Here's a "small world" story. I teach a graduate course titled Transitions and Rites of Passage in the online Ecopsychology program at Naropa University. Toward the end of the course this past semester, one of the students, a woman from South Africa, mentioned that her first connection with rites of passage was through a bus. While living in Santa Cruz, she and her family had bought an old bus to use as a kids' playroom and art studio. The bus had the words "Rites of Passage" painted on the side, and they christened it their "Magic Bus." She had assumed that rites of passage were for other cultures and other times. Gradually, she learned about modern rites of passage, the School of Lost Borders, and the Wilderness Guides Council. Now, she is weaving beautiful rites of passage into her life and her work in Cape Town and nearby.

Hearing her story, I wondered if the bus could have been Steven and Meredith's from the early days before the School of Lost Borders. Meredith confirmed it was, in fact, the bus they had used in the early 1970s. The proof? On the front of the bus in faded lettering was the name she and Steven had given to the bus: "Sage Hopper"!

Hearing this story and seeing the pictures, Meredith wrote: "Oh, this actually really thrills me. Certainly it's Sage Hopper that took us so many times into 'nowhere Nevada' and the desert with groups. I love hearing her/his adventures after we moved to Big Pine. ... It was indeed a magic bus - so many stories, carrying so many young people and adults on their way, and back again from fasting in the desert, exploring the outback of Nevada, down to Baja Mexico and the Bay of Conception to explore 'community' with a wide range of generations. So many memories."

From Gayle's story in the online course this spring back to the early roots of the School of Lost Borders! This is, to me, a story not only about a bus, but also about the spread of the wisdom and practices of rites of passage in our time: Unpredictable, fascinating, and indeed, a bit magical. From California to Cape Town and in so many other places around the globe. Each of us a vehicle as our work continues to find expression in the world.