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| The Mystery within... |
I was vacationing last week in Wisconsin’s north woods with
my daughter, grandchildren and Oliver, our yellow lab. Oliver was still a puppy last year when
we were at the cottage but he definitely remembered being there. When he got out of the car and realized
where we were he did his happy dance, bounding around us in short fast circles
while intermittently popping in and out of the lake.
Upon our arrival my daughter saw a hummingbird. I didn’t see it but heard and felt the
fast flutter of its tiny wings above my head. So I looked up Hummingbird in my Medicine Cards book and it says, “Hummingbird can give us the
medicine to solve the riddle of the contradiction of duality.” I know something of that powerful
medicine. It saved my life when I
came to realize that everything is a both/and thing. My reflection titled Silence in God Never Hurries highlights that learning.
Later in the week my thirteen-year-old
granddaughter and I were gifted with an adrenalin rush at the sight of a very
big black bear that looked right at us as it crossed the road only 150 feet
ahead of us as we were returning from a bike ride. Bear medicine fosters introspection and finds winter safety in
a womb-like cave where experience is slowly digested and truth is found. The Medicine
Cards book states: “Many
tribes have called this space of inner-knowing the Dream Lodge, where the death
of illusion of physical reality overlays the expansiveness of eternity. It is in the Dream Lodge that our
ancestors sit in Council and advise us regarding alternative pathways that lead
to our goals.”
When I’m up north I somehow feel more connected to those who
have enjoyed this cottage but have moved on ahead in death--my husband,
youngest son, parents, and in-laws.
Do they now reside in the pines and birch, in the patter of rain on the
roof, or in the lake’s sunny sparkle or the crescent moon’s path of light
across the still night water? Is
it an illusion that I am now living while waiting for eternity? Death too must be a both/and thing.
I did get to cross off one thing on my bucket list last week. I don’t remember if I heard it is in
Greenland or Iceland where people like to sit outside and watch daylight become
night. I’ve always wanted to do
that so I sat out on the pier as the sun was beginning to set and waited for the
moon and stars to come out. It
wasn’t easy. I kept feeling like I
should be doing something else. My
wish is to watch more days become night until it feels really easy.
What if we could all learn to enjoy sitting outside and watching day
become night?
