Laying on of hands

The earth this past week has moved enough to bring the sun directly into the window I face and I know the fall is beginning. Another sign is the rapidity with which the humming-bird feeder is depleted as my summer residents prepare for the long flight south.

When I first moved to the lake the biggest change I noticed was the insistence of the changing of the seasons. I suppose in more urban areas prominent bearers of the news of seasons the native flora and fauna, have been largely replaced with electric lights, air conditioning and such.

Maybe that is why so many folks seem unconcerned about the rapidly approaching climate changes of planetary warming. If ever aware, they have become unaware of the prophecies brought by life around us. They become and confident that the earth will yield some kind of energy to fuel the air conditioning and the resources for protective dwellings. They have no fear from the loss and change of the life around them.

I think Sweet Alex is the first cat I have lived with that enjoys hand holding. He is now in his computer chair next to me and we are holding hands, as I keyboard with my right. When not hand-holding he is reaching out to touch, the affirmation of touch. We in medicine call it the "laying on of hands." Now Claudette has noticed and joins us, to also touch.

I wrote last week of the metaphorical mother and her chicks. The children, gathering close enough to touch, to learn the mother's lessons and prophecies. I made brief note that this is also where the young learn how to be a grown up. I will not dwell on the consequences when the process becomes disrupted. We all know.

We humans and our progeny are going to lose a lot if we don't nurture and recover our capacities to hold close, to touch, to hear the prophecies of the earth and all its life.

I am reminded of Chris Young's op ed I mentioned Sunday Explore the academic world with purpose

That's ecology folks.