I met with a new friend Shannon here in Telluride yesterday. Shannon practices Vedic Astrology and she gave me a reading of my stars. It was very interesting and so different from the Western Astrology that I have dabbled in for several years. As I have said, my favorite part about Astrology is the Astronomy. I love looking up in the sky and seeing the planets (you can see Jupiter and Venus in the twilight sky in the picture above).

I wanted the reading because I have been aware of my second Saturn return coming up, and much to my surprise, according to Vedic Astrology, my Saturn return phase lasted several years, and the last day of this was January 18th, 2023. This happens to be exactly the day that I received the last of my bad news from the cerebral infarction that stroked me on January 3rd. It was January 18th that I went to the Ophthalmologist who grimly offered the opinion that I was done with driving and certainly done with snow skiing.

Well yesterday I drove myself to the Car Henge Parking Lot here in Telluride and spent the day skiing in the trees with the super expert Bill Glasscock. It turns out that the trees are easier to ski in that the open slopes in some ways. There are no people zipping into my path from the left, just trees, and the trees do not move. Also, skiing in the trees requires me to pick my way through deep moguls and to find the best path through the forest. I can study the terrain and link together five or six turns, and then regroup.

I did have a bone crunching wipe out yesterday. I caught my downhill edge on the top of a big mogul and fell downhill and impacted the next mogul on the shoulder. I heard a loud series of crunchy sounding cracks as the entire range of my thoracic and cervical spine received a big chiropractic adjustment. I lay down in the snow for a few seconds waiting for pain, but none came, and I got up laughing. What fun to spend the day skiing through the trees.

I came out of a shoot called Log Pile with my orange vision impaired vest on my chest. Knowing that his was a safe end I had linked together a couple more turns than normal. There was a group of about six people who were pondering their next move from this point. Bill knew one of them and was waiting with them when I came out. He had been boasting about his Vision Impaired student, and everyone was kind of flabbergasted as I came out of the trees.

I have learned so much about neural diversity and disability from this experience. Vision Impaired is absolutely not the same thing as blindness. My vision impairment simply means that I cannot process visual information pertaining to the upper left. But I see everything else just fine. I have learned to tilt my head to the right as I pivot my neck to the left to look over my left shoulder. By tilting my head, I make the horizon of my field of vision parallel and slightly above the ski terrain, and thus, I can see just fine. I just have to adapt to the new situation.

I have learned that every challenge is unique, and that there is joy in overcoming them. I have also learned to stop looking at people in wheel chairs with a sort of assumption that their life is not joyful. Who am I to assume what their life is like?

And so here I am in the autumn of my life. Autumn, not winter. And actually, this is only the very beginning of the Autumn of my life. It’s basically September 22nd in my Life. And yes, while there is a melancholy to the fall, it is also a beautiful time. The final harvests are coming in, the leaves are turning color and the weather is cool but not cold. And so as I enter in this new season with my third lap of Saturn around the Sun just beginning, I want to focus on four foundational areas of a Glorious life.

Material, Relationships, Health and Spirit. The foundations of a life worth living are these four, and it’s amazing how interrelated they are, and how much balance is required. How often do we see relationships, health and spirit suffer if we focus too much on the material? How many spiritual enthusiasts do you know that have a disdain for wealth and material success, or who fail in their relationship while they seek solice in solitude and meditation?

One of the things I love about Telluride is that it brings all of these together. When we are here we cook and clean and do our laundry and walk the dogs and take care of our material. We have great times together and many friends, and the lifestyle and food choices here are great for the health. And for Spirit?

Spirit lives in every rock in every canyon in this magical place. Spirit is the balance of the snow upon the branches.

Peace.

Schmarya Space Shalom