Reincarnation Moon

--The moon was up and the temperature was down in the thin light Utah morning, and our balls were up and tight and hiding. Frozen fur corn snow braid hung from our stomachs as we rollercoastered through the soft and crusty snow and left bloody paw prints behind.--

Twenty-seven degrees below zero and dropping off Green River ridge the roof of my mouth feels like zinc and my tongue feels like sawdust from the cold and the exertion. Dehydrated and hungry and desperate we fall down the ridge up to our knees in snow following the blood scent that means our death or our salvation. On my right is Samuels, and on my left is Plummer, and behind me is big lazy Robert using me to break trail. We are all of a piece and all of the same past and all dreaming of the same future.

We are wobbly kneed and bags of heaving bones in the Utah cold and snow but we know a last chance when we smell one; and the hunter's deer on a sled behind him is our last chance. He's got a gun and he'll get some of us--but the rest will get him and then the blood and the bone and the meat. Nostrils flared, ears back, and eyes tearing we run from the past towards the future in the four mammal loping diamond with a ten thousand year history and an immediate need.

Samuels and Plummer and Robert and I were all farangs in Thailand many years ago who went native and went Buddhist and threw off our watches, and our western ways, and our desires, and became monks. Unfortunately, we did not throw off all of our desires and there were some incidents. With Thai women. One incident would have been enough to seal our fate but there were many incidents. Incidents beyond redemption or second chance. Reincarnation found us starting over and starting lower.

Samuels and Plummer and Robert and I were all in the same truck riding up the wrong lane outside Three Pagoda Pass when we met our reincarnation future with an oncoming bus. We are still mammals who can cry in the night, and dream about sex, and value companionship, and remember the past; but we are now wolves. Wolves in the lonely cold mountains and valleys and gorges and river bottoms and canyons of Utah.

But wolves with memories of Thailand.  And we are all going back. Somehow we are all going back to Thailand. It is all we howl about in the diamond studded nights, and all we dream about in the pale blue days. That is why it is so important to stay the course and not stumble and fall dropping down the ridge and get to the hunter's throat before he can reload. Those of us who can get to the deer carcass get to keep the dream alive. The dream of going back to Thailand.

So be nice to the animals you meet. They might not be so different than you. They might be dreaming the same dream. The dream of going back to Thailand. The reincarnation spiral can carry you up or down and there are no guarantees. All you ever know is where you are, and where you want to be, and what you have to do. To become  farangs again in Thailand the wolves have to move up, and to become a Pattaya bar drinker in Thailand the hunter as to spiral down. The wolves have been good and natural wolves only killing to eat. The hunter has been a flawed human killing needlessly for sport. The reincarnation reckoning is coming. They may all meet again in Thailand.

The hunter heard nothing as the wolves came up behind him on the frozen meadow above the river. His fur hat and sheepskin baclava and beaver cape shut out all noise. The four half dead wolves now pressing flank to flank were panting and gasping and wheezing, but so also was the hunter panting and gasping and wheezing as he pulled the deer laden sled through the soft and crusty snow. The first thing he felt was the thump and grunt of an emaciated wolf body heaving itself on his back. Not a heavy weight but a surprising force and he nearly pitched forward and lost the advantage of his height. Then the battle started on that bitter cold morning above the frozen river and below the morning moon. As the hunter fought for his life all he could think of was:

"I can't let them get me down--have to keep my feet--have to survive--I want to go back to Thailand."

Mammals all--the wolves and the man--all sharing the same dream. 'I want to go back to Thailand.' The silver cosmic thread of dream and consciousness that connects every man and mammal that has ever been to the Kingdom regardless of their hierarchy in the reincarnation sweepstakes.

"I want to go back to Thailand"

So be nice to every animal you meet because you may meet them reincarnated again--in Thailand.

"Hi mate--ever been to Thailand before?"

"Yes, many times."

"Say--you look familiar to me."

"I should--I'm the last wolf you shot before we fell dead in each other's arms."

© Dana. All rights reserved by the author.