The purpose of life, wrote Ralph Waldo Emerson, is not to be happy. It is to be useful, to be  honorable, to be compassionate, to have it make some difference that you have lived, and lived well. That is my purpose in life. I sometimes succeed, I often fail.

Next weekend, I will try again. Next weekend, something important, something very special for a friend, a group of creative people, for  me and for Maria.

Next weekend belongs to Pamela Rickenbach of Blue Star Equiculture, it is in support of her, in her honor, in celebration of her great heart and bold vision, of the creative spark, of support and encouragement. There is nothing more selfish than reaching out in support of another.

The weekend is also  in celebration of Paul Moshimer, Pamela’s lover and partner, my friend and the work they began together on behalf of animals and people. Paul died several months ago.

Next weekend, Pamela is coming to Bedlam to get  a blog.  Blogs – originally called Weblogs – were conceived for Pamela. She has so much to say, and like many prophets who live out of the mainstream, she will never be the big topic on Twitter or on the evening news.

Pamela is coming up Friday to spend the weekend at the farm, and on Saturday, there will be a coming together of many different points of light: Pompanuck Farm,  the Creative Group At Bedlam Farm, several students in my writing workshop, Maria, our farm – people have rushed to volunteer to be part of the weekend as we help Pamela set up a very personal and exciting blog and learn more about the medium ourselves.I was humbled. People wanted to come. They want to support Pamela and her blog.

Pamela has long wanted her own space to write and I believe a blog  will help her give voice to her powerful ideas about horses, the earth, the wisdom of native peoples and the future of animals.

Pamela is a mystic and a prophet, a brilliant visionary. She is devastated by the death of Paul but determined to carry on her work of speaking for the horses and celebrating their ties to human beings. I believe Pamela’s vision is the true future of animals in our world, it transcends the increasingly hateful and polarizing effects of the animal rights movement in recent times and speaks to a new way of loving both animals and the people who care for them and work with them.

It was heartbeaking to see the savage attacks on Pamela, Paul and Blue Star for daring to argue that working horses need to work and ought to be given the chance. And that the people who care for them are important. These attacks – some unspeakable – intensified after Paul’s death. It is a spiritual challenge to see how low human beings can go, it is a spiritual gift to see how high they can rise. That is what Blue Star is about.

Domesticated animals like horses are vanishing from the world, as Orwellian notions of animal welfare drive them away from the lives of people and climate change destroys their natural world. They have nowhere to go unless we make room for them as well as cars and malls and condos. Blue Star saves them, heals them, understands them, finds meaningful and healthy work for them to do. It helps the people who wish to live with them, it does not persecute them.

Saturday morning, the artist Rachel Barlow, a computing whiz, will join Pamela at Bedlam Farm. We will set up a blog for her – name to come. Mid-morning, Pamela, Rachel, Maria and I will travel the short distance to Pompanuck Farm where a small group (we had to close off the number, many good people wanted to come) and we’ll have a two-hour blogging workshop. We’ll talk about the cultural significance of blogging. Then we’ll meet at the Round House Cafe in Cambridge, and repeat the process on Saturday.

There is a great coming together here that inspires me: Bedlam Farm, Pompanuck Farm, the Creative Group, a community of encouragement, Pamela and Blue Star, writers who want to grow and learn, animal lovers eager to help keep animals in our everyday lives. A new kind of constituency, a new awakening.

Pamela and I hope to be writing about the weekend in real time on her new blog and my blog, we want to share the process of putting a blog together, and of the weekend itself. Blogs – moderated websites – have given voice to millions of people shut  out of our corporatized and increasingly destructive corporate media. The ability to moderate comments has given bloggers a sense of safety and control. Jefferson would have loved this explosion of democratic creativity and diverse voice.

Is there anyone out there reading this who believes the news assaulting us every day reflects our lives and aspirations? Blogs have brought a golden age of writing, ideas and individuality. In the Corporate Nation, that is proving more important than anyone imagined.

I spoke with Pamela this morning, she is excited about the weekend. And grateful to have the purpose of my life reaffirmed.

I’m excited about next week, and very grateful to the many people who are already supporting Pamela’s blog.