Something for my headache

I entered uneasy with a dull throbbing pain  reverberating throughout my head and I began to walk. I was not naive to the fact that my walking was serving as a metaphor for the toxic build up from the week that was I found myself trying to escape from.

I soaked in the sights, sounds and smell to no avail… I heard a dull drone of cars in the distance, which served to increase the power of my headache and I continued on, like a man on a mission and decidedly so, because I am literally at my wits end.

As continued walking the fog and incessant throbbing in my head began to wane somewhat and I instinctively looked up to see the point of no return.

The area that nature forbade the intrusion of all things and elements foreign to her domain. The trees and her branches were welcoming and with a relative snap of the finger the headache was gone.

In lieu of the headache being gone a backlog of clarity descended upon me and washed away all that ailed me. So I found a spot in the middle of the stream where I sat, savored and fortified myself for whatever would see fit to obstruct my path in the coming week.

The mist and the cool sensation of the water

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Soothing my soul in the best way I know how – The Falls

Rocks State Park is probably one of the most serene places in Maryland.

I often find myself here when my stress load is at its apex. Like I’ve mentioned in my previous writings, water serves as a dumping ground for what could otherwise be the insanity inducing travails of life.

Often, I sit at the streambed and not unlike a file making its way to a Smartphone or a computer… I download, my eyes are like a USB cable as they provide me connectivity with the flowing current of the water.

Eventually, I break my connection with the water and make my way 190 feet up to a natural rock outcrop that was once a ceremonial gathering place for the Susquehannock, called the King & Queen seat. And I let the wind blow through my person as I survey the life that is teeming below me.

As I make my way down from the King & Queen Seat… I know I can’t leave from the confines of the park without paying my respects to the Falls.

Kilgore Falls is what makes this area so dangerous to the element of time, as I always lose track of it, sitting at the base of the falls, being covered in the cooling mist.

The beauty that is encountered on the way is no match for the splendor of the falls. I always make sure to walk slowly, to absorb every bit of the solace. Keeping my ear trained to capture the initial sound of the falls, is an exercise in suppressing the climatic moment…

As I make my way up the path to the Falls… Each time is like it is my first.

She beckons me closer and commands that I sit… I can’t resist her and I acquiesce.

My assorted flings with Mother Nature

 

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Unfortunately, I am not as young as I used to be, but I am as young as I often lie about being.

With that being said, I have no qualms about getting older as it is better than the alternative, of slow decomposition or inhabiting a decorative urn in the form of ashes.

With each passing day of accumulated wisdom, I have come to the realization that this uber-connected world that I make my living in is an extremely toxic environment, I find myself needing deeper excursions into the loving embrace of Mother Nature for the purpose of loosening the tentacles that dull the sense of inner peace that I feel when I’m with her.

I have always had this amorous relationship with water… The sound, the scent of it seemingly washes away whatever is burdening me and often it becomes an act of sheer willpower to peel myself away.

 

 

 

Mother Nature undoubtedly is a drug, but unlike all drugs… Can you overdose off of solace? If so, I wouldn’t mind being the first.

 

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Mother Nature vs. Connectivity to the World at Large – Round 1

Call it a contrived overblown figment of my imagination, but I can say definitively that my communes with nature have had a mentally detoxifying effect on my psyche. I shudder to think of the alternative, had I not discovered the rejuvenating properties of being enveloped in the arms of Mother Nature. Would I be ensconced in a straitjacket; uncontrollably drooling from the side of my mouth, while rhythmically rocking myself back and forth or might I be an incessantly angry individual over the slights that the world routinely doles out?

Our uber-connected existence is a double edged sword, we are forced to engage, compelled to assimilate or otherwise we are left out in the cold. Seemingly, it is the price that we begrudgingly or unwillingly pay for merely existing in the 21^st century.

Many of us; myself included, are at the point of no return. The idea of tossing my Smartphone into the swirling tempest of the waters that I am entranced by has crossed my mind a number of times, but at what cost?

I am tethered to my Smartphone, dare I say that I am not as smart as I would like to think I am without its quad core processor at my disposal. Sadly, I can’t recall much of anything… From upcoming meetings with clients; phone numbers; email addresses for family members, let alone my statistics from my most recent workout.

The million dollar question is this… Are we better human beings for all of the efficiency that technology provides us or are we less human because of it? Dare I say that social media is an oxymoron? As it is the contention of many people that it makes us less social in many instances. We fix our gaze on the screen of our Smartphone’s more intimately than we do our fellow human beings, often we won’t even bother to acknowledge a person within our immediate radius, merely because it is too labor intensive to fire up our vocal cords.

Our technology has a duality in that it has become the proverbial link to our livelihood and in some respects, our identity.

But, as I ponder the answers to these questions and others, the sights, sounds, scent, touch and taste of Mother Nature wipes my mental slate clean… And I scuttle into the escape that is Nature and allow the lull of the water mercifully drown that which was weighing on me and everything is back in balance; at least for now.

rl