7.16.15 What did you do? You went to the ocean.

     I grew up near the ocean. When it was your birthday? You went to the ocean. When something wonderful was happening, you went to the ocean. When your heart was broken, or your life laid to waste, why then, you went to the ocean.
     It was a large body of water, that endless sea. And held all things and nothing. It was the one place where you fully realized the endlessness of connection. Because it was right there in front of you. Place your foot in that water, and you were essentially part and parcel of molecules touching the water and land across the globe.
     Even as a small child, without intellectualizing, you simply knew this to be true.
Soon after I left home, I found myself living near The Connecticut river. That grand old body of water.
     In Vermont, or Massachusetts, somehow I always landed nearby.
     And so it is for many of us. Gravitating toward ancient large bodies of water.
     For clarity. For comfort, and solace.
     Having a birthday? You go to the river. Visitors? You go to the river. Your life is struggling with grave sadness and fear? Why you go to that river.
     You go to the river, and walk along its banks. You watch the teeming life evident all about it.
Coming and goings, beginnings and endings of lives.