13 October 2007 – Friday Harbor, San Juan Island, Washington

But I won’t need it when I reach the end…

Cyndy got us to the San Juan Islands Ferry (after a short detour to a Bellingham waterside park for a walk) in time for us to get settled in before the boat embarked. We sat in the sun, had a snack, read, wandered around, watched the many islands pass by, and readied ourselves for our next stop: the San Juan Island Public Library. At the dock we were met by Adrienne, our main organizer, who whisked us away to meet Ian and Josie, and the house at which we would be staying.

We settled in a bit, made our plans, rested, then headed to the library. There, Floyd had things pretty much in control, in terms of the projector and sound, so we set up our DVDs and conversed with people as they came in. We had a full room of 45 souls, and we started out with a wonderful bit of music from Ian, who sang us an old and appropriate-to-the-occasion John Denver tune. Sally and I made our introductions and Adrienne hit play.

I watched for a while, then strolled back into the library (open wi fi!) to catch up online. My back hurt, so I put away the laptop and did some yoga and stretching. That helped. It may be that Cat Stevens is right, and that I won’t need this body when I reach the end, but I sure do need it now. Sure do. And so I’m taking what steps I can, on this trip, to be its good friend. Three years in front of a computer has not been kind to it.

The stretching helped, so I made my way back to the screening and watched the last half of the doc. The end credits ran. We invited people to stay for the dialogue and then broke for a bit, to move chairs and dismantle the projector and screen. A man in a red t-shirt walked up to me and, without a word, hugged me for a long time. Then we walked away. Sometimes, there is really nothing that needs to be said.

Fourteen of us stayed afterwards and talked for a couple of hours, an advantage of doing a weekend screening and starting it early. We spoke of shame and guilt, of perspectives both large and small. We spoke of action, of fighting, of being paralyzed and of giving up. And we spoke of putting in our picket pins, and what that might mean, and how that might look. The talking stick made its way around and around, and there was time to go slowly, and compose our thoughts, and to see the goodness in that room, the wisdom, the heart.

We keep saying how wonderful the people are, the people who are organizing these screenings, or putting us up, driving us around and feeding us and giving us a bed upon which to sleep. I know the truth of these words. The people we are meeting are smart and kind and generous and loving and good and aware. They are doing their best in the world, and doing much good, even when stuck in a culture that pushes us all in the opposite direction. There is something beautiful and wondrous in the potential of the human animal, and I am getting to see that on this tour. As someone with long years of disgust for humanity under his belt, this is no small thing.

We closed down the library and went to the pub with Ian, Josie, and Adrienne. We drank a wonderful local-brew Oktoberfest, ate fish and chips and coleslaw, and laughed and talked and shared until they kicked us out. It is always a moving experience, to hear people’s stories, to hear where they come from, and how they are facing into the world as we now find it.

Josie works with whales, and spoke of the grays of the West coast beginning to starve, as climate change, most likely, warms the waters and melts the ice and alters the ecosystem upon which they feed. I don’t know what to say to things like that. I’m sitting there eating french-fries and drinking a beer, and the biologists are now finding starving whales. The gray whale population has rebounded from the ravages of whaling only to run smack into an unraveling food chain and the impacts of climate chaos. Out of the flaying pan and into the greenhouse fire.

The same thing is happening, of course, amongst many human groups. And the same will happen here one day too, I think. Here where we are so insulated from the consequences of our behavior. Here where we appear to be so rich and happy, so full of piss and vinegar. So when I cry for the grays, as I did, as I do, I cry, also, for us. We live in a time of shedding our bodies, and as we reach the end, as the perfect storms lash us from every side, that will be more and more the case. There will be great sadness and loss in that. As we humans, and the gray whales and the many living souls that comprise the community of life, leave this world behind, our lives unfinished, perhaps, our purposes unfulfilled, there will be great sadness indeed.

A night’s sleep brought us around the clock to coffee and some quick conversation, before making our way back to the ferry for our short hop over to Orcas Island. Our thanks to Adrienne and Ian and Josie for making this leg of our journey as rich and warm and sweet as it was.

Tim