extraneous

Yesterday I enjoyed a birding walk along the Sand Creek Trail, a local path that follows thick hedgerows bordering cultivated fields, community gardens and the athletic complexes of a nearby college. Hedgerows make for interesting birding because they form a threshold between woodland and open field, and quite often there is a greater diversity of creatures here in these ecological borderlands, including birds.

One challenge with birding along this particular trail, however, is that a section of it borders the busy traffic artery of I-135. If you look closely at the image above you can catch just a glimpse of the interstate's cement through a gap in the foliage.

The highway makes birding difficult because of the incredible noise generated by steel-belted tires on asphalt. Birding this time of year, after the trees and shrubs have leafed out, is done more by ear than eye. As I traveled this section of trail yesterday my ear caught a faint, familiar song. At first, all I could hear was road noise, and I found that my first impulse was to focus on it--it was the most obvious and obnoxious sound--and I felt a growing frustration and resistance to the din. Then, I decided to just try and listen first for the bird.

I took some deep breaths, caught the faint song, and simply allowed my attention rest there. Very gradually the outer noise of the highway faded to background, the inner noise of my frustration quieted, and the sound of the bird became more clear. At first I thought the bird was flying closer, and that the traffic on the highway had lessened, but that was not the case. The traffic was rolling by thick and fast as ever, and the bird remained some distance away, but now its rich, clear whistle was more defined and I could tell it was one of my favorite birds, a Tufted titmouse.

All that had changed was my intention and focus. There was a releasing that happened in that moment, a letting go of extraneous noise, and a corresponding choice to focus differently. The result was greater simplicity and increased clarity.

There is so much extraneous noise in this world and in our daily lives--not just sound but also visual noise, noisy activity, noisy information, etc. Some of this noise is external and some is internal. Our rapid-fire minds struggle to process the incessant input and sometimes it can be quite overwhelming to discern what is worthy of our attention and reflection.

The temptation may be to resist that which we deem unnecessary and unwelcome; but we soon find that the resistance has a confounding way of amplifying the very things we may want to be relieved of. What is needed is a shift of the heart, an intentional shift of focus that directs the intention toward that which is most essential, most truthful, most life-giving, and most worthy of our loving awareness.

'Tis a gift to be simple
'tis a gift to be free,
'tis a gift to come down where we ought to be . . .

(from "Simple Gifts" by Joseph Brackett)

unmoored

I'll make another beginning here. I note that the last entry was nearly three years ago. No need to try and explain the hiatus; perhaps it was needed, perhaps it was neglect. 

Now is a good time for beginnings and restarts; because they are intertwined with endings and so much loss. This pandemic season has been a time of unmooring, a disconnecting from familiar patterns and practices. Most of this has been by necessity, but some has been by intention.

Time passes differently now. Many things that anchored me to the passage of hours, days, weeks and months are now released. Relationships, too, are subject to the unsettled currents and the open-ended absences we endure.

What is ground?

Where is center?

 Who remains?

With so much voluntarily released or involuntarily removed, what holds?

This is the via negativa. We are now given the opportunity to learn by unlearning, know by unknowing, and begin by ending. First, though, we must be willing to know our need for such loss and letting go.

I've been wondering about what it means to grieve right now. The need for grief now is visceral. Private grieving of the most personal losses, yes, but so much more: the collective grieving of great communal and even global losses. How do we grieve as a community? How do we grieve as a whole people? How do we grieve with life beyond our human experience? With a planetary whole? Is this possible? Are we willing? Who are our guides?





So, I return here to wonder and remain
curious and brokenhearted,
courageous and fearful,
still and moving,
alone and with countless others,
with love.


image:  personal rune, Ⓒ2019