“Temple on Golden Mountain ~ A Meditation on Impermanence”
Terry Jean Meekins

Only a few Chinese Temples or Joss Houses survive from the Gold Rush days.  Only one still witnesses an unbroken tradition of worship, honoring ancestors and securing their spiritual assistance with devotions, feasting, parades, fireworks, burning paper offerings and incense, and divinations.

As the temples vanish, the ghost towns, Indian camps and lone cabins that graces my early life with mystery also crumble out of memory.  Soon the last of my life’s most beloved places in apple orchard deer beds, rose-hip meadows and pine music back woods will be scraped up and feed to the pitiless monster of Development.

This spirit-house altar made of artifacts is for my grandmother and my mother who, boot deep in the moldering layers of mining camp ravines, taught me to read and love the history of California.