Change

Life surely rolls along, doesn't it? Ever changing, our surroundings and our very world alter everyday, yet we go along as if everything were the same as it were a year ago, 5 years ago...we walk around in denial for the most part. Even we are ever changing...growing and evolving, maturing (one would hope!) into the adult person we are at this very second and the person we will be tomorrow. Everything effects us. Everything changes us. Even the weather. Every little thing teaches us something, so that some deep down part of us learns something and becomes different because of it.

Our landscape changes...spring, summer, winter...but it always comes back again in a way, to those same seasons of life, which I believe is part of the reason we walk around believing that everything is inherently the same, but it is anything but. With every spring comes a new landscape. If we looked more closely, we would see that. Even the trees grow and change, get older. Land erodes, rocks shift, trees are planted and knocked down. Even those people who shared the spring with us the previous year have changed, or are gone from this world. Those people who are breathing air right now, right this second...well, not all of them will be here by the end of the day, or week, or year. Our personal landscape is always changing. Yet we profess to hate change. Well, at least I do. But, the truth of it is I live with change everyday, I am surrounded by it and smothered by it. I can't run from it. Why do we try? Sitting in the same cubicle day after day, drinking coffee at the same place everyday...that doesn't make things the same. It just gives the illusion of sameness, of safety and comfort. Do I think there is anything wrong with having a safe zone...well, not really, but I just got to thinking today that although I may need to feel safe....how safe am I?

A friend of mine passed away yesterday. Yes, he was 86 years old or so...yes, he surely lived a wonderful life full of love and happiness, sorrow and disappointments, much like all of us, but his passing got me thinking of the impermanence of things, as I know all passings do. You can't walk by a cemetery without thinking of your own mortality. If you can, then you just aren't looking.

I like to be aware of my life, my frailties, my mortality. I know I'll never have enough time to read every book I feel I need to read. I know that my friend probably wished he had more time with his family and his garden. But I know he's at peace now. That just has to be enough for those of us left behind.

The knowing and faith we have in what lies beyond is all we have. I don't mind clinging to it, even in the face of constant change. It's all we have, really.

Change is all around us, but so is hope, and beauty and light. I think we can acknowledge our own morality without losing sight of those things too.

Now, I'm off to feed my birds.