Change.

Everything changes.  Change must come from within.  One person can change the world.  The more things change, the more they stay the same.  Keep the change.

Okay, the last one doesn’t really fit in.

Change is what led me to the River.  The world changed and made me wonder about changing my place in it.  I saw the world around me changing in ways I didn’t like, and not in ways I did.  My efforts to preserve humanity weren’t enough.  At best I could fight a holding action, and lose a little more with each engagement.  I’m still trying to change that.  There are a lot of good people in the world, all wrapped up in their own affairs.  If they could act in concert – if WE could act in concert – we’d be so much more powerful than we are individually.  But that will take a long time.  Years.  Maybe my whole life.  In the meantime, I can try to build a better world, a little bit at a time.

I’m changing.  My role in life is changing.  Once, I was a hunter.  There were people and there were monsters.  We protected people by killing monsters.  Dimly, we knew that there were non-human societies.  We used to try, when we could, to get cursed weres in touch with someone who could help them control their curse.  “Monster” doesn’t mean anything not human.  Sometimes monsters were human, even.  But there was a line.  I’m way over the line now.  I’m going out with a werewolf.  My boss is a werecat-thing… person.  Ubasti.  My last girlfriend was a faerie-fetch.  And that didn’t work out so well.  I should really try dating humans again.  But I’m getting sidetracked here.

 

What am I going to be?  Delia says that’s a question that never has just one answer.  Tamers of Rivers are lots of things, and they change over time, or even from day to day.  Hunter.  Warrior.  Detective.  I know those roles.  Bike messenger?  Not so much anymore.  It was fun for a while, but it’s time for a grown-up job.  Counselor?  Healer?  I have a lot to learn before I can really wear those roles.  Maybe I should go back to college.  Dad used to talk about Mom’s job.  She ran a Chinese apothecary and wellness center kind of thing.  She treated a lot of Hollywood people who wanted to be trendy and spiritual – cause they might as well get some actual healing out of it, dad said.  But she also treated people who couldn’t go to regular hospitals, or wouldn’t.  Lots of illegals.  I could learn to do that if I could find someone to teach me.

(Yet another thing I don’t have time for)

Ohh, here’s one of those epiphany things.  Since I was little, I’ve been really directed.  I wanted to learn martial arts and acrobatics, so I did.  I wanted to master my Ch’i, so I did.  I wanted to learn to be a detective, so I did.  And I hardly ever deviated from the course I chose.  Which isn’t really being right with the Tao, or following the course of the River.

So now what I want is to learn what the Tao wants.

Stop reaching.  Stop forcing.  Stop ignoring.

Seriously consider every opportunity that comes your way.

Seriously listen to the world around you.

Seriously stop writing in your diary and go get ready for your date.