12.27.12 [the Mountain-Climber proposes]

Is not impermanence the very fragrance of our days? 

-Rilke

The hunger in my right hand for my pen has eased by now, and the blank pages of my newest journal perturb me a little less.  I have grown adjusted to the fleeting days and accustomed to ignoring my longing to record all pieces of beauty and heartbreak and detail, given over to the scarcity of opportunities to write this fall and winter.  

Do not fear, Little One, your hand will again drink from the inkwell in its time and season.

But how could I not inscribe this day, when the Winemaker asked for me?  These are the things I will remember from the sunset that changed my life:

• the almost-full moon rising as we drove back in starlight
• and that beautiful expanse, the vista east and north and west he led me to, the sweeping Methow Valley edging toward Loup Loup, the Pasayten, the Cascades and the Okanogan.  

• laughing uncontrollably as I began to discern the immediacy of the coming request.  My love also laughing, terribly nervous.  Turning me as we calmed to face the sunlight on the mountains.

• his arms encircling me as he recalled the dream I had after we met but before we ever spent time together, the scene of us running through tall fields of sunflowers, planted ten and twelve feet high along narrow trails.  Our visit to Elbow Coulee in May, when he first took me home, to participate in the mountain race Sunflower Relay.  (I met you in a dream, my Love,  and I woke with the knowledge that my husband would come to me).
• And then I could no longer feel his arms around me, and I could not turn around to see him on his knees; I was weeping before I even faced him.  I want to run with you, he told me, as long as I walk this earth.

Yes, the Lord has been so good to me.