Must Have Been The Wind

Sitting in a field, I reached for the only dandelion there. It was aged, so its petals had turned to fluff. 

The wind picked up around me, shaking my dandelion. How delicate this flower was. 

Was everything this fragile? 

I looked to the sky to find an answer to my question. It was sometimes blocked by clouds, rain and snow. But the sky was always there. It never broke down, never drifted away. The sky was immovable. A force not to be reckoned with. She was there long before I, and would remain long after. 

I leaned back on the ground beneath me. This too, would not falter. It was uneven, yes, and bumpy too. But the soil beneath me cradled my body, and promised to be there when I fell. I took a deep breath and felt my chest expand against the ground. It was immovable. A force not to be reckoned with.

As I closed my eyes, I felt the wind come back, blowing my hair in my face, and shaking my dandelion once again.

What was the wind? It disrupts water, confuses and interlocks strands of hair, and pulls leaves off of trees. It is movable, but only by itself.

It was a force not to be reckoned with, but to dance with. To blow out a candle, or move a sail with the breeze. 

And when it is still, it changes into something calmer, quieter. 

Air. 

It sits still and waits until it’s time to move again. Dormant but there, air is the in between. The moment between each breath, air is the beat before a decision, the pause before a change.

So I looked at my dandelion once more. It was ready to go. The wind would help me set it free and the air would wait with me until then.

As I inhaled, the wind whispered to me. “Make a wish before you blow, hold that hope as you let them go.” So I held onto the air in my chest, and held the dandelion close. “I wish every part of you lands where you hope, and that you find peace, wherever that may be.” 

I let the air in my chest become wind, and blew the dandelion into tiny pieces. The wind carried them off to a place I could not see, far away from me.

It was hard to let go, but some things, no matter how beautiful, grow old and need to be released. So they are not bound to a body, but free to become something not everyone can see, but always be near.

I watched the sun set and got ready to go home. Just before I left the field, a gust of wind so strong hit me, it spun me around.  

“I’m free! I’m free! I can go anywhere! You may not see me, but I am the breeze in your hair! because you’ve let me go, you can now see the beauty. You can see the truth! I am free to fly and I can be closer to you. I will clear the skies and calm the seas. Now that you understand I am finally free, everything will feel better… I promise it will. Once you see the beauty in departure, you’ll realize that everything is connected and nothing is ever truly out of reach.