I hope I have a receptive soul.

I love the smell of poplar trees.
I didn't realize it until the other day when I was crunching through
some leaves. The smell reminded me of Berlin.
It was spring when I was there, and the poplar kernels had fallen on
the path along the canal. I remember really isolating that smell.
Peppery and sweet. It reminded me of being a kid at the Canyon Meadows
house.
We had a big poplar tree in our back yard, the kind that was easy to
climb. It's gone now, but it was good tree.
In the fall, our yard was covered in those big yellow leaves. What joy
it was to gather them up and lay in a big pile of that peppery
sweetness. The cold prairie afternoon biting at our cheeks and
fingers.

I am reading about lonliness and solitude. Meditating on it, because
that's what Henri Nouwen demands when you read his writings. I love
him.

"From now on, wherever you go, or wherever I go, all the ground
between us will be holy ground."