The turn

"In the morning, while it was still very dark, he got up and went out to a deserted place, and there he prayed." — Mark 1:35

June is almost gone and I did not notice it leaving.

I was so busy with the carrying and the not-carrying and the garden and the heat and the storm and the staying home and the going back that the month did its work while I was looking the other way, the same way it does every year, the same way they all do.

This morning the coffee was ready and the house was still and I sat at the table and the prayer was the kind that does not need direction because the direction is already there and it is the same direction it always is, which is inward and then upward and then out into the morning.

July starts Wednesday. Jack turns twelve. The beans are ready to pick and the tomatoes are getting closer and the blackberries along the fence have turned dark and soft and the birds know it before I do.

I am going to sit here for a few more minutes and then I am going to do the laundry and then I am going to pick beans and then the day will be what it is going to be and I do not need to plan it any further than that.

Ruby keeps a collection of prayers at her kitchen table. You can find them here.