Goatieodeo, the goat I’ve been caring for here on Orcas, (he didn’t really have an owner) didn’t show up for his grain last week. I found him under a cedar tree in the woods he’d lived his life in on the adjoining property. The timing was ironic as I had found someone who really wanted to give him a great home among lots of other animals on her stupendous farm. She planned to come meet him that very day. 

It’s a few weeks short of a year since my beloved horse left his beautiful body behind. This means a year ago, I was having a lot of intimate conversations with him about his approaching journey, our impending separation, and how and where we could still be together in our hearts.

I have been contemplating the next step to take in my Buddhist Services on Death Row. My groups have grown from 1 to over 50 men, all of who are deeply interested in pursuing any spiritual knowledge they can find in order to explore and expand their inner lives. Many of them attend the other faith services there as well, so though I provide the Buddhist teachings, I always ask them to identify where and how the topics we are talking about show up in the other traditions.

Chances are, your beloved furry soul mate pet knew before you did that the time to say goodbye was approaching. That doesn’t make it any easier of course. Our pets absorb our thoughts, feelings and emotions in ways we as humans are just beginning to understand. It is quite possible that your thoughts about your pet’s old age, sickness, injury, etc are getting in the way of them being able to let go.

 It was a clear, crisp but warm morning in the early spring. Sunbeams sliced through the woods at an angle, displaying a myriad of light rays which made the forest floor look mottled and dappled.

Yesterday was my day to see Yard 11-which, for years, was just one man, I’ll call him Ron. Ron and I had many conversations over the years about getting older on Death Row, about his early “spiritual” days listening to the many teachers from the East who visited the US in the 60’s, about his crocheting hats for the homeless, but most of all about being lonely there on The Row.

I was days before my 14th birthday when Jethro Tull’s album Aqualung came out in 1971. Hearing the songs for the first time gave me full permission to raise my voice and question what I had been force fed about organized religion. The songs spoke to the religious ideals of high culture, which I felt as distrust.

This is a piece I wrote for some chaplains on the topic of integration. It was inspired by the reality of our fast-paced life these days, and how it is so very difficult to fully integrate all that life deals us when we don’t build in the time to slow down and let the ground of our being rest in nature for awhile. I hope it offers a reflective moment to you and that you are inspired to STOP and reflect now and then.

The day my chaplaincy supervisor at San Quentin State Prison asked me to coordinate a program that would bring animals into the prison was a happy day indeed. Animal chaplaincy has been a focus my entire life, though it was only after my formal chaplaincy training began several years ago that I heard the term animal chaplain. My excitement did not match the obstacles that met us in this endeavor. Starting a program in San Quentin is not something that happens overnight.