I had not taken one walk this week, every morning being claimed by some errand or another involving babies and lunches and swampy, crittery field trips, all wonderful and completely excellent as excuses not to walk. Of course, I could have simply gotten up an hour earlier on each of those mornings but please...
Do I look like Jack Lalanne? No. I do not.
So this morning, with no excuse whatsoever except that the sky was gray, I finally pulled on my old walking clothes and and went first to the post office to pay my yearly box fee and then walked down Main Street to see where my feet would take me.
I walked past Ms. Liola's house and before I got ten feet past it, she called to me from her doorway.
I haven't seen or talked to her for a long time and it was such a sweet meeting. The Sheik was visiting her and he flashed his golden smile behind her and I told her about my new granddaughter and the upcoming marriage in my family and she said she was well and then she said something she's never said to me before which is, "I love you!"
Blew me right away.
"I love you, too, darlin'!" I told her and indeed, my heart was swelling with those words passed between us.
"I won't keep you," she said a minute later. "I just wanted to say hello." And then she told me again that she loved me and I was so glad my feet had taken me by her house.
Such small and perfect grace.
I walked on to my regular path, was stopped part of the way through my route by a giant pond puddle and turned around and took the other path and decided, up by the old graveyard, to walk into the woods down to where the creek runs.
And so I did, making my way through brambles and thorns. I had not gone that way in so long but I wanted to see how last night's rain had made the creek dance down its banks and again, I was so glad I had.
I was all alone in that still place, water rushing past, tangling around roots and fallen limbs, swirling around banks where the water has cut its own desired channels.
It was one of those moments where you feel like if this was to be where you took your last breath, it would be perfect and fine.
I've been having those recently. These moments of awareness of absolutely undeserved grace.
And now I'm home and about to eat some leftovers from last night. Yolie reports that they have just picked up their truck and that it is perfect.
And this is what my back yard looks like right now from where I sit with Jack drowsing behind me on the chair.
Wild birds and tame, twittering and Trixie singing her little hen song.
Happy Friday, y'all.
Love...Ms. Moon
Gorgeous :)
ReplyDeleteThose moments where it would be OK if you took your last breath- I have those, I am nourished by them, because it shows me what it is to be truly free from fear. love you
ReplyDeleteWhat flow and well-being.
ReplyDeleteDarling Mary, you have no idea how you help anchor me in this life, in the most wholesome and life-giving way. You are the very definition of love, and Ms Liola and the Sheik feel that as much as the rest of us.
ReplyDeleteMary I wish I could take a walk with you. Thank you for showing the beauty in everyday moments.
ReplyDeleteJack Lalanne! That is the funniest thing I have heard today. :-)
ReplyDeleteYou and this community are super in many ways but one I especially like is the feeling of damn it life of is good that I understand because I have them frequently. It is nice to be a part of a community that has those moments too. I hope that makes sense.
ReplyDeleteHappy Friday, Mrs. Moon. You are probably slumbering now. Water is a force. Beautiful strength. Water wears through the rock.
ReplyDeleteJo- It was! And all I had to do was to leave my regular path.
ReplyDeleteMaggie May- That is it. Exactly. I love you.
A- Water is such a sacred part of our lives, isn't it?
Angella- I am so lucky to live in a community like this one. So lucky. I can love and be loved. What more does anyone want?
Leisha- For me, these are the moments that matter.
Birdie- Is he still alive?
Jill- It makes perfect sense. Thank you.
Denise- Yes. It surely does wear through the rock. The perfect metaphor and the perfect reality.
all those years I spent on one river or another as a guide and now, here I am with no water to walk along.
ReplyDeleteBeautiful! I love those pictures, especially the top one -- the similarity of shapes in the trees is amazing.
ReplyDeleteNice to see that water and those trees. You live in a nice area for sure.
ReplyDelete