what I see

I've just got in from taking the dog for a walk, and this is the photo I brought back for you, so you could see where I've been. It was dusk, and the sky white, all colour drained. Under the canopy of the bush it was almost dark, and a morepork called, heralding in the night. I'm not as scared of the dark as I used to be, but I was still on guard, my ears pricked. I walked as far as the stand of young kauri trees that tower above the beach, and then turned around and walked back down the stairs and into the bush again. I tried to take a photo then, of the stairs leading into darkness and the nikau palms framing them only barely visible in the grey light, but the camera wouldn't let me. That would have been the photo, I'm sure. A perfect image for Lent. Lent, the going down to come up; the going out to come back. Preparation for the eternal return.

I've left behind my comfortable routine of waiting for an entire story before I sit and write here. It's the moments I'm aware of now, the moments that are tugging at my attention. And they are leading me to a wider view, to a story more vast than I've seen before.

It feels good, this wide-angled story. Full of kindness and hope. I'm being led down by a gentle hand.

I have loved you with an everlasting love, 
therefore with lovingkindness I have drawn you.
Again I will build you, and you shall be rebuilt.
Jeremiah 31:3-4