This season finds me slightly frantic; things refuse to lie still as I think they should. Instead of the calm waiting in anticipation of the storm, perhaps this feeling is the storm, and I'll have to wait a bit for the calm?
So as my life is packed away in small brown cardboard boxes, marked 'Mel's books', and my greenery gets poked into black plastic pots, and where the priority of garden maintenance comes in at an all time low - I'll tell you a story set in a garden instead.

This tale is unusual, written for children and intended as light meditation. From a book called Nightlights, and is produced by three storytellers: Joyce Dunbar, Kate Petty and Louisa Somerville.
It is truly amazing how much time and effort has gone in making this book as effective as possible to both you and your children. The first nine chapters are all preparation. From encouraging your children's interest in books and storytelling at an early age - how to cultivate positive attitudes, through reading, towards themselves and other people. To the art of reading out loud to your child. Being alive to the narrative and able to convey by the tone of your voice, with both rhythm and speech, the excitement and wonder found within the story.
Re-discovering your own childhood and travelling these fantasies together.

There are twenty meditation stories within these pages, all of them with gentle aspects touching on values, situations and experiences. Addressing issues your child may face like shyness, separation and loneliness. Helping to instil the qualities of confidence, love, sharing and courage. Each story begins in the same way - closing eyes and picking up a magic lantern and following an Enchanted Path. Every story ends with a list of positive affirmations, aiding you to find the story's deeper meaning. Beside each story is beautifully drawn artwork by Fiona Hewitt, rich with symbolism and bright with colour.
Looking toward the back of the book I've found four extra chapters: Toward True meditation, Breathing and Concentration, Helping Your Child to Visualize and Four Short Visualizations.
I am thoroughly impressed with this book. If like me you've always has a passion for interactive stories this book is worth looking through….now for the tale…

The Weather dance

Close your eyes imagine it's raining. Or is it hot and sunny? Perhaps it's snowing, or maybe a big wind is blowing? Think about all the different noises the weather makes. There's the soft, gentle pitter-patter of the rain, the whistling of the wind, the silence of falling snow. Now pick up your magic lantern and walk down the Enchanted Path. Where will it lead you tonight?
To a gray and gloomy garden that's still and quiet. There is no wind blowing. No birds are singing. No leaves are fluttering on the ground. There is no light and shade. You try to work out what's wrong with this place. The weather seems to have forgotten it altogether. That's it, you realize! This garden has no weather at all. How can such a thing be? How can you get out of here? It's so dull, its making you feel drowsy.

Then, as if out of nowhere, a bubble appears and bursts just over your head, sprinkling you with its moisture. Now your arms and legs feel very light, and your toes start to tingle. You look down. Your toes have silver rings and your toenails are silver, too.

In this dull and gloomy garden, you want to dance…but where's the music? Listen. What can you hear? Drip…drip…drip…drop…pitter…patter…pitter…patter…It's the music of falling rain. You can feel it in your toes. You tip toe around, tip…tap…tip…You lick the rain. You feel the rain on you skin. You're not just dancing with the rain. You are the rain and the rain is you.

The garden glistens and sparkles. You dance faster as the rain keeps falling…splish….splash…splosh…You're running and gurgling, bubbling and streaming, tumbling and falling, until you're gasping and laughing and out of breath.

You lie down and look up at the sky. How wintry and cold it looks. You stretch out your arms, and they stretch so wide. You stretch your legs and they feel a mile long. Your breath hangs like a white cloud above you. Around you, the garden is white. The trees are all hanging with icicles. You don't feel the cold. You are the cold and the cold is you.

Slowly, you get to you feet. And the garden dissolves. You are on a huge, shining lake that's covered with think ice. You glide along the long, slow movements. You know just what to do. But where did you learn? You didn't know you could skate like this. Fast ad the wind you move, forward, round, then backwards. Now you do a figure of eight, now you spin on you toes. You arch your back and look up at the sky. A snowflake lands on your face.

Out of the pearl grey sky, big snowflakes are dancing down around you. So now you do your snow dance…so gentle, silent, drifting. You're as light and as soft as a feather. You fall on the mountains. You fall in far away places where no one has ever been before you fall by the polar bear's den and past the huddle of penguins. You fall on the frozen seas and on the albatross's wings. He flies with you, up toward the sun. Nearer, nearer, nearer, the sun changing from pink to red, melting the snow.

Down you dance again, a speck in sunbeam. So now you dance the sun dance. It's the lightest of dances, dappling the woodland, kissing the flowers, ripening the apples that grow in the orchard. You shimmer and shine. You glint and dazzle. And then, as you rise higher and higher, you beam and burn. You are the throb, throb, throb of the heat in the desert. The lizard lifts his toes, because the sand is too hot to bear. The snake hides in his hole. The spider scuttles. But you don't feel the heat. Only the light. You are the sun and the sun is you.
Now a silence. Then you start to grumble. Now a clap of thunder. You stamp in the skies. You bang on the clouds. You zig-zag through the blackness. Loudly you roar. Fiercely you flash. But when the storm breaks, you're done with the rain. Now is the dance of the rainbow.

And so, in a long, slow arch -red, orange, yellow, green, blue, indigo and violet -you're the rainbow. You reach so wide, with your hands in the skies, your feet in a mystery. You are everywhere no one can ever go. You are the dance and the dance is you.

But you've dances enough for tonight. Another night you can dance, you can dance the whirlwind dance, and you can dance the hurricane or the tornado. Or you can do the dance of a sunny summer's day.
But wait! What's become of the garden - that dull and gloomy garden? It was a place that you sometimes find in you mind. What have you done with it?
You've danced it away.

Affirmations

Enjoy whatever nature brings you, there's fun in the rainiest day, just as there's fun in the sunniest afternoon.

People are very much like the weather in their moods. Everyone has dull days and bright days, story days and peaceful days.

In your mind, you can become anything you imagine. Even the weather. You can be falling snow or rain, or a great blustering wind or even a tiny speck in a sunbeam.

Dancing can make you feel happy. You can dance your troubles away.