A Forever Now

Forever is composed of nows.
Emily Dickinson 

The soul should always stand ajar, ready to welcome the ecstatic experience.
Emily Dickinson 

A nun friend of mine once told me that Colorado is so close to God it's a local call to heaven. Again today,it feels like that is true. Yet the day started  as it often does, in a rush of stress, lateness and lost objects. Aden asked me to help her study last-minute notes for social studies, Daniel hated the snack I packed and couldn't get out the door for Reading Together, and William misplaced a Battle of the Books book that he needs to find and finish by - wait for it - tomorrow. When I finally completed dropoff this morning my heart rate was up and the hamster in my brain was sprinting away on its wheel. 

But I made time for a swim, and during the repetitive laps I got my brain to slow down, to focus on one thing at a time. I remembered a quote from Eknath Easwaran's Passage Meditations: "A mind that is fast is sick. A mind that is slow is sound. A mind that is still is divine." Easwaran attributes the quote to Meher Baba, a mystic of India, and it reminds me of the quote "go slow to go fast." So I slowed down and focused on one thing at a time. I have yet to get to my poetry reading or my packing (or finding William's book) but I made cookies, had a gorgeous drive up to the Middle School, and spent a lovely lunch hour watching Aden's guitar concert. Afterwards, she was in a rush to get to science but waited for me at the bottom of the stairs where I had gotten pinned against the railing by a horde of 8th graders. She patiently explained that she was going to student council today, and then - in the midst of rushing middle schoolers - she lifted her face for a kiss goodbye. I couldn't believe that I didn't embarrass her - that she wanted me there and would even share an embrace in public. That moment was my forever now, my ecstatic experience. I'm so glad that we both slowed enough to share it. No task seems to large after that sweet moment. May we always go slow enough - and leave the soul ajar - to catch moments like these.