Butterflies are a beautiful metaphor for change and growth. It is too early for butterflies on the meadow here. They come later. Interestingly, and perhaps in conflict with the whole “growth and change” metaphor in some way, butterflies have no choice. They will go through metamorphosis like it or not. We have a choice whether to learn, grow, and change or…not.

[No AI is used in writing or editing this blog. This is human content for human readers.]

I am thinking about butterflies because I appreciate them as a metaphor, not because there are (or, as is the case presently, are not) any actually around. We can choose change. Can choose “metamorphosis”, we can choose being and becoming.

The last couple of days I’ve taken time to illuminate a couple pages in my notebook (it’s really not a “journal”) for future writing. The pages delight me. The theme is butterflies, and growth and change. I haven’t written anything on these pages, maybe I won’t, ever. I enjoy the prepared pages, regardless, they are a thing all their own.

Butterflies on a page.

An unexpected yawn interrupts my thoughts. Crazy, I almost feel as if I could just lay down and sleep. It’s fully daylight on a lovely Spring morning, and I’m sitting at a favorite stopping point along the marsh trail, as it turns to meander past the meadow and through a stretch of oak savannah and down to the river, where there is a lovely viewpoint at which I rarely stop (too crowded, very popular).

One version of beginning again.

I had started down the trail from “the low end”, heading west, counterclockwise if viewed from above. Most people will start from the upper parking area, and take the year-round trail in a clockwise direction, getting to all the marked viewpoints quickly, and turning back. A few photographers will venture further, to the blind setup in the meadow looking towards the ponds, or the viewpoint less favored by walkers, which looks out over the meadow at “nothing”. The birdwatching folks like that one a lot. The meadow and grassy places between the oaks is dotted with patches of flowers, yellow or white or some hue of pink. The lupines are done and going to seeds. It is time now for wild mustard, daisies, and dandelions, and wild roses.

The view when I arrived was gray and overcast.

Sunshine comes and goes. I think about change and growth and becoming the person I most want to be. I think about how fortunate and grateful I am to enjoy the partnership I have with my Traveling Partner. It feels good to be so well cared for. Like a friend on a road trip who remembers to bring their GPS, he reliably “knows a great place to stop”, and helps me find my way, if only by joking about the scenery, or encouraging me to continue. Instead of each day being a new moment of dread and anxiety, each day brings a new opportunity to begin again in good company.

… We’re still each having our own experience…

Same view, different moment.

Sunshine breaks through the clouds again.  Self-care matters. We become what we practice. I stretch and squint into the sunshine. The meadow-fresh air smells of flowers and something spicy. The robins eye me between tasty morsels dug up from the leaf litter and soft soil beneath it. They sing bits of song at me, but I don’t speak robin. 😆 Perhaps they are reminding me that there is a whole day ahead? So many moments and opportunities to change! I remind myself I’ve got errands to run once I turn towards home on the other side of this walk.

For now I’ll just enjoy this moment. I can begin again later. Right now it is enough to breathe the Spring air and listen to birdsong, and think about metamorphosis – and practice. We become what we practice.