Little Miracles
Dear friend,
Yesterday’s opera was beautiful and moving and surprising. As we took our seats we were met by the sight of a bare stage populated with the orchestra’s instruments. Behind the stage, a blank screen. From there the production grew in colour and intensity and complexity, taking us on a journey that climaxed with Bacchus and Adriadne ascending into a starlit sky.
I’ve not seen so many operas so maybe a five minute ovation isn’t so uncommon The audience were very appreciative and the festival put on a gorgeous post show reception in a beautiful walled garden with a view over the Umbrian hills.
I don’t know what to say about it. We met so many lovely people. What came into view is that we serve one another well when we encourage each other to live the way that suits the uniqueness of each one’s human nature.
The artists and technicians we hung out with, having followed their creative ambitions have also drunk from the fountain of youth. Playful, curious, no-one without their personal pain, but full of energy and humour. It’s work, demanding, challenging and not without conflict, but it made me reflect on the choices that our cultures present as obvious and safe. Really, honestly find out what you love to do and go do it. Whatever, in whichever way you can, take it one step at a time. Sometimes you’ll find yourself taking great big leaps, in ways you won’t be able to predict.
Maybe more relevant, it brought the art of living into focus for me. Chiara and me spent the morning and afternoon exploring Spoletto’s medieval centre. We were late leaving the hotel, there were goodbyes to be said. Italian goodbyes have a timing of their own and will not be rushed. Neither are they linear, they kind of loop back on themselves. You find yourself saying goodbye several times and each time you know is not the one, until it is.
We went in search of croissants and coffee in a local patisserie, but because of the goodbyes the mornings croissant were sold out. We took to the streets on the hunt for an alternative, turning up a side alley we passed a tiny chapel dedicated to saints John and Paul. On the steps outside was a fledgling bird. It had fallen from its nest and seemed in pretty bad shape. Spoletto is a city of heat and cats, so the poor thing’s chances of survival were low.
I’d read that you shouldn’t touch fledglings less their parents reject them. We sat on the steps with the bird not knowing what to do, but knowing that something would turn up. The tiny grey creature would need a drink and we could help with water. Its wing feathers looked strong and almost fully formed, its body quivering it dragged itself a few centimetres away from us. Chiara went back to the cafe to ask about the local vets. In the UK they will usually take in an injured bird and get them to a bird sanctuary. I’ve turned up with injured birds in cardboard boxes several times over the years. Mostly the birds have died from shock or their injuries. Maybe this one would get the chance to fly.
“Little brother, is this the way it ends for you” I’m thinking to myself, “you ought to be up there darting through the sun warmed sky, not stranded here to die of thirst or hunger or feline.
I prayed for a miracle for the bird. Part of my mind was expecting a shaft of light and for the bird to suddenly burst into flight, but that’s not generally the way with miracles. I held the image of the bird safe and in flight. Internally I spoke with Saints John and Paul. We were after all on steps dedicated to them, no more than 40 Km from the birth place of St Francis. Focusing on the point of light between my eyebrows, which is there in everyone should you wish to look for it, I felt the life in me and the air and the stones of the buildings and in the little grey collection of spirit muscle and bone and feather lying besides me, now with its eyes closed and eye lids flickering.
Chiara returned from the cafe with a woman. The woman was wearing a straw hat and carrying an artists easel and cartridge paper. She had brown eyes and you’d think her and Chiara had known one another since their school days. She’d been at the cafe bar taking an espresso when Chiara was asking around on behalf of the bird. Raffaella had stopped into the cafe after visiting her father’s house a few streets down. Her partner happened to be something of a specialist in bird rescue, some of whom they’d happily reintroduced into the wild. She knew the birds genus and feeding habits. After looking around for the parents, the diagnosis was to hydrate the bird with water drops from her fingers and to take it home in her car to her partner. When she picked up the little thing it protested and showed its strength. Maybe there is hope for it yet.
Raffaella placed the bird in a box the staff from the cafe provided, and we walked together with her and the box to her car. She hoped her and her partner would have success with this lost bird. She told us she’d learned a lot from her partner since he’s started his bird rescuing activities. This one belonged to the falcon family.
We gave our ‘grazie milles’ and watched Raffaella, the bird and the art supplies drive off.
Statistically the odds of Raffaella being in that cafe at that exact moment are long. Long enough to call it a miracle? How many times have you had someone lend a hand at just the right moment? Was that a miracle?
Does it even matter what we call these fortunate moments of chance?
All I know is that I asked the divine on behalf of the bird and Raffaella walked towards us with her good natured face and gentle brown eyes.
We just can’t say we know anything if you ask me. Like a child you wonder how an oak tree grows from a tiny acorn. How does the jasmine plant produce such an intoxicating scent? We can name it, label it. We can deconstruct it, but what do we make of the indivisible energy we meet in the subatomic realms? I don’t even understand myself, never mind the multitude of worlds that make up life on our planet.
Later, we’re on a regional train to Arrezzo in Tuscany. The air conditioning isn’t working so it’s sticky and the air is dull, no-one’s thought to open the windows and the people are dozing. Chiara’s pulled out a fan from her back that was spare from the opera.
I’m happy I realise. For the bird. For Raffaella. For the children playing in the streets of the town we’ve just left. For the life that unites us all.
For the day when each one finds the well of peace within.
Someone is smoking a cigarette in the train’s bathroom, Chiara informs me the toilet is blocked and someone else, maybe the smoker has just taken a dump in it, the smell of which along with the tobacco smoke is making her nauseous. We move seats and the air conditioning in this part of the carriage seems for a moment to be working. I notice what looks like a scar on Chiara’s neck, how could I have never noticed it before? But it’s just sun cream that didn’t get rubbed in properly.
In a couple of hours we’ll be with friends for dinner and I’ll upload today’s writing.
I can’t include everything because life is too rich to put into words. I don’t mean money rich. You can have money and why not, but if all you have is material wealth and status, without realising the treasure house of spirit within, then you have nothing.
That’s what Jesus was on about.
The treasure that neither rusts nor rots nor can be stolen away by thieves.
Forgive the paraphrasing.
Till tomorrow
Love
Mikey