One of the best parts of returning to my childhood home more than 20 years after leaving it as a young teenager is the chance to explore it now with eyes and a heart that love beauty in ways I was only beginning to as a boy.

My brother and I set a date for wandering the neighborhood to have our chat and see what was happening in the world – the world close at hand – early one morning in this late Florida winter.

We weren’t out of the driveway when this moment offered itself up.

And I thought again of the majesty of palm trees. Of all the things I’ve learned about them these last few months. And of how I still don’t know if these palm fruits are ever good for me to eat.

And in this particular moment I was reminded again of how what is beautiful, and what has been beautiful – but is now crushed, or in some state of ruin or decline – are always, always in juxtaposition.

The Beautiful and Bedraggled: perennial bedmates in our rotting, remarkable world.

Stop for long enough, be just still and quiet enough, look deeply enough, and most any square yard of ground will tell the same old story of gorgeous, irrepressible life and damage done deeply enough to stink already of death.

What a gift: a bit of morning set aside with one I love to walk some, breathe it all deeply for a while, talk and not talk, behold and abide.