After hearing about the Boston Marathon bombing, and subsequently learning that an 8 year old boy was killed while waiting for his father to cross the finish line, I had to fight the sensation that I get when I am sinking into despair and sadness. My own grandson, Jack, is 8 and I had just seen him that afternoon via Facetime out in his garage on a warm spring day, inflating his yard inflatables (yes, he is obsessed with them and has been for years) because he was supposed to be organizing and putting them away. He had on a yellow short sleeve t-shirt and would stop his activity of blowing up a 10 foot high Brutus Buckeye, the mascot of The Ohio State University, only briefly enough for me to see the "shiner" he accidentally got when his eye collided with his friend while goofing around on the bus on the way home from school. Those are the memories I want in my head. Not the thoughts of a family dealing with unbearable grief over the loss of a child because of the act of some horrifically confused and disturbed individual.
I remembered that earlier in the day before I had heard of this most recent senseless tragedy, I had taken a photo while golfing, of a little wild flower that was growing all alone near where my ball had unfortunately gone into a water hazard. My golf game often suffers because of my lack of focus and my need to be constantly seeing what bird, or tree, or cloud formation is nearby. This little beauty was new to me and I was struck by the absolute perfection. The contrast of the pale pink with the orange outlined yellow and the swirl stamen just thrilled me. I thought of the Chinese philosophy of Yin and Yang. The opposites that are in nature and in humans. The good and the bad. And I was grateful, once again, for the beauty that surrounds me, friends and family that nourish my heart and for nature for soothing my soul.
