Live and, hopefully, learn

Last night's event drew nearly 20 people, 18 women, one man (Tony), and one 14-year- old boy with his mother, sitting on hardback chairs in a circle in a fairly smallish room. All but one actually arrived on time--rare in Montana.

However, despite some very willing, heart-centered, open folks who kept nodding their heads "yes" at much of what I said, this was the first event where I felt like I was pulling teeth for the whole evening. Lots of lulls in conversation, which then would prompt me to start up a new topic, and see where that one would go. Unlike most of the other events, which last at least two hours, this one was obviously out of steam after only 90 minutes.

On the way back to Tony and Kay's house, I decompressed with my friend Star, the organizer for the Hamilton events, and we zeroed in on three women who came in together and who seemed to be somewhat out of it, disconnected. Two of them did at times seem to be responsive, though none of them ever spoke. The third one however, felt to both of us like a black hole, dour, unexpressive, unchanging during the entire time. Could she--or they--have "scotched" the event, so that no matter what the rest of us did or said or felt, they kept dragging down the energy?

Oddly, as Star and I were talking, a policeman's lights started to flash behind me. I pulled over, and he told me that I had been driving on the center line and asked to see my registration, because the car didn't seem to be registered. Peering intently with his flashlight, he then checked the Vin number, and went through a few more official checks, and finally let us go. The timing of this incident felt uncanny.

It's not that the event didn't "go well" in conventional terms, with me as "the teacher" and the others "the students." Tony, for one, liked very much that he was present at a conversation which was deeper than usual. I realize now that my own disappointment was due to the fact that, once again, I had built up expectations-- for some kind of alchemical ignition in the group process. Because that does sometimes happen on this tour, I have grown to personally need it. Once again, Ann, let go!

(By the way, the 14-year-old, who looked as if he had been dragged to the event, was very happy and energized afterwards, said he had greatly enjoyed it. Perhaps it was because a number of people had brought up instances of magical phenomena that had accompanied the deaths of people they were close to, and magic is Harry Potter territory. So who knows? I may be entirely off in my assessment of what happened last night.)

Kay and I also remarked to each other this morning that if I had asked each person to state their name and why they had come it might have changed the evening's course. I had thought there were too many people present to make that a meaningful ritual, but, as Kay said, we were saying to each other afterwards that we didn't even know each other's name, and let's get to know each other now!

Live, and hopefully, learn. This afternoon, a book signing at the local independent book store, then tonight, a Sufi zikr (dance and chant) to which I very much look forward. Tomorrow I travel to Twin Falls, Idaho, and hopefully will be able to go directly south on highway 93, despite the Tin Cup fire, burning near Darby.