Air.
The breath of life.
We are immersed in its invisible currents, and it travels
throughout our bodies to bring life to each cell, our lungs infusing our blood
with that precious O, and our blood cells in organs along the route suck
it up, this life-giving element without which they, and we, will die.
Air.
How easy it is to take for granted, to forget about its ubiquitous
and necessary presence in each moment we know ourselves to exist.
| Thanks so much to Douglas A. Sirois for permission to use this beautiful image, one that captures my feeling about the sacredness of air, especially given my increasing lack of the element in which we are immersed and dead without! The artist has many spiritual and fantasy illustrations I love! www.dougsirois.com douglas.sirois@verizon.net http://dsiroisillustration. http://www.imdb.com/name/ |
So. Why is it that my
cells are not getting enough air? That
is the medical question of the day, the hour, the year. In fact, dyspnea—shortness of breath—began noticeably
for me over Christmas and New Year’s while traveling to Europe and
Switzerland. Actually, it was more like
utter exhaustion than shortness of breath—the shortness of breath came because
I was trying to get that precious air to the muscles that threatened to give
out beneath me.
Air didn’t seem so invisible to me that day. Of course, I couldn’t see it, but I could
visualize its little superhero blobs traveling newly oxygenated from my lungs
through the arteries, greeted with joy and celebration by the thirsty cells waiting
in muscle and tendon and bone and organ, the parts of us that need that bloody,
airy drink to keep going.
