“Surely place induces poetry, and when the poet is extremely attentive to what is there, a meaning may even attach to his poem out of the spot on earth where it is spoken, and the poem signify the more because it does spring so wholly out of its place, and the sap has run up into it as into a tree.”

~ Eudora Welty, “On Writing”

The house was quiet, Frank was gone, the windows all closed this morning when I woke. It wasn’t until I went to make my bed that I remembered my magnificent dream. So, instead of getting out for my walk, I sat down and opened my journal – I had to get it down. In the dream I turned a corner and there was the ocean, and a marvelous sea creature had rolled in on a wave to see me. We locked eyes, this charming creature and I. Part whale, part dolphin, part – what? A silver skinned beast with a gentle face. I took its picture so I could prove I had seen this miraculous sight. These creatures, they didn’t just roll in for encounters with just any human beings. But this one had come to see me. . . I wrote out the dream, finding so many insights, and then I wrote from the role of the sea creature, and it was very moving. I sat with my notebook digesting this experience for some time. I wondered if the dream had something to do with my overcoming my fear of snakes. Then, I went and watered the pots on the deck, and there was a snake that curled and fled from the grass at my feet. Good morning snake. Thank you, dream creature. And then, in the yard, I watered and Charlie waited. And then I took my wagon and dug up more ferns for the garden, and Charlie waited. I put them in the earth and watered them, and Charlie waited. And then I went for my walk with Charlie. And he was sluggish and slow in the heat. He stopped at the brook. I kept walking, thought he was just behind me, but by the time I reached the tracks he wasn’t there. I called and called. What happened to Charlie? I walked all the way back home, no Charlie. So, I walked back toward the tracks. And there was Charlie, running back home to find me. So, I took him over the trestle bridge to our favorite place on the river for him to cool off. We went a little way into the meadow, but I needed to get back home. One more dip in the brook on the way back. I got an e-mail today from a writer who downloaded my Aim for Astonishing writing prompt and she sent me her writing from her photo and I read it and replied. So glad to see what came for her from the prompt; a very inspiring story about her role model, so much description, such a powerful role model; and the writer said she had never told this person what she means to her, and now she will. Another writer told me on instagram that she is so glad to have found a way to write spontaneously from the personal photos that inspire her. Just keeping it simple and finding great satisfaction in that. In the late afternoon I took the dogs to my friend’s dock on Farm Pond for a swim and we all went in. And I felt a certain joy all day, a feeling of having been seen, really seen, and I was glad the sea creature swam to meet me.