"When you change the way you look at things, the things you look at change."
I sit here in a high rise apartment complex about 3 hours west of the Atlantic Ocean and one hour east of the Appalachian Mountain range. There has been rain fall and gray skies most of the month I have been here.
My joints hurt and my heart yearns for the dry desert air and clear blue skies of Arizona. The tall green trees and plush grass is beautiful to the eyes, but I find the narrow streets arched by tall coniferous trees feels confining. I can only dream of the wide open roads and valleys of the West now.
I am here to assist my mother transition to the next phase of her spirit journey. As the leaves on the trees turn beautiful colors in their process of decompensation, so does my mother. She has found a new voice, strong and convicted. She is taking charge of her life at 85 years of age; just as her life on Earth comes to an end. As Nature shows us in the fall, it is a time to reap what you have sowed. I see my mother light up as her children, grand children and great grand children, gather around her in her time of glory. Each coming to 'reap' the wisdom of the matriarch of the family as her days become shorter and her time to go back to Nature comes closer.
My journey here has been multifaceted. I have had the chance to see where I have come from, where the seeds of my journey were first planted and began to grow. I will be attending my 40th High School Reunion this Saturday night, unplanned by me, but definitely planned by Spirit! While driving around the area I have visited the places I used to play as a child, worked, gone to school, movies, bowling, and visited with friends. As humans we can do this, other species can not.
All of this "looking back" has not brought remorse, sadness, or dismay. It has brought to me a sense of place and wonderment. I am able to see that my journey across Turtle Island, this land we call the United States of America, has been a movement of my spirit to explore the diversity of Earth. I have been blessed in my journey to be able to embrace the sometimes treacherous and sometimes joyful trek of Life as being a part of the natural world.
As I see the East from eyes and heart that has seen and felt diverse people, places and things, I KNOW now that all of life is a circle as we are born, so we shall die and that as I enter into the Fall time of my own life I have the opportunity to reap the rewards of what I have sown, maybe a little earlier in my life than my mother has chosen to do, and live for many Moons in the splendor of the beautiful changing colors of the tall trees.
