Wideness

Friday Five, a post I look forward to writing each week. The topic, by the gypsy mama, this week, is Wide. Write, for five minutes, wide open and willing.

Wide

An old hymn sings through my head, "There's a wideness in God's mercy, like the wideness of the sea..." Standing on the beach, my back to the land, my face to the wide open sea. A horizon uninterrupted, unedited, unending - at least as far as I can see. That wide, is God's mercy. To me. Oh, how much I need that.

One of the houses we lived in, in the mountains, was surrounded by trees. I love mountains and trees. But at that house, there was no view. Only a funnel, straight overhead. The only stars were straight up. The only direct sunshine was mid-day. Too narrow for me.

Here, we have the Colorado Rockies to the west, the Great Plains to the east. I stand, the solid mountains at my back, thousands of miles of open plain ahead of me. Wide open space, miles of blue sky and a horizon far, far away. I remember Laura Ingalls Wilder writing of the time her family moved from the woods to the plains. She walked out into the grass, covered by an enormous dome of blue sky, flung her arms wide open and felt like she could fly. She wanted to run forever.

I want to open my view, my life, my hopes and dreams, to the wide, uninterrupted horizon. Not to live in a narrow perspective, enclosed in my own little shell. Wide. Open. Alive.