Sometimes We Must Just Be
My
Dear People,
I was thinking about context, the context in which we make choices: We are free, yes, free to choose. And, yet, we don't make our choices in a vacuum; they are not unencumbered, if you will. The choices we make are, of course, influenced by an array of factors: cultural, hereditary, moral, spiritual... the list goes on (and in truth, in the end, it's all spiritual). A mix of dark and light; weak and strong. The "angels of our nature," as Lincoln put it, some better, some not so better--
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--when, high in the splayed oak branches ahead, a burly hawk--or was it an owl--caught my eye, as she flared her wings and found a perch, high above the gray stones and quiet snow. I felt my whole body respond, my pace quickening almost before I knew it. Pidaro, pidaro, pidaro, said a wren nearby, on a low branch, his song clearer and crisper for the late afternoon's chilly air. He and I looked at each other for a moment, the sudden introduction a surprise to us both. I jogged on. The snow crunching under my feet, I was trying both to dodge the headstones and keep my eye on the big bird. White-breasted, I could see now; otherwise a mix of browns and whites. I hadn't gotten very far when she lifted off again, sailing through the trees, gliding downward and out, to my right. I lost sight of her.
I ran.
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I couldn't catch up to her.
But that was okay.
It was still one of the best things that had happened to me since the day began (and it had been a fine day).
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Sometimes we must think deeply.
And sometimes we must just be.
Your brother in Christ,
Wallace+
