someplace wilder
i jumped out of my car, climbed over the rail and stood in awe. the red-tail tropic birds were obviously out to impress. dramatic halts and dives, in pure white with their long wings and short short tails; all except for the one red tail feather that stretches out far behind them.
i noticed for the first time how they barely have any legs at all, and jet-black, wide webbed feet to match the thick black lines of feathers around their eyes. their flying was so near to me, and so impressive, i felt as though i’d never seen flying before.
a tourist came over the cliff side telling me he had just talked with the shorebirds’ guardian: a man who for the last 15 years has trapped both mongoose and rat on these cliffs. their nests have gone from nine to over 80 in number.
i asked, “what is all this beautiful flying was about?” mating rites. of course…the drama 😂. i stood in the hot sun feeling as though i had caught them in the middle of a celebration. so full of life! and all i had to do was watch.
i remember when playing outside was all i ever wanted. that little girl is still here and i’m gonna let her dilly-dally in nature.
i hiked around the cliffs that day and found a nest with a sweet, sweet, funny looking, big and pinkish nestling. up higher on the cliff and further away was a fluffy brown and white fledgling with it's mother. the younglings were big and goofy and fuzzy while their parents were of a sleek definition of white and black.
i began to wonder…
if all of my best days are spent in nature, why is it so hard to tear myself away from civilization? i feel as if i've stolen these days for myself but, when i am home i am living almost exactly as I please and for my own joy, why does a couple hours spent on the couch with my kids feel like a more permissible indulgence?
a part of me comes alive when i am alone and out in the green and the blue. it’s a-tunement. (sorry, is that a word?😂) it's meditation, and medicine. it's self-compassion and kindness. for God's sake! it's exercise.
but here’s what’s most important: out there is a whole world WORTHY of you. YOU are the crown of all this glorious creation! on the day Yahweh made us, he put us in a garden…and he walked with us there in the cool of the evening. we don’t belong on the couch eating up everything humanity is dishing out.
we belong amongst created things…on the mountains in between the trees, in the garden valleys, or swimming in an ocean of a thousand blues! contrary to popular belief, there are still vast amounts of space, glorious space. and we’ve yet to wear it out! earth is still a glorious place! and we were made for it.
don't put it off as indulgence. learn it as discipline. take your feet someplace wilder.
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These are the generations of the heavens and the earth when they were created,
in the day that the LORD God made the earth and the heavens.
When no bush of the field was yet in the land and no small plant of the field had yet sprung up—for the LORD God had not caused it to rain on the land, and there was no man to work the ground, and a mist was going up from the land and was watering the whole face of the ground— then the LORD God formed the man of dust from the ground and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life, and the man became a living creature. And the LORD God planted a garden in Eden, in the east, and there he put the man whom he had formed. And out of the ground the LORD God made to spring up every tree that is pleasant to the sight and good for food. Genesis 2:4-9
And God saw all that He had made, and behold, it was very good. Genesis 1:31