Life in these strange times: imbibing life

To imbibe means to drink, to absorb, or to assimilate. Today, I reflect on absorbing and assimilating hope, joy, and life. Today is Easter in the Western church, which follows the Gregorian calendar. In the Eastern Orthodox church, Great and Holy Pascha (Easter) will be celebrated a week from today, on April 19th.

This morning, I woke up early so that I could walk to the river and see the sun rise. The only sound that I heard was the singing of the birds as they chattered to each other. Maybe one or two cars passed by but, otherwise, I saw no sign of humans. As I walked, I saw deer crossing the street. I stared, but did not photograph them because they were too far away and because my zoom lens is not powerful enough to get anything more than a little dot resembling deer. Incredulously, I stood and counted… one, two, three, four, five. The fifth, which was the smallest of the deer, stood on the street for some time, looking around, seemingly not knowing what to do.

Then I saw white tails turned up to the sky, and the the deer congregated on the side of the road ran, followed by the small one. Once the deer left, I started walking again. Still no cars. But there was a robin running across the road. It saw me and just kept running, onto a yard. And then, it was gone.

Before long, I was at the river, watching the sun rise. It’s a cloudy day so there was just a bit of redness that faded into the blueness of early morning. And that sky made me happy because it was placid and cloudy, not full of storminess, like it was in January of 1977, when a huge blizzard paralyzed Western New York for more than a week.

Or other times, when I remember seeing dark clouds moving in from the west and then, suddenly, the loud boom and the bright flash of light coming almost simultaneously.

No storms today. Just the peacefulness of early spring, with the daffodils all in bloom and the forsythia beginning to blossom. And quiet. Very quiet as people gather, separately, to celebrate this day of joy and resurrection.