Maria left the farm this morning to spent a few days at Blue-Star Equiculture, a place that is increasingly important to us, and, I believe, to the future of animals in our world. Blue-Star is run by our friends Pamela and Paul, it is, in many ways, the Third Way. Their vision of the future of animals is my vision also. They seek ways to find healthy work for animals and to keep them with people. They seek ways to help people support animals and understand them. They seek to treat both animals and people with respect and compassion and dignity. They listen, they do not judge.

I will be writing more about them in the coming weeks. It is always jarring when Maria goes away, we are not often apart, even though it is often a healthy and necessary thing.  It feels like my world just drove off in a small car, there is hole in my heart, a sense of much of the world missing.

I might go down and see here there tomorrow, if I can work it out, and yet even one day feels like something that is important. Isn’t that wonderfully strange? I think the animals are always a bit disappointed when she leaves, and there are no gourmet food trays for a bit. I will spend some time with the donkeys Red will take care of the sheep. But it is not the same for them. She even talks to chickens.

There is a quietness about the farm, her spirit is very strong and very bright. Her smile fills up every space it occupies.

Maria is the light in my life, my heart and soul and salvation.  I know that when she is here, I see it even more clearly when she is gone. She pulled me back from the abyss, I doubt I would be alive if I had not met her. Now I see that my life is just beginning, love and encouragement brings rebirth and renewal.

We have been married nearly five years and each year we have grown closer, more in love, more appreciative. Maria has brought love and light to my world, and there are few things in my life that have given me more joy than watching her powerful and creative and loving spirit emerge.

Her life, which was empty, is filling up in so many ways. She is going to Blue-Star to soak up the wisdom of the horses, and the friendship of Pamela Rickenbach, a loving prophet and a great champion of the horses. It’s a short trip, really, not a big deal.

I hope to spend the day creatively, in contemplation and meditation and in appreciation for the many riches and love she has brought to me life, and to the life of others. Having love in one’s life is not the same thing as not having life in one’s life.