A Nature Hike

Molly’s friends were mature and generous with us after Molly died – and so were their parents.

One of those parents died yesterday. 

This is the third death to touch my life in the last six weeks and I am once again brought up short.  Experience doesn’t make it any easier to find the right words to say or the right gesture to put out there.  I find myself awed in the wake of mourning.

I have experienced mourning as sobbing…  as pain…  as confusion and loss.  But I have also, and this summer is one of those times, experienced mourning as inspiration.  I see – I know – that a devastating diagnosis can come at any time; I want to be assured that I have lived out my opportunities when my physical or mental capabilities wane.

So, yesterday, a really challenging hike.  A hike in honor of my friend who died.  A hike over rocks that were here thousands of years before we were born and will be there thousands of years after we are gone.  A hike to revel in the creativity of whoever it is that sustains us and a hike to be reminded that while nature does not promise safety, she ultimately does offer comfort.  

 

Nature will not blink at our death or our injury.  She has seen death before and she is big enough – vast enough – to hold it.