flux, photos & a few tears

the view of Miss D from my haven chair in our fenced in park-like backyard (the chain link fence is completely covered with a tangle of Virginia Creeper which will turn the most brilliant red soon) / the lil' man Virgil / A very handsome seagull from this morning's walk along the boardwalk / looking up from the same back yard chair / cosmos bright lights / bathroom selfie in our very old mirror from my grandmother Flo's upstairs hallway / a beach dune succulent / periwinkle / sunflower / crow composition / brotherly love (technically not blood brothers Oliver was 9 weeks old Gussie 6 weeks when we adopted them from our local shelter / calm along the crescent beach / hydrangea / Winnie Dixon - a portrait from this morning

Sit still with me in the shade of these green trees, which have no weightier thought than the withering of their leaves when autumn arrives, or the stretching of their many stiff fingers into the cold sky of the passing winter. Sit still with me and meditate on how useless effort is, how alien the will, and on how our very meditation is no more useful than effort, and no more our own than the will. Meditate too on how a life that wants nothing can have no weight in the flux of things, but a life that wants everything can likewise have no weight in the flux of things, since it cannot obtain everything, and to obtain less than everything is not worthy of souls that seek the truth.
Fernando Pessoa

flux - continuous change, passage or movement

Everything changes & all the time. Sometimes I flow along too, drifting slowly, beautifully down/up with the river of my own life and other times I desperately try to reach out, grab a hold, a branch, a rock - I try to stop time or at the very least slow it down ... even just a little. Slow the pace, the change. It's good, it's bad (it's not really bad but at times it's incredibly uncomfortable - my life is never bad in any way), sometimes it's sad. Sad I realize is not bad. Sad is just sad. Sad is welcome.

I do believe my girl D is on the down swing of her long life - I could be wrong. You know your dog when you're a dog person (or a cat person) and many of you who stop by here are pet people. Winnie is not my first senior dog. You begin to notice the little changes in their habits and personalities, once they've past 12 years your vigilance becomes alert, you feel grateful - you know any time you have with them after 12 is frosting. She is 14 years and 8 months, we moved on to Hyper V some time ago. I'm trying to prepare myself as crazy as I know that is. And I'm trying also to live in the now of every one of our glorious moments left together. I'm letting myself feel sad, worried, concerned. I'm letting myself feel. Whatever it is I might need or want to feel.

I also feel glad, thrilled, excited and lot's more amazingly fantastic feelings about so many other aspects of my life - about the flux, the flow, the change, the pace & the passages of time.