It looks like the COG isn't going to post his pictures of the moonset in Bandon, so I'm posting one of his here. The colors are truer to what we saw. Amazingly beautiful, one of those moments that goes into your lifetime album of perfect moments.
Completely quiet, except for the waves.
4 comments:
It must have been sublime. The colors, the silence, the waves, the feel of the air...
I went to a retreat once in which the spiritual leader observed that there are five ways of "knowing" God, the transcendent, the divine--through 1) scripture, 2) liturgy, 3) other people, 4) silence and 5) nature, (not necessarily in that order.) The moonset at Brandon must exemplify #5.
"After enlightenment, the laundry." My problem with transcendence is it's always so temporary. I get an itch. The sun sets and my bum gets cold. And I really shouldn't have had that 3rd bean burrito. Rarely do I feel still contentment.
Tonight, having a discussion about school funding in a rainslick parking lot, a hundred geese flew overhead & I thought of a poem that Caro pointed out once. I liked it so much I found and it and typed it into my computer:
Wild Geese
You do not have to be good.
You do not have to walk on your knees
for a hundred miles through the desert, repenting.
You only have to let the soft animal of your body
love what it loves.
Tell me about despair, yours, and I will tell you mine.
Meanwhile the world goes on.
Meanwhile the sun and the clear pebbles of the rain
are moving across the landscapes,
over the prairie and the deep trees,
the mountains and the rivers.
Meanwhile the wild geese, high in the clean blue air,
are heading home again.
whoever you are, no matter how lonely,
the world offers itself to your imagination,
calls to you like the wild geese, harsh and exciting -
over and over announcing your place
in the family of things.
Mary Oliver, Dream Work
Andrew, this has something to do with having small kids. In the world of the parent, you don't get up to watch the moonset because 1) you desperately need your sleep and 2) if you get up to watch the moon set, someone or two will be up demanding cheerios or peanut butter on toast. Leaving no time for sublime feelings or for going back to bed for another hour or two after enjoying the moonset.
Enlightenment requires a certain degree of control over your life. Everyone has laundry, but with kids, it always needs to have been done yesterday.
When you are an old Geezer or Geezette, it's easier.
BTW love that poem. Love lots of Mary Oliver's poems.
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