This past weekend, I did the same 2.6 mile hike three times in two days, with three sets of people. I hiked the same loop in the same direction, and each time it was like a new trail.

The first time, I walked with a friend who I’ve hiked with regularly throughout the pandemic.The reason I kept going back was because that first hike was magical. The only other people on the trail seemed to be serious birders with big binoculars.

We stopped to speak with one couple. They told us the preserve where we hiked was in the midst of a two week migration period, when tiny birds flying north from the Caribbean rest on their way to their nesting grounds.

Since we can’t travel to the Caribbean right now, it seemed like the next best thing was to go see birds who have just spent the winter there.

I knew I would regret not sharing the experience with the kids, so the second time, I woke up early, got the six younger kids out of bed, loaded up the car, and made a stop at the Dunkin Donuts drive-thru window for motivation on the way there. The third time, I took the Chaplain.

It was amazing to me how different the trail was each time. Two hikes were in the morning, and one was in the afternoon, and the sounds and smells were completely different at different times of the day. The lupine is blooming, and each time I did the trail, there was more purple lighting up the browns and greens.

I was a little concerned about taking the kids – they enjoy a hike once we’re doing it (although not everyone would admit it), but there is always a lot of bickering and complaining to and from, and sometimes during. And they aren’t quiet hikers. In fact, when I’m with them, I almost never see any wildlife. I didn’t realize the lack of wildlife until I started hiking with a friend and we saw critters and birds all the time – because they hadn’t been scared away.

So I talked to the kids on the way there. I told them there were lots of creatures where we were going, but we would have to be very, very quiet if we wanted to see them.

Well, they did it. They were quiet. They were rewarded by ten chipmunks, a garter snake, a rabbit, and several beautiful birds, including a brilliant red bird that looked like a psychedelic robin (and wasn’t a cardinal), and a red-capped woodpecker who we got to watch in the act of making a hole in a tree. That doesn’t include the butterflies and plants. I’ve never seen so many living things on a hike with them before. Best of all, high in the treetops, hopping from branch to branch, we saw the tiny travelers from the Caribbean taking a break in our neck of the woods.

It made me thing of all the repetitive tasks, and by extension, repetitive days, that make up our lives. We take care of the obligations that make up these days because we have to (I’m thinking of dishes and laundry). We think we know what we’re going to get each time.

The weekend hikes were a reminder that there is magic in doing things again and again.

My hike with the Chaplain felt like a completely different trail. The birds were quiet, but the sun was on the opposite side of the trail, lighting up different things than it had in the morning. The earthy undergrowth had been the prevalent smell in the morning, but a day of baking in the sun brought out the warm, pungent smell of pine in the afternoon.

I know, dishes are never going to be like that.

But I guess I was thinking about what would happen if I were a little more open-hearted toward the repetitive tasks that take up so much of my days? Instead of assuming I know how each day will go, I could assume I don’t know, and that might add a little possibility that wasn’t there before.

It’s a weekday now. I spent much of the morning doing the same things I do every day: breaking up fights, helping people with math, cleaning up the kitchen, and sewing in between. The sunlight shafted through the kitchen window. It wasn’t quite the same as when it slanted through the trees in the Pine Bush or lit up the bright white flowers of the wild strawberries.

There was a floating place of possibility between the mundane tasks, though.

There will be days where all we do is the same thing we did yesterday. I’m giving us all permission to count those days toward the practice of living, and look for surprises inside each one, because they are there if we’re willing to look.