i can't see blue knob for the cloud which has settled in the valley between here and there. it's a very strange sensation for my brain. my eyes are straining to see what my brain knows is there. sometimes i think i can catch a glimmer of an outline of the mountain through the cloud, but then it's gone and it seems i have just filled in what i know to be true. i wonder if this is a front, advancing, toward me. hopefully it will bring some rain with it....

it is another example of how the exterior so succinctly mirrors the interior....or is it that i have so successfully projected my inner outward? whichever....

my mind, too, is clouded, yet light still, with birdsong, whispering wind and dancing trees. but it seems i am disconnected, watching, as the front advances.  i struggle for clarity, clarity of vision, of purpose, of direction.

in my home, as i sit and write, sipping a new blend, i briefly hear a mouse, difficult to judge whether it is at my elbow or over the other side of the house.  i look for it, but it eludes me, goes quiet for a while, and then returns to disturb my flow, just when i have finally let it go....

there are mice in my mind, also. little distracting, gnawing, thoughts which dart in and out, stealing my focus, jolting me out of my brief glimpses of ease or understanding. sometimes these thoughts are smelly, putrid, and lingering, like the mouse wee i sometimes find on my clothes, or the occassional, rotting, dead things which appear in odd places in my home.

i'm drinking a herbal blend, to fortify myself for what i can see is a rough road ahead. my friend on the CSG blockade site often uses the term 'red alert' in relation to the battle they are waging against the capitalist, environmental vandals, and this time for me feels like my own, personal red alert.  i feel shaken loose from any complacency, i am confronting impermanence, i am poised to move in the direction that is placed before me. i feel totally helpless to determine that direction myself. the battle is coming to me.

i am preparing to take to the skies. to pack my bags and travel, wherever necessary, in support of my daughter and her own, personal battle against the cancer which gnaws away at her.....holding my bewildered younger daughters close, tighter for the knowledge that i may leave them behind at certain points on the road, as i ruthlessly prioritise the needs of my little family.....

so, wish me luck, comrades, as i take on this latest campaign.