Simple

I woke at 5:00 a.m. and begged my body to go to sleep. It is a well deserved day off and time to rest. Yet, the birds are singing and the sky is a mixture of peaches and butter. I make the coffee, pull my fuzzy sweatpants up under my nightgown, throw on a jacket and head outside. It is a brisk 48 degrees. The clouds are rolling in as I sit down in the sunny corner of the porch with my cup of steaming brew. The hummingbirds compete for the warm solution I have just prepared. Two feeders full and still they jostle each other for position.

I watch my bluebirds take turns feeding their young. I chuckle to myself when I think back to three years ago when I had a decision to make to move to Missoula or stay in the cabin with my current job. The sign for me to stay was that the bluebirds took up residency in the house I had placed out my kitchen window. All my life in New York, I had wanted to have bluebirds and here in this field I had prepared a place and they had come. It had turned out to be the best career choice for me.

The bluebirds move almost rhythmically in and out of the house. First one, then the other. Their focus is simple and clear. Maintain the species. They build the nest, lay the eggs, rear the young. It's off to warmer climates for the winter and then the cycle repeats. The male is perched on the fence post observing me type as I make my best attempt to peer into his brain. He is being a bluebird. How wonderfully peaceful. He is not worried about where he will go this winter; he is not worried that his mate will not like something he said; he is not rehashing his childhood. He is just being a bluebird.

How did human life get so complex? Why do we seem to go out of our way to make things complicated? Why is it that we feel we have to have the newest car, have the best house, attain the right career, create the most elaborate identity to feel complete? We have the ability to take a relationship  and question its validity to the point of dissolution. Are we ever satisfied? Can we finally rest once any of these things have been achieved? Is there a way to simplify? Can we just relax and breathe in life as it comes?

My oldest daughter used to say, when we were camping, "What else could anyone ever want?" We had our tent, our horses and good food. I had to agree. We'd read books by the fire at night and relive our expedition of the day. I feel that way about living in this cabin. For the first few years, I kept feeling that I should buy a house. It was the first year of the recession of 2008. Real estate was tanking. It has been five years and I am still here. My life is simple in this space. No television, no newspaper, sometimes a radio. There are only six houses on this dirt road. The only sounds are the birds and the wind as it rattles the leaves of the aspens.

The job I currently have, necessitates that I am continually barraged by phone calls, client consults and farm visits. I am grateful to be of service but it is a drain to my system. At the end of the day, it is the simplicity of the cabin that brings me peace and recharges me. I sit here on my porch with my hair askew, wearing my glasses and my fuzzy clothes over and under my pajamas. I am alone and content in this hideaway. My flowers are waving a gentle "good morning" as the rooster crows across the canyon. Thank you, blue bird, for reminding me how simple life can be. On this delicious day off I will not concern myself with tomorrow's projects or my past experiences. I will revel in the sunshine, the hawk that has just appeared over my head and the simple pleasures of life.