I started this out as a journal, noting the date of every entry and checking against Google and Facebook histories to ensure its accuracy. I was very concerned about getting the dates right at first for some reason. As I’ve gone along, I’ve realized all the dates of my life are starting to run together and I’m not really sure it matters.

The day after my sister Shelly died, I sat around the table with my friend Kristi, and roommates Zach and Austin (who is now Annabella). I don’t remember if it was that day or another that Austin told me I was going to save the world. No pressure. Thankfully I have since discovered Eckhart Tolle on YouTube. It was only a few minutes in that he informed me (and the rest of us who watched) that all we have to do to save the world is save ourselves. I have looked for that video dozens of times since so I could share it with you and haven’t found it again.

I decided that day I wasn’t going to give myself a hard time if I decided to drink some of my pain away. I would say Thank God I’m past that, but some days I’m not. I accept that pain is part of my journey – and everyone’s – and I find ways to appreciate the beauty that has come out of it.

Just look at the war on Ukraine, the loss of generations of women in the Congo, insert list of atrocities here whether created by God, Nature or Man. We look at these things and we experience them and we think how could there possibly be any joy in this world? How could there possibly be any beauty? But my own experiences of pain tell a different story. If you maintain faith through it, you discover a deeper beauty than you knew existed. That seems more magical and more real all at once than anything existing in your frame of reference beforehand.

Thanks to many YouTube guru videos including Eckhart and many others who accept pain as part of the journey and have helped me look for the deeper meaning on the other side of it. Mind you, you have to give in to the story. Its always your choice.

Most of my family and friends agree that Shelly’s death was a pivotal turning point in my life. Life would never be the same again and it never will be. I know of many others across multiple generations whom she impacted equally. Shelly was a firm believer in manifest destiny. She and her husband, Steve, followed Abraham Hicks for those who know It as such. I remember her telling me about it one day. Giving me CDs and telling me about someone named Esther. I remember it all sounding quite confusing at the time. But when she told me how good I was at manifesting things, it made sense to me.

Steve had a real crisis of faith after Shelly died. I remember him being completely grief-stricken, “How could she choose this?” How could anyone choose to die at 42, leaving behind an amazing life and three beautiful children? It wasn’t til years after, sitting at a Dr. Sue Morter seminar with tears streaming down my face learning about the Bus Stop and soul contracts that I realized why she had chosen it. Or at least my version of it which brought with it a tremendous amount of comfort. Where would I be now if she hadn’t died? I certainly wouldn’t be sitting in this hotel conference room listening to Dr. Sue talk about how she found her mother in 69 four-leaf clovers after she had died at the age of 69.

Nor would I have ever started a restaurant with my family. Nor would my family have started it with me! But like I tell my dad now, no matter what we lost in the process, we got Chris out of the deal. He agreed with that. I thought of how the lives of so many of my sister’s family and friends had changed – just the ones I know about, let alone all the ones I didn’t. I truly can’t imagine the ripple effects she caused in her short, but incredible life. And those ripples will go on forever, not just in our own lifetimes but in those of her children. They are truly Angels on Earth. I’m sure I prayed to Shelly that day and I’m sure she was with us.

After the trauma of our off road adventure, Chris and I decided to head straight to Crystal Hot Springs. In reality, we realized the sun would soon be setting even if we wanted to take our time exploring. I continued to write down notes of signs that spoke to me as we passed. Bootleg National Recreation Area. Skull Creek Camp. I imagined a children’s adventure story like Zelda or Harry Potter. The names I wrote down with every sign got more and more fantastical. It’s as if the universe was unfolding them just for me. I couldn’t recall the exact turns and the exact locations of each one or retrace their footsteps again even if I wanted to. And if I did, I’m not sure which ones would be there anymore. Or which would be lost to another time space dimension that my eyes might filter out because I was paying attention to something else.

I knew this would be an adventure etched in our minds and souls for eternity. If we’re lucky, we each have those moments where life seems more surreal. More precious. More unexplained. As if we’re being connected with the secret codes of the universe even though we have no idea what any of it means at the time. And I wanted to make sure I didn’t miss a thing. The airstream flowed by desert ranches on lost state highways. And I continued to scribe. AH Neff. JR Broadbent. I wondered when and where these characters would show up in my future. Or if they’d already been an essential part of my past.

Everywhere we went, we saw farms and ranches being carved out of the desert. And housing developments being carved out of farms and ranches. And everywhere, water and more water spread across the hot mid-day desert under a scorching sun. It didn’t take long to realize that the math doesn’t add up. That we have to start doing better by the land we have rather than carving out and controlling more land. Did anyone else see the idiocy in all of this? I prayed for Us to do better.

Our venture at the restaurant hadn’t succeeded under traditional terms. It was difficult for my family and for many others financially, emotionally and physically. And I’ll be indebted to those who helped forever and thank them for the rest of my life and beyond for that time together. I do believe we helped create a wave much bigger than any of us and ignited some real change in food and in our community and in communities across the country. Maybe even the world. One thing’s for sure is that Chris and I now take that energy and those practices into every place we call Home. Including rural Indiana.

But there is so much more to do. And many more places to call Home. And I fear sometimes that we are too complacent. My family and friends seem to think we get a lot done anyway. And hopefully our actions still make a difference in the end.

Chris and I never made it to the Flaming Gorge on this trip. We passed by the sign in a heartbeat, our story in this moment amounting to two words scribbled on the back of a camping packing list. It was only later after weeks of book research, months of thoughtful contemplation and years of mystical curiosity that I discovered the deeper meaning of the Flaming Gorge that’s still an unfolding part of our journey. And I take comfort in knowing that meaning will continue to evolve as we peel back more layers of the onion of our existence. Just imagine what layers we’ll add when we actually visit in person!

Last year, Chris dreamed that he was fly fishing in a beautiful river surrounded by tall pine trees and high cliffs. Someone ran by him. All he could see out of the corner of his eye was a three pronged foot – something between a human foot and a bird’s claw, but he could feel the rush of wind as the creature passed. Chris yelled to get his attention but It wouldn’t stop. “Hey!” I love how his voice drops an octave when he is in defender mode. Chris pursued as fast as he could, chasing It in leaps and bounds but he couldn’t keep up. In one amazing swoop, the object of his pursuit flew to the top of the cliff beyond Chris’ reach.

In hindsight, it’s easy for me to see that Chris was trying to stop Elliot from making a terrible mistake. To reach out to our child and warn It not to lash out from the pain One might experience in this lifetime. As I write this, my left thigh twitches in pain. I feel you Elliot. But in futuresight, who could have known? Elliot didn’t stop to listen. I think it was sometime last year we decided to give that name to the child we never had. When I decided to write this book actually.

Our friend Stephanie is an energy master and she told us we have three children. We’ve explored their potential a lot since we’ve been together. But so far they’ve chosen only to manifest in Chris’ aura and in my body twitches here or there. I’m still learning how to listen and better understand my body. Thank you Marina for always being so helpful in that regard. She reminds me constantly that true wisdom is already present in every cell of our bodies. All we have to do is get our brains out of the way and listen to it.

I read a book recently called Homo Spiritus: A different kind of Human, all about learning how to breathe. I realized as I read that’s my other biggest piece of life advice. “Just breathe!” In fact, it was a friend of Tracy’s at a birthday dinner years ago who noticed that I didn’t breathe. Many childhood years of sucking in my stomach and holding my shoulders up so that my posture was proper and I looked skinny. Thanks mom….that was the advice at the time. Who knew the damage we would cause when we stopped breathing?

Our eldest, Lulu, touches my arm or grabs my hand. She wants to be a Changeling. Which some people think is a negative thing, but it doesn’t scare Chris or me. We love her no matter what. It’s no wonder she has inspired quite a line of salves, shampoos and gifts for family and friends. Changeling? Why of course she is. How on earth could she be so many things otherwise?

Elliot is the middle child. Like both of us in so many ways, Elliot is both divinely masculine and feminine all at once. Elliot wants to be a Phoenix. I’m still not sure what that means entirely, but am hoping to figure it out by the end of this book. The youngest wants to be a LochNess Monster and is yet to be named. I like Nessie, but it’s so over-used. And I’m not sure yet how she’ll decide to manifest in this world. So like LuLu and Elliot, she’ll get her name when she’s ready to make her appearance and when we’re ready to experience her.

I can understand now of course why Elliot didn’t stop in Chris’ dream. After having spent so much time writing this book and having experienced the magic of the Seraphim angels firsthand myself recently, I appreciate how easy it was for Elliot to get caught up in their intensity and passion, reverence and pain. But they would be the first to acknowledge that the power and beauty of all that is lies not with them, nor us, nor any one in particular but only with the One and Creator of All that Is forever and always through each and every one of Us. And while We may desire to be Godly, it is God who chooses to act through us and around us and within us in more ways of glorious wonder and curiosity than we could ever imagine or realize to be possible. But oh how glorious it is to try!

It took a long time for me to be comfortable with using the word God. I know my notion of God doesn’t match up with others. For a long time, I was afraid to use it. It still conjures up so many preconditioned emotions and traumas for people. But I have evolved through that and reclaimed the notion of what God means to me. Having faith in a higher order and connection of all things as One. And the more I believe it, the more I see it, smell it and feel it all around me. Like the Seraphim and all of us, the more I surrender to God the more I find a way to speak the right words at the right time.

In fact, I was writing about their flight with Elliot at the Flaming Gorge today when Chris got his first call as a volunteer firefighter. A structure fire. I sincerely apologize if the Seraphim’s intensity crossed any lines of energetic appropriateness that are too much for this dimension to handle. I will be sure to write about them with care in the future. Thankfully as I write now, I am in Edwards, Colorado in the middle of a snow storm so the fire risk is reduced.

Chris and I celebrated our anniversary a few years ago with a visit to Hot Sulphur Springs, Colorado. I recently discovered that there are seven towns in America named after Element 16 (Sulfur), not to mention how many more named after springs that bear the smell. Add to that the hot ones and there are likely hundreds, if not thousands of rotten egg smelling pins on the map with names who are now out of synch with the periodic table of elements. I guess that table is a lot easier to change than all the home addresses, town codes, maps, point of interest databases and other documents that have been created over the centuries based on it. Do you think our kids one day will realize that sulfur and sulphur are the same thing?

We got married on September 27th, the day before our sister Shelly’s birthday. That’s right. I failed to mention that my sister Shelly is also Chris’ sister Shelly. It’s always sounded like a Jerry Springer episode to me. My mom had Debbi and Shelly with her first husband, Richard. Then they divorced and my mom married my dad, 2E and Richard married Cindy. While my parents were busy having me, Richard and Cindy were busy having Chris. Neither marriage lasted and all parents eventually went on to their next marriages.

Our parents asked a lot of us growing up, exploring and diving into relationships with multiple families. So now we’re asking a lot of them. We are all exploring new relationships in a land of connected now. I’d love to explore our family tree – or network – as part of another book. How could I not? But for now, rest assured Chris and I have no blood or marriage relationship between us. 

Shelly died of ovarian cancer before we got married and surely had a hand in bringing us together. Although it took years for us to realize that. It was really our sister, Deb, that garnered the attention at the beginning of our relationship. Admittedly, she had just gone through a divorce so wasn’t in a healthy place. And for all sorts of logical reasons, she decided she was not happy about our relationship and she was going to show it. Thankfully that’s a wound that is healing with every year that passes.

For this anniversary, we rented out the apartment at the center of the medicinal pools and they locked us inside for the night. The morning we left, we had driven 222 miles on the tank. I smiled and touched it with my finger, making small circles like Shelly might if she were here. Of course she’s here. Today is her birthday. I thought of her and smiled. We set out for home.

We passed the YMCA ranch resort where we had considered having our wedding. We were getting close to 222,222 miles on our Prius, the Gold Nugget. Sorry for the digression, but Chris asked me to remind you that it’s very important for vehicles and special equipment to have names. We no longer have the Gold Nugget. Our newest addition to the family is the Black Pearl, who joins the Jolly Roger and the Beav as our current vehicle pack. So I liked to wonder where we would be when we hit that 222,222 milestone in the Gold Nugget. Suddenly we were so close. How could I be surprised to look up and realize we were passing mile marker 219? Wait. Were miles on this road going up or down? Would the next be 220 or 218? I waited in anticipation. It was a beautiful sunny day. I closed my eyes and leaned my head out the window to feel the sun’s warmth on my face.

There it was. Mile marker 220. I was delighted at the thought of reaching 222,222 miles at mile marker 222 so I asked Chris what the mileage was on the dashboard. “We just passed 222,220 miles” he said. I smiled. We listened to the radio and drove quietly around the mountain turns. There went 221. I looked at the speedometer as it also passed 222, 221 right in step. Shelly was creating some magic in the air today! It seemed like too significant an occasion not to try and document. But how do you really document something like this? Turns out it’s extremely hard to get a mile marker and a speedometer in the same picture frame. But we certainly tried after rolling to mile marker 222 just as our speedometer shifted to 222,222 miles right in front of the Winter Park Christian Church.

We posted the event to Facebook. It’s hard to say whether folks believed us or not. It didn’t seem like sufficient appreciation or recognition to mark the occasion for the mystical experience that it was. To date, it’s one of the most special gifts I’ve ever received. And I’m happy to count it amongst many mystical joys I’ve experienced this time around. May I be worthy of every One.