I forget how important connection to the land is. I'm dying here. I'm dying in many different ways on many different levels. But disconnection from the land is a particularly painful one. And yet, it is a subtle process that I don't notice as it progresses.
We spend a lot of time in life pushing through and ignoring the small discomforts, the small inner voices that sometimes whisper about our happiness. Because we have to, because you can't pay attention to all those little nigglings, because you have to get things done. Because there are things more important than your comfort in any particular moment.
And so I don't notice as I turn grayer, as I keep pushing harder to stay focused, productive, on task--as my body becomes less responsive, as I become less joyful, as I close down more, close in, as I have to push harder to push myself through the days and handle my responsibilities.
And then something--a beautiful bird call in the still of a peaceful, sunny morning--reminds me....
I remember the feeling of joy--of looking up, startled, from my computer work when a thrush landed on the screen in my window and poured song into my cabin. After breathing clean, fresh air--fully--for three days, air with scents of green and flowers, my lungs relax and open up. The cells are oxygenated. My eyes are clear.
The land rejuvenates me. My senses expand and are sharper. I'm reaching to listen to the sounds in the quiet, not closing in to try to block out the screeches of brakes and steering columns, clanks of machinery, and roar of airplanes overhead. The mists and fatigues dissipate. My thinking clears. In that clear space, the thinking is different. Without the clutter, the murk, and cloudiness, there is clarity in the mind like clear, still water.
What will happen when we can't touch into clean, clear spaces anymore?