(Photo - Wikimedia Commons)
I watched the sun rise this morning, and I do not have the words to convey what I saw. The adjectives, descriptive terms and analogies ran through my mind but not one can do justice to what I witnessed. I cannot draw or paint to show you the beauty of the morning so I must use words, however inadequate, to describe the scene.
At first, a sea of pinks and purples ran
across the dark sky and a red glow appeared along the horizon. This grew in intensity and burnt orange-red,
upwards and outwards, until looking at the sky in the east was like looking
into a burning fire. The sun peeped over
the hill, bright gold, against the flaming backdrop.
I moved cross the bedroom to get a better
view and saw the sun behind a line of silhouetted trees. It climbed higher in
the sky between the two extended main branches of an oak and appeared as though
it was enveloped and nestled by the limbs of the tree. I wondered how many years the mature oak has
stood in that spot and the number of times the rising sun cast its light on it.
The thought struck me that no matter how long I live, I will never see as many sunrises
as the oak tree.
From the moment I stopped to look at the
sky, the ‘to do’ list had tugged at my conscience like an impatient child tugs
on its parent’s hand. Now, I dismissed
it from my mind and continued looking out the window. Yes, there are things to do and places to be
but I have only a limited number of sunrises that I can watch, finite
opportunities to drink in the beauty and timelessness of nature. I didn’t waste time this morning nor was I
idling; I was living - truly living, if only for a few moments before the
mundane took over.
