The Retreat of the Butterfly

I took this picture while my dear friend, Efra, and I were driving over the mountains high above the Pacific coastline. The road was rough, steep, and rutted with deep ditches from the rains of the last 5 months. In this tropical land the rain can be relentless, but the dry season had arrived. Massive Agave plants surrounded us and the trees were filled with wild orchids and parrots. I leaned out the window of the truck and took a series of shots thinking I was capturing our destination down below when in fact and the camera focused on a sweet butterfly riding the gentle wind. I was amazed and felt it a blessing.

Much of the time we contemplate the transformation it takes to become the butterfly. We consider that incredible metamorphosis when the larvae cocoons herself and, in a real sense, dies and is reborn again with fragile wings and the lightness that allows for flight.

I have spent most of my life in transformation mode, thinking I was getting somewhere, becoming someone, journeying and working towards my destiny. Lately though, I feel more the butterfly than the moment before she becomes. I feel fragile, tender, and transparent like those wings. I have been reminded of how precious and ineffable Life is.

In the past 5 years my father has died, I survived breast cancer, my home that I grew up in sold, my mother entered a home for people with Alzhiemers, I struggled through addiction, my daughters left home and then due to the pandemic returned, and now menopause is my companion and she is being tough on me.

I share this with you not as complaint, but rather from a place of curiosity and connection. We are experiencing this life together with many of the same milestones, yet with unique and intimate relationships to those ceremonial crossroads and I wonder how you are in these times. How do you care for yourself as you move through the atmosphere of living and dying? Do you cry every day? Or is it hard for you to shed a tear? How do you nurture the wounded child within you? How do you celebrate your beautiful, resilient spirit? I ponder you. I think about you. I wish you well.

I am so grateful for this photo and the idea that is held in it. I am cherishing this life that is so fleeting and I cherish you.

Much love, sweethome