Pumpkins come in all of these really fun varieties. They are white, green, orange, striped,
mottled, big, small, oblong, perfectly round, squat, skinny, fat, bumpy and
smooth. They can have stems that are
large, small, short and long. In all of these shapes, you can see in pumpkins
how creation has this wonderful echo throughout, design elements are used in
clever ways over and over.
A pumpkin sitting on the bale of straw in the front of the
house caught my eye. I noticed that it wasn’t truly just orange. It was like a faux finish of orange, on top
of a cheery yellow. It looked rather
sunny. In face it looked rather like
photos of the sun. Seemingly random bits
of orange in thicker and thinner patterns cover the surface, like it could have
a pumpkin flavored solar flare from any moment.
I have met people that are like this. They just seem to burst with life and
joy. They are encouraging, vivacious,
and warming – just like the sun. I have
also noticed that these tend to be multi-faceted individuals who have experienced
flares in life and learned from them; using them later to bring warmth, comfort
and courage to others. These are people I, and others, want to be around as
they are drawn to the genuine caring.
This is a wonderfully green and orange pumpkin with deep
grooves that lead to a valley where the stem is. That stem, with a round of green at its base
rises up like a mountain out of a plain.
Variances of color and a twist of the stem leave the tip of the stem
uneven; undoubtedly a peak weathered with many mountainous weather fronts.
There are a few women who I have met that are many years
young, and in years of age rather elderly.
And they have done that gracefully. They are like these mountains rising
out of the plains, standing as beautiful monuments. Wrinkles, lines and scars
indicate the weathering they have witnessed. But they still stand, and gather
life in beautiful ecosystems around them. Water flows from snow capped peaks to
nourish the cycle of life. They share their wisdom, gracefully and lovingly;
they relinquish controls that I think would be very difficult to relinquish.
Not placing their value in the ability to do, but in being.
Is it a pumpkin, or is it art in pottery? Something in a light tree trunk brown with a
crackled white glaze. The small lines of
tannin peek through the white and remind me of the shape of waves
moving through the ocean. Lines indicate
movement, just as those cresting waves show the movements of the wind and
water.
The artists, entrepreneurs, movers of large and small movements;
those who see an idea in their mind and heart and then go about trying it –
these are people who enrich the world around them. Encouraging by example to do,
experiment, hypothesize, research – to try; these are the people who I think
teach me bravery to move. To move with
the wind and the water, and know that perhaps I will find myself on new shores.
I’m going to keep looking, who knows what other worlds will
be seen; microcosm within a macrocosm.
