'Tis the season to bring mind and body back together gain.

A (two-minute) personal essay.

This afternoon, during a blustery walk at a city park in Memphis, my mind and body were in two different locations (not unusual).

Body, of course, briskly making loops on the one-mile path around the park, while my mind was far, far away, looping a variety of thoughts over and over and over again (today’s themes: “4th quarter of life” regrets, mortality, etc. 😩).

But suddenly the totally-out-of-context object caught the corner of my eye and snapped me back to my senses—one that had no business being on a park bench.

I walked closer to the bench, my shadow long from the low-attitude, December sun at my back. I looked left. Looked right. Then bent over and read the tag attached to the box.

“The most wonderful time of the year” - from the Grant Family

It was a box of cookies. Left there, presumably, as a random act of Christmas kindness by someone whose thoughts were of the most wonderful kind: focused solely on the external world of others, rather than being self-absorbed with their own woe-is-me ruminations.

All at once, my mind and body fused themselves on the spot. The mind feeling an urgent need to shift its focus, to make a Christmas week to-do list that has nothing to do with yours truly and everything to do with others.

Although the box contained cookies, it felt like it contained a much bigger (and sweeter) gift—at least from where my shadow stood.

Peace & Love,

Mark