Day 238: Kindred Spirits

This morning on the way to taking my daughter to school and then myself off to work, we drove by the park near our house just as we do every morning. I like to think of this park as being more than an ordinary park, however. It's special. Our park sits on the edge of several acres' worth of wetlands, all of which is protected by law from the land being development or from other projects taking place that would ruin the aesthetic beauty and way of life that exists there. It's also a park that stretches from north to south, leaving you to look east to take it all in. On just about any morning in which the sky isn't cloud covered, you can sit on the bench or picnic tables and watch about as amazing of sun risings as I can imagine existing anywhere, sun rises that inch up over the horizon ever so slowly, heating up and flushing with color land that hasn't been touched since before the first settlers came barreling across Nebraska in their covered wagons. 

On some mornings, like today, that sun will be accompanied by a fog and a dew and a haziness that's so thick and seductive, you'd swear you could climb right on top of it all, curl up, and embark in the greatest sleep of your entire life. The way the sun bounces off the whiteness of the fog is beyond spectacular, and the colors that bounce and dance and spiral off the leaves and grass is hypnotic and utterly mesmerizing. 

Most mornings I drive by, I feel as if I'm alone in the world witnessing this beauty occurring.  Despite years of pestering whatever child was sitting next to me in the car's passenger seat to wake up long enough and "just look at that sunrise, will you," they have never been anywhere nearly as impressed as me. These days, I rarely even make mention of the natural miracle happening right outside the car window for their benefit. I just resign myself to take in the wonder alone and leave it at that. 

Today, though, I noticed a woman sitting on the picnic table under a canopy at the far edge of the park. She was leaning back, just basking in that sunrise, and in a mere second, I thought to myself, "I know exactly what she is feeling and seeing right now." As far as I know, we've never met, but for that brief second, just seeing the way in which she was reveling in what was being presented before her, I felt like we have always known one another. 

Life is strange in that way. We can feel completely isolated and devoid of any human contact while standing smack dab in the middle of a bustling crowd, and we can feel completely connected and as one with someone we've never looked at face to face or exchanged one word with. Sometimes, I need to know there are people in the world like me. I need to know that somewhere there is someone who values the same things as me. Even if I don't know them from Adam.