Onward

Life is full of beauty. Notice it. Notice the bumble bee, the small child, and the smiling faces. Smell the rain, and feel the wind. Live your life to the fullest potential, and fight for your dreams. Ashley Smith

Honesty. I'd been honest as I spoke with my mentor. I was honest in speaking of the night before. If there is one single fault to stand out most of my character it is that I am perhaps too honest for my own good. That is not to say I do not have a list of flaws. I am human.

She spoke of propriety ... did I not believe that my actions were improprietous? My answer was that by the time my head gave any rationale to a state of dress, it was too late to feign giddiness then scamper away in a blushing fit of innocence. What transpired had felt natural of a woman who loves a man, to see to his needs ... not desires ... needs. There is no moral superiority in what I feel of the time I have spent with the warrior but there is no shame to be found within me for even the smallest ihn of any of it. I have loved him and in that it is simple purity without guile.

It is said the night has a thousand eyes and the heart but one. Kam taught me to track, well enough, to notice the prints along the bank. There were barefooted ones making their way to the stream that I knew ended where the warrior was. There were another's, both forward and reversed that covered one of mine. I knew too who they belonged to.

As we walked together our conversation continued to other topics, of how empty it will feel when Silken returns and her children are no longer close about. I've savored every moment of being with them and the closeness will continue, but it will once more be just Me Too and I. I am all he has with exception of she and Rook. She spoke gently of the trials and tribulations of raising a child alone, more so a son, and that perhaps that will change for me. The honesty is that I cannot count the stars and claim that one of them is mine even if I whisper to myself of doing so. As the tracks of tears stained my cheek she asked why not? There was encouragement there not to cease to dream, perhaps there is more to my destiny that has yet to be revealed. There was no laughter in my voice as I confided I am used to loneliness and could live my life as I have the past ... alone, but now that the boy has come into my life I can no longer see my world without him. It is only in adding another .. a third star that I vacillate.

I've listened now to a great many things ... during that conversation, afterwards at the fires, what I have heard prior as well as what is in my head and in my heart. Much of these things I will not open thought to here, they will be mine and mine alone. I will share this ... The core of my beliefs have not changed, though to say I haven't, is to say that I have not grown or begun to mature. The continuance of the Tribe is vital regardless of my place or even existence within it. The importance of the bosk never escapes me though I have an understanding of the role the kaiila play in the grand scheme of things. This is where I work hardest to help see the births, the growth and training of them. Assurance of a place within the Tribe for the boy is my priority. I worry for him more than I do for my own heart. My friends are also considered my family and for them I have nothing but good intentions. I worry over them and their well being also.

I have made a decision that is based only in part on the advice of those around me but more on what I feel is right. I will speak to the warrior, not with any expectations but with the honesty that he has right to know. If he is the man I know in my heart he is, he will hear what I have to say. I will be woman enough to listen as well.

I do not care for the concept that the Sky has predetermined our paths in life .. to map our destiny without informing us of its plans. I believe that it provides what is essential to live and grow and perhaps has both wrath and compassion like a loving parent as we pull ourselves up from crawling to walk and onward to be able to run. In return it is offered the reverence, love, and respect that it deserves. Should I find that it has made fools of us all in the predisposition of what is to happen in the future without regard to the right of any one's will, my temper will know no bounds. I would feel the same of people.

As my path continues Onward .. I hold to the belief that beneath the stars, life like the flow of a stream is full of beauty and wonder. It can be turbulent with violence, brimming its bank with the bounty of abundance, calmly peaceful enough to leave crystal reflection and I will notice it ...all of it. In doing so I will live to the fullest of my potential and fight like a larl for my dreams. This is passion.

There is a sliver of jade I plucked from the many things that I have heard ... we are vulnerable, no matter how strong or tough. I marvel to myself that is the impressionable softness that allows tracks to form.