I'M ALL EARS! – Sweet Corn As If For the First Time

There are a few foods which, if you haven't tasted them really fresh—like a day 
or two after picking— you haven't tasted them at all. Among them, home grown tomatoes, apples, strawberries, and, so apropos of midsummer here in Minnesota, corn on the cob.

        

Obviously, the main attraction with corn is eating it—that sublime interplay of flavor and texture that only really fresh corn can serve up. (I like mine with a little butter and enough black pepper to make my lips smart.) M-m-m-m, I can't wait!

But wait you must; first you've got to shuck it. Like so many of life's little chores, you can look at that task as a nuisance...or you can choose to see it as an experi-
ence, a joy. I highly recommend the latter.

                                                  *     ~     *     ~    *

KERNELS OF TRUTH
Pick up an ear of fresh sweet corn and the first thing you notice is that it's heavier than a green, leafy thing should be. I've always imagined that heavy gifts in small packages held special promise.

The next thing that strikes you are the silken tresses spilling out the tapered end in bleached yellow-green, tips perhaps tinted golden brown by summer air and sun.

The snug, slightly sand-papery leaves peel back easily one at a time; try for more and they voice their squeaky objection. Layer by layer, the green softens from dark and dry to light, tender, translucent. The 
last ply or two cling tight, conforming like shrink wrap to the pebbly texture beneath.

      Emergent kernels, near the tip, wander 
      randomly, then fall into neat rows as they 
      march smartly down the cob.

The kernels greet you cheerily, buoyantly. Slightly cool and moist, they grab the tips of your fingers like so many tiny, shiny, pale yellow balloons all squeezed together— inflated, it seems, to the point of bursting.



Emergent ones, near the tip, wander randomly, then fall into neat rows as they march smartly down the cob. Here and there someone loses the cadence and falls out of line for a step or two.

        A few strands always hold out, ducking 
        stickily into crevices between rows.

Then it's back to the silk. Most of it lets go willingly, but a few strands always hold out, ducking stickily into crevices between rows. I suppose this is where some might let the job get a bit tedious. Don't let it spoil the wonder; a few threads of corn silk may even be good for you!

Now just cut or break off the remaining stalk—appreciating the cob's tough, woody core—and your cob's ready for the pot.*

Corn on the cob: whether you're shuckin' it, cookin' it or eatin' it, enjoy! And if you have any funny or informative takes on corn we small-wonder freaks would love to hear from you in the comments!

* There are as many suggestions out there on how to cook sweet corn as there are on how to swing a golf club. I lean toward the less-is-more approach: Boil the water; turn off the heat; plop the corn in; and wait three minutes.

Even better and way easier, microwave your corn: Do not shuck the ears; cut off the stem end just before it starts curving in toward the stem; and nuke for: one ear - three minutes / two ears - five minutes / three ears - seven minutes. 

Using hot mitts or pads, grab each ear by the pointed, silk end and squeeze as you would a big tube of reluctant toothpaste. The denuded ear will slide out the fat end and leave you holding all the husk and all the silk in your hand.

AS IF FOR THE FIRST TIME: Balance

In my As If For the First Time series I pick some common observation or activity—one so ubiquitous as to easily escape one’s full appreciation—and describe it as if I’d never seen or done it before.
                                               ~     •     ~     •     ~    

I toddled before my first birthday, and I’ve been on my feet ever since. Never doubting my ability to stand up, put one foot in front of the other and walk across the room.

Until late last summer.

That morning—it was September 13—I’d gotten up as usual, brushed my teeth, done my stretches. I’d just opened the refrigerator door to grab the orange juice when I felt a twinge of wooziness. Odd, I thought, as possible causes sifted through my mind.

Stroke? Heart attack? Brain tumor? Before entertaining any of these awful prospects, I decided just to sit down, relax and see if the dizziness might pass. But ten minutes later, as the dog barked to go outside, I just knew I wouldn’t be able to stand up. I tried, and I was right.

WHAT IT’S NOT
Quite the saga unfolded from there. Staggering to the door, vomiting, an ambulance ride, and an eye-opening night in the ER where they did every imaginable image and test to rule out the obvious culprits. Thank God, about 24 hours after whatever it was stole my balance, I was finally able to walk out of there.

The diagnosis after all that: dehydration. Ha! I knew that wasn’t the case. (Ever since having passed a couple of kidney stones years ago I’ve been quite conscientious about my water intake.) So if that wasn’t it, what was it, this mysterious, vertigo-like case of the swirlies? I just hoped and prayed it would be a one-and-done.

Then, just over three months later, while I was visiting my daughter and her family in Maine for Christmas, it happened again. Roughly the same time of day, same circumstances, same debilitation. Only this time, realizing that all the most dire causes had been ruled out, I worried less.

Sure enough, twenty-four hours later it was gone. But not without leaving me mystified again and feeling more vulnerable than ever.

           As far as walking, you might as well
           be aboard a tiny boat on rough seas.

ON ROUGH SEAS
While researching my new disorder, I’ve been reminded of the fascinating workings of the human body’s balance center, the inner ear. Among its components are thousands of little calcium carbonate crystals that sit on a gelatinous bed inlaid with tiny vertical hairs.

Normally, the crystals' condition and position signal to the brain where your body is in space. And they coordinate with your muscles to keep you…well…vertical.

But if those little crystals get jostled and some get tipped into the semicircular canals, that can be a problem. The errant crystals are supposed to dissolve, but certain positions can hinder that process, and then all bets are off. As far as walking, you might as well be trying to stand in a tiny boat on rough seas.

If it is vertigo there’s a remedy. The Epley Maneuver—a series of specific head and torso movements—can help satisfy the inner ear that you’re not really aboard a storm-tossed dinghy. I tried it three or four times without success.

LIKE FATHER…
This is one of those junctures in my life where I wish I could talk to my dad. He was a good-natured stickler for good posture. He’d see my brother or me slouched over our oatmeal and, without saying a word, demonstrate what sitting up straight looks like. Robot-like, he’d lift a spoonful straight up to the level of his face and then execute the precise 90-degree turn into his mouth.

Dad must have been taught the same thing growing up, that posture’s not just good for one’s spine, but is also an expression of one’s character. He walked steadily—and even played cartless golf—until just a couple of weeks before his death at age 91. No one would have been more profoundly bothered by the inability to stand.

Maybe that’s why this vertigo thing has hit me so hard. I’d like to ask my dad if he ever had an episode of this vertigo-like disorder. And if so, how he felt and what he might have learned about it.

From here on out, I guess all I can do is keep exploring possible causes…and hope it doesn’t happen again. I’ve made an appointment at the National Center For Dizziness and Balance, located here in Minneapolis, so maybe I can get some answers about causes, prevention and, I hope, a remedy.

And I’ll never again take simply standing for granted.

ONE BREATH AT A TIME – Surviving the Plague

I’m an old man. At least I am when I think about it.

When one reaches a certain age, it’s pretty hard not to entertain, now and then, the stark reality that one’s days are numbered—and that that number keeps ticking away with each inexorable revolution of the planet.

And with each breath.

CURVE? WHAT CURVE?
I’ve been thinking a lot about breath during this COVID 19 nightmare. The virus attacks the lungs, especially of people over 60—which I am—and those who have underlying conditions, including chronic lung disorders—which I do.

Death by this infection is not pretty; if neither drugs nor a ventilator save you, it looks like you either die of multiple organ failure or you suffocate. Some choice.

So, yes, I’m aware, as those old deep-sea divers with air hoses must have been, of every next breath and where it’s coming from. And I’m protective of it to the point of paranoia. When the distancing guidelines say six feet, I maintain twenty.

State epidemiologists and their models project this sobering reality: that somewhere between 40 and 80 percent of Minnesotans will eventually contract the virus. And the way I see it, I’ve got to be among the 20 to 60 percent who don’t.

    I turn off the one prayer that seems always 
    to be playing in the background…and turn on
    one that feels truer to my nature.

A BETTER PRAYER
My emotions swing back and forth between terror and gratitude—if that’s even possible.

Terror’s a motivator, though seldom in a helpful way. So I’m pretty good at not going there. Most of the time, when I manage to draw in all those sticky appendages of emotion that attach to other times and places, I’m able to put myself entirely in the here and now. If there’s something I can do about my concerns right now, I do it. If not, I let it go.

Then I can turn off the one prayer that seems always to be playing in the background: God, please don’t let me catch this thing, and turn on one that feels truer to my nature: Thank you, God, for this day, for this moment, for this one precious breath.

OUT OF THIN AIR
It’s that one breath that intrigues me. Just now, for approximately the half-billionth time since I was born, it’s made my chest rise, and magically, imperceptibly, swapped carbon dioxide for oxygen in something like 400 milliliters of my blood.

How amazing all the little miracles my respiration performs for me, mostly without my even noticing. Of course there have been times when I did notice: when, as a young boy, I held my breath just to see how long I could do it; in my days as a high school and college athlete after the tenth or eleventh wind sprint; during my frequent bouts of bronchitis; while meditating; or when gasping for the thin air in high-altitude places like Mexico City or Nairobi.

        Nowadays it feels as if every single one
        of my breaths teeters on a knife’s edge
        of uncertainty.

LAST TO FIRST
It doesn’t seem a great leap then to go all the way back and imagine my very first breath, that one gurgling inhalation, on March 21st, 1945, that started in motion this precious, now-seventy-five-year-old cycle.

To think, any one of those near-countless breaths could have been the last. The one that fell at the instant the car in which I was riding swerved and struck a tree at fifty miles per hour. The one that occurred just when some inexplicable instinct kept me from driving a metal bird-feeder post into what I learned was an unprotected, live buried power cord.

Nowadays it feels as if every single one of my breaths teeters on a knife’s edge of uncertainty. Will this one be just another of those entirely forgettable, spontaneous draws that have inflated me all these years? Or is it one that’s just slightly off—perhaps getting short or labored as the symptomologists warn—boding that my efforts to elude the plague of 2020 have come up short?

Wish me continued success in not dwelling on the latter.

How often are you aware of your breath? When does that happen? Is that awareness shrouded in fear? In rapture? Or in sheer gratitude? I’d love to hear
from you.

THIS, MY ONE PRECIOUS DAY

Another in my ongoing series of reflections, As If For the First Time, describing the most mundane of daily activities through a fresh lens, one of innocence, wonder and gratitude.

I awoke this morning to a gift, one laid gently on my being by the hand of providence. It is the gift of a certain perspective, one I try to cultivate, but which seldom gets the chance to leaf out in that groggy torpor when thoughts first jostle
to fill the blissful vacuum left by sleep.

PHOTO: Pixabay

It is that rare awareness that, despite what may be on my mind’s calendar for the day, the agenda for my heart and soul will not be confined to some little boxes on a page or screen. It’s knowing my prospects are, at least for this one day, about nothing but blessing and bounty.

In this frame of mind, it is not lost on me that this one precious day just might be my last. It’s not a morbid thought, just a sharpening of my resolve. Let's just say this day most certainly will be the last one just like this one. 

Today, I am uncommonly mindful of how thoroughly, deeply blessed I am, and a silent prayer emanates from my consciousness: Let me be worthy of these many gifts. Let me truly know them, love them, share them.

           Are you able to seize the day, or does 
           the day, with all its expectations and 
           obligations, seize you?

SUPPLY AND DEMAND
Funny, isn't it, how much more significant this state of promise becomes as one ages. For with each passing year one’s remaining days—however many there might be—become an ever-smaller, ever-more-precious percentage of one’s lifespan. Supply and demand, I guess you could say.
 

PHOTO: Children's Theater Company

As if to underscore this awareness, it seems more and more of our loved ones find their once-ample outlook suddenly eclipsed by some dark curtain falling between them and their future—a loss, a crisis, a life-threatening infirmity. I thank God—especially on lucid mornings like this—a barrier like that has not yet fallen between me and what I somehow imagine should be the rest of my life.

So, how do you approach each new day? Do you think you fully appreciate the freedom and grace bestowed on you by a future whose only limitation is your imagination? Will you allow yourself the joy of it? Are you able to seize the day, or does the day, with all its expectations and obligations, seize you? Can you see all the wonders it offers as if you were glimpsing them for the first time?

  Greet sun and fresh air today as if you’d spent a lifetime in a cell. 
  Like a wonderstruck child, let a brand new world delight you.
  Then turn this around. Imagine a today with no tomorrow. 
  Notice how your appreciation moves from wonder to gratitude?
   FROM JEFF’S BOOK, UNDER THE WILD GINGER – A SIMPLE GUIDE TO THE WISDOM OF WONDER

AS IF FOR THE FIRST TIME – Water

Water is the quintessential liquid. We learn about it in utero—how it feels, how it moves, supports, soothes and quiets.

Once we’re out, our relationship with water broadens. We soon become aware that it has to go into our bodies—and come out again. We're bathed in it. We play with it; we splash it, squirt it, slide on it and jump into it, among other amusements.

Eventually we’re taught how water’s a vital part of every living thing. We study how it seeps, drips, pours, wicks and transforms to vapor and ice. We discover that it dissolves and brews. We find, often the hard way, that it can also hurt us—burning, freezing, choking, knocking the wind out of us.

    What other substance can bathe an infant’s 
    head…and carve the Grand Canyon?

THE RIGHT STUFF
Even as we learn of its properties, water, like the air we breathe, is so ubiquitous that it’s difficult to pull back and truly see it. But if we can pretend we’re observing it for the very first time, we begin to appreciate what an utter miracle this clear, quicksilver fluid really is.

When’s the last time you put your busy-ness on hold and took a moment to think about this substance that gives us such utility, such fun, such beauty, such…well…life? Do you appreciate it not just for what it does for us, but for its sheer beauty: its transparency; the way it coats and shines some surfaces, and beads up on others; how surface tension’s invisible skin stretches over it; its lyrical fall and flow?

Water has a capricious relationship with other elements. With light, it can bend like a prism, absorb like a sponge or reflect like a mirror. With air, it respirates aquatic plants and fish, yet suffocates terrestrial organisms. With earth, it provides the nectar of life for nearly 300,000 species of plants. As a mist, it cools, while as humidity it turns up the heat index. Yes, the stuff can even vanish into thin air!

What other substance can both render a Winslow Homer masterpiece and torture a suspected terrorist? Transform itself into the exquisite intricacy of a snowflake and the Titanic mass of an iceberg? Bathe an infant’s head…and carve the Grand Canyon?

      I wonder if and how our attitudes toward 
      water will change in the coming years.

RIVERS WITH NO MOUTHS
I could go on extolling water’s virtues and the wonder of seeing it anew, but I want to know how and where you most appreciate it. How do you value it—that is to say, how do you act on the knowledge that water—at least clean water—is  proving an ever-scarcer and more coveted resource?

As rivers get sucked dry before they can even reach their mouths, and as the largest sources of the world’s fresh water continue melting into the sea, I can’t help but wonder if and how our attitudes toward it will change in the coming years.

I leave you with a visual appreciation of this magnificent, life-giving, ever-present yet ever-abused liquid. These images only begin to demonstrate how much more there is to ponder, but I must stop here. I’m thirsty.

INS AND OUTS – Breathing and Other Cyclical Wonders

(This is the latest in my series of reflections, As If For the First Time, 
describing the most commonplace of experiences through a fresh lens, 
one of innocence and wonder.)

If you meditate, I shouldn’t presume to tell you anything new about breathing. But for those who are open to seeing the familiar through someone else’s eyes—and those who’ve never given breathing a second thought—I offer these observations.

You know how a ball bounces off a wall with that definite pop as it reverses direction? How your teeth collide when you’re chewing?

There are lots of such backs-and-forths in life and in Nature. In some, the change of direction involves an abrupt turning point—a collision of sorts. Two bighorn rams butting heads; your eyes blinking or your heart beating; some cars’ clunky windshield wipers.

There’s another kind of to-and-fro, one with softer yet still distinct reversals. Swinging on a swing; a wave’s ebb and flow upon a sandy beach; that little bead that rebounds straight up just after a falling drop hits the surface of a liquid.

Like nearly every other motion cycle in Nature, these events include three distinct aspects: moving, stopping (even if it’s only for an instant) and then moving in the opposite direction.

     A breath is one of the few things in life that 
     changes direction without ever stopping.

WHAT GOES AROUND
This morning, while meditating, I noticed how different my breathing seems from all those other backs-and-forths, ups-and-downs and to-and-fros. In fact, the transition between an inhalation and an exhalation, or vice versa, is so seamless that it’s absolutely imperceptible. Indeed, it seems a breath is one of the very few things in Nature that changes direction without ever stopping.

Other natural examples of this are exceedingly rare. Perhaps the flow of a stream taking a hairpin turn. An eagle's swoop as it snatches a fish from a lake. The slingshot effect on an asteroid from the gravitational pull of a planet or large moon. Can you think of others?

ILLUSTRATION: NASA

As elegant as those examples are, I contend that Nature’s cheating. They involve motion that’s not truly back and forth—not in a linear sense at least. They all employ a curving element at each end of the object’s path, so it’s not as much back and forth as it is round and round.

Human beings have found ways of borrowing this approximation of back-and-forth from Nature. The cable on a ski lift, conveyer belts, bicycle chains, anything driven by a cam or crank. All seem to go back and forth, but the motion is really circular—albeit with the circle flattened considerably.

 When I think about it this way, the notion of how 
 many breaths I’ve taken in my lifetime—or how 
 many I might have left—starts to lose its meaning.

WHAT GOES AROUND…
How fascinating that the respiration of any creature that breathes—that is, the straight in-and-out path of the air through its nostrils—is so clearly linear, while the deeper sense of breathing is so circular. Perhaps it’s something like that cam or crank...but tell me how the mechanics of one’s lungs even remotely resemble a circular motion.

Whatever the cause, can you name any other motion in Nature that’s so straight-line reciprocal and yet feels so seamlessly round as your breathing?

Okay, this all may seem pretty arcane, pretty immaterial, but it’s the kind of thing an amateur mystic like me can’t help but ponder. I do this not just with the very adult notion of seeking higher consciousness, but also from an incurable, child-like sense of curiosity and wonder.

ILLUSTRATION: http://tao-meditation.blogspot.com

And seeing my breaths—a function I’ve performed without stop about 580,000,000* times now—in this new way is helping me immeasurably in my meditation. It's so much easier getting centered now that I can visualize my breathing not as something that keeps coming back and forth right at me, into me, but as a force, a miracle, that revolves both in me and around me.

When I think about it this way, that notion of how many breaths I’ve taken in my lifetime—or how many I might have left—starts to lose its meaning. Because it’s all one breath.

* According to the Sarasota Herald Tribune, a person at rest takes, on average, about 16 breaths per minute. 
This means we breathe about 960 breaths an hour, 23,040 breaths a day, 8,409,600 a year. Unless we get a lot 
of exercise, the person who lives to 80 will take about 672,768,000 breaths in a lifetime.

GREEN – As If for the First Time

WAXING ARTISTIC
When I was a boy, I loved coloring with crayons. There was something about how they looked, those neat little cylinders with their tight paper wrappers and slick, lathe-turned tips. And the way they smelled—it still takes me back to those purer, simpler days.

Most of all, I loved the colors, those waxy, translucent hues that seemed to channel light through themselves rather than just reflecting it.

            I guess I knew, even then, that this 
            is a world of many greens.

I soon tired of the basic 8-color Crayola sets. Those, I figured, were for little kids who still scribbled across their coloring books. No, I coveted the big 64-color boxes, the ones with neatly stepped tiers of crayons in subtler colors, shades falling in between the basic, primary colors. These were colors worthy of staying within the lines.

What I remember most are the greens—not just plain old green, but the other, more complex, delicious ones: blue green, yellow green, pine green, spring green, olive green and sea green. I don’t know if the other kids cared, but I did. I guess I knew, even then, that this is a world of many greens.

A GLUTTON FOR GREEN 
It's awfully easy to take green for granted. After all, for many human beings—not just those who live in jungles, but us who live in places where grassy lawns and lush, deciduous trees are valued—the color is everywhere.

Just this morning, as I drove to my office, I conducted a little experiment. I took a series of virtual snapshots of my vistas from the car. Then I calculated the percentage of each image that was green. Incredibly, it ranged from about 30 to nearly 70 percent. There was nowhere I could look where green was not a significant part of the view. And that’s right in the middle of a big city.

With this much of it in sight, no wonder we fail to appreciate green. It's like how people eventually forget about the natural and cultural attractions closest to home, ones a tourist wouldn't think of missing.

...from the whispered pastel green of hydrangea blossom to the edgy chartreuse of spring willow.

In that drive to the office this morning, it struck me as never before how that abundance of green pleases my eye and feeds my spirit. It's not just how much there is, but how many delicious flavors it comes in—like my 64-color box of crayons and then some.

From the just-becoming green of leaves’ first unfurling, to the heavy, weary green of late summer. From the deep coolness of those shady recesses between blue spruce boughs to the dusty gray-green of Russian olive. From the whispered pastel green of lichen or hydrangea blossom to the edgy chartreuse of spring willow.

As more and more research is done on the effects of mankind’s increasing disconnect with Nature, studies are showing that proximity to green foliage—even if it’s only in the view out your window—has a measurable, positive effect on your level of stress, your state of well-being, even your productivity.

         Imagine how it would be to wake 
         up one morning and find it all gone.

THE COLOR OF LIFE
So why does green affect us this way? Is it because it represents everything that grows and nourishes us? Might we associate it with the amazing symbiosis between animals and plants where each depends on what the other exhales? Does it remind us of the African landscape where our very humanity was born? 

I suspect very few folks stop to appreciate the incredible scope and range of greens that decorate their daily comings and goings. It’s a bit easier for those of us in northern climes, who lose most of our green for about five months of the year. We know what we’re missing. So do people who live in desert or semi-arid places where greens are scarce and short-lived.

So, even if you’re blessed with year-round green, take a moment to imagine how it would be to wake up one morning and find it all gone. Start right now, with what you can see from where you sit. Look around; look out the window. Make a point of noticing this verdant color of life in all its many tones and textures.

What are your favorite greens? How does green make you feel? Have you ever lived in a place where you felt starved of those feelings?

RECLAIM WONDER! – Some New Years Resolutions

I believe I'm surrounded by wonders great and small, all the time, wherever 
I am.

I understand that many of those miracles lie hidden to first glances.

I will open my spirit to wonder. My eyes, my ears, my heart will follow.

I will make time for awareness, curiosity and wonder.

I will turn off the television, put down the book and start looking, learning and living first-hand.

I will decide for myself what entertains me and, more importantly, what nourishes my soul.

I will notice and celebrate the power of presence.   

I will carefully examine the myth of certainty, and value learning more than knowing.

I will be more aware of the miracle of grace that resides around and within 
every person.

I will shine the light of my own spirit, and will give other people the chance to shine too.

I will try to experience everything as if it were for the first time.

I will approach each day with faith in Nature's instruction, and with gratitude for being Her lifelong pupil.

I will be patient, not just with Nature, but with myself, celebrating small steps in the right direction.

I will seize every opportunity to help a screen-bound child reconnect with Nature. 


WANT TO PRINT & FRAME THESE RESOLUTIONS?

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RECLAIMING WONDER PLEDGE DOCUMENT.
Print it out, frame it, or make it the background of your computer desktop.
Give a framed copy to someone you know who's also yearning to reclaim wonder in his/her life.

TO ORDER, JUST SEND JEFF AN E-MAIL: jeff@willius.com
Thanks for taking the Reclaiming Wonder Pledge! Have a wonder-full day!

AUTUMN LEAVES – As If For the First Time

(This is the latest in my series of reflections, As If For the First Time,
describing the most commonplace of experiences through a fresh lens,
one of innocence and wonder.)

One way to open your eyes is to ask yourself, 'What if I had
never seen this before? What if I knew I would never see it again?' RACHEL CARSON

Imagine you live in a place where the trees either don't shed their leaves or lose them continuously, a few at a time. Or maybe your trees drop all their leaves annually, but the leaves just turn brown.

And let's also say it's a third-world country, you're poor, or you live under a controlling government, so it would never dawn on you that things might be different in
other places.

Okay, now someone new arrives on the scene—a visitor, let's say, from northern climes in North America, Europe or Asia. First, they tell you that where they live rain crystallizes and blankets everything in pure, sparkling white. Yeah, right!

Then they say that, before that magic fairy dust comes, the trees all turn from green to resplendent red, gold and orange—even purple. C'mon! Tell me another one.

Can you imagine fall foliage, snow—or any of a thousand other wonders—as if you were seeing it for the first time? If that doesn't cut through your apathy and stoke your sense of joy and wonder, then try seeing it as if it were for the last time. Hm-m-m... See how wonder turns to gratitude?

WALKING – As If For the First Time

(This is the fourth post in my series of reflections, As If For the First Time, describing the most mundane of daily activities through a fresh lens, one of innocence and wonder.)

Gosh, my feet feel good today! How about yours? Are you conscious of your feet as you sit there?

I actually think about my feet quite often. I wonder what it is that allows those, the lowest tracts of flesh and bone on our bodies, to put up with such a beating, one that other parts would surely protest. Over and again, they bear the full weight of our being—not just physically, but sometimes, it seems, emotionally.

Such lightness of spirit makes each stride flow 

from the last like water down a gentle rapids.

But today I feel no such burden. Why is it that my lightness of spirit makes each stride flow from the last like water down a gentle rapids? That's the way my walking feels today: laughing, liquid, free.

I'm so glad I put on these wool socks. It's more than just their warmth; something about the way wool defies dampness that feels so snug. And the real miracle: if they were on my neck they'd itch; on my feet they don't.

Step by step, a glow starts in my feet and spreads up my calves and through my thighs. Like engine oil, it wicks in between moving parts, salving the friction, cooling the pain.

I'm aware of the complex mechanics of the walking motion. Something so automatic that I'm seldom more aware of it than of my breathing. I watch its workings as a boy watches a steam shovel, marveling at the coordination of so many complex movements—hip, to knee, to ankle, to toes.

I picture muscle and sinew grasping and pulling, tensing and pushing, sliding freely against one another in easy synchrony.

Then there's the matter of balance. How in the world can such a vertical creature go through such a range of motions—starting, stopping, jumping, leaning—and still manage to stay upright? I try to be aware of some of the constant adjustments hundreds of my muscles are making, but they're just too subtle.

What's left is a bright, spacious, inviting place 
for kinder thoughts to settle.

Like any meditation, my focus on the repetition pushes aside thoughts I'd planned to leave at home, but which still managed to stow away somehow: worries, deadlines, self-doubt. Step by step I imagine them nudged from my consciousness, dropping to the path and fading into the distance behind me. 

        

What's left is a bright, spacious, inviting place for kinder thoughts to settle. And they do . . . as if they'd been searching for it. They alight full of wisdom and certainty. I feel abundant.

Hope, joy, connection with all things and all times—sometimes it feels like my strides are the strokes of a pump, not just impelling blood and oxygen, but drawing in and circulating those ample thoughts. 

I sense that my consciousness is shared with 
land and sky, with water, trees and birds.

My thoughts move easily back and forth between soaring possibilities and Nature's constant reminders of my attachment to my body—and, by way of my happy feet, to the earth.

Today, at least while walking, I know myself body and my soul. I thank both for bringing me here to this place of awareness and gratitude. And I sense that my consciousness is shared with land and sky, with water, trees and birds. As sure as I celebrate them and this precious moment, they celebrate me.