Thursday, November 3rd, 2011

A Spacey State

Columbus, Ohio

We were moving in a weaving fashion between tree trunks walking light as on air (or clouds), actually leaves, layers upon layers. Madhu, Ram and I drove a short distance from Ram's house to Allum Creek State Park for a fresh air experience. It was Ram's first time to this place. I like to think that wherever I travel I contribute to helping my host explore his/her neighbourhood territory. I insist, "Let's go for a walk and see what you haven't seen in your own backyard."

To my own surprise, Ohio has lots of great woodsy escapes. And talk about it being a spacey place, well, astronauts John Glenn and Neil Armstrong come from Ohio. And there's also the Wright Brothers who claimed Ohio as their home. Wilbur Bright wrote: "Let in the autumn of 1878, our father came into the house one evening with some object partly concealed in his hands, and before we could see what it was, he tossed it into the air. Instead of falling to the floor, as we expected, it flew across the room 'til it struck the ceiling, where it fluttered awhile, and finally sank to the floor... a toy so delicate lasted only a short time in the hands of small boys, but its memory was abiding."

It appears that fascination for flying really took off for the two boys. In 1903 they built the first aircraft.

The Krishna community in Columbus this evening showed a fascination for my pilgrim pastimes. Students from U of Columbus wanted to hear and so that's what I delivered. In speaking about trekking for the soul you should never assume that it's only a topic about moving on the ground. In any of these talks I let people know that there is a big sky up above where a whole world exists beyond what you could imagine - a world not dependent "on sunlight or moonlight or electricity", a world of lightness where life carries no exertion of weight.

I like to explain that in long distance walking you travel very light and you might keep in mind a hero like Narada, the sage, who does interplanetary travel between both the material and anti-material worlds.

Ah Ha! There ya go. There is this monk who is an actual astronaut who moves continuously into outerspace.

8 KM