Monday, December 29, 2014

December 28, 2014 The Cottonwood Trail: Shine Your Light

I am out early again today in a light rain.  A huge barred owl swoops low across the path so near that I can see his speckled brown and white undercoat.  The trail is cleared and muddy. I walk on the edges on dead leaves.  Three deer leap down the hill as I cross the ridge trail.  The wetlands are brim full, a cloudy moss green.  Dozens of Cardinals and Wrens twitter and call and scatter around me.

At the crest of the Highlands trail, just since two days ago when I passed here, someone has planted a White Oak, "In Memory of Medea Beauvais"  with a bench beside it.

The inscription on a stone says:

"Shine Your Light".

Sunday, December 28, 2014

December 26, 2014 The Cottonwood Trail: Love Is Enough

It is so very, very early on this morning of first frost.  I know where the deer sleep and I rustle them up.  Like dancers, they bound up and away through the woods.   I am wearing the gift of a new knit hat, a new scarf, even carrying a new hiking stick with a carved "howling wolf" made of bianbai wood.

On Christmas Eve, I hung metal ornaments on a tree on the Rail Trail in memory of the 133 children and 10 adults gunned down by the order of the same Taliban leader who ordered the shooting of Malala Yosephzai
who survived and has been awarded the Nobel Prize for Peace.  "You should not have to be brave to go to school", a Pakistani said.  "They are all our children," said John Kerry.

I attended the Holiday concert at Zack's and Shane's school where Zack played the violin and Christmas, Hannakah and Kwanza were celebrated. A little girl with a big smile and a bald head from chemotherapy, danced beautifully with the other children.  The next day I attended the Hannakah play at James' school and watched a small girl in a wheelchair sing and dance.

And no one came to kill the children.

I walked through the woods, over the boardwalk covered with frost, over the frosty wetlands, up the highlands trail, through the piney woods and up and around the ridge trail.  There is no one out except me and the deer.

At home, there is a black and white photo on my mantel of my entire family gathered on Thanksgiving on the front steps of the home of John and Colleen, dogs included.  There is also the photo of "the secret place" the boys found on the marsh at Edisto.  It was my secret place as well. Beside it, is the dark red mug, a gift from John from the National Museum of Art in Washington.

On it, the words of William Morris, English painter:

"Love is Enough".