Daddy After Dark

Upwards & Onwards

I took a hike on Wednesday.

I took the day, unscripted by any other demands on my calendar, and simply drove to where the rain stopped. Just beyond the Cascades, out the Gorge, and on the northern shore, I found a trail that needed hiking.

I’d been there before, years ago, and in a whole other mindset and body, with my husband, and have been needing to go back, to go further with the hike, to see what there was to see.

I also needed to clear my head. A lingering feeling of doubt and cloudiness has been circling around in me for months now. One of my relationships has changed, and I needed to put it to rest in my heart, and mind, in order to make space for a new relationship that has, like the tiniest little wildflowers on that windswept hillside in spring, started to bloom. The hike, and the repetitive motion, was a meditation on changes, on letting go, on accepting the new, and on re-evaluating how I love, and who gets a piece of my heart. I let go, emotionally, a few times, and danced in the wind with the ravens that swooped and dove overhead in the cliffside updrafts.

Dad has a big heart. Dad has a multi-faceted big heart, capable of many things, including loving and caring, but also being brave, knowing when to let go, and when to remain still and quiet as the world, and the people in it, swirl around and flow like the river itself.

I also need to remember to do this more often. I need to separate myself from the digital world, from the built world, and get out there. It does my body, and mind, and spirit, so much good. So, so much.