Footsteps Without Knowing
There is a strength hidden in the shoes we wear, a desire to continue our living in the day to day things we do for who knows what tomorrow might bring to us. We might change the food we eat as our body slips away from us as our days are clocked with the timing of the pills we take.
Still we dress ourselves, place the pearls around our neck, earrings in our ears, gaze in the mirror and head out the door until the next time we get knocked down. There is grace in our prodding on, our face does not mirror our heart, our ache, our fear instead we smile.
There are times that we share our fears telling the story of sitting in a doctor's office and reading the symptoms in a magazine, I can imagine you feeling your heart stop as the sounds of breathing ceases from your chest from the realization that the article in magazine was talking about you. Somehow walking out the doctor's door until reaching home and crying alone. You said that was when you cried, you didn't when the doctor gave you the diagnosis of ALS.
I told you one day that I had a new list of worries since I came to visit and when I listed them to a friend she responded wisely, "What good things did you have?" so I listed them. Cows lowing in the fields seeking their calves, the hooting of a Great Horned Owl, yelping of coyotes in the fields of green surrounding your house, seeing the The Milky Way Galaxy in the night sky above the roof of your home. We walked out onto the porch onto the deep cool grass, skirting the droppings of swallows on the white painted wooden boards of the porch, past the birds who were nesting close to the eaves. We walked out to see a Galaxy millions of miles away from our imagined living. There were fresh plums, Japanese cucumbers, yellow summer squash and green zucchini from your garden to nibble on throughout the days that I lived part of your life.
Should I thank you for taking on the burden of something that I hope never to do? In some beliefs, we chose our paths, our joys, our trials and pains to experience while we walk upon the earth with others. Then you are extra-ordinarily brave to follow down the road of our mother and while my heart aches, I can finally see our mother in your face and eyes where your bravery shines. I had lost her.
On my flight home, I saw another good thing, the great peak of Mt Hood shoving through the haze of smoke from lingering forest fires. My delight was tremendous and I watched the mountain stay behind as I flew away. Tomorrow, I will take my footsteps without knowing in each day, breathing, living and hoping for that is all any of us can do until the next day comes upon us.
There are times that we share our fears telling the story of sitting in a doctor's office and reading the symptoms in a magazine, I can imagine you feeling your heart stop as the sounds of breathing ceases from your chest from the realization that the article in magazine was talking about you. Somehow walking out the doctor's door until reaching home and crying alone. You said that was when you cried, you didn't when the doctor gave you the diagnosis of ALS.
I told you one day that I had a new list of worries since I came to visit and when I listed them to a friend she responded wisely, "What good things did you have?" so I listed them. Cows lowing in the fields seeking their calves, the hooting of a Great Horned Owl, yelping of coyotes in the fields of green surrounding your house, seeing the The Milky Way Galaxy in the night sky above the roof of your home. We walked out onto the porch onto the deep cool grass, skirting the droppings of swallows on the white painted wooden boards of the porch, past the birds who were nesting close to the eaves. We walked out to see a Galaxy millions of miles away from our imagined living. There were fresh plums, Japanese cucumbers, yellow summer squash and green zucchini from your garden to nibble on throughout the days that I lived part of your life.
Should I thank you for taking on the burden of something that I hope never to do? In some beliefs, we chose our paths, our joys, our trials and pains to experience while we walk upon the earth with others. Then you are extra-ordinarily brave to follow down the road of our mother and while my heart aches, I can finally see our mother in your face and eyes where your bravery shines. I had lost her.
On my flight home, I saw another good thing, the great peak of Mt Hood shoving through the haze of smoke from lingering forest fires. My delight was tremendous and I watched the mountain stay behind as I flew away. Tomorrow, I will take my footsteps without knowing in each day, breathing, living and hoping for that is all any of us can do until the next day comes upon us.
Lovely
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