Stepping off the edge of life with the gift of life.

I’m at Mullindress, my house on Rathlin Island. Foils of wind are picking up pace, their song setting sail to the clouds,  galloping tresses chasing something in the distance, an epiphany or a fallen star, its intensity close and all the same far beyond my reach.

My daughter is with me, her as yet unborn son sharing the view and the beauty of our surroundings. He’ll be with us very soon and his imminent arrival repositions everything. Only a moment has passed, it seems, since my son and daughter were born and yet here we are, my third grandson about to share our world, to embed himself in the very fabric of our existence.

The sun is pushing forward, its broad shoulders hugging the softening blue of the skyline, strong arms circling from the stars to the frothing sea, melodies from both trumpeting the sweetest tones that signal the beginning of life and the charting of possibilities.

Life charges along at pace, shapeshifting and frequently rudderless, and yet that is so often the beauty of it. At this moment it is everything. Precious and intoxicating. I’m so excited to share this world with my children’s children. What an astonishing gift. The gift of life.