The Line Between the Worlds
March 29, 2008
by Jeffrey Pierce
With Briana attending her Reiki II class, I turned my car into Oregon's Coast Range Mountains and drove up the Nestucca River Valley. While being willing to cross the line between life and death opened some doorways for me, I didn't feel that I had completed everything that I had set out to do.
So with the snow having fallen throughout the week, I threw a few meager survival supplies into Zen, my trusty Mazda, and drove up a one lane, mountain road, heading for an experience that I could feel, but not quite wrap my head around.
An adult red-tailed hawk welcomes me to my quest.
I stopped the car for a moment, stepping out near where I took the first photograph in the special feature on sacred sites that featured the area. As I turned and looked up the road, standing in a mixture of snow and rain, a mature red-tailed hawk swooped low over my head and landed on a tree a short distance from me, looking ahead in the direction that I was going. I have a special connection to Hawk, one of my spirit animals and an energy that I connected with early in my shaman training. In addition to being a messenger for the spirit world, Hawk is also very significant to warriors, one half of my dual archetype. All worries of the day faded away as I contemplated the message the raptor brought to me. The journey ahead would require me to call upon the Warrior side of my persona, but it was clear I was being called to do just that.
And unlike my journey to the Pacific Ocean, I was undertaking this endeavor without anyone at my side or a support team in tow.
The snow continued to fall...
As I slowly drove into the mountains, the rain turned to snow - which fell in thick white sheets with the more altitude that I gained. My car began to bottom out in the deep drifts of snow and before long I was barely inching forward, my progress stopped by the rapidly deepening snow.
My car ground to a halt. I couldn't move forward and I couldn't turn around. Bri was the only person that knew where I had gone and, rather than distracting her during her Reiki class, I had chosen to email her my plans instead. As I shifted into reverse, my tires spun hopelessly on the hard packed snow. I was in the middle of nowhere, in a remote section of the Oregon wilderness, and no one would even know to begin looking for me until Briana checked her email some five or six hours later.
I thought back to Hawk and the solitary elk that I'd passed on the way in. Elk spoke of endurance and Hawk spoke to my warrior side. Warriors don't give up. Either would I.
So I slowly worked my tires free as the snow continued to fall thickly around me. Without space to turn around, I slowly backed down the mountain in the rapidly deepening snow, working my way down a winding, one lane mountain road in reverse. After what seemed like an eternity, I reached a clear stretch of road under the branches of an overhanging Douglas Fir tree. Backing off the road (thank goodness for front wheel drive) I slowly maneuvered the car around until it was facing the right direction and, with a heart filled with thankfulness, headed down the mountain, looking for somewhere where I could park the car without immediately being snowed in. Another overhanging fir tree presented me with the opportunity and I parked just beyond the old quarry where I had undertaken my first vision quest years before.
The very cold Nestucca River.
There was only the slightest hesitation as I stepped out of the car, my heavy boots sinking deep into the snow, my footsteps carrying me to the banks of the Nestucca River. I left my coat, gloves, and hat in the car, walking toward the water in only my pants, t-shirt, and sweatshirt - and knowing what lay ahead, I had the presence of mind to bring a towel along as well.
No one really wants to be skyclad out here - and yet, here I am.
And even those were quickly left behind.
If you've never been in water that is primarily fed from snowmelt, let me assure you, it's cold. Standing there, a distance off the bank, I pulled out my athame (an old flatware table knife I found next to a railroad track) and began the ritual, ceremonially cutting away and the things that still had a hold on me that were preventing me from integrating my higher self into my current incarnation.
Did I mention that it was cold? Very cold? I reached for the bottom of the river, collecting three stones, one after another, representing the past, present, and future. The clock was ticking. My shivering was beginning to slow and my muscles were growing rapidly more rigid. I was running out of time - and I wasn't done yet.
I still had to submerge.
There is absolutely no way to describe the pain of dunking your head below the surface of near freezing water in the middle of a snowstorm. Your hands fly to your sinuses the instant your face breaks the surface of the river and it's all you can do not to scream. Okay, you do scream. Something profane. Unless you're me and you possess a near inability to swear. Then it's something similar to, "HOLY GOODNESS THAT FREAKIN' HURTS!"
And then you realize that the base of your skull was still exposed as you leaned forward to submerge your head, so you do it again so you can completely submerge without cheating or cutting any corners.
I stopped shivering. I was cold, but the sensation of being cold had stopped registering. My muscles were tense and tight. A strange feeling of freedom and euphoria began to wrap itself around me. Suddenly the thought of swimming out to the middle of the icy river seemed like the best idea in the entire world. My second site began to come on hard. I was slipping deep into hypothermia and had physically approached the line between life and death. Spirits began to form around me, Norse gods and goddesses, the pantheon of my ancestors, coming to life on the snowy banks of the river. I was a warrior! Thor stood above me on the bank with a horn of mead; Loki beckoned me toward the middle of the icy water.
It was a choice. One to serve myself, swimming drunkenly out into the river, feeding my ego and basking in the euphoric rush that filled me. The other path required me to feel beyond the physical, to choose a path that carried no ego, a journey on which I would follow my heart and my spirit as I built a community with others.
It was an easy choice, made easier as the presence of my higher self became a part of me.
I stumbled out of the water, collecting my clothing, heading up the bank toward where Thor waited. My higher self reached out of me, took the horn of mead from Thor's waiting hand and took a long drink as I made my way to the car, dripping wet. My bare feet were tucked into my boots and I reached the car before slipping into the remainder of my clothes. Retrieving the loaf of bread that I had brought with me, I broke bread with the spirit world, renewing my commitment to my path, my higher self forming the words that fell from my lips.
And then I returned to the car, basking in the rush of feeling my spirit whole, and began making my way down the snowy mountain.
I saw one elk going in and nearly two dozen on my way out.
On the way to the ritual, I had passed the red-tailed hawk and a single female elk. As I made my way down the mountain, I encountered herd after herd of elk, their numbers growing the farther that I drove.
The bull elk that led the herd caught in mid-leap.
And while most of the elk were cows, I encountered one magnificent bull that I caught on film in mid-leap.
A few turns later, I surprised a bobcat in the same position.
And then, the same red-tailed hawk that had led me into the mountains, flew in front of me, leading my car out of the sacred space we'd entered before drifting off into the surrounding trees.