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On a sun-drenched Easter Sunday nearly seven decades ago, two destiny maps – known as my Mum and Dad – came together in marriage and stayed together.

 

 

It happened in the remote Ida Valley, Central Otago – sheep-station country in New Zealand’s South Island.  Think tussocks blanketing the dry landscape with shimmering liquid gold, huge rock outcrops and only a few scattered willows bordering the creeks; skies of unfathomable indigo with tiny skylarks soaring and diving and ceaselessly singing on the wing…

Time!  How it creates this apparentness of be-ing!  Creates the insistent illusion of individuals with identities and histories; creates the fabric on which Life embroiders a multitude of manifestations.  Time is mind’s favourite toy.

This is my question:

What was never born
never entered into marriage
never had children or parents
never succeeded or failed at anything
never suffered injury or heartache
nor enjoyed a single moment’s pleasure
and yet ‘knows’ it all, intimately,
while remaining
utterly unaffected and impartial?

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Painting:  Road West, Ida Valley by Grahame Sydney 1999
710mm x 1220mm
Oil on Linen

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