Fort St. John is having uncharacteristically warm weather for the fall. It's October, month of birthdays (niece Celeste, friend Susan in Brazil, friend Lisa in Washington State, and I are all born on the same day), niece Sarah and my eldest daughter later in the month...a fine month indeed. Last year at this time I was alone in southern BC, doing a "commuter marriage." My husband is still in the east, yes, but will join me later this month, and in the meantime I have lots of family and friends with whom to spend my time...not to mention two dogs in this household and two in the other one. I am working with colleagues with whom I worked previously and of whom I am fond, and for whom I have respect, especially the principal of the school, who formerly was my drama teacher friend. The students are all plugged into their iPods...but cell phones are banned in the classroom since they would text each other and ignore whatever the teacher says, or at least some would. On the other hand, I try to avoid lecture, and I am very glad of the resource provided by YouTube: my classroom is hooked up so that when I go to a site on my computer, a projector sends it to the screen in front of my whiteboard (which used to be a blackboard, back in the day). I've prepared a number of Playlists as teacher resources: I, for one, am glad of the new technology. No smart boards yet, but they'll come, I'm sure. In the meantime, we still do plain old reading and writing, and the students chose their novels this last week, a number of different ones. There are several students here on exchange from Nigeria, and I recommended The Poisonwood Bible to a few. Many students also chose Kurt Vonnegut or the classic To Kill a Mockingbird. Others chose new and popular authors whom I'll now have to read in order to decide whether or not their choices have literary value (and that begs the question of how we define literature!) Mostly my reflections today, though, are memories occasioned by the death, this morning, of my friend Jacob Bighorn. Jacob died surrounded by the members of his family; they had been gathered from far and wide to wish bon voyage to their Dad, husband, son, grandfather... He knew he was being called to the next world, as his body gradually shut down, and was prayerfully prepared. I have been thinking about the bounty of being prepared: of knowing you are going on the final journey from this world, of believing absolutely in the mercy and grace of the loving Lord and the birth to a new realm of existence, of being surrounded by many, many people who love you and your legacy, and of being supported by the prayers of a deeply loving network of friends literally from around the planet. Jacob had been a teacher at the Maxwell International Bahá'í School, and had brought the Lakota culture, ceremony, a sense of the intrinsic worth of every soul, and his beautiful wife Deloria and their children, to the Maxwell family. He is being remembered in prayer by a great gathering of those who loved him. It's a legacy of pride and honour. Allah'u'abha, Jacob. All my love. All our relations.