This a special blog post just for you on these days before you come all the way into the world. You presided over the maligned month of August, hot and obese with tourists on our islands, in your Mama’s amazing belly — making her feet swell and keeping her awake, like any good baby. You will glide into your birth month of splendid September, on nearly everyone’s list of favorite times of year. Now this is the setting for your birth. You live in the middle of the beautiful Salish Sea. The leaves on the ground are autumnal, the garden harvests bountiful, and in Friday Harbor, there has been a communal sigh of relief as Labor Day came and went. Now that sigh is hung on every moment in our home, as we, the grandparents, scurry around picking plums and making the winter garden, hosting lawn parties and making soups, researching anti inflammatory diets while listening to acoustical music, cooking extra for your mom and dad; subsuming our anticipation of your birth with earnest tasks made with the perishable deadlines of ripening fruits.

You, my darling know nothing of this yet, as you float in your dream world in that dark mama cave of yours, on your own ripening deadline unknown to all but to some secret pact between you and the mystery of your birth. Take your time, little one. Be ready, for this Earth is so full celebration and beauty and though I wish I could shelter you from the pain and ugliness, I cannot. It is every parent and grandparent’s impossible desire. This much I know is true: You will be deeply loved. You will loved by your family and tribe, by the Creator, your angels, ancestors and the Earth itself. In turn, love and protect what is sacred. Work in intimate ways to heal yourself and all of Life. Make your Wellspring of Power be love for this living planet and the Holy Spirit that ignites and illuminates the world.

I can only offer a few pieces of knowledge for your journeys around the sun–may they be long and easy. Sometimes I touch on wisdom, but I am perhaps a young soul, who knows only enough to value the Beginner’s Mind. We, who are at the crone age at this time, can’t foresee what your elder years will look like. What I know is that life is full of twists and turns. You will be surprised. I hope there are many instances of joy in that astonishment. You will want a mate and family. Chances are good you will find them, but I cannot forecast it. So, this is what you can do, no matter what–Build yourself a strong community. Hold it dear and participate in every chapter, big and small. Find your place. It will call you and welcome you … you will know it. Get to know it as you would a lover, so you know what threatens and what restores it.

Travel. It will both broaden and deepen your perspective. It may be that voyages in your time around our globe will look different. They will almost surely be closer and more mindful of the cost to the planet than ours were. But find a way to value the stranger and the “Other”—the person who is not like you.

This blog has been full of heartfelt messages that I have repeated over and over. You may find some trail markings in it. I hope to live long enough to see you grow. I will always help you. I will always love you. Seek beauty in the ordinary things all around you, granddaughter. Be of service to this astounding home planet. If you learn to say one prayer every day, make it “thank you”. You will never regret it.