The magnolias are gone for the season. The summer falling leaves that drift to the ground brown and speckled with shades of golden and amber, curled up just enough to hold the summer rain for a good part of the day, have ceased to fall and what remains will be for the winters retreat.
I can imagine the new blooms of spring already laying dormant in the massive branches of the majestic southern lady of a tree, hiding from the chill of a December breeze and the cold rain of a february morning.
The large white blooms will come again in summer and embellish the branches like frills and bows on Scarlett O'Hara's own full crinoline dress.
The magnolias are gone for the season, but they will bloom again...for the magnolia lives in a constant state of hope, and renewal, as we do ourselves with our own seasons of life, our own Decembers to hold fast through and our own springtime of new beginnings.

The Steps

 

I get a bit sentimental in a wonderment kind of way when I look at stairs that are worn down from travel, steps that have been transformed by people with a destination. Some people need a step up and some just need to step down to level ground.
The steps seem to carry a trace of what was, and this is where my wonderment comes in.
I can envision a young child running up the steps ahead of his parents eager to get to the shops and the smells of the market that are pulling him along. Then perhaps later in life, the same child, now weary with age, an unacknowledged soul, with slumped shoulders and hurting hips, walking slowly up one step at a time, trying to be sure-footed so as not to fall, and pausing for a brief moment before making it to the top.
I wonder if a young man dashed up the stairs on his way to meet a new lover that has him in a whirlwind -- he has been thinking about her all day and is determined not to be late.
I imagine a woman carrying a grocery bag, a look on her face that has become familiar as she wonders how the contents of the bag will feed her small children at home and if her husband will come back and if her life will ever be the same as it was.
A teenager walking home way past his curfew with slower steps than usual trying to give himself time to rehearse his response for when he is confronted by worried and demanding parents;
while behind him walks a man who lifts up his collar to smell for any hint of perfume as he rehearses his response for when he is confronted by a worried and demanding wife.
Maybe someone walked these steps that had no where to go, who wandered through the town as the night chill began to creep over the sidewalks and store fronts. He's lived this way for years now and the sidewalks know the sound of his shuffling shoes; and the alley ways know the smell of his clothes and the sound of his breathing when he sleeps.
A young lady with the light dimmed in her eyes places her hand on her abdomen and feels her body move as she takes one step at a time, her mind is consumed with the child in her that she is yet to tell her husband about. Her husband who has been out of work for months and who's face has changed more than her very own to a look of despair and hopelessness.
Step by step, story by story, some foot steps were heavy laden, some were swift with joy, they all joined the footsteps that were before them and left there's behind to be connected to those that were to come. The worn down steps, a gentle reminder of many lives that have passed along the way. All with traveling minds, traveling to memories from the past, or traveling to hopeful dreams and what if's of the future. All with hope that each step, the swift ones and the heavy ones, will lead them to a destination that will serve them well.
We all have something in common with the worn steps... the patterns life its self leaves on us, the changing that occurs with steps going up, and some going down, and from the choices we make when we step off to level ground, and those choices become the answer to our life's journey. Choose how you travel the stairways. It will make a difference that only time will reveal, for each traveler always leaves an imprint. And life's steps always leaves an impression on the soul.

My son is going to a viewing of Rembrandt today. I am envious of his opportunity. I would love to view some of the famous artist paintings, Rembrandt, Van Gogh, Picasso and one of my favorites Monet.
When you view a work of art think about where it came from. How it rose up from deep inside a soul as a thought, a vision, a feeling, a passion, and from there it appears on a canvas only a whisper of what existed moments before in the most private shadow of their souls sanctuary , in a place that never has words. Drifting to their finger tips where the movement begins to flow and move and create and then there it is laid out before you. From there you welcome it in and it begins to create emotions that stir within your own shadows, from that place that whispers things to your very own passions, those things that you never have words for. Viewing a painting is like reaching into the center of someone's unspoken dwelling place, finding their heart, holding it in your hand and claiming it for your own.

Grace

There were many times in my life I wish I would have been braver, stood stronger, had more courage. I survived, but through no stance of my own. I was carried by grace. And still, I am not as brave as I would like to be, and my courage fades when situations appear grim. Grace is my companion, ever present, forever carrying me along, until one day I will cross over the river Jordan. I will no longer need courage or strength, I will become the grace.