A Report from Upper Deer House: by Paul Manski
I was happy to arrive at the upper deer house. I was happy because arriving at a deer house indicates a good circumstance. If you find yourself arriving frequently at deer houses you can be sure that you have been brought under a good circumstance. The tiny medicine deer and the large medicine deer, both kinds of deer residing at the deer house were holding special meetings regarding the spring planting of the Valeriana, and other topics of importance to them. Meeting was attended by both the small medicine deer and also the large medicine deer, in addition several wapiti, hawks and eagles dropped by to put in their input and comments and join in the celebration. Thanks to the deer residing at the deer house, along with blue stellar jays, turkey, chipmunks and squirrels who were also involved in the decision-making process. Along with rocks, trees, air, water, wind and countless other beings who were involved with the meeting.
Deer assembled at one of their deer-park-aspen meadows recently cleared of snow. The deer were wearing their white lightning patches that are brilliant white and triangular in shape. these patches become especially large and pronounced during the meeting time. Just at sunset the last rays of the sun activate the triangular lightning patches on large medicine deer. At the point where their large triangular shaped lightning patches are activated
Waterfall were brought to the the Aspen meadow. Several waterfalls of various sizes and shapes made an appearance with bathing healing water coming down from the upper deer house, bathing all in a sweet glorious light. Ice cold baths were had by all in preparation for the Valerian kiss.
The large and small medicine deer came up with many good ideas for the summer season. All the plans for summer are arranged at the Aspen assembly. Their Valeriana dance is the first large festive gathering at the deer house. All the animals join in planting the Valeriana. Taking with them seeds, roots, stems and whole plants that they bring with them to their homes in the forest. They distribute the Valerian throughout the forest. The joyous dancing, singing and waterfall bathing goes long into the night.
Several of the large medicine dear have called for a sprinkling of snow on the Valeriana tonight. I want to express thanks to both the large medicine deer-and the small medicine dear, and all the creatures great and small who took part in the gathering. Thank You, for inviting me to ceremony at the deer house.
We discover the deer park in the act of discovery. Deer parks are teaching places within the forest. Deer parks are places where the deer, the mountains, the Valeriana and ourselves discover the intimacy of romance.
Deer parks are curtained intimate rooms Open to shooting stars, moon light, pollen dust of falling stars, and light of the sun. We enter them like a bedroom or like a place that has been set up for romance. It is a breath taking sight to enter the forest, we enter the Deer Park to learn about the plants not only directly from the plants themselves but also through the medicine deer who plant the medicine plants within Gardens adjacent to the Deer Park. We may enter the bedroom with an invitation or be called there and spontaneously arrange an impromptu rendezvous. The deer, the valerian and the forest itself is prepared for love. It is based on mutual attraction between the person the plant and the place. There is no coercion with regard to the plant the person or the place. The plant, person and place give themselves to one another in a rapturous kiss. Not only a kiss on the mouth, but a caressing of the whole body in the luminous night sky nourished by waterfalls and the sweet fragrant pollen of Falling Star's.
Flowers themselves within the Deer Park are also doing teaching within the Deer Park. So when deer are teaching, this is deer teaching. When flowers are teaching, this is flower teaching. Deer parks themselves are doing teaching with flowers many of them growing within the Deer Park. When the Deer Park alone is teaching this is called Deer Park teaching. Regardless who is teaching within or withoutside the Deer Park, the key point is not teaching but learning and courtship outside of the realm of paid bound intimacy.
It is well known within written history some of the great teachings and learning have occurred within Deer Park's. It is important to know that written history of teaching has little to do with teaching itself. This teaching occurs outside paid bound intimacy and works directly with those involved based on their relationship with the place. The lover is wooed in a courtship process that can take months, years or occur instantly in a single moment. When eyes meet there is a piercing of both souls between the plant person and place. When this courtship process has evolved to the level of a kiss, there is no denying its validity. It reveals itself in the process of revealing.
Sometimes we focus on teaching and sometimes we focus on learning. Most teaching and learning of any value, is done face-to-face directly outside of paid bound intimacy which functions in a different way. In one well documented instance someone held up a flower within the Deer Park, usually what is focused on is the person holding up the flower within the Deer Park. A true understanding of the learning has to do not so much with the person holding up a flower within a Deer Park, but the flower itself and the Deer Park.
Usually the normal regular understanding is that someone, A person is teaching within the Deer Park. Yet although a person may be teaching or maybe not teaching within the Deer Park, what is really happening and is not well understood. Is that from time to time the deer themselves are doing teaching within the Deer Park. The time when the deer are holding classes and teaching within the Deer Park is called the time when the deer are teaching within the Deer Park. That the deer are teaching within the Deer Park has nothing to do with the deer teaching within the Deer Park, it has to do with the learning that goes on within the Deer Park.
Usually the normal regular understanding is that someone, A person is teaching within the Deer Park. Yet although a person may be teaching or maybe not teaching within the Deer Park, what is really happening and is not well understood. Is that from time to time the deer themselves are doing teaching within the Deer Park. The time when the deer are holding classes and teaching within the Deer Park is called the time when the deer are teaching within the Deer Park. That the deer are teaching within the Deer Park has nothing to do with the deer teaching within the Deer Park, it has to do with the learning that goes on within the Deer Park.
Flowers themselves within the Deer Park are also doing teaching within the Deer Park. So when deer are teaching, this is deer teaching. When flowers are teaching, this is flower teaching. Deer parks themselves are doing teaching with flowers many of them growing within the Deer Park. When the Deer Park alone is teaching this is called Deer Park teaching. Regardless who is teaching within or withoutside the Deer Park, the key point is not teaching but learning and courtship outside of the realm of paid bound intimacy.
So it follows that naturally it's not important to find a teacher that holds up a flower within the Deer Park, what is most important is to go directly to the Deer Park, directly to the flowers and plants growing within the deer park, planted by the large and small medicine deer who operate in and around Deer Park's. It's important to forget about the person holding the flower within the Deer Park because the person holding the flower within the Deer Park is only accidentally holding the flower within the Deer Park. Flowers hold themselves up within the Deer Park, they live breathe and move within the Deer Park holding themselves up with the forces of wind water and sky. This is of course experientially and existentially true. Flowers emerge in the spring time and hold themselves up, outside of any concept of a flower being held up. Just as you yourself hold yourself up when you're standing regardless of whether anyone is observing you in the process of standing.
Flowers themselves within the Deer Park may be understood as mountains. Flowers within the Deer Park may be understood as waterfalls. Flowers within the deer park maybe understood according to the understanding that one has. In this way it may be understood, "flowers are walking mountains...". Mountains walk within their own concept of mountains. Mountains like flowers hold themselves up as they emerge and meet the sky. A flower may be a mountain walking, and a mountain may be a flower walking, all things are walking in that they are moving towards their natural completion according to their entire nature. When we see a mountain and a flower walking through the perfect blue sky this is known as mountain flower walking.
We see flowers and flowers are seeing us in that same moment, what is occurring is seeing. Often times we may be looking for a flower and if we look with our eyes for the flower we may not see the flower. It's important to become aware of being seen. Because many times the flower is looking at us. The flower is looking for us, searching for us. Seeing is not dependent on light. Seeing is not dependent on having eyes that are open or eyes that are closed. Seeing is seeing and seeing is being seen. When you are looking you are also being seen. When we practice seeing we are both the object being seen and seeing itself. So it is important at the moment that we are searching for a flower, to be aware that seeing and being seen, are one in being with the same process. Having the same nature as the process. The process of seeing is no different then the process of being seen. We are discovered in the act of discovery.
This fundamental expression of lightning through the triangle white golden flashing area of the large medicine deer's rump and their Valerian kiss, is a powerful teaching that occurs in the first moments of spring time when the days and nights are balanced. The proper understanding of the days becoming longer in the spring time has very little to do with the sun and everything to do with the medicine deer living in the forest teaching within the Deer Park. The large and small medicine dear themselves control the rising and setting of the sun. Depending on the teaching that the medicine deer are doing on any particular day you may find an endless day that lasts forever or a short day. Instantly you may see multiple sunrises and sunsets within a single moment of time. You'll see the sunrise within 10 or 15 minutes, going back-and-forth in the sky sometimes in a straight line sometimes in a circle, sometimes you'll see two or three sunrises in a single day, this is all at the discretion of the deer house teachers and the lessons that they are bringing. Some days are much longer than others within the Deer Park. You can have a very short day followed by a very long day it's all at the prerogative of the medicine dear residing within the Deer Park.
One of the ways that plants themselves are teaching and discovering within the Deer Park is through the large medicine dear who operates and manage the Deer Park.
One of the first lessons that the deer give is the Valarian kiss. When you see the large triangle shaped white golden sun like rump flashing at the rear of the large medicine deer, you will easily notice that lightning and thunder are easily made and expressed through this deer rump, this is called deer lightning. Don't be surprised if out of a clear blue sky, or in the middle of the night, you see flashes of lightning and then from a distance hear thunder, or deep rumbling sounds of the earth moving back-and-forth, this is not the thunder of rain or the thunder of spring snow, this is the thunder of the deer teaching within the Deer Park imparting a Valarian kiss.
This fundamental expression of lightning through the triangle white golden flashing area of the large medicine deer's rump and their Valerian kiss, is a powerful teaching that occurs in the first moments of spring time when the days and nights are balanced. The proper understanding of the days becoming longer in the spring time has very little to do with the sun and everything to do with the medicine deer living in the forest teaching within the Deer Park. The large and small medicine dear themselves control the rising and setting of the sun. Depending on the teaching that the medicine deer are doing on any particular day you may find an endless day that lasts forever or a short day. Instantly you may see multiple sunrises and sunsets within a single moment of time. You'll see the sunrise within 10 or 15 minutes, going back-and-forth in the sky sometimes in a straight line sometimes in a circle, sometimes you'll see two or three sunrises in a single day, this is all at the discretion of the deer house teachers and the lessons that they are bringing. Some days are much longer than others within the Deer Park. You can have a very short day followed by a very long day it's all at the prerogative of the medicine dear residing within the Deer Park.
As we enter into an experiential herbalism it's important to enter through the Valarian kiss of the medicine deer. Just as in any human school you will have introductory classes, you may have tests that you take to see your capabilities for entering into the course of study at the beginning. The deer at the deer house within the Deer Park operate in the same way. The first teaching and introductory class begins with the Valerian kiss. The Valerian kiss is very much a girlfriend experience, GFE outside of paid bound intimacy. It is both romantic and intimate and is something that cannot be forced, purchased or bought. Within the human realm the girlfriend experience GFE, is something that you can purchase by the hour. You may visit a place like a cottontail rabbit ranch and request a GFE, girlfriend experience. This interaction is paid bound intimacy. It is a kind of intimacy yet there is a ticking clock that when the alarm rings the experience is over and the girlfriend, the GFE like wispy clouds of the morning, vanish with the light of the rising Sun. So in this sense don't expect coffee, bacon, eggs and toast with butter, to be served in the morning because the experience usually does not include breakfast.
Within the GFE of a cottontail rabbit ranch there is kissing and touching of an intimate nature, yet in the morning if you expect to find coffee, toast with butter, bacon and eggs served you will be expecting something which will not occur. Otherwise when you visit a cottontail rabbit Ranch there will be no kissing, no coffee. No toast with butter. No bacon and eggs will be served in the morning. There will only be a limited paid bound intimacy within the time arranged. You will be left as you begin in total emptiness unbound and yet no obligations outside of the paid bound intimacy of the ticking clock. It is also true that with the Valeriana kiss of the large medicine dear there is also no toast with butter, coffee, eggs with bacon that are served in the morning. Neither the paid bound intimacy of the girlfriend experience GFE, at the cottontail rabbit ranch nor the unpaid experience of the Valeriana kiss with a large medicine dear offers a complementary morning breakfast. If you are searching for a complementary morning breakfast you will have to search in a different way and seek out breakfast for its own sake outside of a girlfriend experience.
Within the GFE of a cottontail rabbit ranch there is kissing and touching of an intimate nature, yet in the morning if you expect to find coffee, toast with butter, bacon and eggs served you will be expecting something which will not occur. Otherwise when you visit a cottontail rabbit Ranch there will be no kissing, no coffee. No toast with butter. No bacon and eggs will be served in the morning. There will only be a limited paid bound intimacy within the time arranged. You will be left as you begin in total emptiness unbound and yet no obligations outside of the paid bound intimacy of the ticking clock. It is also true that with the Valeriana kiss of the large medicine dear there is also no toast with butter, coffee, eggs with bacon that are served in the morning. Neither the paid bound intimacy of the girlfriend experience GFE, at the cottontail rabbit ranch nor the unpaid experience of the Valeriana kiss with a large medicine dear offers a complementary morning breakfast. If you are searching for a complementary morning breakfast you will have to search in a different way and seek out breakfast for its own sake outside of a girlfriend experience.
The Valeriana at the upper deer house has no system of payment, so there is no paid bound intimacy. The Deer Park, the Valariana, the waterfalls all operate outside the bounds of paid bound intimacy. Yet within the teaching of the early spring at the deer park there is a type of GFE or girlfriend experience within the practice of the Valerian kiss. Valerian kiss is the first lesson given by both the Deer Park, the flowers who hold themselves up, and the large and small medicine deer.
Within the realm of herbal study, and herbalism you may find the plant Valerian is discussed as a nervine or sedative. You may hear of various ways of processing the roots or the above ground portion of the plant. There may be talk of making teas or tincturing the plant in alcohol, storing the roots and perhaps even journeying to the place where the Valarian grows. The Valerian kiss can only be imparted in the direct presence of a medicine deer and the Valerian plant herself.
You may see easily the large medicine deer rolling and frolicking in Meadows of Valeriana. They roll and tumble in the rapturous deep sense of its blossoms. They rub their white triangular medicine rump gently gathering the valerian scent and pollen. They luxuriously submit to its fragrance and in that moment they prepare for the Valerian kiss. We likewise in the same way imitate the deer first having taken a bath in the ice cold water fall. We follow the lead of the deer and likewise roll and frolic in the Valerian meadow rubbing it sent over our entire body. We become one with the valerian and one with the deer who offers herself to us. Her white triangular patch lifts up high into the air and she allows us to easily wrap our arms around her neck caressing her shoulders.
The deer like ourselves has bathed in the waterfall and is now ready to impart the delicate valerian kiss. In a moment with peals of muted thunder and flashes of lightning the deer allows the herbalist to penetrate into the mystery of plant, person and place. For a brief moment we are one with the deer the Valeriana. In that intimate embrace is the knowledge of each plant's medicine. Exactly in the same way with an encounter at a cottontail rabbit ranch, regardless of whether there is a breakfast of toast with butter, bacon and eggs and coffee, we return to our journey slightly different, slightly changed and our journey is now alone along a plant medicine Road with the medicine deer instructing. 
