We stood under a half-moon as thousands of bats flew overhead. Positioned right in the middle of a fruit bat super highway they filled the night sky on silent wings making their way to the next feeding spot. The night air was warm on my bare shoulders, my neck strained from looking up for so long. And still, they kept coming—hundreds upon hundreds.

The next day, I boarded a plane and flew thousands of miles over the planet’s largest ocean. Up in the sky, nothing but blue stretched as far as I could see. A stranger sat next to me, on his way to vacation in Fiji—lucky bastard—but for this leg of the journey, he was my time-traveling companion. No more than ten words were exchanged, but he took care of my trash while I napped, and I handed him a blanket when he looked cold. I sat nose to window as we sped through the air, peering down into the abyss, silently begging the blue whales to come say hello.

This is real. I am a part of this.

How many moments of magic do we miss simply because we aren’t paying attention?

We are so caught up in the trauma of the human experience—the brutality, the devastation, the relentless ache of it all. I think we forget to remember our tiptoeing orders.

"It’s not so much marching orders, but rather tiptoeing orders," Laurie wrote on a Thursday.

That’s right. Tiptoeing orders.

I’m not marching or plowing forward. I’m not militant or organized in my efforts, moving in a single file toward some undetermined destiny.

I’m tiptoeing. Walking gently on the earth. Sitting in stillness so I can listen—to the bees, to the soaproot, to the whisper of a fruit bat’s wing softly moving air as it flies overhead. To the knowing of blue whales deep below me.

This is not a time for sudden movements. Everything is on edge, hyper-aware, bracing for what’s next. So easily startled. So easily afraid.

Because there is a lot to be teriffied of.

But still—the sunrise keeps coming. The moon shows up every night. My breath is still here.

Have you listened to a favorite song recently? Closed your eyes and let it move you? Felt the heat of a shower soothe your body after a long day? Turned to the person beside you and told them you’re glad they’re here?

I’m glad you’re here.

This is not to bypass or deny the intensity of what is in front of us. It is, instead, to say—tread lightly, sweet one. There is magic and beauty here, too.

I am so glad you’re here,
Xo.a

“Some of us don’t want to be tough alpha leaders. Some of us just want to write and wander the garden and breathe in the sky and nourish and nurture and quietly create new pathways and live our lives as our art. To know the earth as poetry.”

― Victoria Erickson