My Wild and Precious Life

This morning, I woke up to the soothing voice of Garrison Keillor reading this poem by Mary Oliver:

Who made the world?
Who made the swan, and the black bear?
Who made the grasshopper?
This grasshopper, I mean-
the one who has flung herself out of the grass,
the one who is eating sugar out of my hand,
who is moving her jaws back and forth instead of up and down-
who is gazing around with her enormous and complicated eyes.
Now she lifts her pale forearms and thoroughly washes her face.
Now she snaps her wings open, and floats away.
I don't know exactly what a prayer is.
I do know how to pay attention, how to fall down
into the grass, how to kneel down in the grass,
how to be idle and blessed, how to stroll through the fields,
which is what I have been doing all day.
Tell me, what else should I have done?
Doesn't everything die at last, and too soon?
Tell me, what is it you plan to do
with your one wild and precious life?

There are only a few things more perfect than waking up to Garrison Keillor's voice--and as a bonus, I love this poem. I love that she knows that each life is wild and precious. Most people don't realize that, I often think. I don't know what I'm planning to do with my wild and precious life yet, but I am certain that it is precious and wild, and I think that is a good start.

I have a friend who often tells me that I am very visually stimulated. The other day I realized how right he is when I was with Laura and Sophia at the park. I was swinging on the swings, stretching my legs high into the sky like I did as a child. I looked up at the blue, blue sky, the puffy white clouds, at my holey-jeaned-knees and Converse shoes set to this backdrop. I took a mental picture of what I saw, of my feet afloat in the summer air, and set it in my mind, an image to illustrate these free and vibrant days I am living. It is a picture to anchor in my mind to the feeling I get while riding my bike fast and furiously on a cool summer night, to the satisfied ache in my shoulders after a long day waiting on customers, to my pleased smile each time I pay all my bills, all by myself, with plenty of paycheck to spare.

I am busy. I work far more than I'd like, and have much less time for pleasure than I had hoped I would. I do not get to read, write, or create. I don't have time to sew, or knit, or plant, or bake. But I am happy, content with this sunshine-life of mine, and thankful for swings and Converse shoes and blue skies.