Tag Archives: Nature

Summertime Blues (the cure)

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We unlearn desire. Quietly, over time, we succumb to the dependable script of the expected life and become masters of the middle way … after a while we no longer even notice the pathways off to the side … John O’Donohue (Beauty)

“The summer is almost over,” my 91 year old mother declares with authority on our weekly Sunday IMG_4182phone call. I already know her next line: “Before you know it, it’s going to snow. It will be Christmas.”

A writing course had occupied my spring and when I hit “Submit” for my final paper on June 30, I also hit “Break Free” for the summer … and here she states the truth: Summer is Short.

In Canada it is very short, and also the reason it is full of outdoor activity. Canadians know its brevity. As if to verify my mother’s words the picture of last September’s snow came to mind. For the sake of the course, I had put off my summer and now my days were numbered.

Three days ago I picked up a friend from the airport, who is returning to be in the presence of an aunt in the final stages of cancer. The struggle was closing in. Last summer, another dear friend lost the battle with a heart issue, her family motherless before the end of August.

Oh the summertime blues. The life time blues … it comes and it goes. Life, breath, beauty, flowers, illness and departure; like the river current moving toward a final destiny.

My own grandchildren come to visit in a week. I have been anticipating this time for what seems ages, and before I write my next blog that moment-in-the-sun will have passed.

The elusive speedy nature has me either lamenting or rejoicing.

So what will I do now that the summer is almost over? … I plan to enjoy every remaining moment as much as I can. It begins with cleaning off of my small patio, setting up the deck water fountain, planting the flowers I got on the end of the season sale.

I want to build good memories that will warm those cold winter days. I want to connect with nature as much as I can. Listen to the music. Enjoy the richness with those that cross my path. There is only one summer of 2015. I want to smell the flowers.

Above all else, I want to practice gratitude.

IMG_4084That gratitude that started July first, where in a moment of unprecedented Canadian patriotism, I joined a small town crowd for the raising of the flag, the singing of Oh Canada, the picture taking with two handsome red-suited mounties. To quote my mother: “I am so thankful for the country that we live in.” She is thankful; she has health care, she feels looked after. She feels safe. My only on-the-planet daughter lives in a region where recent terrorism has taken a deadly toll.

Below a black squirrel hops across the traffic filled street, only mindful that he needs to live in this summer moment, oblivious to the cars that will soon sweep his path … he pauses in the middle of the street, I think he winks at me and scurries to his destination. My pot of recently planted petunias smile at me in shades of blue-lavender. A dahlia from a friend adds the exclamation mark.

Life like summer is brief.  Gratitude precedes the joy … The thunder heads will roll in, we had hail on Saturday, but for this moment, this brief spell, I want to Be in The Beauty, the beauty of a summer morning ripe with anticipation.

It’s The Climb

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It’s about The Climb

Sunday afternoon with the promise of poutine to follow, I invited two international University of Calgary students to join me for a little walk. They come from Africa and want to experience as much of Canada as possible, on their meagre student budget. I can show them sections of the nearby Rocky Mountains. This particular hike, I did almost two years ago, and thought it to be fairly easy. Early on, the 27 year old from Malawi slightly short of breath states, we need to pace ourselves, and take time to enjoy the scenery. We come to a fork in the road.IMG_3298

They suggest the easy option, but I had read the reviews: the more difficult is the more scenic route. Since I am buying the poutine, they agree to go left. They have each had an intense year of studies, are here for the long haul, unable to return home, but thankful for technology which connects them to loved ones in Malawi and Zimbabwe. Our in-depth conversations have been labelled as DRDs—Deep Reality Discourses … we talk about life, the expectations of women in their countries, to be bearing children at this stage of life and the singleness issue. We talk about cultural differences, the loss of fathers for each of them, we always venture into spirituality. I love these DRDs.

And then we spot them … the wild orchids.IMG_3352

I take many photos, another hiker passes us, and I point them out to her. She and I marvel at their intricacy. My students admire them, but do not appreciate the rarity of the sighting. The hiker informs us of an owl nesting in a rocky opening at the top of the hike. She continues her way down and we continue our climb. We dip our hands in the mountain stream, drink of its water, the younger woman expresses her desire to spend a day with her journal next to the sound of a mountain waterfall. We marvel at the aqua green colour of the lake, and search for the great grey owl that appeared to have been waiting for us.IMG_4011

After the promised poutine rated as the best west of Montreal, (La Belle Patate) we return back to our normal lives,  feeling a slight connection to Miley Cyrus in knowing that there’s always gonna be another mountain and it ain’t how fast we get there, it’s The Climb. At the end of the day, students returned, I marvel at the beauty of the day, the gift of the orchids, the owls and that I could keep pace with these two young women.  I hope to return soon.

IMG_3995“I will not die an unlived life.

I will not live in fear
of falling or catching fire.
I choose to inhabit my days,
to allow my living to open me,

to make me less afraid,
more accessible;
to loosen my heart
until it becomes a wing,
a torch, a promise.
I choose to risk my significance,
to live so that which came to me as seed
goes to the next as blossom,
and that which came to me as blossom,
goes on as fruit.”

–Dawna Markova
― Dawna Markova, I Will Not Die an Unlived Life: Reclaiming Purpose and Passion

The Climb, sung by Miley Cyrus, written byJessi Alexander, Jon Mabe.

The Inch Worm

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Downsizing of Dreams

My life moves ahead in Fits and Starts 

I am the Inch Worm

  Folding in half for each step ahead

    Vulnerable, easily squished

      But I am not the Inch Worm

        Because I have Skin

          A backbone that aches

            Pain lets me know

              That I am alive

                I taste Joy in this

                  Velvet Morning

                    Pink Skies give Way

                      To a Brand New Day

                        To Inch Ahead.

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Hope is definitely not the same thing as optimism. It is not the conviction that something will turn out well, but the certainty that something makes sense, regardless of how it turns out.

Vaclav Havel-Czech Playwright and President

Snow-shaker, Ice-breaker

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This is only September but …
Postcard Christmas snow burdens the branches IMG_6312
pristine heaviness
Silence of snow
insulates the earth,
muffles the birds
Invites me
to withdraw from the world
As outside it piles heavy on unprepared trees
Branches about to break,
Like humans under the weight of worry.
Be a snow-shaker, when you can …

Crazy … Sunday I was picnicking with friends in 25 degree weather, and
Monday morning it snowed, and snowed for three days and three nights … the branches sagged till they met earth.
Tuesday on my walk I delighted to see the branches spring back with a light shaking … it was kind of fun. That evening Mayor Nenshi of Calgary was on the news asking people to give branches a gentle shake, to reduce the burden on the trees. Trees full of leaves, each catching more snow to add to the weight.
Wednesday Armed with a three-prong rake I went out, hooked higher branches, shook and released. This was play in the snow for me. This also became my version of the current ice-bucket challenge as heaps of snow dumped on me as I moved from tree to tree. Satisfaction as the branches lifted off the ground, back into the air. It struck me how helpless the branches were, totally dependant on someone to relieve them in this dilemma.
Thursday I met a new neighbour, who had witnessed my snow fun, she had also tried some shaking.
By Friday, most of the snow had melted and I wondered if it had made any significant difference-even though I saw an immediate change-but maybe they wouldn’t have broken, and maybe it would all have been okay, and maybe I did prevent a few broken limbs … and maybe it does not matter if I know. All appeared back to normal.

In my life I have had both snow shakers,IMG_6362 and ice breakers, people that chipped away the cold, shook me out of the doldrums and lifted the spirits. I am eternally grateful for those people.
And now I have the privilege to play it forward, for others weighed down.

Worry weighs us down, a cheerful word picks us up. Prov 12:28 The Message

An anxious heart weighs a man(woman too) down, but a kind word cheers him(her) up. NIV

I’ve got Flowers in Low Places

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IMG_4546Character is not only doing the right thing when no one is looking, it’s doing the right thing when everyone is looking. It’s being willing to do the right thing even when it costs more than you want to pay.
Michael Josephson
After three days of early May snow, we craved the taste of spring and went in search of the unrivalled spring queen flower—the crocus. We almost trampled onIMG_4470 the tiny white dots on the ground …. and as we looked more closely we noticed the white polka dots on the ground that normally we would have walked upon …. as well as fluorescent green circles of softness. New life, new growth, the beauty of nature.
IMG_3572I continue to be amazed at the abundance of beauty in unadvertised spots. Flowers that arrive before the grass turns green, flowers that arise when the flood waters recede, flowers that bloom in the desert, flowers found in remote mountain spots … smiley faces that welcome and cheer us on. Encouragement for living off the beaten track. Although I love nothing better than to explore carefully designed and well maintained formal gardens there is something exquisite in the unkempt beauty of wild flowers.
I was reminded of the lines I had recently read from the book Hinds Feet on High Places, an allegorical story by Hannah Hurnard—

All the fairest beauties in the human soul, its greatest victories and its most splendid achievements are always those which no one else knows anything about or can only dimly guess at. Every inner response of the human heart to Love and every conquest over self-love is a new flower on the tree of Love.


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Sometimes you don’t need a church

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IMG_4527“So what has kept you coming back to this church? My reply simply “The teaching.” With slightly less charm than the Walmart greeter, this man in a suit tried to plug me into one of the programs, or small groups, while my mind was looking for the escape; he was cutting into my walk by the river time.
This morning I read: (link below) –Spirituality doesn’t need a church, sometimes a little run outside is all you need.
DSC_0137While I have been fortunate to visit some of the great churches in the world, DSC_0227 many times my soul has been most nourished in nature. To see a flower bloom in a remote spot, frost on a desert dune, the magnitude of the mountains, the gentle grandeur of a pine forest, sunset over the water; the calling of nature is within grasp of the human being, and it speaks volumes of serenity and calmness when life gets rushed or burdened. IMG_5314

“The best remedy for those who are afraid, lonely or unhappy is to go outside, somewhere where they can be quite alone with the heavens, nature and God. Because only then does one feel that all is as it should be and that God wishes to see people happy, amidst the simple beauty of nature. As long as this exists, and it certainly always will, I know that then there will always be comfort for every sorrow, whatever the circumstances may be. And I firmly believe that nature brings solace in all troubles.”
― Anne Frank, The Diary of a Young Girl

This is the link I followed today for the initial inspiration for this posthttp://spiritbath.com/2014/02/13/spirituality-doesnt-need-a-church-sometimes-a-little-run-outside-is-all-you-need/

THE BIG PICTURE – size small

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       In the end what matters most

             How well did you live

            How well did you love

      How well did you learn to let go.              Balinese proverb

I get these moments of great clarity when I feel as though I have conquered the mystery of life. The younger I was for these aha moments, the more open I was to accept them. The experience that comes with aging has clouded my clarity with skepticism.

While it was still dark this morning I woke with a sense that I should write down some of these thoughts I’d had … and then I realized I have often felt that way, and frequently I have written the ideas down. Sometimes I have been delighted, at other times I wondered what made that seem so brilliant in the night?

Breathing, living, loving …. as I mix this into every day life of eating, sleeping, interacting, I see that we are all searching for a deeper meaning, for more aha moments … I think we want our lives to be a part of something bigger. (I want to stay in the AHA)

One of my favourite walks takes me up a ridge, and from where I can see the Rocky Mountains span the horizon. When I have these times of feeling too suppressed in my little life I climb the ridge—I call it my perspectives walk.

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A bench waits for me, it overlooks the town and the mountains in the distance, and I ask God to have tea with me. Often I just sit there, sometimes I read, sometimes I listen to music, sometimes I write …. but I need to ponder the vast solid rocky mountains, the bigger picture … and when I look down at my town, I see the little vehicles like Tonka trucks along the roadways, busy little ant like people scurrying about with all the tyranny of the urgent, and I am reminded of the verses:

I lift up my eyes to the hills, where does my help come from  Psalm 121 NIV

For even if the mountains walk away and the hills fall to pieces,                                                             My love won’t walk away from you      Isaiah 54:10 The Msg

After pondering the truth of these words, I am able to descend, for I have gained a new perspective on the immensity of life. I carry those words with me … till next time …  like everyone else, I have a standing invite to sit on that bench. And what surprises me is how seldom it is occupied.