Honoring The Circle

Today I’m watching the rains fall again onto my creek rather than hiking in the mountains, which were my plans for my day off, but sometimes Mother Nature, the great circle, and the great balance have other ideas. Though I’d rather be on the trail, this rain gives me a bit of quiet time to reflect on things and meditate. I find myself thinking back upon the recent summer solstice, another day when rain forced me to change my plans.  On this day, the rain was so hard that my fire pit by the creek got flooded so my solstice fire became a candle on a rock instead. This solstice was special though for it was the day I was to release the ashes of my parents back into the sea. I saved some of their ashes for my trip to the ocean the next day, but the lion’s share went into my creek during a tobacco ritual I did to honor the circle of life during the northern apex of the solar cycle. Like us all, my parents came from the sea. Their bodies made up of the substances of the earth, which at some distant time came from the stars. As their spirits return back to the higher realms and their used bodies reduced to ashes, whats left from the vehicles that once housed my parents are now returned back from whence they came. And as the ashes flow down the creek in the summer rains perhaps the fish swallow some for nourishment. Perhaps some of the ashes settle on the shore to help the Orange Jewel Weeds blossom. Perhaps some will even make it to the bigger creeks and rivers and wind up back in the ocean, the cradle of life for the planet; and a new cycle begins for me for from death new life is born as the great cosmic circle ceaselessly spins. .