Summer is so full of life, sun, and warmth that is often approached as the time to Do All The Things™! and that desire I completely get. For me, summer has always been (since I was a child and it meant summer vacation from school) a time to do none of the things unless you felt really pulled to do them. Summer is a time to invite ease back into your life. Heat and humidity? Perfect reason to sit and relax. It is one of the things I love about it – it says, “have a glass of iced tea, sit here in the shade, listen to the insect chorus, and just be.” This summer has been missing ease.

June had more rain than the whole season does normally. My body ached its way through June, from crown to sole. I have brutalized my body with 2 falls and a deeply cut thumb that still is acting like it will never be the same. Emotions and spirit have been filled with unease, too, tight and restrained while at the same time both have been trying to burst through like an overfilled water balloon.

Same as how your skin feels a bit to tight when it gets burnt, from sun or fire, is how my internal Self has felt all summer. Striving for authenticity is a fine goal. Getting there is like boxing your own shadow – elusive and full of misses. This caused fits and starts and then stops. Like the tiny wind-up toy in a child’s hands that can run across a tabletop – fully wound feet slapping wood, falling over edges, feet hitting nothing but air as it is retrieved from the floor, and when set back on the table, the wind is done, and plop-plop-plop to stillness. No rest! *wind wind wind* Here we go again! That is how I’ve felt this summer – too tight for spirit’s skin, feet slapping hard surface then nothing, winding down, then turn-turn-turn of the winding post, and slap-slap-slap. This has been a difficult summer.

“I cause strife,” She said. Yeah, got it. Can we be done now? It seems the answer is finally, thankfully, yes – we can see the finish line. Ease has slipped back into my soul. I felt it fully yesterday, soft as breath, filling the spaces between my cells, silently stretching the tension from my muscles, gently massaging the marrow of my bones. It is still here this morning. Thank you, Summer. Welcome back, Ease.