the important stuff | reverse threading

my sweet poppo died three years before my sweet momma. when she died, the tilt that my world had already felt dove down into a deeper angle, the axis of the earth struggling to keep it in balance. the loss of both parents is profound, no matter your age.

it had been years since i had heard or seen a blue jay. they were common where i grew up, the screeches of jays in the woods or the trees surrounding our home. they have husky voices, always a little bit raspy. but they make me think of home.

i still remember the first day i saw one – after. it’s a few years ago now.

we were hiking on one of our favorite trails and suddenly i could hear them. they flew across the path and i stood still, reveling in the moment, taking it in. since that day, there have been more sightings and i have heard their birdcalls, even out our bedroom window from time to time.

since they are a common bird in wisconsin, i wonder how it is i missed them.

and i realize that sometimes the way home – the sound of a blue jay – is something we just don’t pay attention to, something that falls down on the list of priorities. until one day.

the day comes that all the really important stuff comes into focus. and we realize that we have – maybe – taken for granted the stuff that really is a part of who we are. we slough off paying attention to those things, those places, those people because we believe that there is plenty of time – later. or perhaps there are reasons we cannot grant grace to those things, those places, those people and we somewhat haughtily, in some selfish kind of righteous amnesia of our own actions, put them to the side, the corners of our hearts. or maybe we are just too busy and we have gotten lost, overwhelmed in our very real and partly contrived busy-ness.

any way you look at it, i am surprised i didn’t see the blue jays. until after.

now i hear them, see them, find their feathers in the usualness of our days. each time it is like a tiny nod to home, to all the moments of goodness, to the realness of unconditional love in the midst of the ridiculous hardness of life.

and they were there all along.

*****

THE WAY HOME from THIS PART OF THE JOURNEY ©️ 1997, 2000 kerri sherwood

download music from my little corner of iTUNES

stream on PANDORA

listen on iHEART radio

read DAVID’S thoughts this K.S. FRIDAY

like. share. subscribe. support. comment. ~ thank you. xoxo

*buymeacoffee is a “tip jar” donation website where you may choose to support the ability of artists to continue to do the work you value. thank you for your consideration. xoxo*

just like when i take a photograph of a person i try to avoid having extraneous people in the picture, when i take photographs outside i try to avoid any messy unnecessities.

this time i did it on purpose.

on july 29th i will have lived in this house for 33 years. i have sat out back watching the sky turn orange over the garage for 33 years. i have watched the trees grow up over the rooftops in my view. i have watched squirrels on their highways-of-highwire for 33 years.

it suddenly occurred to me that there might come a day when i can’t simply walk out the old screen door onto the deck, stepping onto the patio to watch the sky in the west. there might come a day when i live somewhere else and i won’t have access to this view.

and so the messiness of wires sectioning off the sky became important. important enough to photograph. important enough to remember.

we’re surrounded by things – and views – we have taken for granted. we see them every day – though we don’t really see them.

they seem unimportant.

yet, these familiar sights are the very things that help ground us. in a world that is politically volatile, climate that is destroying mother earth, bombastic leaders itching to reduce freedoms, disrespect and aggression out of control, it would seem that we need grab onto that which grounds us, centers us, slows down our breathing.

because i’m thready, i notice – and try to memorize – things like how the old wood floor creaks in the hallway, what it sounds like when the glass doorknob falls off, the feel of the small chain on the basement door and the decades-rubbed indent it has made, the sound of a double-hung window with ropes and weights opening, the deck cracking in cold weather, the cool painted-cement floor under bare feet in the basement, the places where the plaster has cracked. they all spell home.

and, with a world in turmoil, everything in flux, so much anxiety and grief and worry, things that are solidly familiar help.

*****

download from my little corner of iTUNES, please

or stream on PANDORA

read DAVID’S thoughts this K.S. FRIDAY

reverse threading

the path back is the path forward

Tag Archives: the important stuff

the blue jays. [kerri’s blog on k.s. friday]

not unimportant. [k.s. friday]

Share this:

Share this: