July 19, 2021, Waterfall and Grandfather Ledge

One of the greatest gifts given to me in this lifetime—besides my children—is the sacred land I live on. On this land, a quarter-mile from the house and fields, is the Waterfall where I am now. The sun has come out this afternoon after a long period of heavy rains for days or weeks (I have no idea), and the Waterfall is enormous, rushing, powerful — Water Mother incarnate.
 
I sit here and weep, alive with the wild again after so long away. Rain, the endless work of retraining after Covid, and the full weekend taken up with plumbing.
 
In seconds I go from crunched in on myself to shoulders back, chest open, the energy of my body reaching out to the wild of the water, to the deep solid stone of Grandfather Ledge rising 15 feet above me. The water is slamming down and even spewing straight out with a force coming from 60 feet above. All of this calls to me, to that part of me that knows this water, this rock. I am the water here. I am this rock. The power of the water is here inside me. The depth within Grandfather Ledge is within me. They have taught me this. They have brought me to this, my real mothers and fathers.
 
As I sit here, I sob and sob in relief, in recognition, in finding myself again here, my whole being lifting up, spreading out to connect with not only Waterfall and Grandfather Ledge, but farther to the Grandmother and Grandfather Trees and Rocks, and to the Earth Mother herself.
 
I could not connect with myself this weekend through the painting I am working on in my studio. I had a full weekend of plumbing to do. And the rain and rain and work and work and my Achilles’ tendons not great have kept me from this forest place. But as I contemplated walking to the Fairy Woods adjacent to the road today, I felt instead the call to come here to witness this wild.
 
We are made up of something like 60% water. I am made up of at least that amount of wild. I need to be in its proximity to remember who I am. Sitting at the edge of the Waterfall on a wet, moss-covered rock, the rage of the water muting all other sound, still I feel and hear and take in the soft, persistent welcome of the trees all around me and the sloping fingers of the land that embrace me. The sky finds its way through the treetops to bathe me in its light. The mass of ledge beside me connects with and infiltrates and replenishes the round river rock that I always envision way down inside, where dwells my deepest self. And that strength, that depth of the Grandfather Ledge spreads out from that small round rock inside to quiet my anxious self, fill each hollow cavity of need with sustenance, so that I straighten up, my body and lungs and heart and soul filling with this love I know Nature is giving me.
 
I am quiet. The tears are finished. I am given this gift of stillness to carry back with me into my busy, challenging life. I have not felt this in a long time, but it is so needed, and I will do the best I can to make it last.
 
Thank you, all elements of earth and sky and water, for the arms you have wrapped around me this day and for your soundless words of blessing.
 
I am your daughter, as you know.