The Tao of Ka'u

The rain has come back tonight, suddenly, though I felt it coming hours ago and made sure to put my saddles away.

I was talking with my friend Dan yesterday, who was visiting Ka'u. He was asking about the connection that the people of Ka'u have with the land. It is hard to talk about the deep stuff, the feelings that run like a river throughout our lives.

It struck me tonight that living in Ka'u is a kind of religion or belief system - a stubborn belief in intangibles. Like the feeling of living in a landscape that shimmers in the sunlight, so full of primordial power it is, or the richness of recognition in the eyes one meets everyday. Like happiness - fleeting, capricious but unmistakable - a spiritual coconut that falls on one's head. Like the freedom to live and work with and among animals.

It is a way, a compass bearing through life, that Ka'u offers to those who choose it. But you have to decipher it slowly in the little things.