone had found her song and she gathered the children close so they'd learn...

as spoken by elders from long ago in the mist, the days of their freedom was passing...the stones felt themselves growing stiff with the cold and they smiled at each other with strength for all knew the time would soon come when the expression they wore would be the one seen for all time...auntie columbia continued the song for she was grateful forever to mama stone for singing...

the sun rose that day and all was silent for a moment...but when you drive down the freeway, pause to give respect - she sits on the side by the river, her children gathered around; if you listen you can hear echoes of her song and you will find wisdom in her stories...

but if you just keep driving of course you'll still get where you're going...