I walk with Llamas.     Freely, unfettered, they walk with me.

I enjoy the company of cows, taking in their calmness, their easy going ways and adapting their peace with their environment as my own.

I laugh with pigs.   Watching them enjoy the ability to run among the trees and savor the goodness the earth provides as nature intended.

I sleep with dogs. Warm and watchful, appearing completely relaxed but never quite unguarded just as I am never completely tuned out.

I chatter with chickens, enjoying their banter as they scratch and peck around the house and I sip coffee and chime in when I have an opinion.

I welcome strangers; stray dogs, fallen fledglings, orphaned wildlife, feral kittens, misplaced beings of any and every kind make their way to me with a knowing, as though led. Some staying out their days, becoming kindred–some moving on as nature intended. Each owning a part of me formerly undiscovered.

I share with this land everything that is myself.  I walk with it.  I talk with it.  I cry with it.  I laugh with it.  I struggle with it. I rejoice with it.  I cooperate with it.  I learn from it.  I glean from it.  I give to it.

The land and I and every being on it are bound in a way that defies all that was proclaimed for me by my birth and circumstances.  Even if I must leave it, this piece of earth and every being that ever tread on it will go with me.