Well hello Dalai II

Here's the thing about seeing the Dalai Lama that I wasn't expecting...the Christians heckling me and my 44,000 other like-minded people. There were lots of Christians standing around Quest Field and on the sidewalks all around Pioneer Square heckling us as we entered and exited and walked saying things like,"You are going to Hell!" and "Save yourself from these false prophets you don't' have to go to Hell!"

I stood on Occidental Ave wandering past my old place of employment, The Grand Central Bakery. The memories of me arriving at 6 AM on foot from the bus tunnel, walking past city workers power-wash the vomit from the cobblestone streets every morning flooded back to me as I waited to cross the street. A Christian man came up next to me holding a modified broomstick with signs of protest in the shape of a cross, started yelling right in my ear. "You are a heathen and are going to HELL!" he yelled as I waited for the light to turn green. There were cops everywhere ticketing people for jay-walking and I didn't want to risk the $51 fine for walking against the light, so I took a deep breath and asked myself, "What would Jesus do?"

I looked the Christian straight in the eye and said, "I love you and know that Jesus forgives you for your ways." Just then the light turned green and I walked a way from him. I can only meet that kind of hostility with love. What is the point of creating more anger and violence in the world? And why do it in the name of Christ?

I have a problem with someone who says they are Christian and their way of showing Christian love is through violence, anger, hostility, harassment. I love Christ as much as I love the Buddha as I love the baby Krishna, as I love Moses and all the other religious action-figures in the world. Pick one and go to heaven? Pick the wrong one and go to hell? That doesn't seem right.

Especially with all the proof in quantum mechanics and physics that support the notion of multiple levels of reality all in existence at the same time. The number of similar-typed Earth planets is too great to know which one hosts the true Jesus Christ.

Back in the Malibu Stacey Funtime Camper days, I went to the Rainbow Gathering in the Oregon wilderness. The Rainbow Gathering is huge hippy festival that lasts for a couple weeks before and around the fourth of July. On Independence Day everyone drops acid...that's like 30,000 tripping out at the same time! I don't do acid and never wanted to try it, so on the 4th I was the only sober one around. I started a bunch of paranoid conspiracy theories to amuse myself. I told people that the acid they were passing around was distributed by the federal government and that taking it would be a part of a huge government experiment. I didn't think the rumor I started was wrong either....I was listening to a lot of "Coast to Coast AM" at the time and big into government conspiracies.

Everything you need at the Rainbow Gathering is done on barter. No money is allowed. People make camps and feed each other. Having the camper, my pad was really sweet compared to some of the kids I was hanging out with...wild poets. At the time, I was performing a lot around Seattle with Spoken Word. A really great, interesting group of people...

The main area of the Rainbow Gathering was located a couple of miles from our camp. We were in a national forest and there was a huge gathering circle where people ate, visited, traded stuff, had drum circles. Pretty much anything you wanted to do in the woods. It was hot and dry outside and there was a large group of Christian Youth Ministers with big army trucks trucking the Hippies back and forth from various camp areas, fifty at a time like in war movies. Except the soldiers were in tie-dyed shirts, skirts, pants. If you got into the truck you were given a peanut butter and jelly sandwich and a lecture on Jesus and how there was time to save your soul and not go to hell.

I had recently completed a five year vow of celibacy and was traveling with my darling companion, Daniel. He was a 21 year old poet/massage therapist/yoga teacher/software guy...and an excellent choice for ending a long bout of celibacy, I must say. I was just 35 at the time. It was at this gathering that I introduced Daniel to his first skirt....I love men in skirts, kilts...you name it...but not like the cross-dressing type...no, more manly. Like Russel Crowe in Gladiator. He wore a sky-blue tee-shirt dress for the first couple hours of the film and it drove me wild. I saw that movie a few times in the theater for just that reason. And a man in a kilt? Forgetabouti!

Note: I applied to do a month-long housesitting gig in Scotland this summer just to see the men in kilts! I am not kidding about this people!

Daniel was/is quite an outspoken young man. He wanted to ride in the truck, so we did and being a Taurus, he went toe-to-toe with the Christians regarding the eternal damnation lecture. He really believed that he could change their minds. I possess too much wisdom for this type of encounter. Daniel was really frustrated that they weren't listening to his point and kept bringing that back to the youth ministers attention. The good part of that experience was that his conversation kept the ministers off my back, and somehow Daniel got what he needed from the conversation.

Exiting Quest Field and having the same type of zealot lecture me about my spiritual ways reminded me that none of it matters. It does not matter who/what/where you believe. It matters how you behave. What matters is what you give in the world. If you give love, you receive love. If you give anger, you receive anger.

I'll keep that message alive with me today as I go visit the shaman.

So much love,
All the way from over here....
Linda