??Why did I come for a week of French Immersion??
Number# 3: Because I was being pulled here by The Great Unknown,
And I said Yes.
Number# 1: to stretch.
to open.
to allow spring inside me.
to get pushed.
to be with a best-friend for a whole week
and another best-friend for two days.
to be with adventurous and open-hearted people.
to sleep beside a large lake-of-living-water
and a loon
and the sun setting on the water
and half a moon rising
up over the woods in the dark.
Plus
ten thousand trees as they’re waking up.
to receive in my body the careful message
of the one frog singing to me
in its friendly wooden rhythm.
I am here to shake myself up
and see what I look like after
being upside down for a week.
To have younger people guide me
carefully, lovingly, with humor and fun
into the different world
that “French people” have created.
because I’m curious;
because it’s fun to learn new things;
because it feels good to be new to myself.
But yes
I want to learn to speak in French.
This exercise is a pencil sharpener
for my old lazy mind.
It’s the rooster call for the old farm lady:
“The sun is up! Nothing’s changed!
The world still needs you!”
calls the cock.
I awaken here. The old body stirs
in the woods
by the lake.
By the campfire
my young spirit rises up again with
the flames of beauty and song.
My young coach,
Like the loon across the lake,
Cheers me on: “Keep going,
Keep trying. You can do it!” says
this wise young companion.
Then he waits, still,
as the motor of my mind sputters
upward once more to do my bidding.
Number # 2: I came because it’s good for people who
love each other immensely
to separate now and then.
Just to be sure they can do it.
Just to remember their
responsibility to their own different
Destinies.
Number # 3, again:
because I choose
my courage and my humility
and obey the pull of The Great Unknown.