This time I only had an hour to get to my quiet destination and I chose to run down the Big Trees Trail for fifteen minutes before turning around and climbing up the wet, red brown earth shaded by redwoods. This time I found a soft mossy stump in the middle of a small circle clearing. The quiet chirping of birds and gentle breeze in the foreground, the hushed roar of the city below like a strong, continuous wave that never hits shore.
There's that electric buzz again of an unnamed insect and an airplane perhaps taking off from the Oakland airport.
Last night (no joke), I had a dream that I was stationed at the front of a small airplane. I was holding onto part of the wing that had come undone. I had seen a nut and bolt drop to the ground just before landing. It was as though I knew it was going to happen and prepared for it. Only in a dream....
Last week (Aug 13th) Jasmine and I met Logan who took us to meet Kathleen Cunningham. It was good to make this connection with her. She wanted to see pictures from the crash site, some images that I had never seen, the little plane unrecognizable, collapsed floaters into wings into front propellers, like a busted up toy on the mountainside.
She appreciated getting together and she is part of the Ned family that has grown from this terrible loss of Ned and her husband Dave.
Dave took 90 pictures before and during their flight on that fateful day and the camera survived. There are pictures of the flight Ned took with Mike Schneider, then of the flight Ned and Dave took together. The stream of pictures end when the terrain turns from the lower to the higher mountain, the granite below dotted with redwoods.
Logan presented Kathleen with a picture of the plaque for Ned and Dave. Last month Logan led a pilgrimage, this time with Dan Rau and Henry Diaz to the crash site, this time able to cross the riverbed, now dried up from the rains and snowmelt and put the plaque in its proper place.
Ned's friend Alisa Hagerty went up at the end of July into what she called "Ned country" one week later to pay her respects to the site, to Ned and to the wondrous beauty of the Cherry Lake area.
This place in front of me now - calm and cool with the tree shelter above and roots below in the rich warm earth reminds me of the dust that we are, stardust, particles of energy engaged in an extravagant dance on this earth for a short while. (Thanks Cat Stevens).
It's filled with our family and our family is as large as we want to make it, can include entire communities of people, earth spaces, flora and fauna. (We can't forget that big fat dog Klaus that was everywhere Ned was.)
As always, thank you Ned for this gift you have given us. We hate not seeing you and not having you here with us but we love the memories that you gave us. They are as real and present as ever.
