The Invisible World

Do you ever experience the invisible world surrounding you? 

The raised shades caught my attention as soon as I walked into my home. Part of our ritual when leaving for a few days involves pulling the shades down and ensuring the door to the room is slightly open. The shades were up and the door was tightly closed.

I asked Jerry if he recalled not lowering the shades.  He not only distinctly remembering closing them but also knew where he sat in the room after having done so.

That's when I realized not only were the shades raised but each one, ten in all, was raised to the same level. This was definitely unlike us. We are not perfectionists.

We puzzled aloud wondering if a neighbor had a key to our home or knew of a secret entry of which we aren't aware.

Suddenly I realized I knew our visitor. The shades were meticulously raised just as I suspected the man who lived here for eighteen years would have done. Mr. Stewart had been to visit. Of this I was certain.  Mr. Stewart was the man who designed and built the dear house in which I live. I have often wished for his return. I wondered if his birthday was near.

Thank to the internet I found Mr. Stewart's obituary. I look at the area obituaries just about every day. One of those days in 2006, my breath was taken by his death notice. Mr. Stewart died the day after Christmas. My breath was taken similarly this day as I scanned the funeral home piece that was still accessible. His birthday was May 12. We came home to precisely raised shades on May 15.

We sat in our sunroom that day certain Mr. Stewart had been there. Just in case he was still around I welcomed him and shared my deep regret in not seeing him after he moved to Murfreesboro. And I joyfully thanked him for the beauty he imparted to this place.

Clarice and Jimmy Stewart were people of love and joy. I work in the yard and feel the love they imparted in the plants and the trees and the love they received. I walk through the house that was once theirs and I feel them. I experience them in the tin kitchen cabinet doors etched with tulips and hearts. I see them in the note taped inside one of those doors. Their handwriting shows the Fahrenheit temperature translated according to the wind chill.

A portion of the Stewart's garden I now tend.

Then I read the remainder of the obituary.

Mr. Stewart had three adult sons. Each died prior to him. I knew he lost two sons but something about reading this impacted me in a way it had not affected the me from even ten years ago when we first met.

How did he go on after outliving three adult children?

As religious people, I suspect their faith sustained them yet intuitively I knew other sources of comfort for Mr. Stewart. The Stewarts lived close to the Earth. Neighbors talk of how they were in the gardens daily planting, digging and clearing. Mr. Stewart also worked with wood. As he walked us through the house the day we met he showed me figurines he had carved. They were on shelves in the very room surrounded by windows.

A Hopi stone carver once told me of the reciprocity between the stone and himself. As he honored the stone and gave it his energy, it in turn shared its energy with him.

The great stone that is Earth offers its energy to us. When I garden consciously in love and "want to" rather than duty and "have to" I feel the sharing. My mood when heavy or sad is always lifted. My heart feels joy.  I'm fairly certain something similar happened for Mr. Stewart as he worked with wood and dirt.

My sunroom shades now remind me to open my inner shades and remember...

An invisible world surrounds us. 

It's in the stars, the Earth and Spirit. 
It offers itself to comfort, bring joy and love. 
An invisible world surrounds us.

I am open to it. Are you? 

-Dawn, The Good News Muse, 9 June 2015 

dawn@imaginetheshift.com