I watched the dust swirl in the yards and even eclipsing the mountains at times. My little dog added to the wind dust as she stopped running and began pawing the ground like a bull about to charge. The wind tugged and pulled on a neighbor’s flag honoring those soldiers still missing. I pondered the phrase “missing in action” as the dust created a visibility cloak to the wind. Not to diminish the intent and honor of the flag but in the midst of frantic wind and swirling dust, I could not help but think of the pace we live each day. How many dust storms of activity do we create? How furious the clouds of information come at us and hide all else from sight. How often we find ourselves missing in action. Our sacred hearts have gone to war and somehow we have also gone missing. The winds of change are fierce with technology’s constant bombardment of to do’s, emails, texts, meetings, bad news, and warnings, etc.  Is not the often used phrase, “my world stopped” heard when disaster or a fatal diagnosis strikes? When confronted with the ultimate wind of mortality, we discover the still small whispered voice calling us by name. The whisper returning us back to our Self that was missing in action.

To know the stillness of the moon as the wind scattered clouds in front of her. They too looked like the frantic dust clouds of the day. She remained in her stillness. True to her light. Not denying the clouds or the wind but neither denying her stillness. Such action whipping around her but she never surrendered nor was captured by the action. Would that all soldiers, yes, could please come home. Would that their return not be greeted by a world missing in action.