A Perfect Autumn Day

It was a perfect autumn day. Is there such a thing?! There was for me! Recently someone asked me, “How do you distinguish one beautiful day from the next, when the sky is blue, the sun is shining bright and the temperature is good enough to hang outdoors?” He went further, “I like reading your blog, but I don’t get it! A fall day is a fall day. I think you are making this stuff up.” (I couldn’t help but laugh out loud).

The average person might look at today and see what you see, but you need to know, dear friend, I am not like the average person. I am no better than you, just not average when it comes to affairs of the heart.

Just like fingerprints, no one exactly the same, the same holds true for the heart. Sure, to a scientist they may all be the same, but not to an individual who allows him/herself to connect on a deeper level, and it’s easy to do with a heart free of fear, a mind open to endless possibilities and with a soul that yearns for something more.

I’m no fool because I know our world is in peril. I don’t walk around with my nose in the air, looking through rose-colored glasses. I see what you see, but move beyond it to realize greater potential, and with that, real beauty emerges.

It’s not enough for me to take notice, looking out a window to say, “It’s a beautiful day! I want to be a part of it!” How I achieve this is by not getting in a car. I don’t leave one enclosure to simply go to another. I don’t just look at what’s around me. None of this is good enough. I must walk, touch, feel, taste (on occasion), connect through curiosity and create a memory of the beautiful world around me because it feeds into what I can only describe as my inner compass, which we all have to keep us moving forward. It takes us to the places we are meant to be.

A friend of mine recently said to me, “You need to find your inner compass.” I was a bit confused by her statement, but after a recent chat (which still didn’t make sense), and a bit of reflection on my part, I’ve come to understand her statement as a projection. However, to my friend, I’m concerned yours is broken. My inner compass is working fine because if it weren’t, we would have never met and became friends, a friendship I cherish dearly.

I know the following to be true: when we choose quality to quantity, moderation to indulgence, and when we see our body as a temple – feeding it proper nutrition, exercise and limiting our consumption of those things that can compromise our existence (smoking, alcohol without using moderation, and other drugs), we lose touch, and what we think is reality is nothing more than imagination, leading to a false sense of security and emptiness.

It’s like the person who sees sex as love, and makes that the barometer for their relationship. Sex is not love, and true love is a gift to last forever, but only when we nurture it together with truth... but I digress.

And if I haven’t answered your question, friend – know this, this day was better than my last fall day because I saw a lonely grasshopper resting in a wide open space, and a little boy (no older than four) holding his grandmother’s hand broke free, and walked over to me as I was photographing this insect, tapping me on the shoulder to say, “That’s a grasshopper!” His grandmother smiled and said, “Thank you for sharing that with us. We would have never noticed it.”

It was with my interests and curiosity that a dialogue was created and emotions were shared, and in return I received what I was looking for – a perfect autumn day. - paerki

Additional Photos: October's End