Observations from Island Time

Children collect all. 

Everything is a treasure...still.

What flashes silver and light? 

Moon beams hidden deep, 

come up from the belly of the sea, 

shining back at me. 

Parents are many things, 

but they are first and foremost gate keepers.

   The turbulent sea is often our reality. Gentle lapping waves belie the real and ever present battle for life beneath the lapping.

   Humans have the great privilege and choice of not choosing war, but rather peace. Do we?

On an island, bobbing is the main verb.

   Gray white hair and crisp linen shirt, someone grew you up, but you're still a little boy with your air planes and toys.  

   Even when it seems the hand of fate seeks and wills its way, you get to choose. You get to choose.

Big jet, loud and noisy, state your presence, your reason for being. 

Everyone who comes here is quiet. 

Almost.

Are you an inflated ego? 

Dried seaweed has a deeply satisfying crunch.

The fantastic things are tiny.

Children are echoes of our childhood. 

They call us home. 

 

   Thomas Wharton had me soaking up the sun and light in Every Blade of Grass. 

   I have decided coffee and books do not mix, ever. Three book stacks later the budget says, "ouch."

   Tiny little island, most homes are quiet and shuttered, but by nightfall laughter will ring loud. It's a Friday in summer, on a tiny little island. 

 The spirit is both fragile and resilient, at once.

    Every life distills down to something, maybe even one thing, what is that one thing?

   Everything on an island creaks and groans with age, and the strain of an isolated, but not alone, life.

   On an island, children and fog horns are the noisiest atoms around. 

   On an island one is tempted to say bad words when a 7 year old driving a Suburban passes you by, with a 12 year old in the passenger seat and no adults present. You didn't know you were so risk averse, nor life so fleeting, then you knew, and now you have been reminded.

What flashes all silver and light, 

breaking the surface of the water? 

A gleaming fish escaping...something bigger. 

 Reflections from time with lovely grandparents on the island,

  and a momento grandchildren make and leave behind.

 Goodbye little blue,

a bon voyage to you,

and on gleaming wings he flew.