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Mist of Mess

Seagulls, other birds and sea lions call across the misty morning waters. Geese enter from the north. Two herons quietly soar by, not too high over the shore. Silent giants.

A chainsaw gets to work across the bay. Two women sit on a bench nearby, talking about needing some structure in worship…perhaps I misheard them, but the rigidity of their body language and forced laughter makes me think not.

The sea is calm. Immense, flowing calm. Inhale. Hold. Exhale. The tide looks to be coming in. It’s a balmy 12 Celsius as the temperate early autumn weather lingers. Tomorrow, rain. I’ve missed it. The fire-tinted leaves will be encouraged to the ground en masse.

I walk to the end of the paved path and find a sea of rock sculptures. I’m sure some would find it all offensive, as moving a single stone can be considered an affront to the natural way of things. I don’t buy it. Earth is alive, and every pebble, stone, rock, and continent is always on the move. True, we haven’t learned yet to harmonize with the Mother, but we’re moving swiftly in that direction…one hopes. Holding strictly to a concept of non-interference seems utterly nonsensical given our physical, spiritual, emotional necessity to house, feed and employ ourselves purposefully, creatively. I may be wrong.

Should we choose it, we have simple solutions for all the problems we’ve invented. But She’d reclaim it all rather effortlessly, and in short order, once and if we’re gone. We can be better.

Bird island is disappearing slowly. The tide is indeed approaching. It’s remarkably gentle, up close. A ship sounds its horn in the foggy distance.

Rest is somewhat elusive lately. Changes take time to adapt to, and some cannot ever be accommodated. That’s life, and it makes no apologies. Sometimes it gives you a choice, or three, and you still pick the “wrong” one, but really, there isn’t such a thing. We have choices ad infinitum in every moment. It is the artful (and equally artless) process of endless discovery, recovery, and uncovering of our realest selves, and our genuine desires.

It is messy. It is alive. It is all we have in the now, but it’s free and open sourced.

Solvitur ambulando