We had been driving for hours. A family vacation road trip.
“Only 3 more miles!” I said.
As we entered the national park I wondered how long until we actually see the famous lake. Because of me we’ve taken a 3 hour detour to our destination later today just to see this lake, which I can barely remember from my childhood. I know I was here when I was about ten, with my parents and sisters.
We’re now driving on a quiet two lane road, we’ve gained lots of elevation. Up ahead, we see a few cars parked along a very short stone wall.
“I’m just going to stop right up there, then we can look on the map and see how far to the best viewpoint or hike”.
I turn off the road.
We all gasp.
Suddenly before us is the gigantic, indescribable, brilliant blue Crater Lake. We leap out and stand, awestruck.
My kids, ages 17 and 20, are also stunned.
My son says it looks like a mystical other-planet, like something out of a movie.
He hops over the stone wall, walking towards the edge of the massive cliff. My daughter follows, even stumbling a little over as she hops the wall. My husband goes too, right past the sign that says “CAUTION” with a picture of someone falling off a cliff.
“Get back over here!” I say to them all “Didn’t you see the sign?”
My heart is beating and I’m a little shaky.
“It’s fine, mom, jeez!”
“No, I really want you to get back over here behind the wall, that’s why the wall is here.”
My son is now actually climbing up a small rock formation off to the edge that has a very small tree gripping its roots into the boulders.
The drop-off is sheer from that tree, hundreds and hundreds of feet. We are at a very high vista where we can see the entire lake stretching out before us. This lake sits in the top of a volcano that blew up about 8000 years ago.
I am picturing my daughter following my son, she is headed that way. My husband is too.
“Do NOT climb up there please, you’re freaking me out!”
We all laugh, I even say I seem to be having a weird physical reaction, my stomach almost feels sick. Oh yes, that thing where I’m a bit afraid of heights. I almost forgot.
“I really either can’t look or I want you to come back”.
My daughter comes back, climbs back over the wall and exclaims “Mom, wow, you are sooo scared”! She gives me a hug. I laugh, but still feeling the adrenaline in my stomach.
The thing is, even while this is all happening, something is watching it all, observing.
Lake, Sky, Cliffs, Son, Daughter, Husband, Wall, Moonscape, Chipmunk, Wind, Stomach, Blue.
This body is reacting, but inside (or entirely outside) knows all is well, nothing to fear.
But let’s look, to help out that frightened voice, the one that imagines the worst….someone falling to their death. When my kids were younger, I might have shouted in anger for them to stay next to me if they started climbing over walls.
A terrible deadly fall could happen.
Is it true?
Of course it’s true! Haven’t you ever heard of gravity and people falling before? It happens all the time on this planet!
Are you sure?
Yes. It COULD happen. It’s happened before, it’s happening somewhere right now. People are falling. It could happen again.
Although, now that I think about it, no one is falling right now in my perception. Only the possibility of falling is happening.
My reaction to “they could fall” is wild. Pure fear.
The most vivid picture is the moment they lose their balance. They are there, then gone. No way of finding out if they are OK. Images of them crumpled far, far below so far away you can hardly see their bodies.
An intense feeling of reaching out and pulling back towards me, towards solid ground.
I pause….looking at this strange and wild scene.
Who would I be without that belief, without the fear of falling, without the fear of heights, without the fear of loved ones vanishing into thin air?
Laughing.
Astonished at the craziness of landscape on this planet, the wonder of the earth which is so bizarre and full of unusual visions, like this one.
Realizing that I am categorizing this as an unusual vision, and sitting at home on my couch as a normal vision. Either one could be just as weird, if it was unfamiliar.
A bird from this lake area, for example, would be terrified in my house.
If I had no reference for falling, for thinking I KNOW what’s a bad or good outcome (falling, bad…nothing unexpected, good)….
….I’d be almost tearful with how weird and exciting it all is.
Here, now. Perceiving an incredible expansive landscape. Totally in love with my family, noticing I love them being alive in these bodies for the moment, all together.
Knowing there will be a moment when none of us have these bodies anymore. And apparently in this moment none of the bodies are disappearing over a cliff.
Without the belief that falling could happen and it would be horrible, without needing this fear to go away, I realize this gasp, this heightened energy, is awareness of infinite space, strange and unusual and new vistas, uncertainty.
I myself feel like I’m on the edge of the world.
It doesn’t matter if other bodies, that happen to be my family, are going closer to the edge. They are happy, comfortable, playful, exploring.
“No matter how far astray or deluded you become, you can never get a single step away from the Infinite’s embrace. If you could all at once stop believing your dreaming mind and be completely still right in the midst of your present state, the Infinite would effortlessly present itself.” ~ Adyashanti
We get back into the car, continue a short way along the road, and stop again. We climb a switchback trail up the side of a peak, and then climb up into a lookout tower built long ago.
I’m still aware of the edge. One part of me still wants to tell my kids to keep back.
But another imagines flying over this incredible land, flying into outer space, flying into unknown worlds. Maybe that’s what it would be like to fall off the cliff from a human body, who knows.
What I notice is that right in that moment, no one is falling….
….except me, falling in love with wild open unknown space.
Isn’t that what I’ve always wanted?
Much Love, Grace