Mountains and Me — Part I

I have always had a love for the mountains ever since I remember. This is where our ancestors settled and this is where our families grew and subsisted generations after generations. My mom would tell me stories of our ancestors seeing gods dancing during twilight at the top of the mountains and that’s what drew them there — from the plains. And here we were! We had a nice little settlement to ourselves with a majestic view of the Valley and lakes below. We were perched at 5000 ft above sea level and shared our space with eagles, marmots and chipmunks. Our diet was simple and consisted of roots, herbs and soups. Laughter and wisdom filled our lives, day after day. What was not there to be happy about? We had clouds kissing us one day, a glorious painting of the sun illuminating the mountains and the valley below another day and magnificent sunsets every evening. We started and ended our day with gratitude for this wonderful creation. We were yet another mountainous settlement to the ordinary eye — And yet, from what I heard from my friends from the plains, we were peculiar in one aspect.
We practiced fire gazing every summer night. We would set up rows of fires built from small twigs and shrubs, sit at the edge of our favorite look out and stare at the fire, sometimes early into the morning. It was a form of meditation. And some of us would see gods emerge from the fires, dancing to the tune of the sparks. Perhaps it was our collective hallucination. But many of us thought it was real! We considered ourselves so fortunate. This is what drew our ancestors to this place — The majesty, the mystery and the call of serenity.
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“Danger is on the way”, whispered our chief. It was the first time, I saw fear in his eyes. He always knew the whereabouts of our visitors, before they came. And this time, he was not happy with what he knew. He called us to our prayer area. We sat down to pray. And he asked us all to pray that we all be together in our next life. He blessed our souls. I don’t recall what happened next. The only memory I have of that life was me hovering over my village, from our sacred tree and being shocked at our settlement being wiped out. I was no longer in my body. The prayer came back to me — “May we all be together in our next life”!
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Our chief used to tell us — The only purpose of our life is to be kind to each other and know oneself. We would even ask the permission of a plant, before plucking its root for food. I resolved to come back to earth, to the places where these invaders of our peaceful village came from and bring about a change in their hearts. If we didn’t do it, who would?