93.

[sounds like hallelujah for the first time.]

it's happening again. the school year is here and i'm sinking into the quicksand of responsibilities and emotionally jarring day to day challenges of my job. so soon for this to feel this way already.

about this time last year i took some time to praise the hill country in vermont as it was the first time she and i became acquainted.

i left my inaugural yoga ball soccer, putney town fair, and bonfire under a full moon experience filled with the hope of possibility. the newness of good folks finding one another and journeys to come. i left being reminded that there are still so many mysteries in this life that i have yet to experience and anxious to flail about wildly into the big nasty world in search of those heart-filling types of mountain top breaths.

i've just returned from that not-so-faraway magical land with those folks who used to be strangers and this homecoming leaves me with a different charge of spirit.

i lay on back picking bark from of a stump this morning as two bearded brethren played some gillian welch and let harmonies be carried away into the nip of the fall breezes. i lay on my back, under the blanket of warm sunshine, staring at a stump, smelling that indescribable but undeniable fall smell in the air, hearing sounds of love and community. i lay on my back, on the damp ground alone, staring into a stump and i was completely fulfilled to be in that moment.

fulfillment is something that doesn't come easy to me. over the past few years in my brain, fulfillment has become first cousins twice removed with that thing my folks always told me to never ever do: settle. oscar wilde once wrote that "the future belongs to the discontented" and over the past few years i think i've taken that too seriously. he was a kind of a screwed up guy, you know? it's troubling to me because there are so many times that i'd give anything to fold into the present moment, curl up around myself and whatever station at life i'm in and say, "yes. mission accomplished and it feels so good." instead i usually blurt out a, "great, let's have a drink and celebrate. what's next?" so, to slow down and feel fulfilled, while it may seem simple, provides a satisfaction and certainty that i have trained myself to avoid. to be afraid of, even. don't worry. i'm working on unlearning this and the spirit of goodness and honesty may be on my side this time around. i'm feeling good about it anyhow.

so i felt fulfilled. i smiled and noticed it. then i tried to think on the importance of the moment and notice everything else...

it was very simple. in a moment, i was reminded of what i forget too often. i'll find myself on a dirt road, high on some mountain top, looking into a creek or a river or a lake, in the middle of a forest, and i tell myself to remember how much i love the feeling of emptiness and wholeness it gives me. i always tell myself, in that moment, to remember. then life ushers in her daily duties and i step in line and settle in on the routine that provides me some solace and time to let my thoughts stretch their arms wide and point their toes far, but it is an uphill battle and while i'm fighting the good fight, i get real tired. and i inevitably forget that what i was supposed to remember in the first place. that remembering is reanimated by a drive on the country road in the forest.

a meditative feeling that we go to yoga to recapture in the middle of these bustling go-getter sort of city lives comes about me, and i don't even try or trust or hope or think. it comes to me when i am there because it is a part of wherever or whoever there may be.

dirt roads, mountain top views, horses, cows, campfire, rivers, pastures, tractors, fresh breezes, blueberry picking, apple orchards in the summer. these things remind me which matters of the heart and head ought to be tended to most rigorously and they do this by replacing my thoughts with beauties too calm and honest to be trumped by the silliness of uncertainty. truths surface and can't be argued, i can't rationalize my way out of being happy...

i sit at home today feeling thankful for people i've met on my journey, and a little more certain that i want to call home a place where the stars aren't a novelty and people ask how you're doing...and want a real response.

i need a home on the range with a porch perfect for coffee and company. maybe even a partner with rolled up pant-legs and old-timey motorcycle that needs a little tinkering. and it feels damn good to know some of these bigger life things.

thanks be to vermont and rolling hills and fresh breezes.