FOR WHOM THE BELL TOLLS

     Sometimes, in the simplest moments, the incredible beauty of life can catch you up and show you how fortunate you are just to be a conscious, breathing being.  So it was this morning while I sat on the veranda sipping locally grown coffee and looking down on the little town of Boquete, Panama.

The sun, cresting over one of the many surrounding peaks, shot beams of light through the fast moving clouds which are urged along by the warm breezes that blow through the valley.  Below the sound of the morning church bells signal the start of a new day.

The bells are used to proclaim different events throughout the day.  The morning bells at 8:00 are almost a call to service.  The mid-day bells let you know that it is time for a break, have a meal, rest.  At 5:30 in the afternoon they signal it may be time to call an end to your toil, wash-up and head home for the day.  They are beautiful reminders, not alarms.  They suggest, not demand.

Then at 9:00 at night there comes a short blast of what sounds like an old air raid siren; just one crank of the handle as the horn wails then slowly dies down.  This is the sound that reminds school age children, up through their teens, that it is time to be home.  It is a curfew; one imposed by the town.  Not out of fear, but out of love.  Simple.  Beautiful.

As I sat this morning finishing my coffee, the bells had just faded when the searing, monstrous sound of a leaf blower shattered my serenity. I winced at the indifference and had to move inside to escape the noise.

But, those lovely bells call out to the artist and the gardener alike.  One may create bright, uplifting pictures, the other straps on a loud, gas belching machine - But both start their work day when the same beautiful bell tolls.

                        “Así es la vida.”  Such is life.