Color of Perfection

The colors were perfection today! The redbud is in full bloom and the dogwood is nearly there, still hanging onto a tinge of green in the white. The magnolias are beginning to drop their big petals beneath the trees. Forsythia and daffodils abound around here. There is a civic group of some sort that promotes the planting of daffodils, so they are blooming throughout the town, as well as on nearby farmsteads and business grounds. Oh, my God, thank you for that! I think I cannot see that color without feeling its energy throughout my body. Trees are sprouting leaves and dark wild onion shoots rise above the rich, green, uncut clumps of varied grasses. Some fields are covered with a purple flower I don't know and some yards are awash with bluebells. I have enjoyed driving past the landscapes. The violets are more subtle; one must be up close to catch their beauty. The pink buds on our peach tree have opened to full within the past two days and will probably begin to fade by tomorrow evening. Against the backdrop of dark sky the colors seemed especially brilliant.

Add to this visual delight the voices of birds reveling in the season, the smell of air washed with a recent rain and the soft touch of a cool breeze reaching through the warmth. Today the gift of a Hoosier spring enraptured my heart. Today I am reminded the Earth is a sacred place.

Oh God, my God!

Another song by "Mana" at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ujZSP8PsDrk&feature=related...helps me remember the whole universe is a sacred space!

Happiness

"I believe that satisfaction, joy and happiness are the ultimate purposes of life. And the basic sources of happiness are a good heart, compassion, and love." The Dalai Lama



Today I saw this quote on a blog that I want to revisit: mariposapsychotherapy.blogspot.com. For the past several years I have worked as an educator in connection with the mental health profession and I miss my former co-workers dearly. Visiting this sight seemed almost like a visit with them. As I write this I am reminded again that every change involves a loss of the former so the new can come into being. I have said my former job was like spiritual boot camp. It was an adventure and a challenge. It brought me a sense of satisfaction and I believe it helped me develop spiritually. It helped sustain me through a difficult period in my life and through the work I developed professional skills that I may use to move myself into this new phase of my life, here in a different community. The author uses the symbol of a butterfly as a recurring theme of metamorphosis and transformation. Again, I am reminded of the inspiration people receive from nature. Are the struggles I'm currently experiencing simply the hard work of emerging from the chrysalis? Maybe if I visualize myself as a butterfly...

image from csslara.com

Sacred Spaces

I have spent some time in the past few weeks exploring the nearby parks, particularly searching for a place that feels like a sacred space to me. Yesterday, we came upon a pine grove on a knoll above a marshy area. Also, I walked a labyrinth while meditating on a specific transition I am going through, then picked up a rock to bring home as a reminder of the insight that came to me. I later learned that this labyrinth is one of the largest and most beautiful within a hundred mile radius of my new home.

To the Planters of Trees

video from amessageinabottle.ca

Out My Kitchen Window

I love the color of daffodils. But, this is not daffodil season. This is not spring, the season of renewal. Yet, in every season is the season of renewal. Not only is the promise of harvest revealed in the planting, but the potential of planting is revealed in the harvest. I find the color of daffodils in the stray kernels and broken ears of corn that hide among the dry stalks in the harvested field outside my kitchen window.

This morning I don't see the color; I remember the color, the hue of hard kernels found on the slightly frozen but still mushy soil underfoot when I walked the perimeter of this little farm in the lingering gray of the past few overcast mornings. Each morning a light layer of melting snow still held hard-edged footprints of moving deer. Today the temperature is lower, the sky is clear blue and most of the ground is frozen. There is another thin layer of snow, this time sparkling. A flock of crows has settled onto the field and along the mostly bare tree line. Snow covers the field like a crocheted sweater, revealing a tweed under-layer. The remembered color of corn and the remembered color of daffodils mixes in my mind, so the scene of stark branches and snippets of crow silhouettes becomes a symbol of renewal. The seeds of autumn are the seeds of spring. My mind reaches for the chartreuse of spring, but it is stopped. This is late autumn and winter is ahead. O, God, let me remember this moment.