Enjoying Just Being Alive !

I have been going at everything pretty hard the past 5 years.

Work, especially having to rebuild an entire company and redesign a completely new technology and create a new system after the breach of agreements our "success" was rewarded with in South Africa, has been draining.

The onset of Lori's cancer, over 3 years ago, and the emotional and financial battle to help her beat this evil, has been to say the least, beyond "horrific".

That said, as of today she continues to defy the prognosticators and the "doom and gloom" groups, by simply being alive and enjoying the miracle of just living, each and every day. 

She even got out yesterday with Stephen and Victoria and had a great lunch at Moon Dogs in Rockport sitting by the Gulf of Mexico, watching the waves, and the sea gulls overhead, and enjoying the "miracle of life" everywhere around her.

So, when I woke up this morning and thought of everything I needed to do today just to be ready for the start of a new week I decided to change my behavior.

I decided to take a day and just enjoy the fact I am alive.

I have a great production crew on site in Texas only days away from stocking the largest indoor production shrimp ponds in the world. (At least, the largest of which we are aware.)

Our construction team is beginning to jell and perform at an amazing level of functionality and efficiency. 

We are assembling what I think is going to be a powerful Board of Governors that will become advisers to our company and eventually will be the pool of talent from which we will select our first Board of Directors, maybe as early as next year.

And I am in Maryland for a few days for business reasons.

Now if there is one time of the year that Maryland holds its own with the most beautiful spots on this earth it is here in the springtime. 

And after this particularly harsh winter these first new days of warmth and sunshine are like welcoming home a long lost friend or loved one.

So, I took a hike today. I walked out my front door along Seneca Creek and while I was never more than 1/2 mile from my house, everywhere I looked was new life.

I just read an article last night in the April 28th edition of "Time Magazine" about "Finding God In The Dark" a very interesting story about acclaimed American preacher Barbara Brown Taylor. I have never read any of her books but after this article you can bet I will be downloading at least one of them on my iPad asap.

So, maybe I was feeling a bit more spiritual than normal for me or maybe I finally had gotten a few decent nights of sleep, but I was in a very good mood when I woke up this morning and an early hour plus hike through the woods along the stream bed, only heightened that feeling.

Year round the miracle of life is every where if you look for it, but in the Spring here in Maryland it is absolutely busting lose.

The young fawns are everywhere. I know many of my neighbors see deer as pests which shows me how far people have become removed from the beauty of life. And how sad that is for them. (and I am not going to even let the thought of those who kill these beautiful creatures for "sport" ruin my mood today). 

There were new leaves on the  crab apple trees and cherry trees and apple trees that abound in Maryland but of course my favorites are the dogwoods that are blooming.

I always loved the story of the dog wood told to me years ago by my grandmother.

The story went that the dog wood used to be stronger and taller and harder and more solid then any other tree in the forest and its wood was prized for its length and strength and its lack of knots or blemishes.

It was so strong and straight that according to my grandmother (and I would not then nor would I even today 
:-) ever question her authority on all things spiritual) that:

"It was the tree the Romans sought out and cut down and used to make the cross on which Jesus Christ was crucified. 

So sad was this event that God in his mercy remade the dogwood tree and it became a spindly, small, bent, gnarly tree whose four petaled blossoms, stained with red at the end of each petal, and with a small crown of thorn like buds in the center, serve to remind all of humankind  and all Creation of the "sin" mankind committed and the sacrifice of the Lord. So that just as new life each spring follows the dead of winter, eternal life (for those that believe) always follows the "death" of this life on earth."

  

The dogwood tree and the blossom above are pictures from the two dogwood trees in my front yard.  The woods all along Seneca Creek abound with dogwoods in bloom this time of year. 

And they just make me smile.

After my walk I took a shower and grabbed a bag of carrots and went to visit Charm, my Arabian mare that is now 28 years old. 

As I have written before I have had Charm in my life since she was 6 months old and like springtime and dogwood trees and baby deer, each spring as I see her shed her winter coat and emerge a bit older but still sleek and still enjoying the sunshine and warmer weather (and yes, her carrots) I smile at the joy of just being alive.

        Charm, David, and Charm's friend, Logan, April 27, 2014.