This morning started out with a flurry of activity. Last night I had baked a cake that I wanted to share with my co-workers and knew I had to run to the grocery store this morning for whipping cream to top it off. My feet hit the floor with the running list of 'to be done' zooming through my head. Making my way downstairs I found that we, in the night, had been home to a sick dog in the living room. (You don't want to know.) This threw a wrench into the works of what was already an out-of-the-ordinary morning. By the time breakfast was eaten, hair was washed, dishwasher loaded, lunch packed, paper read, I felt as if I had lived nearly a full day and it wasn't even 8:00 a.m. Several times in my bustling about I had glimpsed, out the window, the grape iris in our garden as it seemed to grow even taller reaching toward to sun. Each time I saw it I thought, "I have to go out there and look, really look at it." Distracted by the next thing, I moved on and never made it outside.

As the morning sun shone on the backyard, its rays coaxed the brilliant purple petals open on this queen of the garden. I busily packed all the stuff I needed for my day into my car and backed out of the driveway. As I buckled my seat-belt, my eyes caught one last view of the stately iris. I made it all the way out of the driveway and several feet down the street. Then I stopped. I halted the busyness of the morning and pulled over and parked my car. With purpose, I got out and walked back  up the driveway and into the backyard to do the one thing I truly should have done all morning. I walked up and stood looking at the sun's rays fall across the deep purple of the iris. I stared into the heart of it, its deep yellow center with the brown stripes like eyebrows floating out toward the petal edges.(How is this possible?) The sun caught the colors as I reached down to smell the grape scent that emits from the deep purple, a smell that only comes my way for a few days of every year of my life. In just a matter of weeks these beautiful flowers will have died and been cut back as the next wave of color arrives in the garden. To have missed it would have been, dare I say it, sinful.

This morning was for paying homage, for being a pilgrim in my own backyard. I could have missed it. I could have continued driving and made my way onto the freeway and the rest of my day. But something inside me would not let me go, urged me to stop and see. Whether is was the Spirit or just good, common sense depends on your perspective I suppose. Whatever it was, it was a blessing and It has made all the difference in this day.

"Each day, every moment, you place your hand of blessing upon the brow of creation. In your touch, in your words, everything flowers, everything remembers the deep, perfect loveliness within. The deep, perfect loveliness of you." ~Sam Hamilton-Poore, Earth Gospel