@jamesapearson: A few days ago I got to pick my son up from preschool for the first time. As we walked the couple blocks back to my car the old maples along the street glowed in yellows and reds. A light breeze shook loose a slow scattering of leaves. I opened the car door and said, "Time to get in the carseat." But my son's eyes stayed glued to the trees. "I want to watch the leaves," he said. So for five minutes or so we sat on the roadside grass and watched as the occasional leaf cartwheeled to the ground. Often I'll get to the end of moments like this and realize I wasn't really in it. Or like I was there but I wasn't actually touching what happened, or letting it touch me. Like what was actually making contact with my life was some protective layer programmed with how I think I should be. But to miss the texture of those moments is to miss your life. I don't know any secrets to becoming more present. In my experience it has to do with settling into my body. With letting everyone else have their own experience and contenting myself with the limited nature of mine. With not demanding of the moment anything but what I find there. Slowly, over time, I've learned to practice more of that sort of presence. Sitting with my son amidst the the leaves I was able to settle into enough presence to be there, to feel the moment I was in. And what gratitude I feel! Today this poem is reminding me how precious the small, perfect moments of our lives really are. How we may not know the purpose of life, but how its joy and richness can't be separated from our presence to these moments. How in many ways, that presence is the home we've been longing for. I hope it stirs something for you, too. It's from my book, The Wilderness That Bears Your Name.

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