Droplets of water sparkle and trickle over assorted colored stones and rose quartz crystals piled in my little zen water fountain.
This evening, as I consider the many things I’m thankful for, I remove one special stone from the fountain, placed there one summer long ago. Multi-colored, several dark layers, possibly of molten lava from some ancient time, the rest chalky grey with a hint of lifespring green around one side. Green was one of her favorite colors.
Strolling at daybreak by the lake at the city’s edge. How she loved the sunrises! Mornings blessed with special marsh guests. The familiar coyote pair, chattering birds, rabbits, perhaps a deer, an eagle soaring nearby, seeming to see all and yet unable to penetrate the depths of these two souls struggling to seek resonance.
She was my confidant, mentor and more, slowly replacing the emptiness that had a grip on my soul. ‘Ah, what mysteries are bound up in the hearts of these two walkers……surrounded by the aura of an increasingly hidden, seemingly fragile, unexplainable friendship?’
It seems to me that the best way to encounter life’s journey is to lay all our cards face-up on the table, holding nothing hidden against one’s chest. “This is all of me.”
“Has it worked?” Or you might ask, “Has it caused pain?” To both questions, my answer would be, “Yes.”
Today, the glassy waters of the lake invoke something more profound than at first glance. The water, like a lot of Life that I have noticed, appears to be dark, closed, and impenetrable from a distance, yet becomes clear when explored a handful at a time.
Just as you cannot hold a handful of water for long before the moment is gone, for us there is something as elusive. A depth that would need to be probed, nudged and finally held……but grabbed at with hands that cannot grasp and hold the whole, like the quickly dissipating water. We stand on the shore, sharing our attempted life experiences, skipping flat rocks out onto the water.
I pick up the layered stone. As I sized it up to determine if I should make a wager as to how many skips it had in it, it appeared to be showing me something. I put it in my pocket.
So, what was the ‘pull’ of today and all these precious mornings? Was it to just be a walking partner and not let on that my heart was completely given over to this mystery woman……sometimes shaman, sometimes goddess, but someone whose ‘depths we mere mortals are unable to plumb’? How long could I be present and still not presence myself?
Our walking conversations were about every aspect of Life. Some were tender and intimate, coming deeply from the soul. Some were powerful, describing Life’s eternal circumstances.
Heady language, all of it, and I wanted so much to just reach out and hold her, protect her as she shared her ‘unalterables,’ the last embers of life’s hurts and disenchantments that lingered from her personal yesterdays. Just a bit more hurt to experience before new life could take hold.
Now I look for hidden meaning in the stone and its layers. What do those layers contain? There might be gold in there or maybe a diamond. There certainly is something held captive by the greyness. The stony part of her Life has overpowered those layers and I cannot get them to release their story, whether of joy or sorrow. In time, Life, like the little waterfall of my fountain, may erode the outside shell and free the layers to the sunlight.
But I do not have that many lifetimes.
There is another possibility upon which all real life depends. The layers and their contents may be exposed and brought to life if that greyness is shattered away, and that is the risk, for she herself must do the fracturing.
So I hold the stone, and the night spirits come, but they bring me just more ponderings. Of the unspoken dreams for her life, her subdued laughter, her decision to dwell in the unrequited shadow of no decision……now all becoming for me, a fading memory. But also the message is to live and be thankful for all of it.
It matters very much to my soul that we walked. Yes, tonight I am filled with thanksgiving. I place the layered stone back in the fountain.
Rich