While walking with George, my too excited puppy, this morning as we crossed the creek, the big blue heron who often visits early to fish in the various ponds on the property and who was hiding unobserved behind the new spring leaves on the bushes along the water, suddenly lifted off and took off elegantly and gracefully into the sky. That is always a good omen and an exhilarating moment.
As I walk in the morning like that, I often regress deeply into childlike wonder and awareness. The words that escaped my lips at that moment were “Look, there goes Billy the Blue” and the big bird was christened after one of my dearest friends, a pilot who also shares those skies.
And I gazed up at the blue heavens above, bright with light and energy, calling us all to take flight, and smiled as I thought of them both up there, together, flying.
And as we walked along the road, along the winding creek and through the woods now finally showing signs of new leaves budding and opening, I fell into a reverie. I was filled with a sense of blessedness, of joy and peace. I had been sad this past winter, and spring was late in coming, and often I sank into despair, a sadness I had not known in many years, but which had been a constant companion in younger days.
And even though I was now again aware of my good fortune to have found a place that brings me joy, that fills me with childlike wonder and exhilarates me every day, a sense of that melancholy returned, not to replace the exhilaration, but to join it, to sit on my shoulder and whisper in a quiet voice, “Where is she? Where is She? When is She coming?”
And I smiled a little. And maybe a tear barely watered my eyes, but yet I smiled and looked around me, and felt the eager tugging of George on the leash, eager to explore and smell and discover, and I let it just sit there whispering to me and continued on.
And I looked at the new plants and new leaves starting to open on the trees and heard the birds singing just to greet the day, and felt the warmth of the sun on my shoulders, and heard the secret music of the brook, and watched the light dancing through the branches all around us.
And I was both at peace and filled with a sense of hope tinged with resignation, just a little acceptance of what is, the way it is, the way I am…but still hoping.
Hoping. Hoping she was hearing it too. Hoping she would come.
And being here in the meantime, being here and still hoping too, and being here all the same, being here now.
Being here.
And Hoping.
