"Relaxation......................"

In spite of a temperature yet in the low nineties, about five o’clock yesterday afternoon I opted to attempt a shorter version of my walk through the park. The clouds overhead didn’t seem to be threatening and kept shifting to provide occasional relief from the sun, a slight breeze also providing temporary coolness in its mischievous game of hide-and-seek. I skipped my usual lap around the soccer field. That shortened the route by fifteen minutes and, an hour later, sweaty and no worse for the exercise, the old man returned, mission accomplished, needing a shower, but opting, instead, for a dip in the pool. The daughter next door has an enclosed, above-ground one, fair-sized, the son-in-law’s grapevines grown to such extent that they have formed a wall along two sides and captured the overhead trellis above the deck area.

It was all mine, for a bit, the family elsewhere, the water simply cool and refreshing as I slid into it, the trees in my back- yard giving shade to most of its surface. It was quiet, peaceful, me just floating, paddling, a big walrus enjoying the moment. Then, at the far end, the force of the pump recycling a flow into the pool took me by surprise. Mark must have just cleaned the filter out or something. It was hitting me like a jet stream. Turn around. Back up to the source. Submerge somewhat and let it beat against the base of my neck. For awhile there I was in heaven….It doesn’t always take a prayer closet, an altar in the woods somewhere, a candle-lit sanctuary. It doesn’t always require tongues, although it’s been my experience that complete connection somehow finds me there. A stop, a rest, some time set aside for the brain, the spirit, the soul, to focus on Him, however, is essential to one’s well-being. I take them wherever I find them, whenever and as much as they come to me……