Dear Friends:

I enjoy my relationship with writing.  It gives me a chance to learn more about myself through my creative potential.  I trust this may have meaning for you as well.   

I also would like to extend the opportunity for you to share your creative writing with other caregivers.  Go to SUBMISSIONS to explore this possibility. 

by
Gary Wakenhut
 6/26/00

(I would like to dedicate this piece to my mother, Arlene Wakenhut and her brother, Hap Galligan.  The piece of music bearing this name, "To a Wild Rose" by Edward MacDowell), was one of their favorites, and they often played it for each other as they shared its beauty and its meaning through their " pianistic" expressions) 

I like to begin my day by discovering where I am and what I am doing.  This experience is especially meaningful during this warmer time of the year.  I venture down by our pond and explore the day's beginning with nature touching me.  This abundant setting provides me with the perfect environment to begin my day.  

Recently, I have been affected by the wild rose bush that has emerged from nature to edge the pond.   This delicate bush shares a different essence with me than its more popular domestic cousin.  

My wild rose's petals lack the sophisticated beauty and the velvety nature of its domestic counterpart.  Instead, the petals gather together in fives around their nucleus to form each flower.  Several of these small simple flowers gather together on one stem much like cherry tomatoes ripening on a common vine.  Their visual impression is simply a shade of bleached white with small touches of brown and yellow mixed near their centers.  

The wild rose's fragrance also differs from the domestic rose which knowingly invades with its potent and distinct presence.   Instead, with my common rose, I have to consciously work to discover its delicate scent.   Even when I am a few inches from its quiet beauty, the essence of its fragrance may not be offered to me. 

And should I get too close, the tenacious nature of its tiny hooks will grab my hand or clothing with unforgivable possession.   Almost unconsciously I use my strength to withdraw, tearing away from nature's perfect Velcro to again find the safety of my boundaries. 

Strangely, if I sit several feet away in my meditation, I am often amazed and warmed as I continually find myself drawn back to the beauty of reality by the breath of this wild rose.

Unknowingly, there will be a culmination of its essence that will gently float near by, whispering to my most subtle of sensory organs.   Then as I begin to soften and warm with the tender effects of its simplicity, its presence will quickly float away, dissolving me into the past.  I am left waiting for another awareness of something much more powerful and perfect than I. 

I wonder how I might be more like this wild rose.  Perhaps subtly and gracefully drifting into the lives of others sharing some kindness. Then, upon leaving them, knowing we have been touched by something far more powerful and perfect than ourselves.    

(I wonder if my mother and her brother ever sat together sharing the presence of the wild rose?)

Hap and Arlene, the innocence of their youth

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Other articles from Gary's Teacher Within

Article 2:  Tuesday Afternoons  with "M".  My experiences as a hospice volunteer with an Alzheimer's patient.  (9 min.) 

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