Still breathing and reporting from somewhere near a shore crackling with the terror and hot with radioactivity in the Valley of the Weird, where deranged Islam rolled through and angry Christians seethe and war engines roar and the shock troops of empire train for invasion and death.  Despite those realities, I can’t ignore the beauty of the place—home to the black sage, violet bush mallow, morning glory, lemonadeberry and monkeyflower, the striped skunk, long-tailed weasel and dusky footed woodrat, the red-shouldered hawk, American kestrel, western bluebird, white-tailed kite and California gnatcatcher, the native coast live oak and western Sycamore.  Why, it was here that earth sisters Aine and Rose stood back-to-back post-9/11 in the center of a stone circle, facing east and west on the dry rocky riverbed, calling out to the world in soft voices on the gentle sea breeze to respect the ancient Indian burial ground placed here long ago on a land that ties all of us together in the Valley of the Weird.

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