There’s a bridge in the woods on a path I used to travel. From a distance you’d never find it, its outline masked with the coverings of moss, branch and broken stone. I discovered it first in a moment of desperation, hoping to find the means by which my faith could be restored.

Ten years we’d been together; he went to school, while I cared for the children. And, now? Of all days, Mother’s Day – he ran away with another.

Anger doesn’t begin to describe that depth of betrayal. I wanted to hate him. I wanted his hands to tremble as he watched the life he had once known slip from his hands.

But that wasn’t me, and I couldn’t hate. Instead, I ripped a log from it’s resting place and sent it sailing into a ravine.

Satisfying? I suppose so, yes – but, nothing that could ever last.

I didn’t notice the bridge at first, standing now a full century proud. Though worn, it held its frame proudly intact. As crazy as this might sound, she ‘looked’ at me just as the sage to the student – never judging, only knowing.

There’s a wounded child within all of us, Thich Nhat Hang shares, one which demands our attention – begging us to address the root of our fear. As I looked at that bridge, I realized I’d lost my ‘safety net’ – that space where the routine of complacency offered a false sense of peace.

But now that it was gone? What was left to maintain it?

The Buddha taught that everything dear to us causes us pain; that this, alone, is the inevitable reminder of the constancy of change and loss – where the flower once flourished, the fruit must fall. And, in its place – always – there is a renewal.

Though weathered and worn, like the bridge – we are always changing, always becoming.

In peace, my sweet friends…thank you for the gift of your gratitude and patience as I recover from this flu.

Namaste ❣️