life

August in Vermont is a time of grace, beauty...and poignance. I delivered a meal to a hospice patient on Thursday evening. She and her family lived in a beautiful place in Rutland Town, full of light and growing things. It must have seemed like such a sanctuary to her and her family; a place of safety, beauty, comfort, control. I was struck by the irony of it all, delivering a meal to someone who was dying in a setting that was so full of life. After dropping Erin and family off on Friday morning at the train, Allyn and I went to visit some long-time neighbors in Ira. The woman of the house was very ill. They live in what I consider to be one of the most beautiful settings in town, and it certainly seemed that way on that sunny morning. The house set back among large oak trees. Sun and shade, flowers and greenery, silence and birdsongs, a small garden brimming with vegetables down the hill in the back. The man of the house spoke about the feeling of Shangri La, and the description certainly seemed apt. It is the kind of place where you could live happily ever after except that there's no such thing as "happily ever after." August is followed by September, and so on.
Our friend died peacefully early on Sunday morning. Sometimes it's easy to forget that this is ultimately where we're all heading, especially on a sun-dappled morning in August in Vermont.

What is the meaning of life? That was all, a simple question; one that tended to close in on one with years. The great revelation had never come. The great revelation perhaps never did come. Instead there were little daily miracles, illuminations, matches struck unexpectedly in the dark...
Virginia Woolf
Zen page a day calendar