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The support and fundraising that has happened on my behalf has touched my heart and has made alternative cancer treatment a possibility for me. Donations continue to be my primary funding for healthy food, supplements, living expenses and medical bills. If you feel moved to give to my Health and Wellness Fund, please follow the Paypal "Donate" button below. To avoid Paypal's 3% fee, checks or cash can be sent to Zachariah Walker, 1003 Chipeta Ave, Grand Junction, CO 81501. Blessings!

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Thursday, June 21, 2012

The Camping Diaries part 1


June 18th, 2012- Camping off Forest Rd 254, Grand Mesa
            Quite a lapse in my journal since the last entry.  I guess you could say quite a lapse of time.  My last entry was early March; I was pondering what was going on with my health… 
I find myself lounging inside the protective bubble of my tent.  The seasons are early this year in Western CO, including mosquito season.  I have been here long enough that many of them that were frosted onto the netting have given up.  Still, a dozen or so, with the leg-span of a quarter, hopefully await my departure from the tent.  I imagine this will come soon and I will navigate their buzzing and parasitic nature.  I should free my pup as well.  I have quarantined Beacon to the back of the truck for her own protection.  The pathetic look on her face earlier expressed her own solemn irritation at the onslaught she was suffering.  We’ve both napped the morning away.  I’ve also put a nice dent in my book, Mom’s Marijuana… (AND WHOOO! At that very moment a large cinnamon colored bear just lumbered across the field in front of me.  I am suddenly energized!)  My thoughts seem unimportant now- I have been blessed by bear medicine, introspection.  Perhaps my thoughts are important now! 
            I remarked to Larkin a few days ago that I am tired of reading books about cancer stories.  It reminds me too much of my reality.  I have been living lately with such life.  No fears or concerns around my AML diagnosis or the “failure” of the two rounds of chemo I’ve been through.  I’ve been to Tijuana and back on a crazy adventure the whole time optimistic and completely confident in success.  At times I’ve wondered if I’m in denial, but I know I’m not.  I’m carrying the mindset that will cure me.  But reading the book, today’s account of a bone marrow biopsy with ravaging chemotherapy after a Hodgkin’s relapse, and me, in the grandest solitude I have felt in months… the “what ifs” arise.  The ache in my elbow joint, the occasional throbbing in my shinbones, what is happening in my body, my blood, my marrow?
            I am so content here in my MSR bubble.  The natural world is moving all around my stillness.  A ground squirrel has twice walked up to the mesh of my tent and hopped on.  Fearing rips in the delicate yet protective barrier, my protesting feet sent it fleeing up and over to slide down the slick rainfly attached to the aft half of the tent.  What levity!  The chorus of feathered ones has been a constant meditation since sunrise.  Thankfully, the irritating rattle of tree squirrels that woke me originally has long since passed.  Occasionally, the relative silence is broken by a gust through treetops.  The rush through the aspens and evergreens sounds like a long wave crashing to the shore.  Back in the silence, the large firs in front of me subtly ungulate like anemones in a tide pool, each branch independently swaying.  With an unfocused gaze that takes in the complete scene there is sweetness.  The view from my mesh bubble has me sandwiched between sky blue and various shades of green Earth.  I like it here, certainly better than in the tattling pages of my compelling book.


June 18th, 2012
Leeches and Lilies

The lure of the Buddha in lily pads drew me to this mesa lake sitting spot.
Dragonflies with medieval enchanted magic, charged from illuminated pedals in bloom,
dance the Hop to Hop and hover in stillness, pausing for realness.
Like I’ve done on this “getting out.”

My gaze drops below to the watery realm and unmoving current.
Wildlife viewing of leeches, in mass, beyond reaches,
take me to parasitic actions I know.
Daydreams ensue of abdominal strife, healing cuts of the knife,
And this battle I should now be waging…

That moment or more, past,
once my eyes took the shore, refocusing my sight on the surface.
There, stillness and charm, an unbothered account of surface beauty.
Present, the length of the pond.

There the vision stays, until the mind betrays with fears of my Beyond.
And back to the surface, to the practice of Beauty.
The Buddha in lily pads.

2 comments:

Health and Freedom Yoga said...

My words are tied in one
With the great mountains
With the great rocks
With the great trees
In one with my body
And my heart.

Do you all help me
With supernatural power,
And you, Day
And you, Night
All of you see me
One with the world.

Yokuts Indian prayer

Zachariah said...

Thank you Anthony, Beautiful and much appreciated.