Rings and Birds

Twenty-two years ago around this day my beloved asked for my hand in marriage.

I had no idea what the heck he was doing. 

We went hiking and for some reason I was strangely fascinated by a bird thingy. I don't even remember what it was other than I tend to randomly get drawn into caring about birds until I don't. It's just like shiny things, manhole covers, and pretty much anything else that suddenly catches my attention. 

I walked away from one of those moments with a stranger giving me a CD of 100 different bird calls found in Ohio. Unfortunately on our trip to Pennsylvania, it was the only CD in the car so we listened to them all and realized they weren't very interesting. (Except for Hannah, who thought they were fabulous).

My beloved began to sweat as I became fascinated by birds until he finally got me to the perfect spot where he sang a song, got down on one knee and placed the $6 abalone ring on my finger. That was how I knew he loves and knows me. I am not to be trusted with jewelry and I'm kind of a cheapskate. 

I've been through four wedding rings and now I just keep #3 taped to the sound machine next to my bed (I found it in the potato bed a year after I lost it). There are things I don't do well in life and accessorize is definitely one of them. 

This week has me thinking about life, love and the pursuit of happiness. It all kind of happens in the midst of distractions. The sacred ends up woven into the ordinary moments. One minute you're commenting on the mating habits of cardinals and the next you're beloved is proposing. 

It's not all happy stuff either. Death gets mushed in there with life, love and happiness right in the middle of shiny things and manhole covers. 

My beloved is making me triple ginger, coffee, molasses, and lemon cake right now. That makes me really happy. 

And I suppose that's my point. 

I try to be present to delight in what's around me now, and I try to be prepared for kairos moments. A kairos moment is a cool name for time (like proposals, birth, death, gingerbread cake) when we get pulled out of the present and thrown into profound life altering experiences where choices and character are revealed. 

Be grounded in the present, but prepared for the sacred. 
Watch the birds, but don't miss the guy on his knee.