Once upon a time ago in Sri Lanka, when the monsoon winds howled their way to our bungalow, my sister and I nodded to each other and headed for the beach at a breakneck speed.
Hide and seek in the monsoon wildness, when the creatures and all of nature would be misbehaving and all was pregnant with possibility. Hawks and bats and flamingoes and peacocks and ducklings and goslings and snakes and mongeese and monkeys monkeys monkeys and thrashing palm trees and crashing waves and the mighty wind. We nestled down together in a sandy beach depression to wait out the peak of the onslaught and drifted off to the hum and steady bluster of the wind. Seeping through our altered states we startled to the sound of heavy breathing, and there, standing over us was a giant elephant making friendly snorty noises. He was telling us that we were in his bed! We scampered out and he settled in.
The quiet immensity of one’s presence…