As I write, the snow is coming down in Boulder. So quiet and cold, so wonderful, so close to a new year with limitless posibilities. A call to go inside the hut, and inside the heart. The deep time harkens, look inward and gather up all that warms and sustains.

MLA is entering a new time and space, wonderful, uncharted, frightening, exciting. Keith Fairmont is moving back into a faciliator, coaching, and consulting role. The Guide Council search for a new executive director is in full swing. The 2008 program calendar is here with two new Spirit Camps in Nashville and Oregon, and a new youth initiation program. Colorado Winter Spirit Camp is just around the corner. Recollections from the November Alumni Gathering, and echoes from the Canyon.

Please read on...

Keith Fairmont, co-creator of MLA, Facilitator, Executive Director, Operations Manager, Guide Council Member, Fundraiser..., (the list goes on as he wore many hats), is ready to move on—to heed the call of a new path.

Keith will continue to serve MLA, but in a new and different capacity. He is in a place where he is being called to “let go”, to open up to new potential, and to welcome others to step into the leadership of the organization, in a way like he has not done before.

I hope I never forget the wonder of seeing the first emergence of a seedling from the soil, that wondrous realization that a buried and invisible seed has actually undergone a transformation of growth. MLA is like that growing wonder, except that we are way past the seedling stage. Our expanded 2008 Program Schedule shows that our alliance is more like a young fruit tree beginning to bear its fruit.

Ben Taylor (Bear) and I had the privilege of presenting a paper to the Native American Fatherhood Conference. Our subject was suicide among Native-American adolescents boys and young men. Why? Because in the indigenous communities, the suicide rate among teens and young men is 3-4 times the rate in the general community.

The Colorado Winter Spirit Camp is just a few weeks away, January 25-27. This camp promises to be an exciting and new time for MLA. We'll be meeting for the first time at Cal-Wood Retreat Center just outside Boulder. Camp is limited to 40 men, register online or by mail today!

• The November Alumni Gathering - by Brandon Davis
• It's Time - Poetry by Jim Day

• Fall 07 MLA Newsletter