budding

It's quiet.  Well, kind of.

The door is open as I sit in my living room overlooking the garden.  At eye-line is the flowering crabtree - no longer flowering.  It rustles in the wind.  Birds fly in and around it - their chirping blends with the rustle.  

The open door welcomes the buzz of flies - the price I pay for the view.  

Fred and Stella had a late breakfast and readjust their napping positions on the floor and my bed, respectively.

Cars brush past in the distance adding a bass note to the chorus of calm.

As you know, it has been one heck of a couple of weeks.  In this Monday afternoon I have finally found time to breathe.  A tuft of cottonwood floats past.  One brother's marriage and another's graduation were so tightly scheduled and hurried with activity that I (as well as my parents) have barely had time to let their happening sink in and to reflect on the emotional and family implications.  

Dad has touched on it a few times but the thought quickly is abandoned with another task to be performed in that very instant.  

It really is closing the chapter of our childhoods.  Yes, I can hardly qualify as a child but with the six of us being so close in age we collectivize ourselves.  Zachary is our youngest and him graduating takes the family to a new place.  A place that no longer plans around a game, meet, performance, concert or awards ceremony.  Life has for so long encircled those things.  Now, we let him go and figure out where he needs to be in this world.  Suddenly, our place is a phone call or encouraging message but from afar.  

Samuel has a wife.  He now has his own family to think of first and formost.  

I guess I can equate it to the bud of a peony flower.  They stay so tight and round and close together for so long and then slowly they unfurl to become their true beauty.  It takes a while to readjust to that new sense of place.

Maybe I will just sit and listen to the wind for a little bit here.  Or, maybe read a book - I haven't done that in a while.

Four years ago, I graduated.  I made a decision to be present and take an active role in my youngest two brothers' lives while they were in high school.  I did take a break last summer and then renewed that commitment.  This past weekend fulfilled that promise.  It took me to the edge of that plan in my life.  It has brought me to the edge of my answers.  I've got a good view - maybe I will just wait for some new ones.