Welcome to Living a Life of Gratitude.
I'm Sarah Wiseman.
Crossing the Stream We're at Kanita,
A warm spring,
A casino,
A resort,
A campground in eastern Oregon.
People come here for all the reasons.
Those are just four.
We're here for a few days,
My partner for a conference,
Me to do some writing.
We've driven 140 miles to get here,
Transversing the state as trees give way to scrub,
Give way to desert,
And I realize we have reached a new land,
A new sense of place.
I've never been anywhere like this,
But I am getting used to that.
The more I travel,
The more I realize how big the world is and how many places there are and how there is no way I will visit them all or even most of them or even a few before I die.
This particular place,
Established in 1855,
Was once owned by a shaman,
A spiritual teacher who used the natural plants and roots for ceremony and medicine.
The casino doesn't match the historical vibe.
We're numbed by the noise and light,
The sour smell of cigarettes as we pass through.
That's not what we're here for.
We swim in the giant pool at the center of the resort.
It's nice,
A luxury for early autumn,
But that's not what we're here for either.
Pulled by some unknown cosmic string to the experience that will be our destiny in this new place,
This place we have never set foot in before,
We decide to head toward the small town down the road.
Sure enough,
As we merge onto a main road bordered by nothing but rock and sand and sage,
The sign appears.
Horses for rent.
It's a tiny place,
Hardly a place at all.
There are no horses,
Just an empty stable and rickety old trailer serving as a front office.
There's nobody in the trailer either,
An old paper coffee cup on the floor and some newspaper inserts and a fly buzzing around to stay warm.
We're disappointed and made a little nervous by the desolation we've stumbled upon.
Hey,
A young guy yells at us from out of nowhere.
He's very small,
Muscled brown with a thick back plate of hair down his back.
I don't know where he came from.
Hey,
He turns and yells at something behind him and a mini stampede of horses barrels toward us,
A rider and a horse leading three more horses all galloping full force at us.
The rider whirls and stops,
Same black hair,
Same brown skin,
A girl.
We decide to my amazement that we'll take the four hour half days ride with these two young people we've just met.
We will take the four hour half days ride up high into these hills,
These mountains of tumbleweed and slippery sand,
Even though I have only ridden a horse a few times in my life and our guides,
We find out later,
Are ages 16 and 18 respectively.
The mountains loom,
The sky is glooming,
The sweet sage fills the air and an old saddle creaks as I throw my leg up like a cowboy,
Get stuck and have to try three times while everyone laughs.
And finally,
The boy who's just 16 has to boost me up by the butt into the saddle.
My whole body is trembling as we set off on our journey.
My horse,
Wise soul,
Knows I am terrified,
Knows I am terrified and cares not a whit.
I grasp my water bottle with one hand,
My saddle horn with the other and pray.
The funny thing about fear is once you hang out there for a while,
It goes away.
We pick our way among rocks and I marvel that my horse can move all four legs so easily.
We veer off toward more rocks,
Then descend into a slanting riverbed and finally a stream.
It's a trickly stream at first,
Only a few inches deep.
It's fun and I'm laughing and crowing with delight,
The river burbling bright,
This clear cold day,
The mountains rising.
We travel further and the water gets deeper.
Our guides,
Unconcerned,
Press on.
The water is now at my horse's chest and in a turmoil of panic,
I don't know whether to jump off and lead my horse or jump off and splash back to shallower waters.
Our guides ahead of us are talking quietly to each other.
The thought of trying to get back on my horse again keeps me glued to my saddle.
But now my horse is chest deep in the water,
Which suddenly has become dark and cold and whirling.
I am clinging to my saddle,
Ready to call out in panic when our guides begin a kind of clicking and calling and coaxing on cue and suddenly our horses are lunging across the river,
Swimming strong against the ripply,
Dark,
Cold water.
And before I can do another thing,
We are lumbering up the riverbed to the other side.
My legs are wet,
My shoes and pants sodden.
I do not say a word.
We spend the rest of the four-hour,
Half-day trip climbing high into the mountains and I am still so amazed I have forded a river on the back of a horse that my heart does not stop thumping and my eyes do not stop shining until later in the day when we finally arrive home.
I tuck a rock in my pocket and some sage to remember this day.
But I don't remember it until many years later when I am thinking about miracles and experiences and life in the world and all the times my heart has burst open.
We each have had unexpected adventures in our lives.
Think back to an event in which you stretched yourself or were stretched.
Remember this day,
What happened and how amazing you felt.
Take this memory out like a precious jewel and hold it in your hand.
