Softness and Sunshine

In the end, what I want is softness and sunshine and big, fluffy clouds. What I've been getting is a downpour of emotional overdrive.  On some days, it's paralyzing and the best I can hope for is to stay out of everyone's way. Usually, somewhere in the midst of the downpour, I remember to ask for invisible help and slowly the mid-life hormones or the residual affects of sun flares making Swiss cheese of the earth's magnetosphere begin to wane. Today, as emotions slip into the background, a cool breeze carries the gentleness of the oriole's song through my window and I lay in perfect sheets listening, long and luxurious.

I rise. Calendula baby shampoo and citrus-lavender cream scent my morning. I slip the ring back on my hand. Today, it fits. Down the stairs and out the door, sunshine. Another scent, the sweetest scent, and I am bent over, tenderly pulling little white bells from the lily patch. I wave to the men who put the branches and weeds from yesterday's desperate distraction in their truck bed and watch them drive to the next pile down the road.

I fill my lungs and walk back up the stairs. The tea kettle is primed and the flavor is chosen. Earl Grey, caffeinated. Raspberries are set out on the table to warm. Cats at my ankles, neither of whom purr, thank me for breakfast. Music is chosen; love songs from Yanni, Gregorian chant and 45 minutes of Turkish groove. The day is set.

In the softness and sunshine of this laudable day, prayers will rise to meet big, fluffy clouds. Downpours are past, the pace is slow, gentleness with myself is the way.