Fish Creek Morning
When I’m working on a writing project, I’m a bit of a workaholic. I don’t go for morning walks—I write, edit, reread, type. I carry it on into the afternoon and sometimes late at night. This can go on for weeks and weeks at a time. Ask Jim. I turn down invitations, opportunities, forget to pay bills, answer letters, go to the dentist.. This has been a particularly intense time as I’ve labored to finish yet another draft of the upper middle grade novel I’ve been working on for much of the last several years. But I just sent it off to a “beta “ reader—and I gave myself a long weekend! Today when Jim decided to take the morning off, I joined him, along with our dog and our daughter’s dog. We all know about renewal, right? The idea of the Sabbath, the idea of resting mind and spirit, waking up to the world around us, opening ourselves to the present moment, inviting new ideas. I was as giddy as a child set free.
I could have written this as a post on my Facebook site—but I’m putting it on my website as a reminder to myself and anyone who reads this that keeping body and soul together is part of the work of writing or any other creative endeavor (by which I mean just about any aspect of living). I am putting a few more photos on my Facebook author page (susigreggfowler, writer). Here is a photograph from our morning. What joy to live in this place of such beauty.
The last line of Wendell Berry’s poem “The Peace of Wild Things,” says it better than I:
“For a time I rest in the grace of the world, and am free.” To which I can only say Amen!