The air this day is hot, hazy, humid, heavy — oppressive, as though the elements conspire to keep us more forcibly earthbound than usual. The disconnect between ambient air and weather is stark now: For two days, the atmosphere has felt weighted with rain, yet not a drop deigns to fall.
Just past the summer solstice, light still long and close, and even the wild creatures now seem inclined to hide from it.
It’s not the light that is the culprit, of course; it’s merely one element in a world sent wildly out of balance by human misconduct. And even as we associate it now with heightened temperatures and deepening drought, a world without its gifts would be uninhabitable.
Colonial culture, with its profiteering insistence on trying to control the natural world (see Daylight Savings Time for a current and hugely disruptive example), to harness the day and suppress the night. In our way, we recognize that we inhabit a world cradled in the light.
It is, after all, one of the first gifts of the creator spirits, and one of the first medicines, too: a Mother Earth sufficiently close to Father Sun to permit our mortal bodies to live, to survive, to thrive; a cosmos that keeps us near enough to that great central star not to freeze, without being so close as to combust.
We humans take so very much for granted. But in attempting to think about it, to understand and be grateful for it, it’s hard to comprehend just how miraculous our very existence truly is.
Today’s featured work is a reminder to be less expectant, less dismissive, more conscious and grateful for the most elemental gifts that keep our world alive, and us in it. From its description in the Rings Gallery here on the site:
Embracing the Light Finger Cuff Ring
We begin each new year by embracing the light, whose return brings us a world renewed. Wings honors both the light and its embrace with this new finger cuff, a ring designed to hold one in silvery reflected and refracted light. It’s a simple sterling silver band, hammered by hand to catch the light, its arc sloping gently upward on either side courtesy of the ring’s graceful anticlastic shaping. Its “cuff” style, one length of silver wrapped and held via the metal’s natural tension rather than a circle soldered together, leaves room for self-adjustment. Note: This particular cuff is made for larger fingers, roughly a size 14; it can be resized a bit, but much more than two sizes downward would require trimming the ends of the cuff. Band is 3/4″ across at the top center, narrowing gradually to 7/16″ at either end (dimensions approximate). Side view shown below.
Sterling silver
$375 + shipping, handling, and insurance
The design of this ring is a literal manifestation of these lessons: a surface ashimmer and glowing with the fire of a reflected sun, its walls sloping gently upward to form a cradle of silvery light. It’s a comfortable and comforting shape, one you can’t ignore or forget, but one whose clean, spare lines feel cool and smooth on your hand.
It makes for a beautifully ornamental focal point, a reminder always at hand of the the ways in our which the natural world births us, nurtures us, supports and cares for us even when we are too wrapped up in our daily lives to recognize it.
It’s a reminder, too, that illumination is a gift in more than one way — not merely a matter of keeping the night at bay, but of imbuing our path, our steps and words and ways of being, with that heightened form we call wisdom, or medicine.
And it calls us to be thankful, yes, even in the face of a deepening drought, surrounded by pandemic and dangers behind every door. It calls us to be brave, to be strong, to do the work that is required of us, knowing always that we are cradled in the light.
~ Aji
All content, including photos and text, are copyright Wings and Aji, 2020; all rights reserved. Nothing herein may used or reproduced in any form without the express written permission of the owner.
