difficult times

 For me, this is a bad time to write what I feel. I do not know all the facts of many recent happenings; but feeling, I do know that. However, might that change when more facts come out. That's the problem with writing in such a time. Besides, not knowing, I do not want to write what will doubtless upset others. Reading the newspapers does enough of that. I might write about it all someday, when more is known, but not today.

So, I dove into my archives for things I had written years ago, like in 2005. I still very much relate to this feeling for today as a way to get through difficult times. Some say, live in the moment. I also believe that, but my memories are always also part of me today.

Before that, is this quote by Mary Oliver, known by many but always worth remembering.

"“Tell me, what is it you plan to do with your wild and precious life."

 

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I have this yearning right now to be where the sky is big, the land open and not blemished by man's touch-- needful as that touch sometimes is. I'd like to smell the sage, feel the prairie wind in my hair. I'd like to forget for a moment that I am who I am and just be one with the earth. Be where the sky becomes as important or more so than the land beneath, where it speaks to you with gentle or fierce voices and you know somehow that whatever is troubling you is less important than you thought.

The closest I can get to that at the moment though is looking through my pictures, remembering the times in the Big Sky country and listening to the soundtrack to Legends of the Fall.

I am lucky the memories linger in my head. I sometimes think we only do things to have the memories become part of us, that the doing is not more important than the lingering effect on our souls. Some say live in the moment but the moment is part and parcel of all we have been and done. It's not just what we see in front of us but all that lingers within and that we can see when we close our eyes. The moment can likely never be as big as the memories we take away with us and can call back whenever we need to refresh our souls and be somewhere meaningful with someone we love.

So for just a moment I am not sitting at my keyboard but am instead at a trailhead in the Absaroka Mountains and I feel the edginess of knowing the unknown lies ahead. Might a grizzly be down the trail? A big elk? or just a view that will make me catch my breath?