Still Shaking

Heaven on Earth at Riverwood

I don't quite know where to start, so maybe I will just send you over to AC's blog for some details first.

Oh my, I am not kidding when I say I am still shaking. I read AC's blog just now and got goose bumps all over again. It was such a close call, and it would have been head-on at 100k's per hour. We would NOT have come out of that alive, and if we had, we might have wished we hadn't.

I took my journal and my coffee out onto the front porch this morning and sat in the sunshine in stunned silence while my brain wheeled and spun around the events of last night. On this particular morning, the sunshine felt brighter, the coffee tasted richer, the bird-songs sounded sweeter; my quiet life blessed. I was so thankful to be sitting in my peaceful house without a scratch, bruise or broken bone. It could have been so different.

After our narrow miss, I sat in the car and shivered last night. I had hot coffee in my hand, for we had just stopped at Tim's five minutes before our encounter, and my hand shook as I tried to bring the cup to my lips. I think there was a coat-of-paint distance between us and the other car when we passed each other going in opposite directions at 100k's per hour. I could feel air blowing on me through the open door to the next world as we whizzed by the other car. It made the hairs on my arms stand on end.

The road we were on was dark, narrow, twisty, and hilly. We passed rock outcroppings, gullies, marshes, lakes, and guard rails in spots with no shoulder. The dark woods, full of deer and other animals that have been known to dart out in front of speeding cars late at night, were all around us. We were on the alert for all of these things, but speeding cars trying to pass a line of cars under such conditions was not an expected sight around one of the bends.

We avoided a major crash, we were OK, we would live to see another day, but as we sped on into the night, the terror of what might have happened wrapped its icy fingers around me, and I shook.

Sitting out on my sunny front porch with my coffee and my journal this morning I realized that if we had crashed last night and my life had ended, I was pleased with the way I spent what might have been my last day on earth. A day that started with a beautiful early morning drive in the country, and then was filled with family time, a walk in the woods at Riverwood, good food, laughter, hugs, and talk about wedding plans, was just about the best day that one could have.

Farmer Tuck and I walking along the Logging Road at Riverwood.

I also realized that I am doing what I want to with my life. What more rewarding task could I be doing than giving Smudge my tender care while Mommy and Daddy are at work? It is a rich and rewarding venture AC and I are on. I have started to paint again, and found a way to do it without pain. The ink is flowing on the journal pages, wedding plans are moving forward for Bug and Puff, and a new baby is on the way for Thesha and Theboy. Life is good. One of the first things on my "to do" list for today though is to give Smudge and family a big hug. Looking forward to giving Bug and Puff a big hug when I see them too.

We don't know what today will bring, or if we will have tomorrow, so I suggest you do the same and hug someone you love while you have the chance!

This favorite Mary Olive poem came to mind this morning, so I thought I would end this post with it.

When Death Comes

When death comes
like the hungry bear in autumn;
when death comes and takes all the bright coins from his purse

to buy me, and snaps the purse shut;
when death comes
like the measle-pox

when death comes
like an iceberg between the shoulder blades,
I want to step through the door full of curiosity, wondering:
what is it going to be like, that cottage of darkness?

And therefore I look upon everything
as a brotherhood and a sisterhood,
and I look upon time as no more than an idea,
and I consider eternity as another possibility,

and I think of each life as a flower, as common
as a field daisy, and as singular,

and each name a comfortable music in the mouth,
tending, as all music does, toward silence,

and each body a lion of courage, and something
precious to the earth.

When it's over, I want to say all my life
I was a bride married to amazement.
I was the bridegroom, taking the world into my arms.

When it's over, I don't want to wonder
if I have made of my life something particular, and real.

I don't want to find myself sighing and frightened,
or full of argument.

I don't want to end up simply having visited this world.

Mary Oliver