I love summer.  I love the warm, sensuous mornings, the feel of water on my skin while swimming, the sounds of birds, the brilliance of night skies.  I love potato salad, ice tea, ice coffee, eating outside, anything outside.  I even love the sweat running down from under my riding helmet.  I love dancing in the heat, muscles looser, longer, more playful.  All sweet.

In the midst of summer’s sweetness this year is the bitter absence of my youngest daughter, and the accompanying inexplicable silence.  There are certain hellacious life experiences that feel like psychic whiplash.  Unexpected, brutal, painful  This is one of those.  This morning, Pam and I wept as we ate our peaches, sitting outside in the soft, curiously empty morning.  I said that I felt I could not contain both the bitter and the sweet of these days.

With this, I can neither carry it nor put it down.  The ache feels like it is carried in each of my cells, like a stain or a bruise. At the same time, the beauty of each day, the irresistible sweetness of my new granddaughter Laila Rose, the kindness of my daughter Bimala, the touch of a horse’s nose on my cheek, the caress of the water on my skin – all call me, hold me, soothe me.  Sweet, bitter, sweet, bitter.  Breathe in, breathe out, breathe in, breathe out. Keep walking, keep opening, keep hoping.