The Serenity Pond

The pond was finished the same day a woman, who I know only as "Serenity", lost her Mother to Alzheimer's. I couldn't shake the name, 'serenity', whenever I was around the pond. I kept thinking, even though I've never really named any of my previous landscape projects, that it was a perfect name for this one. But I didn't christen it or anything...just thought about it.

One afternoon, a day or two after it was done I was placing another rock near the water and one of the dogs chased a squirrel across the yard and up the tree that grows right behind the pond. He sat there on the lowest limb, just out of reach of the dogs, and watched me. The dog sat beside St. Francis and a sparrow lit on the rock and was drinking from the fall. And the fish had come up to me when I placed the rock, thinking I had food for them. So, for about 5 seconds, right here in the city I had birds, fish, squirrels, and the dogs all within an arms length, or two.  Mom missed it but later that afternoon we were sitting by the pond and I said, "isn't it great, Mom, just to sit here and listen to the waterfall?"

She said one word.............

 

 

"Serenity."