Quest to the Southwest - Chapter Sixteen - Raven

Alone, I wanted to be alone. Martha paced the small room. She grabbed her coffee and headed outside, pacing down the driveway, looking at the view. One ear was poised listening for the mountain lion. She wanted to see the big cat again, but not up close and personal. This was the third day of staying in the little house. She had gone for long walks each day, sticking to the road. There was lots to see, the gravel crunching under her feet, walking past the river with the spawning coho, the pastures of the various breeds of cattle, the ponds with ducks and water birds unlike those back home. The writing was going well, but there was only so much time she could spend at the awkward library table, a little too high for comfort, each day, fingers flying over the key board, ideas filling her head like the swirling fog creeping up from the hidden river.

Time for some meditation, something spirital, this is a quest after all. Martha found her ipod, her drum and her folding chair, slinging the black strap over her shoulder and heading up the hill. She didn't change out of her slippers, if she stepped carefully the ground was firm.

Amazing how it could rain torrents and then be dry so soon.

She set up the chair near a stone, this would do for a foot rest. She found the songs she wanted, drumming, but meditative.

"Gar, glack." The raven perched on the branch of a dead tree, tipping his head as he asked his croaking question.

"Hey, you're back." Martha greeted the black shiny bird, his eye like a onyx bead, sparkling in his face. She closed her eyes, listening to the music, consciously relaxing the muscles in her face, those areas around her mouth and eyes which clenched so tightly when she wasn't paying attention. It didn't seem right, that things would be tense when you weren't thinking about it,

that one should have to consciously relax them.

Alone, you wanted to be alone. The next day Martha awoke with the same thoughts in her head. If only the dog were with her, or there was some reception so she could watch the morning news. Martha stared at the laptop, the chapters already written spread out on various surfaces of the room. Not today. I need something different. She picked up the black computer pack, with all it's special pockets for hard drives and discs, stuffed the laptop into the special padded compartment, grabbed her purse and headed for the car. I'll check out that coffee shop in town. She had spotted the small sign when driving through town on her way in. "Three Ravens Coffee House". The sign was mounted on a stick, stuck in the soft earth between two stones near the road. The huge old house was dark, unpainted, sagging wooden porch. It didn't look inhabited, in spite of the "open" sign nailed

beside an ancient wooden door. The sign was up permanently, something she was becoming used to in the small towns she had crept through, Utah, Nevada, Arizona, New Mexico. Open had some alternate meaning in these places, a permanent greeting which meant, yes, come try the door, we are here sometimes.

Today she wouldn't be alone, she would seek company. If this coffee house wasn't open she would drive to the next one, twenty, thirty miles up the road.

The Three Ravens was open, and it was extremely pleasant. Once through that wooden door, pulling it closed three times before the latch clicked and held, there was a pleasant coffee

house atmosphere. The barista was a young girl, pleasant smile, chatting with a friend across the tall counter, glass case filled with pasteries. The painted wooden tables and chair were decorated with ravens in various poses, curious, hungry, puzzled. The shelves along the wall held white glazed plates and bowls, decorated with black, small bits of red for emphasis. The

general theme of these dishes seemed to be ravens, chickens and skeletons.

"Do you have wireless?"

"Yes, the password is three ravens, all one word, no capitals."

She was happy in the coffee house, conversations with strangers, she could be whoever she wanted to be for awhile. And she wasn't alone.

Later that afternoon, as she sat on what was now her hill, eyes closed, listening to the call of the birds, her mind was free to wander where it may.

Ravens. They had popped up everywhere.

The first was at Bryce, hopping close and bumping her leg, causing her to jump at the unexpected contact. "Hey, you scared me," she had said to him.

The ravens at Zion had chatted to her along the trail as she hiked the wrong direction. Maybe they were trying to tell her something. "Wrong way, wrong way." She just didn't

translate or listen.

At the Grand Canyon they had circled below, small black specks in the vast canyon.

In Prescott she had picked up an old issue of the Sun, one of her favorite magazines, althoughshe had let her subscription lapse. Interesting article about crows and ravens, how smart they were, made tools, banded together and dropped rocks to scare away unwanted humans, we should have respect for this bird.

At Canyon de Chelly there had been hundreds of the birds, profiles of black standing out on the smooth red walls. Circling on the drafts of wind, she had been enchanted by two who stayed together, as if they were the Blue Angels, banking and turning in perfect unison.

Then there was the poster, placed on the back of the stall door, so that when she sat on the cold toilet in Chaco she couldn't help but read it. "Help us train our raven." The poster had advised that the campground ravens would rip and destroy tents in an effort to find food, advising that tents be flattened when campers were out hiking.

Today she had found wireless only eight miles away, a business thriving in a town which was dead. Three Ravens.

Is it bad if the raven is my spirit animal? Ill tidings? Black cat? Sign that death is to come?

It didn't feel bad, it felt right. She decided that the raven was a good spirit animal, he could travel great distances and see a long way. He could stand alone or fly with his friends.

He was resourceful and funny.

"Garkle gack." Her friend was back.