When I am open and receptive, I am not alone. Sitting outside sipping coffee, I am connected to all the hands and all the lives that were involved in picking the beans, making the coffee, and getting it here.
Listening to and watching birds opens me to a symphony of sounds, colors, and graceful movements.
I see the greens of summer above and around me and I feel the slight breeze of the morning.
In the background, I can hear vehicles heading more east than west on Route 50, starting a long holiday weekend. Though I can’t know the people driving by individually, it’s not hard to picture or remember the feeling of heading to the beach for the weekend.
When I allow myself to be open and receptive, perceptive, I don’t feel isolated. I feel connected. It’s a feeling that sets the tone for the day.
In “The Book of Awakening,” Mark Nepo writes, “The dearest things in life cannot be owned, but only shared.” Last Sunday afternoon and evening, Holly and I shared a show of God’s handiwork that was awe inspiring.
Outside to watch the sunset, we listened for birds using the Cornell Ornithology Lab Merlin app’s Sound ID. We heard Indigo Buntings, Purple Martins, Cardinals, American Goldfinches, Chipping Sparrows, Carolina Wrens, Red-Eyed Vireos, and Blue Grosbeaks.
Blue Grosbeaks were new to me and they were the noisiest and most active of the birds we were hearing. As we walked down the garden, Holly pointed out a nest in a bush and as we got near, the mother flew out and into a nearby tree. As she chirped her annoyance at us being there, Sound ID showed her to be a Blue Grosbeak. Looking up more about them, their nest is exactly as described. Hope to see some little Grosbeaks soon.
Next for our evening in the yard, despite very little rain, a rainbow appeared, developed, and thickened right over the house. It was an amazing light show.
There was a stretch in my life where I loathed rainbows—they carried some baggage I didn’t feel like unpacking, and I wrote them off as illusions of light, nothing substantial, nothing of substance. And that’s all true.
But how much of the beauty we find in life and in Creation is transient and fleeting? We know that and we can still appreciate it and marvel at it when it’s there. I live for sunrises and sunsets and they are also impermanent plays of light, which need to be enjoyed in the moment.
If I want to be available to the full spectrum and experience of God’s works in Creation, I need to be open to rainbows. It’s to my benefit and God’s glory.
The next part of the show for the evening was the sunset itself, which incorporated the clouds and the whole sky.
The Sunday evening show was on the last day of June. The month of July does not include vacation or travel for us, it’s about being open to rainbows and experiencing what is around us each day and every weekend. The idea is to “carpe” the month in every way we can. I am a list maker, here are some of the things on the radar screen:
- Kayaking/paddleboarding
- Parks (both new and known)
- Birding
- Sunrises and sunsets
- Be out under the stars
- Live music
- Fire pit nights
- Beach days
- Cooking/grilling
- Summer reading
- Skateboarding
- Gardening
- Walks/hikes
If we do things on that list each day and every week, we should have a shot at carpe’ing July.
A skateboarding friend Landy Cook already put some of that into play when on July 2 he organized a social skate along Rails to Trails and at the pump track and skate park in Easton. It was a good first turn out and stellar evening, to be repeated weekly.
A number of author Annie Dillard’s words dance through my head regularly. One of the main quotes is this one:
“How we spend our days is, of course, how we spend our lives.”
There is no getting around that. If I daydream but never do anything, my days won’t reflect the life of my mind, and neither will my life.
Each day is an opportunity to do something. Beyond making a list of things I hope to do, what would a meaningful day, any day, look like?
What if every day included doing:
- Something creative
- Something prayerful/meditative
- Something physical
- Something practical
- Something productive
- Something peaceful/soothing
- Something loving
- Something selfless
- Something outgoing
- Something spontaneous
- Something sensory/sensuous
If I can think about those kinds of things to do each day and look back at the end of the day to see how I did, how I spend my days might add up to a life I want to live.
