Christmas Morning - Indiana 2008

We left the house at 9:30 to take my daughter to work and stopped at a travel plaza to on the way to the highway to buy coffee. As we came down off the overpass, we were headed south, but the sun is so low in the sky these days it was already shinning in my eyes. As I blinked to adjust, I began to see Geese ... Literally hundreds of Geese ... flying in formation in sizes from dozens of birds to just six or seven.... but they were doing this in numbers that I've never seen ... they literally covered the sky.

We parked in the lot to go inside for coffee and I could see miles to the south, where the bare trees of the forest marked the skyline, more and more geese coming over the horizon. I've never seen anything like this ... they ascended over the tree tops, flying a little bit north-easterly, then circled, joining up with other "V's," circled again and then changed direction to the northwest ... I could see their wings beating, and I rolled down the window to listen, but they weren't making a sound. They were just flying silently and with great purpose.

Flying north on a bright, cold, but sun-shine filled Christmas morning ... they seemed so brave up there that it brought me to tears ... I have no idea where they were going, but obviously they do. I asked the Mother to protect her children in their flight and see them to their destination. I watched to see if they would land soon, but they didn't, they flew until I could no longer see them. I watched
them for at least fifteen minutes - an estimate of how many there were.

In a world that has lost its heart and soul to mindless greed, power, and materialism, I was gifted with a brief reminder that the sacred meaning of the Winter Solstice is older than time, and truer than we'll ever understand.