Simple, Good Things
April Stream
Our Town by Thornton Wilder has always been one of my favorite plays. When I need to be reminded of the gifts I’m overlooking, gifts often right in front of me, I read these lines from Emily Webb, who returns to life for one precious day, looks around in wonder, and says this:
“Good-by, Good-by world. Good-by Grover’s Corners…Mama and Papa. Good-by to clocks ticking…and Mama’s sunflowers. And food and coffee. And new-ironed dresses and hot baths…and sleeping and waking up. Oh, earth, you’re too wonderful for anybody to realize you.”
Only after dying and returning to life for that day, does Emily wake up and realize what was always there, reminding us to take note of the gifts as they are being given: a cup of coffee, a book, a reading chair. And certainly, in New England, the whole blessed month of April when the brown days are bursting into yellow, and the air smells green. Shedding coats, hats, scarves, we leave the rooms we have built around ourselves in the dark, inward months.
In spring, I reconnect with something once easy, now more difficult: a complete immersion in the moment. Not a thinking moment but a being one. Sitting in the sun today on the back steps, feeling its warmth on my face and arms, no shoulds or yearnings are intruding on the moment. There is only sunlight, warmth, gratitude. Simple, good things.
Talking with a friend this morning, we wondered if we’re living up to our days, not wasting precious minutes with worry and want, recalling that in childhood, it was like breathing to climb a tree and be a pirate or make a home by an April stream. The moment provided all we needed; there was no disbelief to suspend. It’s a curious paradox that the older I get, the more the child wants to surface, rattle the pots and pans, eat the ice cream first, surprise a me that has forgotten how.
Perhaps that’s why we want to declutter, even move to smaller places. Somehow we think that in paring down our possessions, we’ll find that simpler life that holds so much appeal. And what is a simpler life really than a life lived in each moment. No need to move to another land or across town or even rearrange the furniture, unless the moment calls for it. Promises joy.