each grain of sand

I had to chuckle this morning, sympathetically, walking past the horseshoe pits in our local (amazing) park. 

We just noticed last week that newly-built wood plank backstops had replaced the old rotting ones. This week, two of them were clobbered by a humongous limb of a giant oak tree. 

Bummer.

Limbs drop here year round, and summer seems to bring a rise in the numbers. Storms blow through, the 96% humidity dissolves the soft wood, deluges wash them down. Piles of trimmed branches and pieces line the paths and roads, as the park rangers and staff (cutest little ranger carts ever) buzz them into manageable lengths.

Our choice to live with gusto, as humans, continues to amaze me. So often our focus on each day and each year means that we forget we've only been around for a blip in the stream of billions; even when we do momentarily remember, we so often choose to dig in more deeply.

The vast majority of us. Whether the limbs fall or not, we build horseshoe backstops. We rebuild them. Whether that person will remain in our lives or not, we love. If they don't remain, we keep getting up in the morning. If the rivers rise, we move the house; if we've trashed the world, we repair, create, and adapt. Whether or not life feels meaningful, we make it so.

Yep, the stinkers still stink. And maybe our work is in vain. But so many of us close our eyes to our blip-ness - or just let it be - and bring our selves to the world that is ours today. Amazing.

In the meantime, past my windows most days I see great egrets looping over oaks, red-tailed hawks landing on 150-foot high HVAC vents, swallows catching dragonflies four stories up, and occasionally a bald eagle swooping by. I also see firefighters cleaning up an accident at the intersection, someone sleeping on the bus stop bench, neighbors helping each other across the street, joggers jogging. And those park rangers motoring around in their cutest carts, taking care of their little world.

Recently I bought an hourglass timer. Humidity seems to have made its way under the glass, and the sand sticks in its futile journey toward the center of the earth. Sadly, not functional. But a little reminder of each grain of sand in the flow of the years.

One more grain this day. I tap the glass; it flows.