Mood adjustment :). Koi.

.     You don't ever really need an excuse to stare into a pond of Koi or to watch the water flow from atop a bridge. If you can find peace and serenity for a moment in your day, take the opportunity and do so. 
.      The thought occurred to me, when I stopped at a nursery and landscaping business to wander around the very perimeter of the grounds. I wasn't there to find or buy any plants, flowers and gardening are not exactly my forte; besides I'm years away from having a property I can nest properly. 
.     Someday I will; and it will have an apple tree. Maybe a few rows of vegetables, probably tulips lining a walkway or something. As I passed a myriad of plants, shrubs, flowers... I found myself wandering the back section. Trees in their decomposable pots and burlap ball bags, waiting to be planted and begin a life as someone's ornamental status-symbol, all pretty, all saplings. 
.     I came to a pond where the frogs were big and croaking their slow love songs to one another. I always went down to the lake as a kid to catch frogs. Remembering this made me smile. I laughed to myself thinking of the time I lst a boot wading through the deep back mud of the mucky part of the lake. I was so upset that it had happened.
.     Wandering around this quaint road-side business I came to a bridge over a small stream. Leaning on the hand-rail I watched the water flow towards me and thought it was a nice metaphor for life, youth I later corrected myself. 
.     Everything you came from, you are able to look back on and while you can't see it all at once, you know that the water comes from somewhere and has touched so much. The influences that make you and your life unique and whole; culminate together in a sparkling torrent and come to you. Staring back at the water rushing towards me I couldn't help but think about how life always seems to be an up-stream battle.
.     Then I turned and watched the water going the other way. Here, I thought, was the true metaphor for life! I'd been looking at everything coming my way thinking I was facing the right direction. Seeing only what came to me. And I was wrong. 
.     What passed me, in life too, was what I could have an impact on. I dropped a leaf into the water and watched it flow down-stream. First it passed a clump of reeds, then a patch of long grass, stalled in a circle around a little pool formed by some larger rocks, it poured from there and fed downstream until it disappeared around a bend and beneath a culvert.
.     Life is an up-stream battle if you look back all the time. But when you realize that where you are going is what you will have done, is what your life is really about, then you can start directing the flow towards the things that need your nourishment. You can begin to sculpt the landscape that will have been your path through life.
.     Walking back to my car I stopped at a pond. It reminded me of a taoist truism I like to think of when things get rough. "When the water is cloudy, just wait. In time the dirt will settle and the water will become clear again." through the ripples in the water I saw something alive. I waited and in a moment of stillness I saw flecks of orange and gold on black and white patches. The Koi were beautiful.