To the past, present, and future

With June come the blazingly brilliant days that command my spirits to soar. The Mackenzie is flowing strong and clear. Last night, I took a walk down by the bank and sat at a picnic table, marvelling at the golden rays of the midnight sun. Soon, I'll go and throw caution to the winds and fly my kites. The branches on the trees are still bare, but I'm dreaming of buds and of lushness. I had my first slushy yesterday, the true sign of a northern summer for me.

Today was the high school graduation ceremony and banquet. There are twenty-seven graduands this year, a number to be proud of for a community this size. As the grads were escorted down the aisle by their loved ones, I couldn't help but get choked up. I was remembering my own graduation, which seemed not so long ago; it was nine years ago. I never had that pomp and circumstance, but it was the same feeling of being on the threshold, of being at the edge of a precipice, of being greeted by something bigger than myself.

Occasionally, I look around me, and cannot believe that this is my life. This past Thursday, as one student entered my classroom, heartbroken over something seemingly inconsequential, I asked myself if I still had that that capacity to feel so intently, or if that intensity of emotion was a territory tread only by youthful feet?

To Yesterday,

I remember you. I remember what the world looked like as I was cradled upside down in my mother's lap. The topsy-turvy made sense to me. Giggles would well up in the most unexpected of places and moments. And, the world seemed not so big. The small and trivial mattered then. A word, a breath, a story, a hand meant everything then. Don't let me go completely, even as I know that hanging on to you is impossible. Tonight, as I whirled around my living room, remembering my ballet moves of years ago, I felt you in my limbs. I felt you counting the beats in my head, channeling the music into my toes.



To Now,

I'm smiling with you. There are no words, just feeling, just grace.



To Tomorrow,

Please hold me gently, but do not shelter me so much that I won't feel the sting of compassion, the hurts that make me grow, or the joy that is so overwhelming that it's almost unbearable. Help me strive to understand myself better, to go after what I want with more courage than I think I have, to leap even if I don't know if I'll be all right.