I fell asleep last night to the roar of the waves. Maybe that’s why I dreamt about a Lion. I don’t know. But the Lion told me all my days were numbered before one of them came to be. When I woke, I roughly counted that I have been alive for 24,090 days.
It was stormy earlier but the waves have calmed to a gentle rocking, playful splashing, no roaring, silky landings on the shore. The beauty of the ocean is how it is constantly changing. Which is a good thing because I’m not in the habit of counting the days I’ve been alive, and I hope to sleep well tonight.
But you have to admit. Life does start to add up to a lot of days pretty quickly. Which is maybe what the Lion was trying to tell me.
You could say I’m way past the halfway mark, but why bother. That’s obvious.
You might also say I’m over the hill,
or you could say, I’m climbing the steepest stretch. The glory stretch, you know, nearing the Mountain Peak.
We walk around labored and burdened as the Lion watches. With one giant leap He is at our side, whispering as only a Lion can, “This way, I’ll lead, but you’ll have to let go of all that.”
Why would I say, ‘No,’ to that? Maybe here, at the sea, I’m learning to be more like a cat?
At home, our house is in a flight path to the airport. Here, at the sea, three flights up, sitting on the uncovered deck, I’m on the pelican flight path. They don’t know I’m here, for one, because I’m buried in blankets because the sun is buried in clouds, it’s cold. And secondly, because, well, I don’t have a second reason. The pelicans don’t notice me.
It’s as though I could reach out and touch a wing. I can look them in the eye as they soar by. They don’t blink. They don’t even move. They just soar. Here in Topsail, I want to be more like a pelican.
It’s Friday, the end of our week, and the beginning for others. A new family is on the beach today that yesterday was deserted.
I keep thinking my husband is boiling water for coffee downstairs, but I finally figure it out. It’s the wind off the water whistling in the rafters. The wind can whistle. I find that extraordinary.
I will miss sleeping to the roar of the waves, the whistling wind, the salted ocean air, the unblinking pelicans, but not as much as I’ll miss the long talks I’ve had with my son.
I’ll take the lessons of the sea with me, keep my ears and eyes and heart open to the Creator of all this, remember I can soar in the shadow of His wings, have more patience like the old turtle crossing the road yesterday, and accept change as it comes, as if being polished like sea glass.
