Abundant Life

Anne, it's summer again! A perfect temperature out, and the evening breeze is gently billowing the blue curtain in my room. Slanting rays dip the tips of the blue spruce branches in gold.

In five weeks, we will celebrate your marriage to Jean-Pierre in Normandy. It seems a perfect time to speak of abundant life, of miracles and synchronicity. When I pray and am very still, listening, I get a sense of the enormous love that is God. I get a glimpse of light within me, the reassurance that everything is okay and that I am loved. This light, this love keep showing up in my life in unexpected ways.

Years ago, you welcomed me into your home in Versailles, filled with beautiful books, antiques, items from Morocco, Mali, and Normandy--everything so perfectly arranged in a completely tranquil setting. I had left a different beauty that morning--had plunged into the cool water of a Virginia river with dense green forest around it, had sat on the big rock to dry off and contemplate the voyage ahead across the ocean to France. It was surreal. The stories that well up inside me, that I've got to share with you, are surreal--too coincidental to be accidental, they are the stuff of dreams, but they are true. I am filled with wonder at the beauty of life's experiences!

I've always been attracted to colored light. Among my earliest memories is the way that light shines through flower blossoms and of course, fragrance enriches the color. I remember iris growing near the clothesline, the fairy-dust sparkle on the ruffled purple-blue, a heavenly smell that connects in my recollection to fresh clean sheets blowing in the breeze. My mom showed me a slice of cucumber, held up, its pale green circle enclosing deeper green transparent window seed spaces. Pomegranite seeds were ruby colored drops of sour juice with a tiny crunch. When I was three, we lived in San Francisco. So many sights and sounds! The tinkle of a Japanese glass wind chime, with pink and red painted on it. Clear, yellow-green light of jasmine tea. I recall a fantastic lollipop that I would hold up to the sun between licks, fascinated by the jeweled floral pattern of light coming through the sweet candy. Then, I must have been four and back in Long Beach, there was a kaleidoscope, just a simple, cardboard tube affair, but when you twisted it, aimed toward the light, you'd hear a satisfying swish, and then, you'd want to murmur, "Ah...!" in the same hushed awe that people watching a particularly wonderful firework display will say "Ah..!" because here was all the radiant crystal effect of starburst of patterned colored gems and you could hold it right in your hand. Twist gently, slowly, and see the difference one drop of cobalt blue will make, adding saphire fleur-de-lys to the green and gold filligree.