Sometimes it just stuns you
like an arrow flung from some angel’s wing.
Sometimes it hastily scribbles
a list in the air: black coffee,
thick new books,
your pillow’s cool underside
the quirky family you married into.

It is content with so little really;
even the ink of your pen along
the watery lines of your dimestore notebook
could be a swiftly moving prayer.
~Andrea Potos

We are in that season when words like gratitude and thankfulness become the stars of the stage. This poem called ‘Essential Gratitude’ came across my reading plate this past week. The word ‘essential’ has been bandied about a lot over the last months and when it appears it brings about all kinds of questions within me. What does it even mean? Who can say what is and isn’t essential? Everyone’s life is so very different and to try to define what is essential for anyone of us seems an audacious act. In this conversation about essential we became confronted with all the people who plant, grow, harvest, sell, serve our food. All essential and most underpaid and under appreciated. Certainly, during these last months, we were reminded in ways we so easily forget that those who offer health care, elder care, child care, respite care, just plain everyday care, are certainly essential to our daily living. And then there are the teachers who welcome the young ones, witness to their lives, teach them skills they will need, inspire them with kindness and a sense of belonging, work hours longer than any of us would endure…essential all…and worthy of our thanks.

When I think back over the last months I am stunned at the many ways I have been bathed with a sense of gratitude. Certainly there is deep gratefulness for all those I have mentioned and also for the other numbers of people who have surrounded me and others I know with attention, phone calls, notes, ways of connecting that have lessened the isolation we have all felt from time to time. I have been grateful for the creativity of so many as they dreamed and brought to reality new ways of doing every thing from church to education to exercise. Aren’t we all astounded by what we have learned in the midst of this pandemic? And, of course, paramount is the gratitude for the scientists who came together to solve problems I cannot understand to create a vaccine that has helped us breathe a little easier. So many people to be grateful toward.

And yet, I think the poet is pushing us further. “Black coffee, thick books, the cool underside of the pillow, ink, cheap notebooks.” As I look out my window on this cold, November morning, I see the brown of the leaves from the trees that now make a winter blanket for my garden plants. Earlier in the summer these same leaves brought brilliant green to my yard and shade from the Sun’s rays. The wind is doing its work to bring the hangers-on to the ground to join their limb neighbors, a wind that is strong and cold and also reminds me of how the Spirit moves in our lives, unseen yet powerful nonetheless. A butterfly who lifeless body I found in June still adorns flowers on my kitchen table, its beauty a visual of what was and what will be again when summer returns. The Sun is slanting across the bowl of fruit that sits nearby and the colors of orange, yellow, red and green give my eyes a show. 

What is essential? What isn’t really? Important questions to consider. Essential gratitude? And how to cultivates its importance in our lives. Every day is filled with so much that I had nothing to do with bringing about but which serves my life and begs me to notice. Perhaps that is the true act of gratitude…the pausing, the noticing, the naming, as it becomes the ‘swiftily moving prayer’. 

“So this, I believe, is the central question upon which all creative living hinges: Do you have the courage to bring forth the treasures that are hidden within you?” 

~Elizabeth Gilbert: Big Magic:Creative Living Beyond Fear

In the last  few weeks, I have experienced two big ideas that came to life. They came to life because the creators possibly overcame their fears, their inner critics, the naysayers that likely showed up on their path. These creators followed a hidden desire to bring something to life that had niggled into their brain and would not let them go. We all have them…and some follow that thread that leads to an outcome that may even surprise them in what is born. 

The first big idea come to life happened on a trip to souther Wisconsin to a place called Kinstone.(https://www.kinstonecircle.com) Sitting in the beautiful farmland surrounded by the ubiquitous corn and soybeans, Kristine Beck worked several years creating stone circles, a dolmen, prairie gardens and a chapel that is small and so enveloping that it feels like a sacred embrace. Standing in this amazing landscape, I could only imagine the neighbors who watched as flatbed trucks hauled immense stones along the gravel roads to eventually be lifted high and placed into the ground. She must have been constantly questioned and challenged. But the big idea that lived within her and those that worked with her would not be quelled. And now this place welcomes others to come and stand in the amazement that is echoed in places like Stonehenge and New Grange. 

The second big idea in which I had the privilege of being present was the Immersive Van Gogh experience that has taken up residence in a warehouse in Minneapolis. What would happen if you take some of the most beloved paintings in the world and allow people to be held in the images as they float up the walls and dance on the floors? This must have been a guiding question that played in the mind of the creators. Add a background soundtrack that moves through jazz and classical music and the participants become a part of a play that never ends whose actors are ever changing and reacting in new and different ways. I can imagine the critics who tried to shoot this idea down for countless reasons. But the big dream that had been born in the creators would not bend to the critics words. In the end, people who might never see the smaller versions of these paintings in museums far away, feel the pulsing color and fluid movement of Van Gogh’s brush as it strokes their faces with color. 

These two experiences reminded me of Elizabeth Gilbert’s book, Big Magic:Creative Living Beyond Fear. I was blessed to meet Ms. Gilbert when she was on a book tour and to hear her speak about this inner drive that we all have to create, to make. “Do whatever brings you to life, then. Follow your own fascinations, obsessions, and compulsions. Trust them. Create whatever causes a revolution in your heart.” That night, her enthusiasm was contagious and I think everyone there walked out with the inner coals of creativity fanned. I know I did.

Of course, walking back into the daily, that enthusiasm can get lost or squelched by the outside(or inside) voices that want to keep us dreaming small. Thinking about these times in which we live, it seems to me we are hungry for the big ideas, the big dreams. How do we move on from this pandemic life? What will we do to hold onto all that was good that came to us? How will we resist the urge to try to return to things that seem ‘normal’? How will we change the systems that keep us hostage to a way of ‘us and them’, of the ‘haves and have nots’? All these questions need the work of big thinkers.

Ancient stones lifted to standing is not new. But it is new in the landscape of the southern prairie. The paintings of Van Gogh are not new. But the ability to have them embrace you with their beauty is. Big ideas or big dreams do not have to be particularly new to dazzle or inspire or shift the trajectory of human life. “It might have been done before, but it hasn’t been done by you!” says Liz Gilbert. 

What are the big dreams smoldering in your belly today? They might not need a giant crane to lift into place. Or a warehouse to house them. I believe they are there in all of us. May we find the courage to stoke the embers, our big dreams, for our own healing and for the healing of the world.

It is the season of letting go.
Green makes way for red and gold.
Winds blow with fierce intention
and what once held strong
now releases its grip on limb and bough.

These words began a piece I wrote for a collection of prayers, poems and reflections for a book entitled Autumn printed by the Iona Community’s Wild Goose Press. The writings would most likely be used by those preparing worship services but the invitation to reflect on the gifts of this season in which we now find ourselves reminded. me once again of the wisdom of the rhythms of Creation. This time of the year which we call ‘fall’ confronts us with the lessons of letting go, of slowing down, of being present to our own mortality. As I write this the leaves are dropping from a maple tree I have concerns about…its leaves have turned prematurely brown and an arborist has instructed me to watch it, to water it and to wait until spring to see if the summer’s drought has injured it and nothing more. Like with many of life’s circumstances, only time will tell.

It is the season of slowing down,
of remembering the bud and seed,
of measured light, dying beams,
slanting across the changing rhythm of our days.

Darkness is now coming earlier in the evenings and exiting later in the mornings. This change in light can bring on a melancholy, our bodies seem to need the light to propel ourselves off the mattress. Having been a morning person most of my adult life, I find the darkness something to grapple with, something to hold gently as my own rhythms shift and become accustomed to this shadowed beginning to the day. I have to remind myself of all the good things that come from darkness: babies in the womb, bulbs that will bloom from dark soil, stars that can only be seen on a background of blackened sky.

It is the season of returning,
falling back to the earth,
to the life that quivered in summer breezes,
to the energy that shone sun onto our upturned faces.

Endings are always difficult. Summer’s end carries the memory of color that arrived after winter’s white and spring’s promise only to burst into greens and reds and brilliant yellows with summer’s arrival. This circular movement reminds us of the cycle of birth, life, and death that exists in the Universe, a cycle of which we are all a part. How to rest in that wisdom and allow our bodies to settle in it? It is the always present call offered to us if we choose to listen, if we choose to stay awake. 

Creator of all seasons, enfold us in the wisdom of letting go.
Infuse us with the breath of slowing down.
Guide us in the dance of returning
as we rest and renew in this most holy season.

May this day find each of us looking up to the trees that want to teach us. May we spend time watching a leaf as it falls to its resting place. May we notice the skies in their brilliant blue as they make a home for fluffy, white clouds and birds in V-formation heading to their winter home. May we await the darkness with gratitude for all it houses. May we know the gift of letting go. 

It is the music that undoes me. Almost as soon as it begins, I feel the tears pooling in my eyes while my throat tightens with that overwhelming desire to fight off the emotion. Why do I bother? I look around and see that I am not alone. As someone who has logged more hours in church that I care to admit, the return of being with others in what is called worship still draws me in while holding an ambiguous feeling. Even though the services I attend are held outside and some of us are wearing masks, the experience is still held in that gray area of the unknown. The spoken words are mostly familiar and the rhythm of the liturgy is there and yet…we know that something has changed in how we come together. And we don’t know what it all means for how we will move into a future that holds both the ‘way we were’ and the ‘who we will become.’ It is probably true for schools and work settings, for sports teams and card clubs, any place where two or more are gathered.  Many of us find ourselves in this tenuous place that has not yet formed, caught in the in-between. And that in-between place carries so much that is unknown and also so important.

But the music. In the first in-person time of worship I attended on the lawn of the church, the service began with singing “Morning Has Broken”, a simple tune with words planted inside me from camps long ago. Through my masked face, I did not get more than a few words out until the tears started to fall. Finally, I gave up singing and just let the music wash over me, allowing the place where the tune first entered me to be stroked with memory, gentleness and healing. Yesterday, the opening song was “There Is a Balm in Gilead” and the same thing happened. I was reaching for a tissue when I noticed the young woman sitting near me wipe an errant tear from her cheek before it could be caught in the cotton of her mask. “There is a balm in Gilead to make the wounded whole”…may it be so. I managed to make it through more of this tune than I did on that earlier Sunday which I am counting as a win. Perhaps by Christmas, I will be able to get through a whole, tearless song but I am not holding my breath. Perhaps by Christmas, we will be able to safely meet in the sanctuary. Again, no breath is being held. Mostly, I am simply thankful for the care and caution exhibited by those planning for these important times, for the ways in which they have taken into account those who are most vulnerable, the oldest and the youngest among us.

These tearful musical experiences have had me thinking about the role that music plays in our lives. As a former middle school music teacher, I remember realizing how music became that place of identity during those precious, often painful years. The music listened to during adolescence bores into some cell deep place and defines who we are, what we hope to become. How many of us remember certain songs when we drive past a particular place or down a certain street? As we get older our music palette may change but those initial songs we could sing by heart, over and over, are within us and we can’t escape their presence. The words and tunes told of our longings, our dreams, our hopes, our fears. For those of us who still listen to a lot of music, the same can be said. There are certain songs and those who perform those songs, that create the soundtrack for our days saying things we might not be able to say for ourselves.

Yesterday’s service contained a song that was new to me, by Sara Bareilles.  As the young woman began to sing this tune called ‘Brave’, the tears once again welled up in my eyes. The lyrics urged the hearer to ‘show how big your brave is’. The last months have required much of us all. Compassion. Empathy. Isolation. Caution. Patience. Discernment. Intelligence. Creativity. Perseverance. Resilience. All these and so much more. And also, I suppose, I certain kind of bravery. The next months may ask more of the same. Bravery comes in many forms and, hopefully, we will all have the wherewithal to show how big our brave is. While we’re at it, may we be surrounded by music that lifts us up, fortifies us and brings us to tears. 

Here’s a link to the song. You’ll need to skip through the ad. Enjoy!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QUQsqBqxoR4 

I did not plant them. And yet, there they are. Blooming in my garden. A bouquet of lavender petunias. And one strikingly tall sunflower. How they did this is both gift and mystery to me. Among all the other plants and bushes I did plant and tend, some blooming with more success than others, I have now added these two guests to my care. In the gardening world, I believe they are called ‘volunteers’…they volunteered themselves to make beauty in my yard, to bloom where they were planted. 

Who understands such a phenomenon? Who can give language to these many gifts that show up at our doors?  Who can speak with adequate eloquence of such mysteries? It seems to fall to the poets and artists to do so. Of course, Mary Oliver, poet and observer of all life’s beauty said:”Truly, we live with mysteries too marvelous to be understood.” You can say that again, wise poet! 

Truth be told, I have never been a fan of petunias. And I would probably never have chosen this particular shade of lavender. Yet I have come to love it as much as the other blooms scattered about the yard. And sunflowers never fail to floor me so I have watched this stalk, now taller than I am, grow and grow and open its sunny, yellow face to the Sun. Today I stood and watched as the bees collecting energy for their journey fed on the golden brown center. If all goes according to the stalks’ plans, there are three more floral blossoms to appear before autumn makes its inevitable entrance and the flowers fade. 

These two blooming volunteers have given me much to remember and reflect upon in these steamy days at summer’s waning. Whether gift or mystery, we are surrounded by so much that comes to us from no work or effort on our part. Of course, we need look no further than our dinner tables. I think of the abundance of summer vegetables coming our way right now. Some people may have a backyard garden but the majority of us rely on the planting, harvesting, transporting and selling of the food that nourishes our bodies. People we have never known and whose lives we can only imagine have toiled on our behalf. They have made sacrifices we know nothing about. They have sweat in the morning sun, ate home-packed lunches in the heat of the day, then dragged themselves home in various states of exhaustion. They have battled sun, rain, insects and working conditions both just and unjust. And this says nothing of the animals who offer their very lives for the protein that graces our diets. So many gifts. So much mystery.

As for me, I want to walk the world in awareness of all the many concentric circles of connection that bind us to one another, living as human beings having a spiritual experience. I want to never take for granted those who have labored and offered gifts for my living, whose lives are intertwined with mine. In the minutiae of the daily, it is often difficult. I get bogged down in the lists I make, the details I try to accomplish. But on a good day…in a particular moment…I become awakened to these invisible threads of connection that make my life possible and my heart is lifted in gratitude.

So today, I will say thank you to the petunia and the sunflower for starters. Again, as Mary Oliver urges:
‘Let me keep company with those who say
“Look!” and laugh in astonishment,
and bow their heads.’

Yes. Yes, indeed.

The 2021 Olympics have come and gone. Like everything over the last months, they were not what anyone expected. No cheering audiences. Masks were worn by athletes as they walked to podiums to receive their medals. Testing for the virus became as daily an activity as stretching, jumping, running, and moving through water. Watching these mostly young people, my heart went out to them knowing their experience was so much different than most had imagined since they were children. 

The Olympics always has those of us who watch learning new words, words we never say any other time in a given four years. Triple Salchow comes to mind. “Will she land the triple salchow?”, we say, allowing it to trip off our tongues. Watch enough of ice skating and you can recognize one when you see it and to be able to flaunt the knowledge of what it is called seems appropriate.

This year’s word that seemed to be front and center was the ‘twisties’. We learned about the ‘twisties’ when Olympic champion Simone Biles sat out most of the events she was expected to win because she was suffering from this condition. Describing it as ‘the experience when a gymnast loses their ability to judge where they are in the air, made most of us quake in our armchairs. The fact that these young men and women can catapult themselves into all manner of heights and then land safely on their feet is always a marvel. To think that there might be a time mid-air when they lose the ability to know where they are is completely unnerving. Ms. Biles’ courage at sitting out of the events she has trained for over so many years provided a learning opportunity for all of us.

As I thought about ‘the twisties’, I couldn’t help but think this is a perfect new Olympic word to learn this particular year. Doesn’t it describe for many of us what we have felt over the last eighteen months? While we have not spun high in the air and done splits on a balance beam, we have tried to find a way to gauge how to hold our lives together in ways we have never done before. I know I have lost the ability to judge many things. What day it really is, for one. Which situations are safe and which are not. How to interact with others who see this pandemic much differently than we do. How to move forward from where we are into an uncertain future. All of these can throw us off balance, unable to judge, not only where we are, but also where it is best to land.

Perhaps we can all take a cue from Simone Biles. What did she do when ‘the twisties’ overtook her? Of course, I don’t know for sure what her process was when this happened but this is what I observed. She stopped. She sat still. She named the anxiety that was gripping her. She watched her friends doing the things they all love. She talked to those who support her even when she is not doing stupendous jumps in the air. Stillness. Naming. Being witness to others. Continuing to hold onto what you love. Surrounding oneself with love and support. 

In June, we thought this pandemic was on its way out the door. Things have changed and we are still in its grip. In the days and months to come, the ‘twisties’ may still visit us. But as the poet/saint Mary Oliver reminds us:”it is a serious thing // just to be alive / on this fresh morning / in this broken world.” And so it is. So, I will continue to practice…stillness…naming…witnessing…loving…holding onto those who continue to circle round. All this may not keep the ‘twisties’ from altering my judgment. But at least, I know climbing back on the beam is a possibility. We can’t stay in the air forever.

“Then the singing enveloped me. It was furry and resonant, coming from everyone’s very heart. There was no sense of performance or judgment, only that the music was breath and food.” 

~Anne Lamott, Traveling Mercies: Some Thoughts on Faith

This has been a summer of reunions for me. At the beginning of the summer, I headed to my hometown to look into the amazing faces of those I had known since early childhood. Last week, I was in the presence of people with whom I joined voices and created beautiful music for the Ohio State Fair, for people all over the state of Ohio and for audiences of strangers as we toured Europe together for three weeks. It was a memory held, laughed filled and poignant gathering as, with one another’s help, we stitched together memorable concerts, songs and relationships. 

Singing in a choir is one of the ways in which we get to experience what it means to be a small part of something larger…to bring our individual gift and team it with others to make something greater, more beautiful than one voice can ever do alone. One person sings a note, another joins in and yet another adds to it and, Voila!, music that lifts the human soul is created. For those who have sung in choirs, you know what I mean. Even as you carry your, perhaps, tentative voice into the space, you are lifted by the energy and power of those around you, joining you, making music.  The singers look out on an audience and know that they are communicating something to them that only sound and poetry can offer. Which is why these last months, without singing, has been so tragic. To think that the very thing that has the power to heal the hurting heart can also be the thing that spreads illness seems unbearable.

I am sure that folks who participate in a team sport experience a kind of bonding that may be similar. Never having done this, I don’t know for sure, but I have seen a camaraderie build among those on teams my sons have played on. So I know it is possible. And yet, I believe, there is something special about making music together. There is always the possibility that a song with erupt in the oddest of places! And I know for a fact that spending time basically living with other singers, traveling to places that challenge and excite you, changes you and creates a place in you that will be with you forever. This is what happened this past weekend when these singers gathered again. Stories were shared, life updates were told, memories were dredged up and the bond that had been forged so many years ago was again strengthened. Our lives had at one time been joined in such a way that, even though we have not seen one another in years, was renewed. 

Reunion. Re-Union. “The act or process of being brought together again as a unified whole.” Of course, in this reunion many were missing from our ranks. Not everyone could travel to the weekend get together so perhaps we were not completely ‘unified’. But those of us who were there remembered and celebrated for the whole that we once were. The music we once made. The adventures we once shared. The hearts we once stirred.

I believe we are all hungry for a re-union. As the pandemic lingers on, we are all aching for an experience of being ‘enveloped’ in something ‘furry and resonant, coming from everyone’s very heart.’ A re-union that has ‘no sense of performance or judgment.’ Something like music…which can be both ‘breath and food.’

“If music be the food of love, play on.” says Shakespeare. So here’s to more music…more love…more re-union. 

“The world is full of magic things, patiently waiting for our senses to grow sharper.”
~W.B. Yeats

Walking around the lake last week, I was taking in all the many wildflowers that just show up and strut their stuff in some of the most unsuspected places. These July days are filled to overflowing with a riot of color everywhere you look. And yet it wasn’t the color that drew my eye, but the simple, white elegance of the Queen Anne’s Lace that seemed to nestle in between the blooms of yellow and purple and pink. This wildflower can be found in fields and along bodies of water in both city and countryside providing the counterpoint to the colors of summer. It is a simple flower. Understated. Beautiful.

But Queen Anne’s Lace has always been a flower that is special to me and carries a wonderful memory of my Mother.. I can’t remember how old I was. It was definitely summer and we had been out walking in a field somewhere. As we walked, my Mother picked some of these flowers and we carried them back to our house. I likely thought she would put them in a jar for our kitchen table. But she instead proceeded to fill some kitchen glasses with a little bit of water. Into the water she dropped food coloring, the same tiny bottles with their teardrop tops that usually only came out at Christmas cookie baking time. She then placed a stem of Queen Anne’s Lace into each glass. “Watch this.” she said. 

I remember the feeling of staring as these flowers turned from white to blue or yellow or pink as the food coloring made its way up the stem and into the delicate petals. It was then that I knew that my Mother was magic. I knew I loved her and that she had always done amazing things to care for me and our family. But this was the moment she was lifted up to something much higher. My Mother was magic! I can’t remember how long those flowers remained in their glasses or how long I marveled at my Mother’s brilliance but, so many years later, I still have a nearly visceral experience of what happened in our kitchen that afternoon. 

Magic. The Irish poet, Yeats, reminds us that ‘the world is full of magic things’. And it is, of course, true. Sights and experiences that boggle our minds and cause us to see things in an entirely new and fresh way are around every corner. We rarely call those moments ‘magic’ but we might do well do so, don’t you think?. And after the year we have just experienced, couldn’t we all do with a little dose of magic? I tend to believe that children are more attuned to being witness to magic. It is what draws them to fairy tales and stories where what might seem impossible really does happen.Yeats reminds us that this ability to see magic is within all our reach as we hone our senses and allow our eyes, ears, fingertips, tongues and noses to be present to what is already there. 

It would be one of my deepest wishes to be so attuned that the magic of the everyday would make an appearance. How about you? What magic have you seen lately? What kind of magical moments have walked into your life? Summer…at least in Minnesota…is a time to be on the look out for that ever-present magic. Queen Anne’s Lace in its simple form carries its own magic. The birds in all their variety eating from the same feeder remind us of the magic of diversity and of co-existing. The tree or flower planted by a seed dropped from a winged or four legged creature that now has its own claim in the garden. Then there are fireflies, fields alight with the flickering of insects. All a kind of magic.

My Mother was most known for the magic she created in the kitchen especially baking pies. Her hands and the recipes she held in her head allowed her to create magic with the simple ingredients of flour, fat, salt and water. Into these crusts she would pour fruit or fillings that were infused with sugary sweetness and, mostly, love. 

In a few weeks my Mother will have been gone from us for a year. I still find myself thinking I will call to tell her about something I saw or read during my day. The Magic Makers stay with us through all they helped us see, all the ways they helped us grow. For this, I am grateful.

He walks into the space and his limbs are already moving with the music. His shoulders jump up and down, keeping the beat. His arms fly and thrust into the air. And across his face, a smile grows from ear to ear, never seeming to stop. Within a few moments he is dancing…finding his spot on the dance floor…switching out partners with the change of each song. And all the while he is projecting… joy…joy in the music, joy in the moment, joy in the dance.

During summer evenings, I make my way to Como Park Pavilion to listen to the local musicians who offer their gifts during these precious Minnesota days of warmth and sun. Overlooking the sweet, little lake that creates the backdrop of this idyllic summer experience, I rest in the sound, the scenery and the beauty of a community that forms when multiple generations of strangers come together, held in the power of music.  And I revel in watching this one particular dancer who fills me to overflowing with deep happiness. Always clad in a University of Minnesota T-shirt and baseball cap, he is a walking…dancing…advertisement for the ‘U’. “If you go to this university, you, too, may be as happy an older person as I am.” This is what his movements bring to my mind.”You, too, can exhibit this ‘joie de vivre’! his movements seem to say.

Joie de vivre, a ‘keen or buoyant enjoyment of life’, say the French. And who among us would not want to be able to walk through the world with such a gait? Especially now, as we creep out of our homes and back into this different world where we are so cautious. The ability to embrace life with such zest seems particularly alluring. When I watch this man dancing, I am buoyed that the world is going to be okay. What he is bringing to those who watch, or those lucky enough to dance with him, costs nothing except a little energy and sweat. And while locked down and in our homes, didn’t we all learn over the last months how little we really need? While the joy may have been dampened in our individual and collective lives, his movements tell me that there is hope in recovering some spirit that declares a keen and buoyant enjoyment of life once again. 

Being witness to his movements, I have to admit that I wonder if this is how he has always been. I tend to believe it is. I can imagine him as a young boy gyrating around his kitchen in the mornings before school. Or trying to contain his body that wanted to bounce and kick while sitting in a desk at school. Likely the adults in his life have said more than once,”Stand still! Keep your feet quiet!” I can also imagine that he was a draw for all the young, high school women who wanted to move from the chairs that lined the gymnasium walls and onto the dance floor with a partner who could really dance.

One thing I know from watching this wiry gentleman: ‘joie de vivre’ cannot be contained. I, for one, am glad that his fit, lithe body still propels his limbs and feet into the world. My life is better for it. My spirit is lifted because of it. And from the smiles I see emanating from the faces around that concert space, I believe everyone is filled with an energy and a joy they, perhaps, thought had been lost.

Agnes de Mille, the great dancer said: “To dance is to be out of yourself. Larger, more beautiful, more powerful…This is power, it is glory on earth and it is yours for the taking.” 

Wherever you are reading this, the invitation is to breathe deeply, to lift your limbs in whatever way is available to you. To dance. To feel the glory on earth. Yours for the taking. Joie de vivre! A keen and buoyant enjoyment of life!

Everything that is made beautiful and fair and lovely is made for the eye of one who sees.

~Rumi

One of my favorite drives is down the Wisconsin side of the Mississippi River. Taking in the rolling, evolving farmland and noticing the different stages of the growing seasons always grounds me in some deep way. Observing eagles flying overhead while sheep and cattle graze below is a blessed sight. Along with a friend, I made this drive on a recent holiday Sunday as we observed our own kind of Independence Day. The weather was steamy and the sun intense but the scenery soothed us. 

In Alma, Wisconsin we drove to the highest point in this little river town, a park named Buena Vista. It brought an inner chuckle to think of this area, likely settled by Germans and Scandinavians, choosing this name for such an amazing overlook of the valley below. Sometimes we need to cross a bridge into other languages to have the perfect descriptor for a scene, an experience. 

Buena Vista…literally meaning ‘good view’. When I see these words, I often think what the namer meant was really ‘beautiful view’. Good is fine yet beautiful is something larger, more expansive, worthy of flowing words like ‘buena vista’. This was certainly true of the view that met our eyes on this hot, July day. We stood with others who had directed their cars along the winding, rising ordinary road to reach this extraordinary feast for the eye. Standing, looking out over the river, islands, and backwaters I thought of what it must have meant for those who witnessed its beauty long ago. For some it had always been home. Their eyes likely took in the view in a way different from later arrivals. For these it perhaps spelled adventure. Or freedom. Or opportunity. Yet, all…buena vista.

I have been blessed to be witness to countless buena vistas in both this country and others. Oceans, mountains, lakes, cities, countryside, all have placed their bounty before my grateful eyes. Architecture dreamed and built, art that flowed through the artist’s hand, have joined forests and fields planted by both human and the precipitious gift of wind. All have provided extraordinary experiences that served to lift my spirit and nourish my heart.

And, of course, there are the buena vistas that are not housed in the landscape of the natural world. Gazing into the fresh faces of my newborn sons…buena vista. The comforting smile of a friend. The unknowing kindness of a stranger. A perfectly executed table laden with food prepared for celebration. A newborn baby’s eyelashes. My mother’s hands. All…buena vista.

The experience of ‘buena vista’ is in many ways dependent on the viewer. As the wise one Rumi says: “Everything that is made beautiful and fair and lovely is made for the eye of one who sees.” We see, we notice, we wonder, we marvel and we name. May these burgeoning summer days find us having more and more moments of throwing our arms in the air and declaring with joy…”BUENA VISTA!”