Love until your hands bleed--

Sunday, Sunday...day of rest, or at least in all books hypothetical. It has been a full morning thus far. I rose early as a bird (in night-hawk terms) in time to slide in some standing and kneeling and thrashing of my way through hymns. This was followed by a brimming spread of breakfast food...hashbrowns, french toast, black coffee and slivers of fruit all intertwined on the plate balanced between my fingers. Dreamy.
The sun is sweet and heavy today, and my body is aching to soak up whatever warmth and natural light that it can. Of late, my limbs are frail from repeated pilgrimages to hot yoga classes. It is a good ache; the best sort. Like my bones and muscles are cursing and thanking me all in the same breath, but mostly they are adoring it.

I feel like I have been thinking a lot about the frailty and fleetingness of life these past few weeks. Although impersonal, the death of Heath Ledger streaked me with immeasurable sadness. The night following the news of his slipping from life, I saw a film that spiraled me even a little further into this head and heart space of thoughtfulness and borderline-melancholy. It was called "The Diving Bell and the Butterfly", and it is a stunning story of tragedy and a strange sort of renewal. Maybe it is my own personal slant on the world and all things life-giving right now, but in the space of that slender hour and a half, my innards were stirred. I felt drawn into a degree of sadness and awareness that is new to me; unrecognizable even. It feels alien-esque still. I think it is maybe to do with the fact that the emotions brought forth were so beyond myself--they failed to revolve around me or those in my reality; but, rather, the human condition in general, and our state of absolute unknowing and vulnerability. I continue to find it difficult, impossible even, to grasp the realization that the precious things I take for granted today, right now, in this very moment as my fingers graze the keyboard, are not guaranteed. They fail to be now, and the truth is that they never will be.
My intention is not to make this a reflection drenched in darkness and negativity. On the far-reaching contrary, I feel like collecting these pieces of tragedy and pain in my extended surroundings...picking them up like deadened leaves or water-glazed stones on a beach, internalizing them and living in consciousness of the beauty and sanctity of life--that is inspiring and that is good.
To life in the moment.
RB.