Ripples and Eddies and Ebbing and Flowing.....

The setting sun is like a spotlight on the horizon, making shadows that lay long on the grass and the dwindling leaves on the maples and yellow birches seem to have a more brilliant glow than in an afternoon light. The purple and pink clouds are pale against a pale blue sky and they move slowly and almost imperceptably across the spreading twilight. Soon the light will be gone and then one by one, the glinting stars will be there, resting as though jewels against the jewellers black velvet cloth. The end of October, almost November, then ..... and another year passed through. There have been times when I felt as though I was stepping lightly and easily, and then other moments when it was tough going, a mental struggle more than anything but different enough from the former as to cause notice. And whether this imbalance was due to this or that, I feel blessed to say that the days of joy and peace were more, much more than the other.

Taking that into consideration, and then including into the mix that this year has been, the bugs and the weather,I notice that I've sort of laid aside for just a time, a few things that I had been occupying my mind with. Somehow I began to feel like I needed to rest myself, pace myself more. And so the blog was left behind. I guess that's the way it is for most things unless you are the really focused type who can limit themselves to a fewer numbers of interests whereas I admit to having an inability to say no to new things to do. Too many names on the dance card, if you know what I mean.... Another thing that I'd laid aside for a while was art. Busy-ness and a mental dry spell creatively speaking, and I haven't really done much in that regard for a few years. But I think that may be coming back and perhaps in a week or so I'll have something to show.

The point is this, I think that when it comes to our interest or things that we must do, there is an ebb and flow just like the seasons and the best thing to do is to just accept that never ending rhythm to our natural lives and our very being and float right along with it. Just as spring necessitates planting and nurturing little garden plants and fall brings lawn rakes and putting away and tidying up in preparation for the next spring, so to do we mentally, spiritually go through a constant state of flux, of reshaping and refinement, particularly when we have an actually awareness of our life, our being. That conscious appreciation of our existence in this moment, right now, when taken with you each step of every day can be the beginning of an ability to remember the joy that each and every one of us has come out of. We've have replaced that joy with a forgetfulness that has obscured the connection that exists between us all and indeed between the Universe and humanity and the races, the planet that we live on, the waters and all the creatures that walk this world with us....yes, we've forgotten. But I have faith that there is a change coming and I think the odds are 50/50, that things are heading in a direction that will bring a growing awareness of the necessity for compassion and love and acceptance amongst all of us human beings. And perhaps being human will begin to mean that we all realize that each moment is an opportunity to be the grandest version of our greatest vision about ourselves, and without thinking, we'll seize that moment. And our contribution to the world will be an island of harmony, because after all, we're moving with the ebb and flow, not against it. And if by some bizarre and unexpected miracle, all of humanity could be convinced of the need for this change and so follow through, then think in amazement of a world of harmony, not just a one man island here or there.

Silence

Today I'm alone. That sounds strange to say…."today I am alone". Those particular words don't enter into my vocabulary in that order very often. And I am a person who doesn't mind my own company, but since we retired, I am rarely "alone". Don had a doctor's appointment in Amherst (pronounced 'Amerst') so he went, and I stayed. I was out in the garden mowing the lawn and then moving some things around…preparing for winter you know. All very pleasant. And when I got bored with doing that and had finished putting things like my little hand rake and wheelbarrow and whatever else I might have gotten out, --when I had put away those things, I knocked the dirt off my boots and went in. I put my coat in the closet and then went to wash the garden from my hands, and as the water spilled out of the tap and rinsed the bubbles away, I caught myself thinking how quiet it was and perhaps I'd go and put some music on.

And as I caught myself thinking that, I realized in almost the same moment, the other side of the coin as it were, that the idea of letting the silence reign, seemed difficult and odd, and I must confess, for a moment it made me feel a teeny, tiny bit anxious. Now I know that sounds silly………..but if you try it yourself, you just might find that you too, experience some unusual sensations. And of course I think you might agree that the reason for that is that by and large, our whole society rarely looks for the meaning of their lives in the quiet of their own mind, but instead we surround ourselves with television, and movies, and Ipods and videos on our computers, telephones and singing cards, and by our identifying one version of this or that, we identify ourselves, who we are, what we like, what kind of personality type we have. Choose classical music, long walks in the countryside, good books from the Bestsellers List, and we become an intellectual or a more cerebral individual. Choose rap music and accessorize with baggy pants and backward hats, or too much jewellery and too short skirts and we assume the appropriate tag, and it is obvious to all, who we think we are.

Turning all of those noisy and distracting things off is the opportunity to begin to know yourself in a different way and understand not only why you are like you are, but how to pare away old you and find the new and improved you that can only wait for its opportunity to emerge.

So this past year has been a time of doing that, paring away. I'm a lot more peaceful in my spirit now. Just as when I was worried as a child that nobody loved me and afraid that I would find out that it was true or that the unforeseen and unthinkable would happen to me, and so avoided situations that might be 'dangerous', I think that I've done the same in my adult life. Don has been my protector and my encourager through all my dark years and moods and I'm so grateful to him for his love and kindness. And in spite of his care, so many of my years were wasted in the emotional landscape of doom and gloom.

Fifty-five years, and it has taken that long for the clouds to begin to break and thin, but my new way of looking at all that 'wasted' time is that they are a brilliant contrast for the brightening skies in the landscape of my mood. Breaking away from my worrying means turning away from the habit of seeing only the difficulties or trials of life, and so I appreciate the contrast and enjoy the lightness of spirit that fills me more often as the days pass in quiet succession.

So the house is filled with silence and I sit, motionless, listening to it.