Around 900 CE

      My earliest memory in this Viking life is of walking down a trail from the mountains into the shorefront village.
      The countryside is beautiful.
      I am walking on a path along the floor of a small valley with low hills on either side. Beyond the low hills are very high, snow capped mountains. From where I am walking are also high mountains.
      The valley is very green, with wild flowers all over the place.
      It seems to be spring.
      I am 16 or so. I am dressed in a knee-length tunic, with a shoulder cloth, and have straw sandals on my feet. I am comfortable; the sun is nice and warm, while there is still a slight chill in the morning air.
      I am going to the village to get something (probably ingredients for medication) for my father who is home in bed sick. My father is the village shaman. (Merv, my current co-worker, is my father in that life.)
      Our house sits high in a mountain valley about 4 miles from the village. The walls are light tan, mud plaster over straw and rock, with a thatched roof. There is an outcrop of thatch on a wooden frame over the front door and for a number of feet off to the right along the front of the house, when looking at the house from outside. This overhang is like a front porch, though there is no flooring under it.
      To the right of the door is a stump which my father uses for his chair when he is "holding court" for his patients.
      So I am going into the village for something. I remember not being sad at the time, knowing that things are fine and what ails my father will be cured by what I’ll be bringing home, so I am more interested in seeing the people of the village.
      My father and I live alone in our valley, and we are well liked and respected in the village. My father is the shaman, and I am the apprentice, though about to the point where I can work completely alone. I handle most of the housecalls already.

      Then my memories flash forward to the time when my father is older and bedridden. It feels like maybe 5 or 6 years after the first memory.
      He is about to die. Yet, neither he nor I are sad, because we both know that he and I have had a good life together, and I know that he is going to a great place, and he is ready to go, and he knows I can take care of myself. We have actually been living more as best friends over the years, than as father and son. And we have enjoyed our life together.
      But now it is time for him to go. Many people come to pay their respects, and there is very little sadness. The attitude towards death is so much different.

      Then a year or two has passed, and I am helping a mother deliver a very healthy baby girl. I speak over the baby words, which I do not in this life understand, but they were energy words, which imparted secrets to the baby.
     The mother was awed and honored that her daughter was chosen to receive such secrets, and would eventually be the shaman for the clan.
      This newborn is now Tina, an Army buddy and old girlfriend from this life, who now lives in Florida.

      The next memories are some 18-20 years later.
      One night the village is gathered around a fire in the council hall. A debate rages over whether to go to war with another group of people. It seems those people are of the Ros’, a clan from old Rus, or Russia.
      I counsel against war, but I am in the minority. While I talk, I see that I am not making any impression of the young warriors of the village. They are itching for a battle to bring glory to them and their houses. They do understand my reasoning, but decide it is time to get out and about.
      By this time, the girl I delivered has been working with me as apprentice, and has also gotten married to one of the young men. That young man, Ed, is also an Army buddy, Tina’s 4^th husband this life, and also lives in Florida, a couple of miles from Tina.
      Her husband is among those who choose to go warring.
      He asks me if I will take care of her and let her live with me while he is away.
      Uncharacteristically for the time, I tell him he better ask her what she wants. At first he rebels, but I point out to him that she is his equal and may be higher someday, because she will be the Shaman of the clan.
      So he asks her, she asks me if it is okay, and we agree that she will stay with me under my roof and at my hearth until he returns from the war. At which point she moves out of the village and up to my home in the mountains.
      Then we see the warriors off from the village.

      Next recall is the return of the boats from the war. The husband is dead, on one of the boats and covered with shields… He is returning in glory, dead at the hands of his enemies. But he left behind a ton of karma with his wife, for having gone off and gotten himself killed. (That karma has been worked off a lot in this life.)

       The next recall is when I am bedridden, ready to die of old age – somewhere around 55 or 60 years old, which was phenomenal for that time.
      The wife stayed with me, learned, was raised and loved as a daughter, was apprentice, partner, then shaman for the village, now with her own apprentice, and students from neighboring clans.
      She had, in fact, been handling all the healing and medicine work for 5 or more years at this point, and has stayed with me simply because we are the best friend each other has.
      All members of the clan and even many members of neighboring clans come to the home on the mountain to say their farewells. Some even talk of my various counsels against war, and how, someday, maybe things could be that way.

      It was actually a long, good life.