Читать книгу The Wisdom of Wildflowers - Heather Robbins - Страница 8

Foamy white clouds drift lazily through a brilliant blue sky, silently slipping their violet shadows over the early summer landscape. The waves of dark and light make the land swell in rolling emerald waves—a shimmering sea of jewels.

Swaying playfully in this ocean of green are dozens of blue-violet Harebells. The whispery soft and delicate bell-shaped blossoms, with their five-pointed edges, look to be made of translucent blue tissue paper. I am certain they would disintegrate if even a drop of rain splashed on their sides. Slender pale-green stems rise from crowns of lance-shaped leaves, holding the blossoms up in the fragrant summer breeze.

The Harebell looks like an elfin hat that a woodland fairy might wear. It captures my gaze and takes me back through the years to when I was a child. I remember trying in vain to catch a glimpse of those elusive sprites that I was certain lived and played among the foliage and trees in the nearby woods. Alas, I never saw one, but I knew in my childhood heart they existed. I just had to be on guard and employ my best sleuthing techniques to seek them out.

I do not remember when I stopped searching, or when my child-like imagination was silenced and I no longer believed in the unbelievable. There is a part of me that misses that state of sweet innocence and wonder, and I realize how important it is to hang onto some part of that eternal child. The part of our spirit that is optimistic, sweet, affectionate, and young at heart. The part that is touched by magic and fantasy.

As children, our dreams and imaginations spilled out from our little hearts and souls, barely contained within our excited earthly bodies. We sprang out of bed each morning, eager to get out and explore the world. There were simply not enough hours in the day to get in all the important discoveries we were trying to make. I know I would have found those fairies with the Harebell hats had it not been for my 8:00 p.m. bedtime! But as we grew older most of us lost that youthful enthusiasm. We became all too aware and concerned about our image, and what other people thought of us. We put aside what we perceived as childish nonsense, and strove, en masse, towards our duties and responsibilities.

Our lives are not always as fun as they used to be. We laugh less, we explore less, and because we allowed the dark, heavy burdens of our adult world to weigh us down, we grew old. And we did that without even realizing we were losing a very special quality.

Let us reawaken that child-like enthusiasm, and rekindle our imaginations that have long been silenced by our terribly important, grown-up lives. Be kind. Be curious. Get excited about things. Learn something new. Shower unconditional affection on those we love, not because we expect anything in return, but just because we can. Be generous with our smiles and laughter. Show the world our warmth and tenderness. Our world will be a much better place if we all allowed our inner child its rightful expression. Begin again to wonder about the mysteries in life. We have not discovered all its secrets.

I am certain the Harebell knows the whereabouts of those fairies. Let us all go out there and see if we can find them.