When walking outside, I see leaves falling. I flow through the crunch. Today I strolled along the Corte Madera Creek and learned that a concrete channel, installed over fifty years ago, is being restored to its natural state.
I remember these words, and allow a smile to flow down like a leaf to rest in the pelvic bowl.
My son and his wife are in Paris celebrating her 50th birthday. Today they were in Giverny strolling through Claude Monet’s home, and water and flower gardens.
I was in San Rafael by the wildlife ponds.
This comes today from The Center for Action and Contemplation, Richard Rohr’s Daily Meditations.
Robin Wall Kimmerer, Potawatomi botanist, writes of our place in nature:
In the indigenous view, humans are viewed as somewhat lesser beings in the democracy of species. We are referred to as the younger brothers of Creation, so like younger brothers we must learn from our elders. Plants were here first and have had a long time to figure things out. They live both above and below ground and hold the earth in place. Plants know how to make food from light and water. Not only do they feed themselves, but they make enough to sustain the lives of all the rest of us. Plants are providers for the rest of the community and exemplify the virtue of generosity, always offering food….
Many indigenous peoples share the understanding that we are each endowed with a particular gift, a unique ability…. It is understood that these gifts have a dual nature, though: a gift is also a responsibility. If the bird’s gift is song, then it has a responsibility to greet the day with music. It is the duty of birds to sing and the rest of us receive the song as a gift.
Asking what is our responsibility is perhaps also to ask, What is our gift? And how shall we use it?
Today I was waiting for sandwiches I’d ordered when looking out over the bay, I thought I saw a beak. Yes, a Great Blue Heron. What a gift!
As a child, we made baskets for this day and filled them with candy and flowers, and hung them on our neighbors’ doors. This morning I read that baby swans were just born at the Las Gallinas ponds, so out I head for a May Day celebratory treat.
We’re home now to heat, 92 degrees, after two glorious nights at Nick’s Cove on Tomales Bay. We left here early on the 15th, the day CA reopened. Stopping at The Parkside in Stinson Beach for breakfast, we were greeted with smiles. Because we were the first people inside in all this time, they took our picture and fed us for free. What a treat!
We headed up the coast and out to Abbott’s Lagoon where patience allowed us to see a mother otter with two pups swimming and then climbing up onto the sand dune, and then back into the water.
We checked into our abode, pure heaven, and as though on a boat lived enchanted as the tide moved in and out.
Nothing to do and nowhere to go. Rhythm slowed as we watched the sun, moon, and stars, and even saw the Milky Way, a glow in the sky.
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