Digressions

The following is a small digression from the norm found here. Why? I’m not sure. Perhaps it was needed more than I realized. Perhaps it was a truth that needed to be shared. Enjoy.

The Blessing

She sat behind her desk, fiddling with the ball point that should be gliding across decorative paper, staring out the window without seeing the scene beyond the pane of frosted glass. The day dragged on as it had since 8 am. Memories held her attention, drawing her back to people and places thirty years before and far away from this cold and dreary place; memories of those gone from this world though never far from daily thought.

Emotional upheaval caught at her throat as she pictured another holiday season, another room, another impending loss. Tears threatened to take permanent possession of her eyes even as swallowing became a challenge. How often did she have to relive those days and nights belonging to the past?

A moment, a day, a lifetime later, the woman turned away from the window to see where she’d left off on her annual Christmas letter to family and friends. In the center of the bright red, beribboned page she saw a portrait; an image she’d not seen smile in so very many years. The sudden appearance of that face broke her resolve to forego crying.

Her mother’s laughing, loving countenance required a release of the building tension that threatened to overtake her again this year.

Had her mother’s spirit found a way to visit long enough to reassure her of the rightness of things? Was this a message instructing her finally to let go? Or, was it merely a sign that her mother was happy where she was?

Did it matter what the exact message was so long as something positive came from it?

The woman found herself smiling at this gift that had been given to her. Whether her subconscious had doodled the portrait or some other means had put the beloved face on the page, the gift was gratefully accepted. She could go on now with the holiday that had become a burden to survive rather than a gift to appreciate and celebrate.

A slow smile began to spread across her face, her throat loosening its muscles and tear ducts turning off their leaks. The time had come to release the unshed grief. Blessings came in myriad packages, she realized.

Blessings and Irony

I’ve been thinking for the past few days about blessings and how often we fail to take the time to count them. I’ve been trying to take the time for a few blessings each day and ruminate over them so that I can truly appreciate them.

Being thankful for the ability to write anything and have someone read it seems a petty thing. But when you think about it, it’s not petty at all. For instance, I have this blog and another, plus the website. I have poetry and short stories. There are articles around and about and essays. And now, BJ and I are putting together the beginnings of our book.

Those aren’t really petty at all. They may not garner a Pulitzer, but then I never expect to get one of those anyway. Hanging on the edges of that blessing is one other consideration.

The ability to write and have it read and appreciated is a blessing for me and others. But, what if all you could write was something for only a few and it brought them nothing but pain and sorrow? See what I mean about edges?

BJ and I went on a short car trip on Saturday, winding our way through the mountains and across the eastern high plains to Great Falls. Photos were many, but not as many as we would have liked. One of the things we noticed throughout was the river levels being so high. Flooding is going on throughout the northern Rockies and plains. Just ask Iowans about the Missouri.

We looked at the headwaters of the Missouri Saturday from its edges. It was running full and heavy. The geese and pelicans didn’t seem to mind, though. One of the little towns we drove through to get to Great Falls is called Sun River because the Sun River runs alongside it. The Sun was running high, fast, and heavy, too.

Word came down this afternoon that all roads leading into/out of that sweet little town are closed right now due to being under water. We can say that if the roads are under water, I feel for those residents that couldn’t get out in time.

We talked about the weather following us around the country while we were on tour and little of it was good weather. I had that same déjà vu feeling when I heard the news about Sun River today. Talk about irony! BJ and I discussed how high the river was as we sailed past on one of those roads on Saturday.

Speaking of irony, here’s one for you. If any of you have gone to my http://claudsy.wordpress.com/  blog, you’ll know that I posted little travel piece about our drive on Saturday. This morning I received a notice from Wordpress admin that someone had liked the post so well that a finger had been engaged in pressing the “Like” button. Admin congratulated me and told me that said reader was from Manila, Philippines.

I loved this notice. It told me that someone really enjoyed my words. The irony is that try as I might, I looked everywhere I could think of and couldn’t find a like button to click. Did they hide it? If someone knows where they keep it, let me know. I’ll start clicking. There are some marvelous postings over there each week.

My writing blessing brought pleasure to reader and to me. It brought deeper thoughts about serendipity of events and the irony that’s carried with some of those events. I’ve run the gamut this morning.

Now, you want to hear the last little topper. We’d planned on doing lower Glacier Park this morning. It began raining during the night and it’s still going. Up there it will be snow. The last word on Glacier’s Going-to-the­-Sun road—it’s iffy whether they’ll be able to open the Visitor’s Center this year. Right now it’s buried in snow. That Center sits a good twenty feet above the parking lot, and they can barely find a speck of roof. It seems the Park Service did aerials on June 4.

Our temp right now is 43 degrees in Kalispell, with rain. The blessing for us—we live on the northwest side away from rivers barely below flood yesterday. We also live on the only hill around of significance and we have a second-story apt. Sometimes it pays to have irony work in your favor.

Hope you all stay dry and happy. Take care. Count those blessings, too.

Until later,

Claudsy