Having some formatting problems with adding photos causing broken sentences and then losing photos when I try to fix the problem. Reminds me of Windows 10 years ago. I'm just going to put the photos back up - again and we can live with broken words. Photo: CK & JZ, Wheeler Peak Wilderness in New Mexico It was an okay room and I dug it a lot. Up early,
peanut butter sandwich and apple (from home) and cooold milk and coffee for breakfast. I took Highway 104 to Las Vegas and drove for several hours in the dark and in the dawn without seeing any other vehicles. On to Taos, where Jim Z. walked into the coffee shop were we planned to meet about 2 minutes after I arrived. It was a good trip backpacking with Jim, except I fell out on the second day; actually I was pretty much fallen out the first day, but on the second day realized there was no way I could make it up that mountain in any sort of reasonable time. Jim was kind and helpful and in the end, it was a good trip.
The first night we camped on the side of a hill under some trees on land that turned out to be privately owned. Joe, the man who owned it drove up in his pickup, saying, “You need to explain yourselves.” “Uh-oh,” I thought, “I need to stay out of this conversation.” Jim talked with Joe, who said we were welcome to stay on his land as long as we didn’t have any animals with us and didn’t build a fire. The next two nights we camped
in a grove of large pines near a stream and then hiked out.
From New Mexico I headed to Colorado, where I hung out in Fort Collins and Boulder for a few days, waiting for Jeff. Happy me in those mountain towns where (unlike Dallas) I look pretty much like everyone else. That’s a real nice thing for me. Photo: CK & Dr. Love
Jeff got to the hotel around 1am and I awakened long enough to let him in, and slept through him eating, showering, arranging his gear.
The next day we drove to the festival
site, where because of eagles nesting, camping alongside the river and under the trees next to the music had been changed to a treeless field far from any water and a 40 minute drive from the music. We camped kind of at the edge, near some other older people and a coffee and taco stand. A 20-something woman camping nearby attached herself to us and we had good times sitting around the campsite. When it came time to head to the music, the organizers had just one or two buses running and there about a hundred people clustered at the bus door, reminiscent of buses in Phnom Penh, except the buses there are spiffer. So we just spent several nice, though sunny days at the campsite. The drive home was okay. I missed the turn-off at Raton Pass, so went a ways out of the way and once again drove many miles, this time on Highway 56/412 Springer to Clayton, without seeing another vehicle. Then I was again on Highway 87 Dalhart to Dumas and somewhere along the way there was a huge thunderstorm and I got off at a picnic area. I jumped out and ran through the rain (watching for rattlesnakes) to stand under the concrete cover over the picnic table, peeing into the torrent. Dash back to the car
to unleash the magic of the Campry, stretching out with my feet in the trunk and the rain pounding on the car roof and falling soundly into some of the best and dreamingest sleeping imaginable. Photo: CK & LK around 1970
Then that long cross-Texas drive and finally home and so glad to see Leslie and David. Several things were learned on this journey, including that I need to get it together on my physical status. To that end, I’ve resumed biking and walking and yesterday started at the Lakewood Gym. Another thing I learned was that Mike4 H. was right: the best way to Colorado is I35 through Oklahoma into Kansas to I70 on into Denver.
ning that Martin can’t make it to the Weminuche Wilderness, so the last of the trip is cancelled. Jeff and I may backpack a few days or hang out in Boulder – or not – I don’t know. Photo: We think that's a finch in the left center - the only one we've ever seen
out being away from her for so long. In the final analysis - by the time the trip rolled around - this trip was based more on getting into the mountains with Martin vs. just getting into the mountains (though I was really looking forward to getting up there with Jun, too). Anyway, I’m probably coming home a few days early. Photo: At the clinic
said she was crying every day, had headaches, and insomnia. Her father is in jail since February and it’s unclear when he may be reunited with his family. Photo: Nora and me
day this is. Photo: One of the DNP graduates when she was an undergrad - outreach in the community gardenLike Dr. Schweitzer we all see things that need to be done.
Who and what will you see? People who are hungry? People who are thirsty - who thirst for freedom and justice? People who are strangers in a strange land? People who are naked – naked of dignity and of hope? People who
are sick – sick in body or sick in heart? People who are in prison – in prison like Paul or in prisons of a different sort. What will you see and what will you DO.
Here is something else from my journal – about a woman in prison …
A middle-aged woman came into the clinic today. Her chief complaints were diabetes and asthma. The promotora who saw her in intake asked two depression screening questions and on the basis of the woman’s answers then administered a more complete depression screen, which also was positive. When I saw her she said that “something happened” when she was 8 and 9 years old. It turned out that she had been systematically molested when she was a child. She had not told anyone other than her mother until today. One of her children has been asking her, “Mommy, why don’t you ever hug me?” The answer, which she hasn’t been able to say, is that she cannot. There is something about physical affection between family members… because, naturally, it was a family member who molested her. She and I talked for awhile and it was intense there in exam room 4. When we were done, I told her I was glad she came in and that she had come to the right place. I gave her medications for the diabetes, asthma, and depression (or more accurately, PTSD). She’ll see our psychiatrist next week...
There is much left undone by the ones who went before us, by the Apostle Paul, by Maimonides, by Albert Schweitzer, by Mother Teresa, by countless people – and these people, dear ones, are our colleagues, our brothers and sisters in faith and works. They would ask that we carry on; that we see the poor and the afflicted and that we do something about them – that we do something about the individuals who cross our paths AND that we create even greater opportunities – programs for adult survivors of abuse, for children whose potential is swallowed up in the hard life of poverty, for prostitutes, for drug addicts, for people seeking to break free from so many different prisons. So much left undone.
'Come, you who are blessed by my Father; take your inheritan
ce, the kingdom prepared for you since the creation of the world. 35For I was hungry and you gave me something to eat, I was thirsty and you gave me something to drink, I was a stranger and you invited me in, 36I needed clothes and you clothed me, I was sick and you looked after me, I was in prison and you came to visit me.' Photo: The students had a shower for this Karen woman who was pregnant. You can see the guys are having a great time.
You/we have the rare opportunity to heal the sick. To relieve suffering. To help the world be a better place. To be a part of the great dream of mercy and human dignity.
I’ll end with the Oath of Maimonides* (gender-adjusted)
The eternal providence has appointed me to watch over the life and health of Thy creatures. May the love for my art actuate me at all times; may neither avarice nor miserliness, nor thirst for glory or for a great reputation engage my mind; for the enemies of truth and philanthropy could easily deceive me and make me forgetful of my lofty aim of doing good to Thy children.
May I never see in the patient anything but a fellow creature in pain.
Grant me the strength, time and opportunity always to correct what I have acquired, always to extend its domain; for knowledge is immense and the spirit of a person can extend indefinitely to enrich itself daily with new requirements.
Today we can discover our errors of yesterday and tomorrow we can obtain a new light on what we think ourselves sure of today. Oh, God, Thou has appointed me to watch over the life and death of Thy creatures; here am I ready for my vocation and now I turn unto my calling.
this book I began to understand what he was saying. About 1 in 7 (~15%) Marines actually fight. Of that 15%, not that many are what you would call true hard-chargers. The book made this clear and then I read this: “As soon as I told them I was wounded, they crawled over and patched me up.” I was one of the two that got to him. I even took his photo (situation described pp. 94-95). I was a hard-charger. And here is an amazing thing: so is Leslie. She is straight out of the Book of Five Rings – she’s burnt out and beat down, but never conquered. Photo: Taken at the Hill Fights
of those who bear the mark of pain” – and he further realized that all people bear pain – and in this way (and other ways) he understood that we are One. I thought about some of the people who put boulders in my path. What I wrote about this seemed unseemly, so it’s gone into the void of deleted.
----------------------
About a week after I got home from the hospital I found out I'd been on a vent for a day & night. I had no recollection and still have none. I also realized I was 11 days in the hospital.
---------------------
From 2007 trip to Burma
Pulled into Moulmein about 2pm. It's hot as blazes today - the first day without rain since we got to Hong Kong. Taxi man said 2000 kyats to hotel. I said, last time 1000. He said, Okay 1500. It turned out to be about a 1000 kyats ride to the Thanlwin Hotel. The closest room to what we wanted was a big room with shared bath and aircon t
hat barely worked and a fan that turned at about 20-30 RPMs.
We caught a tuk tuk shared with two Chinese women with all kinds of gold and heavy perfume on to the Aurora guesthouse where they had no rooms available. Photo: The Breeze
We're really hot by now and everywhere involves at least one long flight of stairs and we're a little dehydrated since we've had only a few sips of water on the long bus ride knowing that there would be 2 stops at most. Actually the bus stopped once for lunch/toilet break (sorry I didn't get a photo of the toilet at the bus stop - which wasn't bad at all, for a squat toilet). So anyway, we're standing outside the Aurora GH, dripping with sweat, (I'm) feeling dizzy, wondering what we'll do if we can't find a room. I left Leslie sitting, dripping on a suitcase on the sidewalk while I took a moto to check out the Breeze GH. They had 2 rooms available, one for $15 with aircon and one really big one with 20 foot ceiling and big windows overlooking the river, but fans only for $18 - "natural aircon" says the man showing me the room. I say we'll take the aircon, 
but my wife will decide for sure. Back I go to Leslie and we load ourselves and luggage all into one trishaw - oh we were a sight to see! Photo: From the Old Moulmein Pagoda exactly as Kipling wrote: "By the old Moulmein Pagoda, Lookin' eastward to the sea,"
Lonely Planet says the Breeze is "funky, but adequate." By now we understand part of how things work, so asked if they turn off the electricity at night. He tells us they have a generator, so we take the aircon room. So here we are, in a room with tile walls like a giant bathroom (photo above) and glad to be here - especially given the ceiling fan that moves briskly. The Breeze is funky but okay and it's right on the huge Thanlwin River and our room very conveniently has a bowl for spitting betel nut juice into - what more could you want?
Several times on this trip Leslie has said, "My father would not believe it if he saw me now." I guess this continues that tradition.
