Spring has finally put in an appearance and seems to be
serious about sticking around this time. Unfortunately, it is still way too
early to do any serious gardening up my way just yet. So I took advantage of a
beautiful, sunny day recently and hopped the bus into town to do a little
shopping and visit my favorite health food store (they make these decadent
chocolate cookies with avocado that are to die for).
Around lunch time I got a veggie pita sandwich, and some
pineapple coconut water to-go, and walked over to the sweet little park that
surrounds the county court house. As I sat on a bench munching away and enjoying the
antics of the resident squirrels, my attention was drawn to a young woman in
her late 20’s who had stopped beside one of the giant maple trees adjacent to the gazebo. She was digging something out of the wallet she was carrying. That something turned out to be a folded piece of paper. With her head down as if
she did not want to be seen, she wedged the paper into a crack in the trunk of
the tree, then simply walked away. She had sunglasses on so I could not see if
she was happy or sad. She never looked back.
I have to admit that I love watching people and have often
assigned myself the task of making up stories about complete strangers that
intrigue me for one reason or another. Sometimes they are mystery stories, sometimes love
stories, sometimes tales of sadness or of renewal. This time, however, I was seriously
hooked. What was in that note? The time and place of a secret meeting? A illicit love affair? A break up? Had she said yes or no? I wondered how long I would be able to hang around to see if someone
actually came to pick up the note before I had to leave to catch the bus home? Who knew that when I went out in search of sunshine and chocolate cookies that I would stumble on an adventure!
Sometimes our best adventures are the ones we don’t plan in
advance. As I’ve gotten older, I’ve tried to be more spontaneous and more
flexible, with my time. There are some areas in my life where I have regular time set aside
for things that are really important to me like morning prayers and
meditation. For anything else that doesn’t require me to be somewhere or do
something specific, like a doctor’s appointment or a family gathering, I like to
take some time in the morning and ask myself, “What can I do today to make
myself happy?” I can’t begin to tell you what a difference that has made in my
life since I started doing it. I could never have imagined doing this when I
was younger and so caught up in the dreaded “should’s” that I kept putting
myself last instead of first in my life. Now I put myself first and every day
is Adventure Day if that’s what I decide to choose.
So, back to our mystery. Checking my phone I saw that it was
just about time to head on over to the bus stop to catch my ride home. As I was
gathering up my lunch mess to toss in the trash can on the way out of the park,
I saw a young man approach the Secret Tree, as I had decided to call it. He was
about the same age as the young woman who had left the note. He was obviously a
hard- working man which was evident from the worn work clothes he wore, his
soiled baseball cap and the lunch box he was carrying. Looking around to see if
anyone was watching him, he stepped up and took the note out of the tree. He
stood there for a moment reading it, and then a smile spread across his face.
It was a look of pure joy. Had she said yes? He folded the note back up and put it in his breast
pocket, then stepped back on the path and made his way along the same route the
young woman had taken earlier. Whatever the note said, it had certainly made
his day. Another mystery to work on! Don’t you just love a good adventure?
And so it is.
