These last few months, weeks and days have been very interesting indeed.  

Hope.  In case you haven't heard me say it before, it is one of the abilities that separates us  from the machines.  Human beings have the ability to hope in the face of insurmountable odds.

Fear. Yes, we do share that most instinctual survival instinct with our animal friends.  The fight, flight or freeze behaviour.

And so here I sit in the end of the day on my front porch.  It's nothing like the porch I had in any of my other homes - no acres of land, no pond, no plantings of aromatic plants, no rose garden or zen retreat of my own.  This porch is in an urban loft in a converted landmark building.  Thankfully, they carved out the center and put in some plants and a blessed fountain which helps us to forget the noise of the traffic which careens on past us.

I must have known that someday I would live in such environs, because I have always said that I could do it for a time.  A day will come when I will remove myself back to a garden of my own, but for now here is where I dwell.

But as is my wont, I have digressed.

These last 12 years, more or less have been about congruence.  About aligning thought with actions, about directing things about realizing what a charmed life I have led.  I have striven for integrity and chosen it as my path, often at great personal cost.

And here I am.  In this time of so much imploding that there are still choices and options gifts from the universe if you prefer to call them that.

LIfe is full of blessings if we remember to look instead not for what we don't have but that which we can give. That to me is when we are truly at our best - when we are giving and striving to improve not only our lives, but the lives of those around us.

This existence of ours sometimes seems to be held together by mere gossamer threads.  Let us not forget to reach out and touch each other in ways that can make a difference.

In truth.

The Urban Cliff Dweller