November 18,2020
“So just maybe it is these small silent moments which are the true story making events of our lives…”
Douglas Coupland
‘To see a World in a Grain of Sand
And a Heaven in a Wild Flower
Hold Infinity in the palm of your hand
And Eternity in an hour.’
(William Blake from ‘Augeries of Innocence’)
I went snowshoeing on a weekday last January up on Forbidden Plateau. Leaving the parking lot at the Mt. Washington Nordic Lodge, I headed out towards Helen Mackenzie Lake. The trail wends its way through an evergreen forest, past a myriad of small ponds and open sub-alpine meadows. An arctic high pressure ridge had settled over the area and the skies were clear and sunny. It was cold for Vancouver Island- well below zero and I was immersed in a winter wonderland.
I was making my way through a shaded forest
section when I came to a place where a single column of sunlight was
shining down through the tops of the trees all the way to the snow covered
ground. I paused there for a moment looking up. Just then, an accummalation of
ice crystals sloughed off a branch high above and drifted down.
The crystals were so fine, that they descended in
slow motion- almost invisible until reaching the column of the sun’s rays and
then suddenly they were alight. A mist of crystalline ice became this stream of
falling white light against a backdrop of evergreen branches and dark tree
trunks.
Everything seemed to go quiet and I stood very
still. For a few moments, nothing else existed except this falling of light in
a silent winter forest. Such a simple thing and yet in that moment it seemed
like one of the most beautiful things I had ever seen. My goal had been one of
distance- to snowshoe to the lake and cross to the far side. But now it was to
be present to the full depth and breadth this small silent moment that was now seemed
held like a jewel in the cupped hands of the day.
Another such moment happened when I was in my early
20’s and living in a second floor apartment above the corner of Jervis and
Pendrell in Vancouver’s west end. It was in the early spring. The sun was out,
the sky was a vivid blue, a northwest breeze was blowing and all the cherry
trees were festooned with pink blossoms. They looked otherworldly –like I was
looking out the window into a Renoir painting come to life. Looking out
into streets lined with cotton candy pink.
(Sakura Fall)
I was standing with coffee in hand looking out the
window idly watching a middle-aged woman walking east on Jervis street. She was
wearing a long dark coat and carrying a full bag of groceries in each hand. A
sudden gust of wind blew through the trees just as she was passing beneath and
a great shower of pink petals came cascading down-falling and whirling all
around her. She stopped. She put down her burden and then just stood there with
her arms raised up and wide open. Her face upturned to the shining sky as the
fall of flower petals filled the air all around her. She gazed upwards with
this radiant, beautiful smile illuminated her whole face like that of a child. That
single moment. I have never forgotten that. And even though it was over 40
years ago, I can remember the look on her face amidst the swirling cloud of
pink petals as clearly as if it had just happened.
Another such remembered moment was of my
daughter Kira and the fern circle. How a morning walk through a grove of
old growth forest led to a moment that I’ll remember the rest of my days. She
was about four at the time, embodying the archetype of the ‘Wonder child’ and
she certainly was that.
As the three of us ambled along, Kira suddenly
jumped into the open middle of a large circle of ferns- scrunched right down
into a ball and then called, “Look, I’m a sunflower!” And she was! With her
shining crown of blonde hair, she was scrunched right down in the middle of
that green fern circle and she became exactly that right before our eyes- a
sunflower. Another one of those moments that would endure for me long after the
rest of the day had been forgotten. She showed me that such a magical thing was
possible in that one small silent moment.
It may seem that these three moments are separate- that they are not connected with one another and yet it feels to me as if they are. Each of those three experiences-those encounters has held a kind of resonance for me which persists to this day.
Paul Kendrick
No comments:
Post a Comment