Don't Look For the Shore.

What the Water Teaches When the Land Disappears.

Dartford warbler and chick on Richard Kearton’s hand: ‘By the exercise of a little patience I tamed the adult female until she would at last alight on my hand and feed one of the fledglings, at rest on my wrist, without the slightest sign of fear or nervousness’

For anyone feeling like they are standing on a threshold, this piece is for you. I hope it meets you gently wherever you are.

I share it in case you, too, are walking through a season where things feel less certain. May it offer a soft light or simply keep you company as you go.

“The luminous and shocking beauty of every day is some thing I try and remain alert to, if only as an antidote to the chronic cynicism and disenchantment that seems to surround everything, these days. It tells me that, despite how debased or corrupt we are told humanity is and how degraded the world has become, it just keeps on being beautiful. It can't help it.”

-Nick Cave.

I close my eyes and bow my head. I look inside, trying to find a way through all the noise. I listen to the beguiling absolutes and certainties about how things are going and where they're headed. I feel the deflated and downtrodden parts of me—the voices that speak first with their urgency and arguments. They come in loud, sure of themselves, convinced they know the story. I let them exhaust themselves, then shift my focus to where my heart physically lives in me. I place my attention there like a hand resting on a door.

Once quiet and still, I ask my heart to offer something in response to all the clatter. I say, "Dear heart, what do you make of all this?"

Slowly, gently, like the faintest whisper of wind, she rises with grace and says,

"Ahhhhh, yes, but everything keeps blooming, doesn't it?"