June 13, 1970

I am me and I am alone and just now I feel content to be so. Still not wanting to go home after the movie & thinking of driving as help, I drove out Hwy 5. I remembered the U of Minn. Arboretum & thot there might be a spot for quiet. There was no one at the entrance tho it was not yet 6:00. I drove in, seeing no one except what at first appeared to be a coyote crossing the road. When I got out of the car the coyote turned into a silver german shepherd who immediately approached me (w/very little encouragement). Here I was all alone as far as eye could see with only dog for company so I spoke to him as to a friend. I asked him if he lived there - for answer he followed me into the enclosed garden. I had the whole glorious place to myself - it was like finding a pearl. Most of the beds were bare, newly planted, but there were several groups of interesting & lovely flowering plants - tall, tall spikes topped w/fat round balls of periwinkle stars, lower spires ending in similar blue constellations - all of the allium family evidently leaves flat, broad & pointed as iris leaves.

In the corner there was a bench simply made of a long raw weathered board w/a mounted inscription "In memory of Ruth Eggleston Heines". I asked Ruth if I might sit down which I did & I thot then I could think of no lovelier way to be remembered & I, too, would like only such a memorial to me after death. I commented occasionally to my shepherd once, with tears rushing to my eyes, I was inclined to say how good it was to make a friend so speedily - "not an easy thing to do these days." He sat at my feet with head to be scratched & rubbed.

The beauty & quiet of the place were spectacular. The sky was empowered with huge masses of cloud - grey & white - mass upon mass - huge & boiling & off in the distance was a formation to gasp at. Great figured shapes formed a hallway of incredible proportions - a hole in the sky - mass behind mass, growing brighter the greater the distance, giving a feeling of infinite space & distance such as I had never seen or felt before - it literally made me gasp for breath. The sun was setting, blue sky was clear between cloud clumps, but still there was a sense, more than anything, of a haze, a dream-like breathlessness throughout all the air. This was a moment so rare & yet to be rarer, as to be too much for me. I had to move, to walk, to remind myself I was not a true part of the scene - I was but a visitor - an outsider looking on. I would have liked to have frozen there, to have become immobilized - to have dissolved - no, to be instead as marbelized or otherwise made permanent so as to spend eternity there - or my chair of eternity as that wooden bench, that weathered latticed fence to enjoy each season in its turn & time in absolute peace or as the lovely lavender clematis to enjoy each summer season & rest to come up yet again.

Shepherd & I strolled along & around the varieties of peonies - rose-fragrant & shading from deep red & pink to white, all w/diff. aspects, some w/diff. leaf shapes, some still in spherical bud & some bare & to seed, surrounded by fallen petals. All this time there was complete quiet save for the constant embroidery of bird song, loud, constant & lyrical.

Then the first glints of evil in nature's plan intruded & mosquitoes appeared. I began to have a moment of reacquainting myself with the ginkos of my girlhood. Then I said goodbye to my friend & drove off as he stood in the road w/his head turned toward me, watching as tho sorry to see me go.

I still could not bring myself to leave so I stopped again short of the entrance-exit where the breeze was strong & kept the mosquitoes away. Here was the lilac collection, sweet-smelling where lavender & pink clusters & deep green where blossoms had fallen. I stood against the stone & wood fence, surveying the scene - I felt healed & whole for once - here peace & grace & graciousness abounded - filled the air & the eyes & the whole sky-world. I did not want to leave - I did, in fact, want to stay there forever, for all my life, which is the same. A tiny thing flew toward me - I thot a bumble bee - but it was a hummingbird, sleek & fast & extraordinary. I knew I must go, I felt I had to leave before I lost my grip on reality - I wanted to leave before staying became compulsive - before, in essence, I had to be dragged away. With great dignity & poise I got in my car & rejoined the stream of life on the highway feeling a slight touch of panic at the reentering, but yet feeling I'd gained a life-giving, healing message or injection & a knowledge as to where & when to go again when fake-life again began to crush out my acquaintance, no, love-affirm with true-life. It is yet there to be found. How long - oh, how long?