In the Arctic, the Inuit are saying water and land are the same; they're an unbroken unity. In the winter, you travel on the ice because it's the linkage and the easiest way, and in the summer, you move around on the water.
Nature confounds her summer distinctions at this season. The heavens seem to be nearer the earth. The elements are less reserved and distinct. Water turns to ice, rain to snow. The day is but a Scandinavian night. The winter is an arctic summer.
Living on reserve we hunted; we fished; we trapped. We lived off the land. If we didn't hunt, we didn't eat. In summer, we hauled water from the slough. In winter, we hauled in snow to heat for water.
In winter, you fed the birds; and in summer, do the same thing! In winter, you gave them bread; and in summer, give them water!
I learned that Canadians are furious because Canada is exporting water to the United States. Their lakes are shrinking because they're selling water to the U.S. We water our golf courses and every ice cream shop and every coffee shop in the country because the health inspector has said you have to have a steady stream of water cleaning your spoons that you're frothing milk with and their ice cream scoopers. Are you kidding me? We're wasting all this water while we're sucking it from Canada and they're watching their lakes shrink?
Water is everywhere and in all living things; we cannot be seperated from water. No water, no life. Period. Water comes in many forms - liquid, vapor, ice, snow, fog, rain, hail. But no matter the form, it's still water.
Once you are present in the Energyfield of Self-discovery, it's like you are a piece of ice in warm water. The warm water is the Self. The ice is the mind. The warm water is not fighting with the ice. The ice can not resist the melting. It is a natural and fatal attraction.
Bulgarians eat tarator every single day in summer. They think of it as salad although we'd call it a soup. You can make it as thick or thin as you like depending on how much water you add. It's very practical in summer because yogurt cools the body faster than water, but the water hydrates you.
In Alaska, the beaches are slumping so much, people are having to move houses. In Tuktoyaktuk, the land is starting to go under water. The glaciers are melting and the permafrost is melting. There are new species of birds and fish and insects showing up. The Arctic is a barometer for the health of the world. If you want to know how healthy the world is, come to the Arctic and feel its pulse.
Waitress: "And to drink?" Artemis: "Spring water. Irish, if you have it. And no ice, please. As your ice is no doubt made from tap water, which rather defeats the purpose of spring water.
We are using the same water that the dinosaurs drank, and this same water has to make ice creams in Pasadena and the morning frost in Paris.
Flying over New Orleans on our approach, I got it. There was no view of land without water - water in the great looming form of Lake Pontchartrain, water cutting through in tributaries, water flowing beside a long stretch of highway, water just - everywhere.
On land off an ice covered sea the traveler can, for example, detect the presence of open water, simply because it reflects less light than land or ice. The open sea's telltale sign is thus a darkness on the underside of the clouds.
The river moves from land to water to land, in and out of organisms, reminding us what native peoples have never forgotten: that you cannot separate the land from the water, or the people from the land.
Water does not resist. Water flows. When you plunge your hand into it, all you feel is a caress. Water is not a solid wall, it will not stop you. But water always goes where it wants to go, and nothing in the end can stand against it. Water is patient. Dripping water wears away a stone. Remember that, my child. Remember you are half water. If you can't go through an obstacle, go around it. Water does.
From the very beginning all beings are Buddha.
Like water and ice,without water no ice,
outside us no Buddhas.
Water is life. We are the people who live by the water. Pray by these waters. Travel by the waters. Eat and drink from these waters. We are related to those who live in the water. To poison the waters is to show disrespect for creation. To honor and protect the waters is our responsibility as people of the land.