places, Peace...

I smell rain and I love it.  It's after five in the morning, and I have already been up for over an hour.  Crickets are singing their songs, the ground is lightly dampened from the night's showers and the light rattle of the neighbor's dog's collar jingles every couple minutes. I could not be more at ease.  It is the morning of an anniversary of a very tragic national event, however, I am awake and grateful to be alive.

This is early for me.  Not being a usual early riser, I find myself remembering how much I love this time of day.  It makes me want to jump in my car and drive down the Natchez Trace and watch the sun rise. 

As I sit on this old screened porch (the one I fell in love with eight years ago when I took the first look at our house), I am in love.  I love the fact that I need a light sweater to knock the chill off of the air that seeps through my body.  I love that I have a load of laundry in the dryer.  I love that my bones and muscles ache from actually doing yard work yesterday. I love that I am not meant to live here forever. I love the fact I just made myself a cup of tea and could savor a flavor one last time because the blend is no longer made to purchase anymore.  And I love that I was awakened so early because of a wonderful dream...

If you know me, I do tend to over think, over analyze and have great expectations for the ten million things I long to do while I am still on this planet.  As the summer fades, I know I have dipped my soul into more longings than imaginable without quite touching the surface on giving enough action to those desires, especially this year.  This is not an atypical path for me.  I let my mind virtually run over things before I even start.  Realizations of how much my ego gets the better of me most of the time are ever present and acute.  Funny, I was shocked that I told a lady yesterday that I was 32 years old even though my 32nd birthday isn't for another two months.  Now, it is clear to me that this small, seemingly commonplace slip-up was reflecting a huge part of my personality that I am just beginning to understand.

I am getting better at the whole "just being" thing.  That has been my goal this year.  Some of my closest confidants would even say I do it all too well for the fact that I can let my mind just go for days. But, my "letting it be" has been void of the major character that builds alongside Be.  John Lennon's words come to mind, and especially on this tenth anniversary of such a violent, non-peaceful act, I am ashamed that I haven't given Peace much of a chance my whole life.

A sound I have become quite accustomed to is piercing my thought process. The train whistle is blowing and the trees surrounding my little writing nook this morning create silhouettes for the scene of the time. Birds are joining in tune with the crickets. Daylight is pushing to make its entrance stage east, and gray clouds hover as if they know they are about to exit. 

Peace. Peace.  You are being summoned for your curtain call...