I hadn't intended to go to this event. 'Event' isn't a particularly accurate term, I suppose: Rainbow Gathering is indeed a gathering of the tribes, and of the nomads, and of the curious from all walks of life.
Initially, I put my foot down: personal circumstances just wouldn't allow me to attend; Rainbow is meant to be a spiritually cleansing and healthy space, a place people go to find community and light. Perhaps retrospectively, I ought to have trusted my instincts. Perhaps I ought not have gone...
Saturday, July 2, morning:
I'd intended to do a BUNCH of things this weekend. Clean. Pack. A friend's birthday party. Then up to Tubal Cain again to backpack in, hike around, and heal myself with solitude and water. We're just getting ready to cook a huge brunch for those of the tribe who've also elected not to go to Rainbow when my phone rings: it's Bellingham Zac.
The prelude goes something like this: Bellingham Zac, Stepha and Harrison all biked into Port Townsend late one night, in need of shelter on the first night of an incredibly ambitious quest to bike all the way to the Gifford-Pinchot National Forest. The distance, in case you're wondering, is over 400 miles. We have dinner together, and they allow me to emotionally vomit all over them: I'm not going to Rainbow because my former partner will be there, along with HIS supposedly-former partner, whom he's now back with, and I just don't know if I can take it. My heart feels as if it's been planed along by a woodworker's tool: thin shavings curling up in some recess of me that I haven't the strength to sweep up and throw away.
Bellingham Zac, this Saturday morning, is in a predicament. Stepha's turned back-she's exhausted, and rightfully so, so he and Harrison are somewhat stranded somewhere on I-5. Harrison's Achilles tendon has been bothering him (strained?) and they're just wondering if anyone I know might be heading that way that could offer them a lift. I tell him I'll make some calls, and hang up the phone.
Then it hits me: I am meant to do this job.
How often in our everyday lives do we bypass the tasks laid before us? Like those passing the Samaritan in the road, do we consciously avert our purpose & therefore our Selves by skirting around those seemingly inane jobs laid in our paths by the world? Rather than resting on the backs of Materials- my cell phone, the friends who were to leave for Rainbow the next morning, my sense of false obligation to cooking for the leftover Tribe...- I quickly turned around, began slinging orders to Abbey, picked up the phone & simply told Zac & Harrison: "We're coming to get you."
It was my job to attain experience for my friends, my tribe.
Saturday, afternoon:
It took less than 2 hours. Abbey & I fly around Tim & Andrea's kitchen: bacon frying, garlic fritatta in the oven, strawberries macerating with basil in a bowl. There are people around the table eating and drinking strong coffee while I alternately chop, wash, fry, package, and answer the phone again and again; the strength of Purpose that I climb like a ridgetop bearing me up. For long minutes I think not a whit about what might await me at Rainbow: the sickening yet exhilarating shock of seeing that beloved face, the one I so hope will remain luminous for me. We shoo our friendship family out of the house. Wash up. Empty the fridge of its perishables, pack smartly but lightly and jettison ourselves.
Chehalis, Washington: Wal-Mart Parking Lot:
It's hot. 80+ degrees even in the shade, and Abbey and I have been driving for hours, speeding gratuitously and blaring bluegrass at unhealthy decibel levels just to stay awake and motivated. We pull into the Wal-Mart parking lot just before 4 pm, and find Bellingham Zac and Harrison sprawled out under a pitiful shade tree.
I am enveloped in gratitude. So often we do things in our lives that go unnoticed-picking up trash on a walk. Perhaps we offer love and solace to someone when they need it. Donate money. Take the time. This time, I am covered in thanks, picked up and spun around and made to know that the completion of this task matters, and is recognized. It takes us an hour or so to load ALL THIS STUFF in the car! 2 bikes, the dog, 3 huge trekking packs, and 3 boxes of produce gleaned from the Wal-Mart dumpsters. Take that, chain box store! We are on our way, and more importantly, Zac and Harrison are rejuvenated. They are on their way to Rainbow again, in a car! With music! And air conditioning! Hippie Limousine indeed!
The car is full to the brim with love and light. These men are so, so happy to be off their bikes and on the way to realise their dream of meeting Sushi Tribe at this international Gathering of spirits. It makes me supremely fulfilled simply to have summoned the wherewithal needed to swoop them up out of the heat and uncertainty and help shepherd them on down their paths.
We are at a confluence.
In rescuing these bright members of Sushi Tribe, I've altered my own path. Overcome my own fear and trepidation, and moved to merge my path with theirs in an eddy of destiny. The discussion in the car is sometimes silly-there are tricksters amongst us, of course-but more often than not, returns to destiny, confluence and meaning. We've met up out of the needs of some of us, and the jobs the universe holds for others, at the junction and in a swirling undercurrent of meaning, for all of us. There's some discussion of my personal journey. Of why I just feel that I cannot cross that threshold, between my individual self and the community self of Rainbow, when I know his energy will be there, affecting mine. And yet we move. We keep on driving.
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