Yesterday, it rained again. We are so grateful, as the moisture seems to be cycling back into more regularity after a hot, hot summer. There is no wildfire smoke in the air, at least these past several days in the valley.

So many prayers for rain – and they have been answered. The elements of the earth lean back into a little balance here, right now.

After the rains, this early morning is so beautiful in the garden. The harvesting of beans, tomatoes and corn is full on. I’m going to a dance of universal peace tonight, with a pot luck before hand. What to make, with all this bounty? I could go many different directions….Come on out to the garden with me, and let’s decide.

Here’s my favorite place to contemplate the day.

Once out in the back garden, I really am overcome how beautiful it is, the natural world creating gorgeous landscapes of color and light. I can’t stay seated, my eyes want to drink it all in…

Natural grace surrounds me.

What a gift to be alive on this still morning, looking through the eyes of the garden spirits, after the two nights of generous rain. I’m drawn to weave my way over to the herb garden.

This year I planted sacred Native herbs along with the culinary –  sweetgrass and white sage.

I pick a white sage leaf, and breathe in that amazing scent…Burning white sage as a smudge to cleanse mind, body, spirit and places of dense, stagnant energy has been used since ancient times, by indigenous peoples, and this morning, fresh picked and rubbed between my fingers.

We create the beauty in our lives. Along with some help.

I pick a few beans – and without a basket right at hand, I slip them into my pocket, beside the white sage leaf –

and breathe in the sage, clearing my head, to feel more deeply, and think.

It’s early morning yet, and I have the whole day ahead. Plenty of time to cook, to plan what to bring. My friend Jeff has also called me, and invited me to help tend the fire for a Lakota sweat lodge tomorrow night here in the valley. After our deluge of rain, it is perfect timing. So now it feels right for a different kind of harvest. For the lodge.  And my first sweetgrass braids. I go find the scissors.

This should be enough to start.

It is simple, yet it feels like a memory, sitting on rocks and preparing the grasses.

What do we do? What do we think? What do we keep, what do we let go of? These choices present themselves constantly, almost within every moment. Keeping the sacred in my daily life is so important to me. And in my garden. We all may find different things sacred, but whatever they are, if they help us be kinder, more compassionate, let’s keep those things in mind. Or in your sacred pocket.