Today we got a little taste of Spring in Seattle: blue skies with wispy cirrus clouds, and a high of almost 60 degrees Fahrenheit. We took the opportunity to finally explore a few of the 230 acres of the beautiful Washington Park Arboretum on the Seattle shores of Lake Washington. We had visited the Japanese garden there years ago, but never walked in the main arboretum.

When I suggested this outing to Jung she loved the idea. However, I knew that our daughters were counting on a short trip to a local park rather than driving to Seattle. They are homebodies, and very jealous of their weekend time so convincing them to spend time outside generally requires intense negotiation. What I didn’t know was that the word, “Arboretum,” was going to going to make them so excited! They absolutely jumped on the idea and unlike most of our nature outings, I never heard either of them ask, “when are we going home?” We had a glorious time learning about all the different plants and trees featured there, including hybrid rhododendrons with velvet leaves, wonderfully expressive gnarly trees, ebony grass and bright yellow witch hazel in the winter garden in bloom in early February! We walked, talked and marveled in the sun together, enjoying our respite from the usual gray Seattle winter.

When we left in the late afternoon, I looked up and saw the almost full Moon already high up in the sky. I thought about the plants in the arboretum and how many of them had been planted there generations before, and how we had enjoyed them today. I thought about the trees and how they experienced time. I thought about the water flowing through the landscaped streams and what a brief part of its cycle this was. I wondered if any of these water molecules had come this way before. I looked up again at the Moon and thought how small I would appear if anyone could even see me from there. Even the grandest of trees I saw today were but babies to the Earth and the Moon and what am I to such a tree?

There was a time when I couldn’t reconcile living a fierce life with the perspective that I am but a speck and my life is but an moment to the Universe. I don’t know when the shift occurred, but now I am able to move between those two attitudes with ease. I can bring my full life force to bear on standing up for my children and what we believe in as a family, while at the same time recognizing that the outcome doesn’t matter. I recognize that even if the community we are in doesn’t share our values, simply learning that fact is a gift. It provides us with clarity and the opportunity to make a conscious choice. All that matters is that I choose to live my life following my true heart.

Although our lives are but a speck of existence in a moment of time, they are precious all the same. My hope is that by the end of my life, I have also planted something that future generations will enjoy. And I hope my children will continue to marvel at the miraculous variety that pervades all of life, just as we saw in the Arboretum today.