6/28/21
I wish I had the words to describe the feeling of driving home at sunset with the perfect song blasting through my car speakers. Hopping off Ellington and turning left onto Cleveland and coming up the hill to overlook the golden sun pouring out over my neighborhood – homes and stop signs and friends walking their dogs. Perfect moments that replicate themselves often enough that I can close my eyes and see it all, often close my eyes so that I can see it all.
I wish I had the words to describe the feeling of waking up before most of the world and dragging myself to my car in a mismatched outfit to serve coffee to sleepy strangers who become sleepy friends over time, through repetition. My mind is filled with hotorcoldcreamorblackteaorcoffeehereortogo preferences that match faces whose predictabilities and soft smiles are safe places for my heart. People are found in their routines, and I have been blessed – to find and to be found, an exchange of finding that exists here in this moment today and hopefully tomorrow but will inevitably change as people change, as their routines change. Sleepy finding that I can only dream of being a part of for the rest of my life.
When I pay attention
when I set aside my thoughts, my moods, my frustrations
when I find the space in myself to stop being so predictably discontent,
I find that I am surprisingly content
that my thoughts, my moods, my frustrations aren’t so troublesome
and that my attention rests more lovingly, more kindly.
What a gift, to rest more lovingly. More kindly.
Lightly,
Leah
Leah Kepley, M.Ed. 