Molting

Every fall she appears forlorn, bedraggled, 
with feathers missing and
bare patches on her rump,
surely cold and damp without her full plumage, 
which is yet to come.
A time to endure 
and hope for renewal.

Massive skeletons against the sky, 
they stand stripped, devoid of color,
foliage shed.
Perhaps it doesn't matter whether
by the gale's force or a gentle letting go;
The outcome is the same, 
entailing a long winter's wait 
for green and new growth 
to resume.

They float on the river, 
waterfowl bound to the earth 
for a season.
Unable to fly, 
they must bide their time and watch,
vulnerable, 
eyes on the sky they
cannot inhabit until 
new flight feathers emerge.

Browned and brittle,
stalks that were supple and green 
stand drying in the cold.
Goldenrods and asters, 
yellows and purples blanched to tan, 
holding pale, fuzzy seedheads 
soon to be 
dislodged by the breezes, 
sowing promise
of life to come.

Molting, Shedding, Waiting.
Emerging, Sowing, Hoping.

Believing.
Thanks be to God.

Leftovers

I did not set out to make a bouquet with these flowers. They were supposed to be part of an arrangement that, as it turned out, not only didn't need them, but looked much better without them. These flowers became the leftovers.

I have been thinking about living in the present moment, lately...about appreciating the rain, even after several days of showers; about letting go of my frustration as I fight my way through snarly traffic to travel most anywhere north of here; about willingly accepting the aches and pains that are a given part of my chosen vocation. While it is easy to embrace the moment when all things are going well, how much more challenging when such is not the case. During those seasons, when life is not as I might wish, I am coming to realize that there is an invitation in accepting what is, and that surrender often offers riches that I have surely been slow to appreciate. 

If you keep a garden, you are likely intimately aware that its conditions change over time and, that at least sometimes, you actually have very little control of what occurs there. Some plants you try are just not happy where you put them. Some run vigorously where you would rather they not venture, the moment your back is turned. Some newcomers appear, seemingly out of nowhere, and other faithful members suddenly disappear altogether. Is this not one of the intriguing mysteries of gardening, if we but admit it? What we would miss if we were able to direct the players and keep a tight rein on the production...the unexpected mingling of colors and textures, the good health of plants that have positioned themselves into conditions best for them, the joy of a tiny, unexpected seedling of a favorite flower. 

I have found that life also has a way of offering deep rewards on the other side of what can seem like chaos. Seeds of trust, sometimes barely alive, germinate when I least expect them. Paths that I would never have chosen lead to places that begin to seem like home. Questions that seem to have no answer become less pressing. Sometimes, what seem like the leftovers of my life end up providing the greatest opportunities for growth and self-discovery. I am gradually learning that, through the meanderings and the twists and turns, beauty evolves, as surely as in a bouquet of leftover flowers.

Something to Do While We're Waiting

Do you remember that old Mr. Roger's song about patience? He sang "Think of something to do while you're waiting. While you're waiting, think of something to do." That sentiment so describes my need right now. Most any gardener, or naturalist, for that matter, finds this time of year a lean one, and this year is even more difficult. We had that teasing taste of spring a week or two ago...enough to cause early fruit trees and magnolias to flower and spring peepers, wood frogs and American toads to awaken and commence their mating songs and activity...And then the bottom dropped out. The flowers froze and, this year, there will be no fruit on those trees or berries on the magnolias. What of the frogs and toads, and the eggs they laid when it was warm? Will there be new generations? Did the parents live through the sudden cold? And what became of the nectar and pollen of the red and silver maples that were flowering at the time of the freeze, first food of the season for bees?

We humans had warning of the coming freeze, and time to make preparations. In my case, that meant a mad dash to plant three new crabapple and two plum trees while I could. In time, the crabapples will form a protective thicket, with plenty of autumn and winter food for any birds that want it. Thanks to the squirrels, we may or may not ever harvest any plums for ourselves, but the leaves will be hosts to various butterfly and moth species who need that genus for reproduction.

In the midst of ice and snow, I realized it was time to start seeds for the spring that I still expect to come, at some point. I sorted through packages of cool season lettuces, kale, spinach and dill, warm season tomatoes, various peppers and lots of flowers, choosing as many as I could fit into my trays and enjoying the feel of dirt on my hands, once again. And thanks to a new propagation arrangement, I had a place to put them afterward, where I can watch those seeds grow into healthy and stocky young seedlings, ready to set out at the proper time. Like the dormant fruit trees, seeding promises hope for the future and stirs the weary imagination into remembering the colors, fragrances and tastes that are yet to come. 

The morning is sunny and the beginning of warmer days ahead and on my early walk, a multitude of robins were singing away, as if spring's temporary setback was just that...a temporary setback. I am watching downy and red-bellied woodpeckers at the suet, cardinals, red-winged blackbirds, chickadees, titmice, white-breasted nuthatches and goldfinches at the feeders and myriad blue jays, crows, white-throated sparrows and squirrels where I have scattered seed and corn, up the hill. I sometimes envy their lack of human ability to look ahead, to fret and worry over what is or is not going to happen, their ability to live fully in the moment, because they know no other way to live. 

And at the same time, I am grateful for promise and for imagination and for being able to plan ahead, after all. I am grateful to be able to sit indoors in the company of potted plants, to dream of flowers and butterflies and bees and to think about what else I can plant for them. I am glad to look forward to the woodcocks resuming their mating flights over the fields nearby, and to hope for the frogs to resume their choruses, when the time is right. While I intellectually know that winter will not last forever, this time of year I need these experiential reminders that it is so. Soon the blessings of new growth and warm breezes, of the fragrance of the earth's awakening and the buzzing of wings will, indeed, come again. May it be soon.

Opening to God on Retreat

We begin our day without words, unaccustomed to quiet.
Gathered together in the dining room, the clinking of utensils on plates and soft thuds of mugs set on tables is the music of our common life, missed when thoughts are spoken.
Sleepy eyes averted and tentative smiles are given in greeting.
Gratitude in spoken blessing and the unspoken, “Amens.”
Kindred spirits communing in the richness of breakfast silence.

I heard them before opening my eyes, mighty gales and downpours at first light.
Grey is the sky and river, dark the mountains and mist fills the valley,
 damp chill in the soggy, saturated air.
The towhee’s whistle and blue jay’s raucous cries punctuate the background murmur of ground crickets and rain falling on the land and my umbrella.
Reddening sumacs, yellow goldenrods and the tiny white asters dance in the wind, oaks and ashes waving their arms wildly in the wetness.
Rainy, windy autumn morning full of promise, pregnant with the possibilities of the unknown, gift of another day.

“What am I called to let go of, so I can fully live this present hour of my life?” she asked us.

Without umbrella, I was eagerly looking forward to seeing the pond, when the drops began again,
Slowly at first, tap, tap, tapping on the still-green leaves, as I turned back.
I came expecting the crimsons, oranges, yellows and purples of last year.
I looked forward to seeing migrating warblers and the frenzied chipmunks again,
but all I saw was a gathering of tiny gnats, zigzagging around in circles on the underside of yellow birch leaves.

I thought I might hear God speak out here…something profound, soul-searching, challenging.
Instead, I hear silence…abundant, enfolding, nurturing silence, except for the tapping of the rain on the trees.

Sacraments of the present moment.

To Plant a Garden is to Believe in Hope

A few days ago, I took this picture of a new garden I recently installed for a client. It has taken a lot of hours, a lot of energy and no small amount of mental (and physical) frustration at the various obstacles that were encountered and then overcome. It sits in the midst of a woodland, and will need continual maintenance to keep it from being reabsorbed into the ecosystem from which it was carved. With due attention, however, it will be a lovely space filled with color and provide habitat for bees and butterflies from spring into the fall. 

While working, I have plenty of time for thinking and, like so many reflective people, I have been wrestling with the violence of the last few days and my response to it. I have wondered about what possible contribution to others' well being I make in my day to day life. I wonder about my role in bringing peace, to whom, I'm not even sure. I spend most of my working hours gardening for people who have the money to pay for someone to take care of their gardens...people who are financially well off, people who are well-educated and work for the federal government or private businesses. They are good people, well-meaning and compassionate to those within their circle of acquaintances, neighbors who look out for and take care of one another. I know that I am fortunate to be working at something that I enjoy, that creates beauty and habitat  but, still, I have nagging questions about the real value of all the hard labor and hours I put into the work of being a private gardener. 

I recently shared these thoughts with a friend, a therapist who serves people who have experienced significant trauma and its aftermath. She is too well acquainted with the devastation the world can sometimes bring and how it  shapes the identity of those who have been severely wounded. As I haltingly broached my questions about the worth of what I do, she had thoughts that, were they from anyone else, I would have been likely to dismiss. She declared that the world needs beauty, especially in the face of so much ugliness, and that it needs to see what can be, rather than only what is. She acknowledged that though I might feel called to do more, I must never think of my gardening in terms of not being enough.

 I decided to believe her, and her perspective allowed me to think about lessons learned from gardening that might apply to the healing of our fractured society at large. Gardens, be they flowers or vegetables, are never stagnant. They are never the same, two years in a row. Challenges that were once conquered reappear without warning. Remedies that once worked, are effective no longer. Inattention to the needs of individual plants invites their ruin, and inattention to the whole of the garden invites chaos and disintegration. One cannot long turn his or her back on what they have nurtured and expect an abundant harvest from healthy plants. 

Gardeners are some of the most optimistic people on the planet. When one approach does not work, they try another and are ever watchful for the need to adapt to challenging conditions. They may grumble and complain at impediments, but they seldom give up on their goal of a harvest-their practice is for the long term. They learn from past mistakes, readily share what has worked well for them andask questions from those who know more than they do.

Gardens, just like society and the individuals from which it is composed, need beneficence, defined as "the doing of good, active goodness or kindness". Beauty in both comes from the commitment to hard work and long hours, days, weeks, months and years of care. In a garden setting, it is the caretakers who do most of the work. In society, each of us either contributes to or subtracts from the well being of the whole. What if each of us were to consciously choose to contribute to the well being of the area in which we lived? In our different settings and situations, what would that look like?

I have a t-shirt that, up until now, I have felt was just a little too cliche-ish...a little too cute and folksy, but I have changed my mind. Just like the shirt, I sometimes feel worn and ragged, even cracked and faded in my efforts to contribute to the society around me that needs my involvement and care. Whether that effort be working in client's gardens, involvement in my church and with its members, choosing to be intentionally kind to people in the grocery store or on the boardwalk at the river, I believe that each instance of caring surely must contribute to a healthier whole. Indeed, I am reminded that to plant a garden or to work for the good of all really is to believe in and be willing to hope for something that may not be readily visible at the outset. The work of gardening and of caring for those we know and those we don't know is built on a hope that we might not always recognize, but without which nothing would be accomplished, or even begun. The hope that, in some small way, our contribution will matter and will bear fruit.

Gratitude in the Ordinary

It is easy to give thanks on feast days, like the beautiful bright and sunny Thanksgiving holiday we had a couple of days ago. Today, however, it is cold and damp, rainy and dark and, in the same spirit, I am celebrating, in my ordinary daily life, that for which I am thankful. Such an exercise is not always my mindset, lest any be misled, but I am praying about and working towards developing a grateful spirit, no matter what the externals might be. I will not always manage it, I am well aware, but, at the moment, I am enjoying the ease in which so many daily blessings spring to mind. 

In no particular order, I am grateful for:

The bright red of winterberry and deep red of oak-leaf hydrangea on this colorless day in late November
The joy of oiling a more-than-a-century old chestnut table and butter bowl and more recently handmade wooden utensils
The intense, deep purple layers of a red onion, as shiny as any eggplant
A delicate, blue pottery cup my daughter once gave me, that makes me feel like a queen when I drink from it
Beavers working in the marsh, who seem to pay no heed to the day's humanly inhospitable conditions
A dawn chorus of birds that, while diminished in variety, still greets each day with enthusiasm
The few remaining herbs in my garden that spice up salads of mostly arugula and kale
Foraged greens for creating Christmas wreaths of cedar, pine and holly
The chattering of an eagle overhead and chittering of a nearby red-headed woodpecker
The two black, formerly-neutered feral, cats who have made our back porch their home
A dear husband who loves me as I am
Grown children and their children who continue to delight and encourage
The opportunity to help a neighbor in need this afternoon
A heart that still is able to love, despite the awareness of having hurt and been hurt by others
The abiding presence of the Spirit of the living God

May your own hearts be filled with gratitude, even in the midst of struggle, as you head into this blessed Advent season.

Where is Home?

Today, a new friend asked me, "Where is home, Ann?"  An easy enough question but I did not know what to say.  What she really meant was,"Where do you feel at home?" and that is what gave me pause.  A few weeks ago I had the opportunity to spend hours walking a northeast Pennsylvania woodland whose oaks, hickories, maples, black gums,  various viburnums and fall blooming asters and goldenrods glowed with the colors of fall. I felt a deep sense of "rightness", being in that space, one that overshadowed the awareness that I would soon be leaving to return to southern Maryland. I felt "at home" there, but those mountains were not where I live.

I lived in Lancaster County, Pennsylvania for almost thirty years before moving to start life anew in Accokeek five and a half years ago. And many times over, in the course of these last five years, I have returned to visit my children and their children, good friends and familiar places in central Pennsylvania and I have longed to stay. There are memories everywhere I look... memories that span thirty years of my life. When I am there, central PA feels like home, but we do not live there either.

We have lived in southern Maryland for more than five years now,and lately I sense this place beginning to have a "homeness" to it that I have not experienced here before. Such an awareness is an unpredictable and transient realization these days, but at least it I recognize it when it comes, however briefly. As I always do, I am working on new gardens at this new/old place where we live now and recently I counted the number of gardens I have tended and then left in the last going-on-six years of moving around. I was startled that this is my fifth garden in almost as many years. I have read about gardeners who love to move and begin new gardens, but I am not one of them. 

As I thought of my friend's question this afternoon, I looked around at the woodlands that surround our home and questioned whether it was living in the midst of this splendor that is allowing that sense of "homeness" to come creeping in. But no, I have appreciated and enjoyed many beautiful natural settings without feeling connected to them with any sense of permanence, and so that isn't it. And then I realized what I have been doing the last couple of weeks, what I do every fall when the leaves begin their glorious transformation...I have been planting the landscape, once again, for color and for wildlife. I have planted dogwoods and crabapples for birds, more salvias for next years's hummingbirds, asters, goldenrods, thorougworts and a host of other natives for next years pollinators. As has been and will be for as long as I am able, it is the planting of habitat that links me to where I live, the partnering with the Creator in sustaining the life that lives around me. 

This afternoon, I wondered more about why this is so..why does creating homes for wildlife mean so much to me, other than that I value their presence? And then I realized...I grew up without a sense of home. My family moved twelve times in my first thirteen years and I attended four colleges before finally managing to finish. After graduating, I lived in nine different houses within eight communities in two countries over the course of the next eleven years, finally living at and coming to love the last house for twenty one years before moving to Maryland and beginning all over again, several times. Creating homes for wild creatures who need them is the only way I know to root myself into where I live. The transient life I have lived accounts, at least in part, for the deep longing and sense of vulnerability I sometimes feel...the tendency towards feeling lost and lonely, without moorings and the connection of place. Creating  spaces for creatures to live their lives in relative safety and stability affords me the opportunity to do the same. I am humbly grateful for their companionship and for that of our Creator God who lives among us.

Winter Gardening and Life with God

What follows is a reworked piece that I originally wrote a few Decembers ago. On such a sunny, balmy February day, I thought it bore a revisit.

I have just come back from what I like to call the vegetable garden area. Many years ago, I created some raised bed in a back corner of our yard and they started out as a butterfly habitat area, when there wasn't yet any other habitat in the yard to speak of. Over the years, as the yard plantings have expanded, the beds have served as an herb garden and a vegetable garden, though last year, I am sorry to say, my dachshunds managed to eat more of the produce than the humans did. Fencing the area will be a priority this spring.

Most years I have taken better care in putting the garden to bed, and I was feeling considerable remorse for ignoring the soil that should have been protected during the winter. Since the weather wasn't too cold or too wet, this became the morning to take care of the long-neglected chore of gathering my neighbor’s piled up leaves and grass clippings and mulching the garden beds. The wheelbarrow and I made trip after trip, gathering and dumping, and, though I took a break for a while, I knew better than to hope that I would finish it another day if I tarried for very long. Finally, after a couple of hours in the wind, I was satisfied with my work and called it a morning. Now when I venture out to the winter garden, I’ll picture the soil microorganisms feeding on the plant material I put down and the beds being enriched by their efforts.

Somewhere along the line, while pushing the wheelbarrow filled with yet another load of dried grass and leaves, I thought about how life with God is similar to the garden task I had undertaken. I wasn't caring for the garden on this winter day because it was in crisis or because there was some extraordinary need. It was just a task that should have been done, a rather routine task, really, particularly if it had been done at the proper time, rather than waiting until just after Christmas. I was just doing what was necessary to ensure the health and fertility of the soil, so that the garden will be as productive as possible during the upcoming growing season.

I think of cultivating my spiritual life in the same manner. It is in my sometimes unremarkable, daily interactions with God that we build the relationship that sustains me and from which I draw when I find myself in need. Lately I have been praying that the Spirit will conform me more to the image of God, that I may represent Him well in the world in which I live. I imagine the process is going to take even longer than than the time needed to build and enrich the soil in my garden. But, just as in soil building, I do not see myself as the one who does the work. In soil building, I bring in the organic matter, but it is the microbes who do the work of enrichment. Similarly, as I bring myself to God, it is He who can do the work of transformation in my heart and spirit. That work isn't something I can ever hope to accomplish myself.

Within the natural world, there are signposts pointing to God almost everywhere I look. The trick is remembering to stop and pay attention, to notice and to ponder, even to wrestle, with their meaning. Embracing what He reveals is the challenge but, even more, the blessing, of learning to know Him and His ways more fully. 

Sowing Hope

Anne Lamott wrote, "I heard a preacher say recently that hope is a revolutionary patience; let me add that so is being a writer." I thought of this line today, as I was preparing a garden bed for a very late planting of winter salad mix, and will add, "so is being a gardener." Even in southern MD, November 5th is too late for planting anything but garlic... but, why not? What do I have to lose but a few seeds? And, perhaps I will gain fresh greens at least through early winter, if the row cover provides enough protection through the coming freezes.

The author of the book of Hebrews wrote, "Faith is being sure of what we hope for and certain of what we do not see." Faith is that revolutionary patience that believes that God is at work, even when we can't fathom what he is up to and what he is working to accomplish in us. Determining to trust is not all that removed from planting. Both require determination and work, both must wait for evidence that we have not hoped in vain, both need us to weed away hindrances to growth and both, when we are patient, bring about a bountiful harvest. 

I spend much of my gardening days now winding down the season, removing frost-killed plants, adding compost and mulching the empty beds.  At this time of year, it requires a good measure of faith to picture the garden in spring, filled with tender seedlings holding the promise of another year. The garden and I both are tired, ready for a slower pace and some well earned rest, but we are not finished yet. Next year's bounty depends on my labor now and the soil organisms making use of what I feed them. Soon enough the ground will freeze and rest will come and there will be energy again to look towards spring.

An old friend wrote me yesterday that the Pennsylvania land conservancy for which I still do occasional landscape consulting is looking for someone local to take over the service. And I completely fell apart at reading her words…emotions of grief and fear of loss of meaning suddenly gripping my heart.  Even though I knew that this prospect is what is best for the conservancy, I felt like it wasn't best for me at all.  I feared losing the connection and what has seemed like a thin lifeline to central PA.

But maybe that is exactly God’s intent…what do I know?  After thinking more clearly last night, I have some different feelings…maybe even feelings of relief and of adventure.  I’ve been thinking, now and then, of adventure lately…that maybe all my adventures of this life are not yet over and that more await.  Holding on to what is safe is not the way to find them, but letting go and seeing where life and God take me seems the more positive approach.  Holding on to the conservancy and my involvement, hoping that nothing changes until I get back again someday, picking up where I left off, now feels like a narrow and restricting kind of mindset.

 Yes, there is fear in letting go, isn’t there? I like knowing what I can count on and where I can be of use and how.  But what if something wonderful awaits, instead? I am slowly, slowly being dragged towards the possibility that  more is waiting for me than I realize and to letting go of my hold on what use to be. Still, I want to have a plan for the future, a goal to work towards, and right now I don’t. It hasn't shown itself, as of yet, just as the seeds I planted yesterday are not yet visible.

So, if God and life are moving me away from my old familiar role, then that is the fork I will follow and believe that for the conservancy and for me, it is the right path. I’ll continue walking down the one set in front of me, whether I know where it is taking me or not…In the words of the Wailin' Jennys, “It’s a long and rugged road, and we don’t know where it’s headed, but we know it’s going to get us where we’re going. And when we find what we’re looking for we’ll drop these bags and search no more, cuz its going to feel like heaven when we’re home.”

Obscure Blessing

Sometimes blessing comes in circumstance we would have never chosen for ourselves or for others.  Last week, my 10 month old grandson was diagnosed with cystic fibrosis and he and his parents have spent the last two weeks in the Children's National Medical Center in DC. His tiny little body had wasted away to 12 pounds and he was admitted for malnutrition, none of us knowing why. After a few days of testing, the specter of CF was raised, his mom's family having a distinct history of the disease, and several days of waiting for a diagnosis began. When the CF diagnosis came, our worlds were shaken, filled with fear and uncertainty, and at the same time, we determined to trust God's hand in whatever the future brings.

 Trust is difficult when I am afraid. When the days ahead loom uncertain and are potentially filled with suffering, I have to make a definitive choice between becoming incapacitated by that fear, or turning my face to God and holding fast to His promises of nearness.  The seesaw of emotions teeters between debilitating, nauseous anxiety on the one hand, and deliberate confidence, on the other.  Even if trust and confidence win the day, or more accurately, the moment, the turmoil takes its toll, nonetheless.

What I have rediscovered in these last two weeks, however, is my gift for loving and caring, for nurturing those who need support in trying times. St Teresa of Avila wrote some lines centuries ago that John Michael Talbot set to music and the words have been my prayer for many years. "Christ has no body, now, but yours. No hands, no feet on earth but yours. Yours are the eyes with which He looks, compassion on this world. Christ has no body here on earth, but yours."  

The obvious blessing of these past days is that my grandson has responded to treatment, is gaining weight, is happily becoming his old self again, and has returned home.  The more obscure blessing is that in the suffering and grief that has been part of our lives lately, God has been at hand, "saving, helping, keeping, loving," in the words of the old hymn.  And He has reminded me of my most important contribution to the world, to be His hands and eyes in this broken, hurting world, and, in so doing, I discover again just who I am.

This Fallen World

This evening I've been mulling over events of the last few days, and find my attitude softening, ever so slightly. I'm reminded, as if I need reminding, that life on earth is never going to be as God had originally intended for any of us, and that sometimes we are besieged by an ugliness over which we we have no control.

Yesterday was the first time in my life I have ever reported anyone for sexual harassment.  Not someone I worked with or knew, but someone here at the farm on a construction crew. Perhaps there are women who would not have found his behavior offensive, but I was shaken and fearful,even,of having to be around him for the duration of their work.  I talked with the HR woman for our organization and was blessed by her compassion and determination that it would not happen again, and sure enough, she made good on her promise.  But I keep wishing that I could have been more...more...I don't know exactly.  More effective, maybe. Not just for myself but for other women this man must surely make uncomfortable, and even for the man, himself. I wasn't sure whether he spoke English , and so did not attempt the conversation that was playing in my mind, but I wish I had felt that I could have. I wanted to ask him whether he had a daughter and if so, did he want her to someday feel as I did, to be treated as though she were nothing more than a thing to be toyed with for some perverted man's amusement.  What would he have said, I wonder. And I wonder whether that might have been the more redemptive approach, holding some possibility of change.  

There is constant construction going on at the farm right now, land being torn up, trees being torn down, continual noise and, what seems to me, carnage. Those who initiated and have made the decision that this project will go forward do not spend time on the land, be it this or any other. They work in offices and talk about "green living" and how this current effort will be a grand example of the same. And perhaps it will be, someday, when all the equipment is gone and top soil has been spread and new plants are growing where the old ones were ripped from the earth. Right now,all I see is destruction and sadness and some days I feel as though I hear the earth's cries.

Being hard on the man who frightened me and those who have decided to injure this land comes easily to me, and yet, if I am honest, I know that such is not the right response. I was reading of St Francis this evening, who showed mercy to those who were in the wrong, just as he did those who were in the right. Not condoning their behavior, but extending grace, that they might turn to God's also.  And so I am thinking about both as I retire for the night...thinking about those who cause pain and about the possibilities for redemption.  Both are pieces of living in this fallen world, as one who loves Jesus. I have more growing to do and hope that I can learn to hold the sometimes ugliness of this world and the beauty of forgiveness and redemption in tandem. Jesus did, and Francis did, and perhaps, someday, so can I.

Mindfulness

I've been reading and thinking lately about living life mindfully and this evening I decided to look up the word and discern whether I was understanding its meaning correctly. The words "attentive" and "aware" were most often used as definitions, but usually there was the implied "to" or "of" attached. I didn't find the word used in the context of defining one's life, but maybe those "to's" and "of's" really are the key, after all.

Early this morning, as I have been doing lately, I took a walk down to the river.  The farm and river are quiet then and there is ample opportunity for observation and for thinking. It is a good time to be mindful of what is happening around me - of the tide, of the summer singing insects, and of the voices of which birds are or are not present. It is a time to be mindful of the bounty of late summer and to be thankful for the land that feeds all living things right now.

However, even as I thought I was being aware, I learned a new lesson about mindfulness.  Sitting on a favorite log and looking up river, I saw a few Forster's Terns gracefully whirling and plunging  into the water, as they fished.  From up river, the fog began to roll in and the landscape before me grew increasingly fuzzy. While I could still see in the distance, I thought to look through my binoculars and there, beyond what I could see with my naked eyes, were dozens of terns flying to and fro.

How does this pertain to mindfulness? If being mindful means paying attention to what is present, it also mean paying attention to that which is present, but not always visible. I am learning that living life mindfully means being aware of God's presence in any and every situation I find myself.  It means being attentive to His voice and the leading of His Spirit as I go about the seemingly mundane affairs of day to day life. I am very sure that I will have much more to learn as I try to live a less distracted and more intentional life, but I am thankful for the gift of these insights this morning, and for the terns.