He came into my life quietly, catching my attention with his sense making, enthusiasm, intelligence and obvious passion about the topic. Very quickly, Michael became a teacher, mentor and a good friend. I’m blessed to know a lot of impactful elders. Seldom have I crossed paths with one who quickly made me (and later I would learn everyone) feel special and important.
Michael’s gift of easy engagement both in interviews and in personal conversations was a special gift that not everyone can boast. His laughter, smile and quick acknowledgment of everyone’s curiosity and questions, responses and challenges as we collectively walked down this path of collapse acceptance was a balm for whatever ails ya.
I find myself sometimes wanting to pick up the phone and talk with Michael about new questions that have come up for me, to dig deeper with him about some of the things he spoke of. Now he is one of the ancestors. I connect with him in my meditations. He is still there to ask questions of, and to engage in, and to remember some of the many teachings that he offered. Thank you, Michael. Keep smiling!
-Steve Aman
Before the Deluge
Jackson Browne
Some of them were dreamers
And some of them were fools
Who were making plans and thinking of the future
With the energy of the innocent
They were gathering the tools
They would need to make their journey back to nature
While the sand slipped through the opening
And their hands reached for the golden ring
With their hearts they turned to each other’s hearts for refuge
In the troubled years that came before the deluge
Some of them knew pleasure
And some of them knew pain
And for some of them it was only the moment that mattered
And on the brave and crazy wings of youth
They went flying around in the rain
And their feathers, once so fine, grew torn and tattered
And in the end they traded their tired wings
For the resignation that living brings
And exchanged love’s bright and fragile glow
For the glitter and the rouge
And in a moment they were swept before the deluge
Let the music keep our spirits high
Let the buildings keep our children dry
Let creation reveal its secrets by and by, by and by
When the light that’s lost within us reaches the sky
Some of them were angry
At the way the earth was abused
By the men who learned how to forge her beauty into power
And they struggled to protect her from them
Only to be confused
By the magnitude of her fury in the final hour
And when the sand was gone and the time arrived
In the naked dawn only a few survived
And in attempts to understand a thing so simple and so huge
Believed that they were meant to live after the deluge
Let the music keep our spirits high
Let the buildings keep our children dry
Let creation reveal it’s secrets by and by, by and by
When the light that’s lost within us reaches the sky