I'm very exhausted, and I'll probably write more about the actual retreat in the near future, but there is still tomorrow morning to go.
I got up very early and went for a long walk at Cathedral Caverns. I decided to skip the breakfast portion of the retreat so I could get some exercise today and to help alleviate all this emotion. There is no cell service there, so it's me and my thoughts and the sounds of nature. Not even any highway noise that early in the morning.
I got out of my car and started walking and either I am going batty now, or I heard a very faint organ playing a church hymn. I couldn't recognize the tune, and it was faint, but there is no church around, so it either carried far from a church far away or perhaps someone just does it in their house. It was soothing.
I was walking down a road, no longer hearing the organ and began wondering if the boys whose folks spoke last night, now have a connection up in the Heavenly realm with Morgan, now that their parents and me are connected down here. Right when I thought that, a cardinal flew right across my path.
For those that don't know, many people associate the cardinal with those who passed. I just couldn't believe the timing! God knows our thoughts. 100%.
At a long break in the middle of the day, I went back to the home of one of the single women who lived like ten minutes away. We just really hit it off and thought we'd share a glass of wine to just relax us a bit from all this intensity. She will be a new friend.
We were chatting more about our children on her patio and I told her about the cardinal that morning. Just then, another cardinal perched on her fence . We were shocked. She said that cardinal visits her every morning but she'd never seen it late day ( around 5pm).
We both feel there really must be something to these connections that reach up to that realm.
I'm finishing this post live. It wasn't pre written earlier in the evening and scheduled like I do sometimes. Time for some sleep. You can use open thread for any topic you'd like.
Your post gave me chills!
I went back to my homeland of Tucson for a visit last week. The first time I went back since I moved away. I felt Troy, my besties, my parents (they used to stay in the same hotel when they would come visit) and even my old best girl dog, Ruby, who was with me for 15 years. That dog was my rock when I lost Troy-believe me! One afternoon I went hiking up the small foothills behind the hotel and knew that would have been where Ruby and I would have hiked. I looked up at the sky and said "yep, old girl, we would have been out here every morning". At that point, I looked down and there was a message written on a rock with chalk. The message read "I love you".