Canada Day. A very special day for me because it is also my birthday. When I was young I took offence that people were actually celebrating something other than my birthday. How dare they! It is MY day. Who cares about Canada Day?
As the years passed I began to enjoy the celebration and of course the fact that it was a holiday! The beginning of summer holidays. So as I was preparing for this year’s jaunt to the cottage to celebrate with my family, I let my thoughts wander to how I feel about Canada Day now at the ripe old age of 57.
My first thoughts turned to the political. The newly elected government of Ontario, the federal government – things I wholeheartedly agree with and things I vehemently disagree with. But I was urged to go deeper.
I began to realize that this country, this nation that we live in is part of Mother Earth and all of her Divinity. This rich, fertile, beautiful country is Her gift to me. It is exactly where I am meant to be and exactly where I am meant to fulfil my life purpose. It’s home base. This land allows me freedom and abundance. This land, this country has nurtured me, supported me, protected me.
It’s a country of extreme temperatures so that I can enjoy all the seasons of Mother Earth to the fullest. It even allows me to have two completely different wardrobes so I don’t get bored with choosing clothes! I can enjoy pretty much any sport here because of the seasonal changes. The extreme temperatures provide me with dramatic changes to all my senses and encourage me to feel the rhythm of Mother Earth. We certainly can’t miss the change of seasons here!
The next place I went in my wonderings was to the ancestors who have nurtured, cared for and loved this country long before it was a country. I picture those from millennia ago, centuries ago and decades ago. Their gentle, peaceful love.
I am a farmer at heart and have lived on the farm most of my life. Years ago, when I was in a dark, contemplative frame of mind, I walked back to the bush on the farm through the fields. I suddenly saw a young native man walking with me. I had sensed him before. As I walked past a rock pile that I had walked past hundreds of times before I saw a rock precariously positioned on the top of the pile. It was shaped in a perfect heart. I was surprised to see it. I had not seen it before. I picked it up and carried it with me. I knew that it was a gift from this wise man who walked with me. And I also knew that he was acknowledging the next generation to care for this land. He was a healer when he lived on Earth and I recognized that he was passing that healing energy to me.
My great grandmother bought this land decades ago and I began thinking of her and picturing her in the house. I actually knew her quite well and actually remember the sheep in the field, the front lawn was her potato patch (why grow a lawn that only creates work when it can be used for good growing). My grandparents lived there too and I think of my grandmother’s gorgeous gardens and my grandfather planting crops, fixing things with wire and baler twine (a farmer’s joke). My grandmother and great grandmother worked fluidly with Mother Earth and her rhythms. They knew just when the perfect time was to harvest each garden crop, to preserve each thing, to dig out the bulbs and to prune the orchard trees. It was so fluid that it became a dance that repeated each year.
So I thank Mother Earth for sharing this land that we call Canada with me. I thank all the ancestors who have cared for this land we call Canada for me. I thank all the people who live on Earth at this moment and love and nurture this land we call Canada. And I thank all the Divine beings who call this land home for allowing the love and peace and joy of the Divine to flow through this land, these people, these animals, these plants. Together we all make this land Canada. Oh yes, and the government (God bless them) for working on keeping this country abundant and peaceful and gracious.
So have a wonderful Canada Day. I know I will. And maybe let your mind wander to what Canada is for you. It’s more than you think.
Submitted by Cindy Wahlstrom
Stone Cottage Creations, Guelph (creative gifts infused with healing energy)