Parinama

  I recently found the YouTube videos of a woman who backpacks in the White Mountains.   She is older like me, hikes slowly, and camps out on mountain tops in winter.   Her aim is solitude, aliveness, sunrises, and sunsets.   Her pictures of the night sky full of stars are amazing.   On one winter’s overnight on a mountain top, she shows us how she sets up her tent, packing down a square of snow with snowshoes and a shovel, burying tent stakes under snow, blowing up the sleeping mats and unrolling the heavy down sleeping bag.   Temperatures drop close to zero after the sun sets, early, even as the wind of the day dies down.   She heats a cup of water from her little red stove, so happy that it works, and mixes it in a freeze-dried bag of noodles for dinner.     Layered in thick down jacket and pants, a balaclava to cover her head and face, the heat packs tucked into boots, she sets up her camera to capture the explosion of ...

  In the first half of life, we cannot work with the imperfect, nor can we accept the tragic sense of life, which finally means that we cannot love anything or anyone at any depth. Richard Rohr, Falling Upward There are so many surprises on this journey into older age.   While on the outside I look my 61 years, on the inside I don’t feel that much different than I did at 30.   At the core, I feel myself to be the same.   Only now, I know myself with more depth, understanding, and compassion. There was so much more under the surface than I could have imagined back then when the world and people seemed comprehensible. Because at 30 I was just starting to dip into the mystery and wonder of the innermost self - a slow and wild journey of self-discovery that continues – I could not see the depth possibilities in myself or in others. I used to think I could read people well.   By their appearances and after only a few conversations I could put...