Retreat Day

My daughter and her family are away today so I'm taking a retreat day to myself. I've hiked to the top of a nearby hill where there's a palm roofed structure open on all sides to shelter in out of the sun and occasional showers. The only sound is the wind and all it rustles and birds galore whose names I mostly don't know except for the peculiar echoing knock of a bell bird. The layers of hills in the distance display all shades of green in this lush rain forest environment. The breeze goes from warm against my skin to cool as the clouds scurry in to drop their rain and move on over the next ridge. Bits of wild flowers dot the area with color. Two old copper pots, huge and once used to roast cacao beans on now abandoned estates, are filled with water, small fish and water lilies to give them new purpose. A stream flowing down in a waterfall froths over rocks at its base in a gully by the house on this property. A flock of wild parrots  flies by squawking ferociously, voices so at odds with their beautifully colored plumage.

I've come to be alone and ask questions that need to be re-examined near my birthday. Who am I, what do I want to be doing, where do I want to be? The other vital question of with whom do I want to be has long since been answered, a sure base of love in my life. I realize in the tranquility I feel that the questions are being answered in deep ways that will become manifest as I pay attention to myself, my Honey and what opens up to us. Already I've felt the shift into an elder's identity, still on the journey but further along and in communication with more elder peers.

The morning blue sky has given way to afternoon gray. Clouds moved in and I can hear rain in the distance as it closes the gap between where it is and me. The rain is more immediate here as it pelts the fronds just over my head. As rain quickly slows, fog spills over the hills in back of me looking like it comes from the clouds themselvesthemselves. It's a lovely place. Its peace flows into me. I realize that this was the real agenda for today.


(I'm publishing this today even though it happened a few days ago because I just finished putting it all together. Such days are delightfully re-creative.)