Dawn in the desert...

...is a glorious thing.

The view from the porch at Endicott West: dawn breaking over the Rincon Mountains to the east.

Dawn over the horse corrals and the Santa Catalina Mountains to the north.

Dawn over the entrance to the Casita, one of the Retreat's guest spaces.

Dawn over the campfire pit out by the Bunk House, another guest space.

The land here sings a song of beauty: prickly and soft, harsh and lush, a place of contradictions ...revelations... stories...spirits...and twenty-odd years of my personal history. It's an emotional experience clearing out the ranch -- each drawer, each shelf, each box coated with memories thick as the dust of the desert.

On Tuesday I closed down the art studio....

...and we began to sort through the many things that must be packed, or sold, or given away, or given back to the various folks in the E-West community that they belong to.

Yesterday, we began to dismantle the Library...a Herculean and melancholy task. I haven't the space to house the books in the UK (nor do I have the small fortune it would take to ship them there), so I'm plucking out a boxful of sentimental favorites and sending the rest out into the world again. Let go, let go, let go, let go, has been my constant mantra this week, these wise words from Mary Oliver's poem "In Blackwater Woods" running through my head:

To live in this world

you must be able
to do three things:
to love what is mortal;
to hold it

against your bones knowing
your own life depends on it;
and, when the time comes to let it go,
to let it go.

I am letting them go. I am letting it all go. Life moves on and so will I.

Speaking of the E-West Library: would you, perhaps, like to own a small piece of it? Most of the books are being donated to The Special Collection at Northern Illinois University, where they'll be of use to students and researchers of mythic arts and fantastic literature -- but a few special boxfuls are being auctioned off by the indefatiguable Ellen Kushner, to help defray moving expenses here. Go over to Ellen's "Puggy's Hill" blog for details. The auctions will be running until noon tomorrow, January 24th.

Now back to work.