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About a week ago it was winter again in Esperance, Western Australia.  Storm clouds hung low and had everyone frustrated, Spring was short, much like youth.

A week later, Mother Nature has accelerated into summer. The jolt between seasons creates havoc and mayhem at night and leaves the sky bruised the next morning. The transition between black, indigo, purple, pink to shimmering pewter and gold is fleeting.  Like a heart that forgives quickly, so does the sky.

Forgiveness has its own language, its own vocabulary, its own perspective, its own meaning … to those who choose it.

I have often wondered why I find myself in situations where I am vulnerable and consequently, need to forgive people.  Why are some lessons harder to learn than others?  Is there a power higher than myself that feels I need more practice at forgiveness?  On reflection, I’ve come to my own conclusion.

Forgiveness is not an outcome. It is a place of renewal, a sanctuary, a place where you go to remember the good and the not-so-good. It is an opportunity to become new and whole again. It is a place where, once you ride out the pain, you can smile at yourself again.

Forgiveness is a gift of peace, to self.

Until next time

As always

a dawn bird

 

I was thrilled when I realised I would be in the Wheatbelt in Western Australia during the Super Moon.  The sky is big and often clear around this region.  Driving towards my destination, at dusk, I pulled over in a picnic area to take a picture of the moon over a paddock, only to find an elderly couple in a caravan were there first.  They were camped sipping tea, camera on tripod, waiting to be enchanted.

At night, I drove around looking for the best place to photograph the moon.  A risky thing to do as there is no street lighting on country roads.  Just the flash of eyes from kangaroo or fox or the blinding lights of a road train.

In a clear sky, the moon was a moon.  I hadn’t factored in the beautiful moon needed more.  It needed something else to add perspective.  My attempts were futile.  Now past ten pm, it was time to go back to my hotel.

I woke before dawn the next day and went looking again. This time there were some clouds floating by.  The moon was lower on the Western horizon, big and luminous.  It was the delight I was searching for the previous night.

The moon is often associated with fertility, life.  And her ocean lullaby of gently rocking tides from shore to shore, makes her Mother of all life on Earth.

Undaunted by a fierce sun, she is ever present in the sky.  She is a celestial watchful eye.

The moon is a reassurance, a silent promise, there will be another day.

I believe this.

Until next time

As always

a dawn bird

 

 

 

 

Friendship does not covert by stealth

does not exclude purposefully

is reciprocity.

Friendship does not seek to hurt and harm, intentionally.

Friendship is childlike,

a celebration of life.

In a moment of alone

Friendship is a gift,

offered spontaneously, generously

between a ‘you’ and a ‘me’.

May you find friendship, when you least expect it today.

As always

a dawn bird

 

 

I saw a sliver of luminous light,

from under a dark lashed eye.

I wished it open.

It did.

May your wishes come true, too.

Until next time

As always,

a dawn bird

 

Dragonflies are small. Dragonflies are strong. They can fly across oceans with wings of lace. Dragonflies are beautiful, even more so, after they morph into who they are meant to be.

Dragonflies represent life, prosperity, renewal, birth. They represent light. They represent strength. In the Japanese culture, they represent joy.

At the cusp of change and transformation with new experiences ahead of me, they represent joy for me too.

“I am with you”, “All is well”, “Be still and know I am God” are my favourite prayers.  I have relied heavily on these for years, but even more, this year.

The waiting is over.

With frayed wings, I have flown over an ocean.  Once again.

Until next time

As always

a dawn bird

When travelling, the last thing I do at night before sleep is to check the time for sunrise, then set my alarm five minutes earlier.

At Esperance Bay, like me, the seagulls and Pacific Gulls also sit and wait for dawn.  I am never disappointed.

As we head into summer the sun rises to the right of Frenchman’s Peak, some 40+ kms away across the water.  It always makes a stunning appearance.  It is a quiet time of day for me.  I like being alone at this hour.  I usually have company though.  Fishermen, joggers, people with dogs, lycra clad cyclists bent low over their prized bikes.  Each of us curious why the other is up so early.  Too precious to break the silence, “Good morning” is a subdued greeting.

I feel invincible at dawn.  I plan my day.  I plan my life.  I plan.  I plan.  I plan.  Then, I prioritise. Having a list of ‘Most Important Tasks’ is something I do first thing in the morning.  It is a chance to group my tasks and assign meaning to them.

I have been practising this strategy in my personal life as well.  A new dawn, is a new day, every day, in more ways than one.  Each day filled with possibilities.  Until recently my vision lacked clarity.  I can see now, this is the road I was meant to travel.

Having decided on what I want to do with the remaining work years and how to do it, opportunities seemingly flow towards me.  I have met like minded folks through the most extraordinary set of circumstances.  Some would claim this is the law of attraction.  I’m not sure how that concept works.  But, it seems to have worked for me.

I’m sure Esperance Bay was beautiful at dawn this morning.  I’m some 700+ kms north of it and, yet, it is just as beautiful here.  I woke to a bruised sky of purple, orange and pink.  The rainbow lorikeets are screeching in delight, the kookaburras have laughter gurgling in their throat, I can hear the whoosh of flapping wings of the big water birds as they head to the lake.  They are starting a new day.

So am I.

Until next time,

As always,

a dawn bird

In Australia we are officially one month away from summer.  There is confirmation of this in the garden.  The rainbow lorikeets have returned to nibble at the new leaves atop the trees.  I hear them at dusk.  They are noisy.  Having the garden to themselves, most of the time, they screech and look at me in the eye with curiosity.  I suspect these are young birds.  Their feathers shine and they look almost like ceramic ornaments in the tree.  The feathers are perfection.

At the front the passionfruit vine across the garage wall has spread, like loving arms wide open.  It is laden with buds.  Only two flowers have bloomed.  I’m learning about helping the pollination process that encourages flowers to fruit.  I feel there is something invasive about helping Mother Nature like this.  But, if I want fruit, the flowers need my help.  Where have all the bees gone?

Like a change in season, my life is in transition.  There are others who are giving me a helping hand.  They are reaching out to help me contribute the best way I can to the community.  This is team spirit in a larger sense.  After a phone interview last evening, I am being interviewed in person today for a much desired opportunity.  To find the team wants someone with my professional background, is a win win situation.

The advice I give my children when they have gone for an interview is consistent.  They may be good for the job, but it is critical the job has to be good for them.

The same applies to life.  To people.  To relationships.

Until next time,

As always,

a dawn bird 

 

 

 

 

This week Indians around the world will celebrate the festival of Diwali.  A festival that celebrates good over evil, light over darkness through lighting decorations and spectacular fireworks.

As a child growing up in India, Diwali was anticipated with delight.  Hundreds of earthenware saucers would be bought and the children would sit with adults in circles and roll wickers of cotton wool between their palms.  The saucers would be placed in decorative fashion around home, the wickers placed in them, and oil poured carefully to fill the saucers.  At dusk the wickers would be lit.  It cast a soft glow.  It was fairyland.  Then came the fireworks.  Huge explosions in the sky and the triangles that shot spouts of fire from ground level.  The strings of red ‘crackers’ that skidded around or leapt in the air.  The ‘bees’, tiny curled fireworks that buzzed unpredictably from the ground and into the sky.  (How did that ever pass the safety inspection!).  The nervous and raucous laughter of teens who loved the dance of danger.  People would be dressed in new clothing.  Homes would be thoroughly spring cleaned.  Strangers were welcomed by genteel hospitality.  Trays of sweets and goodies would be sent around the neighbourhood as a gesture of celebration and good will.  The premise being, the more you give, the more blessings you receive in return.  So largesse, was the order of the day.

Although my birth country may have changed now from when I left it, the memories remain and have shaped who I am today.

I believe in the bond of true friendship.  The kind that gives, more than it takes.  I believe when we engage with others this way, we celebrate life.  We celebrate being alive.

I have no fireworks or earthenware sauces to light today except the fireworks that Mother Nature has provided and the wish that your heart, home and life be lit with love, light and prosperity at Diwali.

I will light a tea light at dusk scented with essential oils of ‘Peace’.  When I do, I will think of you.

Until next time,

As always,

a dawn bird

 

 

 

 

How often has one heard someone suggest, “You should …” and never follow up on the suggestion?  Of course, when the place being suggested is called, quite simply, “Big Swamp” and does not even have ‘The’ to distinguish it, one can be fooled into thinking it is an ordinary place.

With an early start back to Perth I knew I had a full day’s work ahead of me.  Decision making has been weighing me down lately.  Even the several hours of solitary driving, on other trips, would have been a welcomed space to reflect and plan.  But, not this morning.  I felt swamped.  Utterly swamped.

I drove out of the hotel at 4.30 am to clear my head.  A lone dolphin broke the surface intermittently at Koombana Bay.  Two fishermen, launching their boat at Leschenault Inlet, were surprised to see me up so early and in typically Australian vernacular, say, “You’re up early mate!”  “I keep fishermen and farmers’ hours”, I tell them.  Their laughter rises above the throttle of the engine.

Still restless, and with the sun now fully crested, I drove down Ocean Drive looking for coffee.  Then I remembered ‘Big Swamp’.  I turned left and found it with ease.  I circuited Prince Philip Drive and Tuart Street a couple of times.  My attempt at recon, this being unfamiliar territory.

I park my car and watch a man with a boxer and a smaller dog stop and let a duck and six ducklings cross in front of them.  Within striking distance, the dogs are still and silent. People and animals live in harmony here.  I step out of my car to air that is alive with the sound of birds and “Good morning”.  I am home.

The peppermint gum tree, an ordinary looking tree, has tendrils of beautiful delicate flowers.  The grove of paperbark trees is an enchanted forest.  The honeyeaters, loud.  The bottlebrush, much like me, is bursting to bloom.  The New Holland honeyeater is bold, flies past my nose and clutches a flower less than six inches away from me, tilting his head with curiosity.  So close, my camera is difficult to focus, so I move away.  He stays.  This is his territory.  I see native wildflowers entwined in embrace.

By now, like a wild child, I know no boundaries because none were imposed.  I stop for a moment, confused, and try to find my bearings, when suddenly, and perfectly, the Splendid Blue Wren, dropped from the tree on the ground before me, like a bright blue leaf.

I left Big Swamp reluctantly, making a silent promise.  I will return.  It is no longer unfamiliar territory.

Until next time,

As always,

a dawn bird

In a coastal town deep in the south west, the surf was pounding at my feet below while I enjoyed a leisurely breakfast of buttered toast and Vegemite.  A movement caught my eye and I glanced up.

She is seated near by, almost within arm’s reach.  The skin on her face moves like a concertina accordion in motion.  She is playing the music of smiles between strangers.  Hesitant, unsure.  We hold each other gaze a moment longer, and the moment sets her face aglow.  Her smile comes from a place where she keeps good memories.  Encouraged she says, with utter delight, “You’re a Vegemite kid!”  We both laugh at the incongruity of this observation.

We start talking and she tells me she is from Broome.  “I’ve just returned from there!” I respond, the comment invigorates a new friendship.  “I lived there from the war years until 1954”.  An only daughter among several sons, she lived free among the mangroves.  “Of course, there were snakes, but no crocodiles”, she tells me in a hushed voice of caution.  “There was only Chinatown.  Now …” her voice fades wistfully.

I tell her about Crab Creek where I watched birds live in harmony and the red earth bleed into the sea, my attempts at photographing the lesser sand plover at Cable Beach, the pindan cliffs of Roebuck Bay at dawn, the Shinju Matsuri Festival where art finds a home on shore.  Our smiles find a resting place here too.  Soon, her elderly husband helps her up on her crutches.  She limps to the door way, stops and turns around to look one last time.  Nostalgia is reflected in her eyes as blue as the sea she frolicked in, and as warm as the sun above it.  She is not looking at me, but at her beloved Broome.

Little did she know, so was I.

Until next time,

As always,

a dawn bird

It’s a beautiful Sunday.  Spring has arrived late.  Overwhelmed by the demands and deadlines I have to meet, I impulsively dressed and escaped by driving 70 kms to visit Araluen Botanic Gardens.  I went to see the tulips.  They bloom beautifully, all 100,000 or so in spring.  But, I was two weeks too late.

The gardens are undulating.  The eye candy helped me stop and catch my breath.  Among thousands of flowers, the ones that caught my eye were the ones that shone in the light.  The light, it seemed, came from within.

What comes from within is important.  It is nurtured there by self, and adjusted by others, throughout one’s lifespan.  Nature and nurture.  If the combination is right.  If the influences are right.  You get an optimum result.

Every so often I come across people where this calibration has gone wrong.  When it does, it is quite tragic.  What doesn’t shine, shows.  It is visible to all except self.  And, therein lies the tragedy.

May you find the right light to guide you today.

Until next time,

As always

a dawn bird

“If life had a second edition, how would I correct the proofs”, so said John Clare.

For me, every day is a second edition.

We are always given a chance to ‘correct’, modify, clarify, consolidate, reflect, edit, amend, add.  For me, this process starts at dawn.

Reflection can be uncomfortable for some but, over time, it can become a place of sanctuary.  A place of renewal. When we practice this consciously, mindfully, we enrich our life and of those who cross our path.

May you find a few minutes of renewal in your sanctuary, today.

Until next time,

As always,

a dawn bird

For those who look, there is guidance in stars.  Travellers on land and sailors on sea scan the skies to find their bearings.  Some look to stars of media, from whom they model their behaviour.  There are stars in cyber space (Instagram, Pinterest, come to mind).  There are stars within family systems, as bright, or brighter, that guide future generations, than those found in astronomy.  Then, there are stars that guide others, who seek them, in astrology.

For some, Our Lady, Star of the Sea, is a prayer.  A symbol of guidance, of hope, of safety, of protection.

So to find a sea star at my feet, alive, at Cable Beach, Broome, was fortuitous.  Yes, I believe there is guidance in stars.

I’ve been focusing on living mindfully.  I’ve been attempting to appreciate the experience of the moment, and I’m finding this to be larger than the sum of all others.  Early one morning while walking mindfully, step by step, it was no curious thing for me to find a sea star at my feet.  It is an interesting creature.  The sea star is not a fish.  It has no brain.  It uses nerve endings that travels the length of the limbs.  It senses.  It survives by using this strategy.  It can regenerate a limb, when one is lost, to be whole again.  How can a creature without a brain, be so powerful? (Wannabe ‘leader of the free world’ excepted!).

Being busy, one loses the capacity to sense.  One dances to the rhythm of demands.  And, when one can hear and one can feel a bum note, one ignores it.  Rhythm takes over.  Because.  One.  Is.  Busy.  Then the bum note reaches a crescendo.  It is unmistakable.  It demands one heeds.  It demands one responds.  It demands one stops, looks and listens.  It is all about savouring the moment.  Living the moment.  Pleasant or unpleasant.

I heard the bum note.  I stopped.  I looked.  I saw.  And, I listened.  My life has been enriched because I did.

Yes, I’ve learned to renew my life through new experiences.  Through my senses.

My wish for you today is that your footsteps be mindful.   And may your path, too, be guided by a star today.

As always,

a dawn bird

After a whirlwind of trips, walking up to the front door, flanked by dozens of roses is a welcome like no other.

Waking to the sounds of birds in the garden, the beep of the garbage truck, the whistle of the kettle in the kitchen, the churning of clothes in the washing machine, may be mundane to some, but music to my ears.

I am home.

Briefly.

But home … and, where I am rested and happy.

Until next time,

As always,

a dawn bird

 

I was taught to believe storms are dangerous.  Perhaps, some are.  But not all.  Storms can be transformative.

As mentioned in the previous post, we are experiencing unseasonal weather.  Busselton, in fact most of the South West was buffeted by strong winds and rain.  I am learning to experience a storm differently.

I woke one morning, pre dawn, and rather than stay in bed, I went outdoors only to find the cloud formations were wonderful.  They were huge and hung so low, one could almost touch them.  The iconic Busselton Jetty that curves some 1.8 kms over the Bay in the morning light, was serene and more beautiful under a stormy sky.  During the day clouds were like a careless blanket cover thrown halfway across the Bay.  At sunset, still gorgeous and making a fiery statement, every sunset is a new day elsewhere.

Storms make us look upwards.  We try and interpret what we see.

I did not see a rainbow this time.

As always

a dawn bird