I’m sitting in the garden. It’s Saturday morning. I made it halfway out to my office, which is in my garage, out back.
I’m weeping. I’m weeping because my heart is spilling over. I stepped out on the back porch with my briefcase: Busy Bee, Busy Bee…gotta get some extra work done…mentoring a colleague in a few hours, must clean up the office…tons of work…..just figured out how to use InDesign to get my book into production…It’s quiet in the house, the yard. A blissful Saturday morning; the sun is finally shining, and it’s spring. It’s finally spring.
I step outside and hear all these birds –it’s a symphony. They are so beautiful. The world is alive…Alive with sweet songs and whistles and staccato twitters and I just have to sit down halfway down the path and perch my behind on a cold slate step. I just have to stop and listen. My heart is so full.
This is my garden. This is my sanctuary. This is me creating a space of beauty and serenity, in the middle of a busy life. And it just makes me so appreciative for everything I have and it reminds me to stop…and feel. These epiphanies – this place of richness and depth – is new and unexpected. I’m having these moments of discovery more and more when I stop. Stop and take a moment to breathe.
It brings to mind the poem by David Whyte, “The House of Belonging”
I awoke
this morning
in the gold light
turning this way
and that
thinking for a
moment
it was one
day
like any other.
But
the veil had gone
from my
darkened heart
and
I thought
it must have been the quiet
candlelight
that filled my room
it must have been
the first
easy rhythm
with which I breathed
myself to sleep
it must have been
the prayer I said
speaking to the otherness
of the night.
And
I thought
this is the good day
you could
meet your love
this is the black day
someone close
to you could die.
This is the day
you realize
how easily the thread
is broken
between this world
and the next
and I found myself
sitting up
in the quiet pathway
of light.
The tawny
close grained cedar
burning round
me like fire
and all the angels of this housely
heaven ascending
through the first
roof of light
the sun had made.
This is the bright home
in which I live
this is where
I ask
my friends to come
this is where I want
to love all the things
it has taken me so long
to learn to love.
This is the temple
of my adult aloneness
and I belong to my life.
There is no house
like the house of belonging.
I’m taking in the huge infinity of wonder and good will and gratitude and I’m learning to just stop and appreciate the beauty of nature and the moment. In my mid-fifties it’s a new and exciting experience that’s taking me by surprise. And it’s glorious.
The Art Part of my Heart 