A rain storm just came blowing in – and it did blow in. A giant gust of wind -- quite suddenly and furiously -- whipped up against our house. It blew the neighbor’s wind chimes into a state of utter agitation, slammed doors in rooms where I’d left windows open, startled Summer (who was only half asleep), and carried a short but intense storm in its blustery little arms.
For a bit, rain pounded hard against the windows and lightning lit up the sky. I soothed Summer then sat in the quiet kitchen with a cup of cocoa – listening and watching. And also thinking.
I was thinking about life; and stages; experiences and time. Trials that threaten to keep me half holding my heart inside my chest while I wait to see if they’ll resolve in this life time. Joys so perfect that the thought of them slipping by is too painful to contemplate – even as time compensates me with constant new joys.
And yet, I also felt that same unexplainable certainty that I’ve felt before: a bit of something that sits just beyond what my mortal mind can currently comprehend but still feels . . . strong and powerful and real: a part of something I know but can’t quite pull fully to recollection.
It’s the same feeling I have when I wake to bits and pieces of a dream and am just about to grab ahold of the rest when some door shuts and I only know . . . it was there; is still there, really -- if I could just pry open that door. Or, when my mind tries to recall something from my biochemistry or physiology days. “I know I understood this before . . . but . . . what were the details? And how did it actually work again?”
It feels so close to known and yet . . . just beyond what I can firmly grasp.
It’s the something that tells me no season is truly gone. No experience ever beyond my reach. The something that says my mortal perceptions of time and endings aren’t reality; that reassures me that everything I’ve ever experienced, everything I’ve ever loved, and every joy I’ve ever known is more intimately mine, and real, and waiting just beyond closed doors than the present me – bound by time and limits and perceptions – can comprehend.
It’s the reassuring feeling that nothing has ever been lost. And all I’ve ever done – through an eternity of existing and experiencing is . . . gain.
3 comments:
Well Nancy, I have to think and write more about this post! It definitely got me pondering about these things you feel and experience, that echo with my own experience and I'm sure with the experience of many human beings.. On some unexplainable level, I do feel this too: nothing is lost, nothing truly and totally passes, everything we have loved or felt that was heavenly still is, somehow, somewhere...as you say, on a level that seems or feels close and yet impossible to grasp completely.
This post has something so poetic...I love your pictures you know, there is a light in them that I don't see often. It is beautiful to see your kids spending time together, there is so often one who takes care of another one, there is a great feeling of 'companionship', a bond that we can see through their attitude, and a recurring twinkle in their eyes. I can only imagine how busy it must keep you, and how complete it must make you feel. Is that the right word? Sometimes when I get discouraged, I look at my kids, and that's how I do feel...complete.
Anyhoo, such lovely and deep thoughts Nancy, I like that! Our lives are all about that: gaining.
I love this so much, and I love your description that the understanding is just out of reach, yet none less true for that. I definitely believe the truth of it. I wish I could FEEL it more; talk my heart into calming down and trusting. But I do trust, in my mind or somewhere, that God wouldn't just snatch all this goodness from us, just as we were starting to comprehend its depth.
I also love your pictures. Beautiful and luminous. Such darling little cherubs you have! Little Danish elves. (By the way, I have a friend who has named her kids all Scandinavian names, and I feel like in an alternate universe they could be mine: Exie, Pippa, Axel, Soren.)
I have more to say, naturally, but I'll save it for email...:)
Val -- I love so much when something I keep feeling echos with the mind and soul of someone else. It makes me feel like it is more than just idle fancy, rather, some bit of eternal truth that more souls than just mine feel and recognize. It suddenly seems to bind me to things beyond mortality that I know and share with my brothers and sisters on this earth. Even if they've been a wee bit forgotten by mortality. And I love your description of feeling complete. When I allow myself to let go of to-do lists and worries and stress and simply bask in moments of whatever we are doing together as a family, I do feel that! A wholeness and completeness.
And Marilyn, I already chatted with you further about this, but yes, like so many things, I think we can't fully feel their truth and comfort and goodness . . . until they are concretely ours and clear rather than a shadow of good things ahead.
And thank you both for the comments about the pictures. It made me feel like maybe these little people are doing all right under my somewhat faulty mothering after all.
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