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My daughter-in-law shared a photograph of the girls running on the beach. “Best Friends” she posted.  It’s hard to believe how fast these granddaughters are growing. Eight-year old Quinn is a third grader and Piper, a seventh grader, has begun young adolescence with all its physical, intellectual, and emotional changes and challenges. They are close sisters who share a bedroom and currently, a virtual classroom in the guest bedroom on second floor. Over the years I have watched them explore and define their personal life rhythms, one an exuberant gymnast in perpetual motion, the other an introspective reader and talented artist. Time progresses in a continuum of life experiences and cycles.

Since the beginning of the pandemic in early spring, I have observed parallel transitions in nature from my patio swing. The roses that stretch toward the sun in glorious bounty have grown deeper in hue and thorn as autumn nights continue to cool. Tree foliage, once new-green, is scattered in yellow and brown across the backyard grass. I have been privy to the cycles of the birds preparing nests, hatching and feeding their young. What delighted me most was the scene of the offspring playing like children in the crape myrtle, on the feeders, and across the brick flooring. Sibling robins, woodpeckers, cardinals, bluebirds, doves, and jays. Baby chickadees, wren, and goldfinch so tiny they could fit inside tennis balls.

Irish author, John O’Donohue, in To Bless the Space Between Us: A Book of Blessings (Convergent Books, 2008) uses the concept “threshold” to describe the experiences or stages of life. He writes that a threshold is “a frontier that divides two different territories, rhythms, and atmospheres” (p. 48). At times, a threshold may surprise with challenges not anticipated, such as suffering or loss. At other times, thresholds are natural progressions. A threshold represents an invitation and promise for a new space to explore and use our gifts. It is important to acknowledge the thresholds that determine our lives and to have the courage and trust in what might be emerging.  

During the past months, I have given thought to the thresholds that span and shape my own life. In cleaning out the family cedar chest, I uncovered a trail of mementos that stretches back to my own early childhood. A lock of hair, a first and favorite book, a kindergarten graduation certificate, a small white Bible gifted from Godparents. Hand-made Mother’s Day cards, the early ones to my own mother, then Michael and Brent to “Mom”, and more recently with scribbled signatures from the girls to “Granna”.

At this point in my life, I ask myself, at which threshold am I standing? According the Eastern philosophy, the 70s are a decade in which we renew the energy of our youth and release our creative spirit more fully. I believe I am seeking, at this threshold, a sense of self that integrates past experiences with the joy and beauty of both the visible and invisible world that lies within.  At the still point of the turning world, there is the dance (T.S. Eliot, Burnt Norton).

At what threshold are you currently standing? How is your heart?