Mountain Lions + Master’s Degrees

I have to tell you that we welcomed the arrival of four, 8-week old piglets this week on the farm before I promptly left for Santa Barbara to attend a graduation ceremony for my degree in Counseling Psychology. Heathar and Jack went to pick up the piglets and transported them back to our farm on a bed of ice so their little bodies would not get overheated in the desert sun. I was relieved when I picked them up that what was dripping from them was not pig urine, but only melted ice. And yes, they grunted and squealed like you would think little piglets sound when you pick them up.

The breeder informed Heathar and Jack (only upon picking them up) that there were three males and one female and that the males would definitely have to be castrated so they don’t impregnate their sister. For some reason, she seemed to think that we should be able to castrate our piglets with no problems and made it sound relatively easy. She told us, “You just slice open the testicles and pop the inside out.” I can imagine it — like peeling a grape ever so delicately and trying to scoop out the inside without breaking the skin. I have been elected the castrator on the farm, which is a title I am proud to step into, but one that will be entirely new to me. My YouTube history will now be: “How to castrate baby pigs” and “How to stitch up baby pig testicles”. All kinds of new ads are going to start showing up in my feed…

After we fed the baby pigs their delicious first meal of cereal and milk, apples, dried figs and sweet potatoes, they immediately fell asleep on top of one another and began snoring. If you’ve never heard a baby pig snore you should absolutely watch a video where that is happening right now. It is the most wonderful sound I have ever heard, as is the sound of them chewing their food with their tiny, little piglet jaws. Usually, I don’t like the sound of people (or animals) chewing but with these little ones, it’s different. It’s an endearing sound, like they are trying to make earnest use of the delightful food that is entirely too big for their mouths.

Being in Santa Barbara, and away from my farm, is of course a stark contrast. I am now highly aware of rain catchment systems underneath roof gutters, fencing materials around people’s homes and if people do or do not coil their hoses up when they are done using them. Of course, in Santa Barbara, the hoses are coiled delicately in the lawns next to the pruned rose bushes and barrels full of trimmed and clipped succulents. Everything is in order, everything is measured and accounted for. I remember when I used to live in neighborhoods and didn’t actually mind it — there was something comforting to me about hearing all the noises that humans make. But now, after my years of living in New Mexico and especially after beginning to steward our farm, it feels crowded and cruel to keep humans that close together. Where are we to lie naked in the sun? Where are we to sing and scream and whoop without someone thinking they may need to call local law enforcement?

There is also something I noticed about the city while being here in Santa Barbara: I am always being watched. There is a constant gaze that is happening in any city — as you walk down the street, through your living room window, driving in your car — someone is almost always able to look at you, to witness you and observe you. One of the feelings I love the most is knowing that absolutely no one can witness me or watch me — to be completely unlooked upon, to be without any and all human gaze is true freedom to me. I love that about our farm — I can be and feel truly alone. I can walk into the Piñon  trees where I will not see another human all day if that is my desire.

The farm report that I received this morning was that Jack awoke before the sunrise to find a mountain lion walking around our property. This is the first mountain lion that has been spotted since we have moved onto the property. Perhaps it is the warm weather, or perhaps it is the enticing smells of all the baby animals on our property but what I think it really is, is a symbol. For me, the mountain lion was a symbol that moved with me for the past two and a half years of my life while I was in graduate school. When a new cohort of students begins their studies at Pacifica, they pick a card from the Animal Tarot Deck to represent their time in school. Our cohort chose the Mountain Lion from the deck in our first week together. For the next two and a half years, we walked closely with this animal and used it as the totem for our cohort. After completing a graduate program that highly values symbology and the archetypal realm, I deeply feel that the mountain lion showed up this morning to recognize me and to honor the program I have just completed —I’d like to think it so. Besides, our baby piglets are still inside, the mountain lion cannot possibly be prowling them already right?

I can brush by a milestone or a transition in life and wonder if it really is as big of a deal as everyone is making it out to be. I can move back into normal life with ease and effortlessness, turning my heart back to my Work and the relationships that are most important to me. But with the mountain lion showing up, I slow down and think, maybe the completion of this degree that I have spent the last two and half years of my life investing my soul into, is a big deal and does invite me to bring my Work more fully to this land we are living on. Perhaps the mountain lion is the epic nod toward my diploma and my studies in depth psychology. I will take it as a blessing for our farm and that the Work I love is ready to be moved forward.

And as I fly back to New Mexico today, back to the sun, I fly with my masters degree but I also fly with the nod of the mountain lion — the recognition of the wild. I fly with the tenderness that the Work I do in sitting with clients is sacred and supported. When our cohort drew the mountain lion as our totem, I initially thought it was too obvious an animal. Who doesn’t love getting the mountain lion as their totem? Some cohorts got the goose or the muskrat. I mean, we totally scored with the mountain lion. For a while, I wanted a more obscure animal and a less blatantly powerful animal. But with the appearance of our mountain lion friend this morning, I will begin to track its footsteps more closely and perhaps even allow myself to try on the obvious charisma of this animal.

Maybe the mountain lion can also symbolize that this path I have chosen in life has been brewing in me for a long time and maybe even is the obvious choice for me. Holding space, extending compassion and love to people who I build deep relationships with has always been a gift of mine. I’ve often felt that I need to look behind more doors, cross more bridges and trudge through deeper trenches to find the less obvious Work but perhaps I can let it be now, resting in front of me as obvious as the power of the mountain lion. Sometimes we have to accept the obvious and stop trying to make it more complicated than it is. Perhaps the MAGNUM OPUS of our lives tracks us down and hunts us like the mountain lion. Perhaps I am being watched after all, by the mighty and illusive wild cat. Perhaps I can stop looking and searching and just surrender to what is hunting me, especially when it is a beautiful and magnificent beast.