“Seth material” search engine (Jane Roberts)

I pushed Jane in her chair out on the porch, as close to the hemlock as we could get behind the floor-to-ceiling glass; we looked up at the chattering animal from only three feet away. We’d seen raccoons playing in the tree a few times, and Floyd, who lives on a farm, sees them often. This one was fully grown and bore a heavy coat of mixed black, brown, and gray hair; the colors exactly matched those of the tree trunk. In the gloomy day we couldn’t see eyes in the black face. We couldn’t tell the animal’s sex. [I read later that females and the young live in groups, the adult males usually alone—perfectly suitable accommodations of consciousness for raccoons!] “Coons can’t run fast,” Floyd told us, “and big dogs will attack ‘em if they catch them out in the open in the daytime. But that coon could kill even a big dog, if it got cornered.” He added that if we heard a loud thudding noise on the roof tonight, it meant that an animal had managed to dislodge the stone cap on the chimney. And Floyd had been right: The raccoon stayed in the tree until dusk, then descended and ambled into the woods in back of the house.³

“Wednesday, November 18, 1981. Right now I’m really blue, my eyes operating poorly; tears warmly close; yet enjoying the dark sky and street as rain threatens… the view of the mountains afforded by the windows; the rock music on the radio; the odd remaining odor of door varnish—deeply loving all of it yet swept through with something like nostalgia. The phone rings and at first I can’t tell if the ring is really here or from the radio, and when I answer the phone the voice is distant; it asks for Rob. A flash flood watch is in effect—nothing to worry us on our hill! I wait to feel better. Rob turned off the radio so he could hear on the phone…. He goes out front to feed the birds. I do feel relieved some, to be writing this down. It’s time for lunch; maybe I’ll do a few notes afterward….”

3. Jane and I regret that we’ve deprived our guest of the protected and warm—if not natural—habitat it had chosen. We had certainly enjoyed watching the raccoon. I told my wife I’m particularly pleased that even though we live within the confines of a small city, we’re also in close contact with the natural world and its creatures. I think of this enjoyable proximity as an excellent way of keeping in perspective our human position upon the planet. I don’t want to be simplistic here, but for some years I’ve been concerned that those living in large metropolitan centers miss a certain daily, vital participation in the very environment within which by far most of the life forms on earth exist. I’m not sure what percentage of the human population now lives in urban areas, but it must be high, and climbing. Yet beliefs rule all: Evidently, even with all of the challenges that crowding can set up, it’s just as natural for people to congregate as it is for them to live spread out—perhaps even more so, if one facet of their behavior can be said to be “more natural” than another!