Sunday, November 14, 2010

Promise of a Wonderful Winter

While waiting for nature to take her course is an admirable way to live, it does take some training to gear down to that philosophy of life. I've worked on it for five years and I'm still operating my internal engine at high idle. Maybe one has to be born to the pace of peace to live happily in the lap of its luxury.

New Orleans and the Gulf Coast of Mississippi are centers of celebration. When one lives with so much uncertainty of seeing another day, one learns to grab for the gusto in every mortal moment. There's a saying for that, down here, "Laissez le bon ton roulette." ("Let the good times roll.") Another saying about people from these parts is that they work hard and they play hard. Any way you say it, laughing is a way of life for people of passion.

I'm too young to begin living the last of my life. We live in a perfectly peaceful community in the forest, but a tomb is also peaceful. At our edge of the forest, we're surrounded by family plots similar to the cities of the dead found in cemeteries all over New Orleans. The difference is that, in rural areas, the family acreage plots are occupied by the living instead of the dead. Grandpas left land to generation after generation of their family folks.

This is not to say that there aren't also family burial plots where we live; there are, where families come together for picnics near their dearly departed. I'm just not yet ready for the celebration of my afterlife; I still have so much life I want to live in this world.

We don't ever want to anticipate outliving our passions, so we're taking measures to secure our second home. A place where the water washes away all cares, where the sun and clouds dance duets across the ripples. Where even the dead of winter is dancing with delight, and includes no snowbound cabin fever.

What a wonderful winter this promises to be.