Saturday I spent a fair anount of time lost. I was in an outdoor awareness class, blindfolded and trying to go basically uphill through the brush, trees, rocks, upslopes, and downslopes to reach the place where a 5-gallon "drum" was occasionally being beaten.

I could hear others moving nearby much of the time, and I trusted the instructors, so I knew I was not really alone. I never felt like anything too dire would happen to me, but I knew I was lost.

The sound of the drum seemed to move occasionally, which I knew was not really happening anywhere except in my head. But blindfolded, the drum was my only orientation and so I knew I was "lost."

I stopped several times to try to sort things out, thought I did, and repeatedly realized I failed when I got disoriented again. Try as I might, I could not home in on the drum.

Eventually a kind spirit of the forest took my hand, put it on her shoulder and led me to a road. There she put my hand on the shoulder of another guiding friend who led me up the road a short way to the drum.

I took off my blindfold to learn I was not the last one in, but close.

Thought provoking.