Thursday, May 29th, 2014

Pincher Creek, Alberta

Windswept

 

Eric Clapton’s, ‘Further On Down the Road’ was playing off of Michael’s I-phone over moderate volume speakers as he drove me to the spot from where I left the day before.  For it’s genre of music, rock, it sounds good and inspires Michael.  I’m not opposed to it but for 4:30 am I’m accustomed to something quite different.  That different form of inspiration for me was doing my own more mellow song.  It’s called ‘Guruvastakam’ – a song in Sanskrit to honour the spiritual master.

Michael recorded it.  As I was walking I was hooked up to a cordless mic.  Then Michael stored this beautiful song composed by Visvanath Chakravarti.  The winds really started to pick up and as one local put it, “And this isn’t windy season yet!”  Air currents travel over the mountains which you can see from the distance.  They then swoop down engulfing every square inch of space on the open prairie surface.  At one point I struggled to keep my lower robes down.

At the Rotary Club luncheon in Pincher Creek I felt honoured to speak to the members about the windswept plains.  They were also curious to know about the purpose behind all this marathon trekking.  I presented some of my key reasons for doing so, one of which is that I had a bad year in ’95.  Gossip, some rumour-mongering and such, penetrated our community.  “That happens in all communities, right?  After all, we’re all human.”  And of course, that remark resonated with everyone.

Questions came after my talk and one gentleman offered a comment.  It was about gossip.  The abbreviated version goes something like this: “Mildred was the town gossip.  She started a rumour about a local man declaring he was a drunkard.  The man confronted Mildred and asked her why she made up a story that wasn’t true.  “I saw your car parked in front of the pub several nights ago,” said Mildred.  The man left and came back that night and parked his car in front of her house and left it there overnight.  Mildred stopped the gossip.

I want to thank the Rotary Club of Pincher Creek and The Echo newspaper and the on-line news presented by Christian Davis.

May the Source be with you!

 

37 KM