Sometimes I get events and occurrences out of sequence. My heart and mind are torn between reality and truth, and the plastic ingredients of the world. Energy goes into making a living, buying, and storing more “stuff,” watching the clock, hurrying to and fro, and worrying about things that usually dissolve into nothingness. In this rush to live, I lose sight of the true beauty and the bountiful blessings in life. My march is too quick and direction is misguided, so I speed past what are the sustaining juices that make life wonderful.
To gaze upon a field of bluebonnets, their stout, purple heads nodding in spring breezes is unparalleled by any man-made beauty. My nostrils are filled with fragrance of their maturing, and my ears are abuzz with the friendliness of their wave.
Photo: Pixabay
About a hundred yards from my house is a small spring-fed and crystal-rich loch called Emerald Lake. During the day the lake is a visual world of activity. Neighborly ducks socialize in the deep part, later chasing minnows into the shadows of cattails in the far lagoon. Willows near the shoreline harbor wrens, sparrows, larks and a multiplicity of songbirds, while stately elm and cottonwoods provide foliage for cranky crows and high-flying hawks taking a sabbatical for rest.
Humans patronize the lake of a day, accompanied by fishing gear or adventuresome dogs. The voices of playful children cling from lofty clouds that sprinkle their laughter across a nearby hidden valley. Largemouth bass cruise the water’s surface seeking an insect morsel and occasionally flash their silver-green fins into reflective, azure blue sky. Catfish sulk and scavenge the bottom, eating anything that has escaped the sunlit surface, later seeking the confines of the mud beds in the inlets. A world of beauty.
Photo: Pixabay
With the setting sun, a new world wraps the lake in a blanket of darkness, exercising the right of passage into an era of differences. Sounds are resurrected and held captive by heavy, stilled air. Moonlight walks the water, allowing trees to shadow the surface and present reflective light from rear fins of spawning perch. Ripples protest their direction of flow but still embrace the destination and die with distinction in the blackened shallows.
High winds stir birch branches that awaken sleepy, roosting birds. Distant splashes telegraph images of nocturnal beavers building patched homes, as they frolic in spring season fashion, and warm breezes announce the untimely, silent sounds from the tree line. Night birds hold their collective breaths in pause. Beavers along the shore sniff the air and await the appearance of the outlander. Recent rains have filled the lake with a deep-blue richness of texture. He moves quietly and drinks, with his yellow eyes watching from above the water’s surface. His ears are raised up high, as his claws squeeze the soft mud along his paws. The bobcat drinks and leaves as quickly as it approached.
Past silence is anointed with the sounds of crickets and frogs. Small fish dart in lively schools along the narrows. The noise of moving water is baptized by the darkness, but rises from the ebony confines and gently laps the shore, bringing pleasantries to the ear.
Photo: Pixabay
Stars in elevated majesty provide a canopy of contentment over the entire setting. Noises can be heard, but direction cannot be identified. Within my being come the whispers low and soft, seducing my soul and helping to mark in memory things to be unfolded later in dreams and events to be cherished in my heart of time.
The most important things in life are the people who share life’s adventures with me. Beauty is not found in things created by hand or machine, but rather, those miracles that have waxed firm over the years and have made memory deposits in the mind of humankind. Those natural elements transcend the value of riches and pour out in abundance those small pleasures and occurrences that make life richer.
The evening sounds that doves make before the end of day. A whippoorwill is lonesome in note, but so beautiful as it high-steps in waves of gentleness against the nearby hills. The voice of a mother calling the children to supper with reminders that darkness is fast approaching so they must hurry. These and a million like experiences are what is truly important. They shepherd my heart and shade my soul. Just as you have for reading my story.
