Frailty

We sometimes look tough. On the outside.  But inside we are soft and fragile.

Or the other way around.

We are a complex people.  What others see is a facade, a front we put up.

How many people really know us?  Our dreams, our hopes, our fears.



How many people do we really know.

Love

Early this morning, Momma Bird and Papa Bird were outside my window, chirping loudly and hopping from branch to branch.  It seemed that Baby Bird had fallen into a little drain and was standing in the water, getting its feet wet.  

From time to time, one of the parents would fly to its side, trying to coax it out of the little drain, tempting it with food.

There was no way the little chick was going to get out of there.  After an hour of anguished watching, I took the Baby Bird out of the drain and for a moment, I thought it was not going to make it alive.

Warmed by the morning sun, and sustained by the food it received, the Baby Bird finally hopped up a branch of the shrub to its waiting parents.

For the rest of the day, the parents flew back and forth with more food to sustain the little chick and perhaps to build up enough strength so it would be able to fly to higher grounds for safety. 

That's what parents do for their kids.  I wonder if the little chick would remember this someday or are memories only for people.

Life's Delicate

Been away too long.  Too caught up in the mundane things in life.  Spent some time this week reflecting.  It's Agnes' birthday this week.  Almost 30 years since she died but I still remember.  The pain, it doesn't go away.  It just lingers around, reminding me of life's frailty.

I looked at a spider lily the other day and saw the delicate part of this gentle flower. The drooping white petals.  The thin stalks of the orange stamens, and somewhere in middle, the single filament stretches.

In the afternoon that day, a storm blew by and practically destroyed the flowers.

The frailty of life.