What am I looking at? Where do your eyes fall when they have the space to just gaze? Focus is a metaphor and our recollection of our focus can become a daily record of today.

Up close I see Marcel’s blonder hair through the tines of the comb, the knotted up roots of the transplanted flowers, the bold amount due on each statement, the milliliters per dosage on the syringe, the little dry lines cracking around the skin of my heel, and the predictably cheerful red and white checkered pattern on the table cloth in the glossy wedding magazine.

Just in front of me I see the deep the brown mahogany returning to Sam’s skin when the medicine seems to take hold after too many weeks of not being able to eat much of anything for reasons no one can quite explain. I see his relief as he asks for seconds.

In the almost dark I see Shrek’s smile with his eyes closed, as he nods off to sleep. I still don’t believe I am invited to be this preciously near to another human being sometimes.

From across the kitchen table I see Marcel’s hand decisively penning his love for his “Dad” on “Father’s Day” for the sixteenth time. I watch his green-orange-blue-yellow smudged palm carefully fold up another card to be placed in the ever widening envelope of his love for him.

I have to squint to see a little farther away-and a manuscript in my lap, some sand under a blanket, and the gentle shake of my belly as I let myself laugh in the middle of a summer day.

Way out there I see this strong body settling into the ease that comes from trusting in the moment that we are all OK.