IMG_1480      There is that time of day that I call the "tween-time," the minutes when darkness starts to fade, and light is just beginning to appear. When looking out the window, you see patterns that can look like between night and day when you know that anything is possible, and you look forward to the surprise of what the new dawn will bring. You peek out the kitchen window to catch a glimpse of the sky. Is there color? Is there a cloud cover? What time or moment do you need to leave? The next step is to step outside, feel the air, decide how to dress so you are warm enough but not too warm, and calculate how much time you have to get down to the beach. And one must remember to dress Shadow according to the elements. That's our morning and has been since March 18, 2020, when Covid kept us quarantined for months, and I decided to start my Gratitude Project and share it on social media.
     There is no way you won't change if you are grateful and pray every day for over three years; you create little miracles in your life. At the moment I am writing this, it is that "tween-time," and I'm sitting at my computer typing my thoughts, looking out my office window at the neighborhood's outlines, shapes, shadows, and silhouettes. It's exciting for me to watch out that window as the dawn appears in the sky, and I can predict what the color will be and which mornings might see some brilliant displays.
     Over the past three years, my sense of sight became so tuned in on the beauty around me, not only in the sky but in the trees, rocks, waves, and the air. The wind blows so intensely at times that you feel it penetrating your body, whereas other times, you often don't notice it, but it touches your face. I handle everything outside, the rocks, the trees, the flowers, the sand, the water. Every day I touch the outdoors. I hear the birds in the spring as they sing the most in the early morning and feel like they wake up joyful, greeting each other with their songs. The beautiful sight and smell of Marquette lilacs'. Their beauty graces and surrounds the City and the lake. During Lilac season, you breathe in the lilac's scent for its short lifespan and even enjoy it as you see it slowly wither away. A sense of spirit often is felt around the lighthouse and lake as if those souls that passed enter spirit life and, if there is a wrinkle in time for a moment, pass through to say hello.