Day 1: We walked last weekend along the edge of a
protected marine area: three small beings enfolded in the massive mystery of
the ocean. I had some silly idea that I could capture the ocean as a keepsake.
So I used my phone’s video to take several minutes of rolling white waves
building to a crescendo and then uncurling themselves atop the light teal
shallows near shore.
Day 2: Unexpectedly, I attended the memorial service of a
prolific writer, editor, and painter I had never met; the stories about her
life and the book of her watercolor landscapes deeply inspired me.
Day 3: Ensconced at home, I searched for my own watercolor
paints and tried to capture, with my brush this time, the ocean landscape I had
seen. What I caught instead were the edges of my tumultuous inner ocean – color
and flow but no real skill to define it. I made greeting cards from the images
anyway.
Day 4: With the natural world experience of oceanic
majesty still roiling its echoes through my being, I watched and was enraptured
by a meditation video of forests changing seasons. I committed to meditating
with it several times per week.
Day 5: Circumstances arose in ways I never could have
planned - they were so far outside of my conscious intention – as a new friend told
me about a hand bell choir at a local church. My eyes sparkled (she said later)
as I told her about my fulfilling childhood
experience in the youth hand bell choir.
Day 6: The rain came in short waves of heavy bursts; it
sounded like tinkling on the tin porch roof. My handmade ceramic artist’s bell,
animated by the strong winds, began to chime its hollow tune.
Day 7: I followed the path of introduction to a woman who welcomes
bell ringers into the carillon choir. All potential barriers fell away as we conversed
and I was left with the great freedom of standing in the hand bell ringing
practice room as memories and upcoming visions of bell ringing swam through me.
Day 8: The rain became torrential, splashing as I fondled
the buds of flowers and just-unfurled leaves in my yard. I remembered being soaked
by waves at the ocean last week…my shoes drenched by the rushing-in saltwater,
pant legs dripping, voice giggling in high screeches of delight and surprise. I
heard bells ringing in my dreams and envisioned my arms (outstretched to touch
the now-leafy bushes) moving in sweeping arcs to ring my chime in synchrony.
I wonder at how being open to the expansiveness of the
ocean led me down the parallel paths of painting for the first time in more
than a year, and, unconsciously inviting the giddy reality of making music for
the world as part of a group. Before this week, I had not been thinking about
the bell choir of my youth. Nor had I been seeking musical outlets or churches.
I certainly hadn’t been thinking about painting.
I simply opened. I listened deeply. And then I lit up as
some long-buried part of me came to the surface in the form of story and the
tumult of waves washed over me.
…the waves, the sheets of rain, the conversations and flow
of vibrant color across the wet page, the sound-memory of Canberra’s carillon tower a
year ago this month…
All I did was:
show up,
attend openly to whatever life offered in the moment,
share honestly with new friends,
embrace the offerings.
All I did was allow myself to get soaked and immersed in:
paint,
water,
forests,
bell sounds,
new plant growth,
deep conversation,
opportunities,
reveries of the past…
and blessings of the present.
All blog images created and/or photographed by Jennifer J. Wilhoit unless otherwise noted.
