Summer arrived in mid-August.
Perhaps it was the severity and length of last winter that so raised the expectations for summer that even the most sublime growing season could not fill the empty space left by deep darkness and twenty-three below. Still, unseasonably cool and wet months in June and July cramped the Sabbath warmth under the blue canopy of August. Mercifully, August leaked into September.
Walking the dog in fog and heavy dew these mornings, the sheer blue sky and sun burning off moisture from the top down, is a one of a kind pleasure. It is the time of year in which it is easy to allow our thoughts to drift ahead to winter and so miss the glory of this moment.
The next moment (as well as the last one), has a gravity all its own that pulls us hazardously toward it. Though we need to look ahead and plan, doing so robs us of being fully present in this moment – and each moment is the only place we can encounter God.
God does not exist in the past or the future, nor do we.
So whether we are graceful or ungainly, all of us have a balancing act to learn. No one has perfect balance either, so we need not get too rattled or down on ourselves when we keep falling into the past or the future.
In any given moment we are probably falling off balance by leaning too hard into one dimension of the other, that is what we do. But sometimes, and walking the dog is one of those for me, the gravity of the present moment exerts an unusual dominance that pulls us in. When we live within the pull of this moment’s gravity, grounded in the here and now, very often we will discover something or someone waiting for us. Even if it is not a whisper from the holy, it likely will be some kind of delight.
This moment, when we land in it fully, is teeming with small pleasures.
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