SETTLING

"Sun Swath", watercolor, by Don Gray

     When I lived for a few years beside a slow-moving river, I sometimes stirred up the water by the bank just to see it slowly settle back to its usual clearness, and occasionally, when my life seems blurred and unsettled, I still think of how, given time, that river always returned to its accustomed stillness. I guess I need to give my so-called problems, too, time to smooth down and settle. I need to do nothing, sometimes, but sit on the bank of seemingly bad situations and let them loosen and slowly resolve themselves. All too often I stir up the problems more than ever by making my sometimes anxious attempts to fix things, when sitting in stillness might be a better way. Storms always, in due course, lessen and sail off in front of the sunshine, and my difficulties might do the same if not whipped up more by my fretfulness. Perhaps I should see a problem as simply a short-lived fuss and splash in the nonstop river of life, and look with confidence to see things settle and sparkle once again.