Quiet Day Mantra

Today is quiet day at Penuel Ridge, where we are intentionally silent for the day. With a lot of stuff churning inside of me, I decided what I needed to do was go to The Well (our chapel) and lie prostrate on the floor, clear my head and let the small still voice be heard. After deep breathing and clearing the clutter...here's what was spoken:

I open my heart to receive the infinite love of the Universe.

Assumptions About Tomorrow

The little mushrooms were pushing through the mosses in the undergrowth, signaling that the autumn rains were bringing the time of gathering. Two Clouds was teaching the young women of her Clan how to know which kinds of mushrooms were edible, and how to collect them.

One young woman was filling her baskets with every edible mushroom she could find. Two Clouds noticed and stopped the women, asking them to form a circle so they could talk. Then Two Clouds began her lesson.

We can never assume what tomorrow will bring for our children and their children. If we take all the mushrooms we see, there will be none left to continue the generations of food that can be foraged from the forest. We might discover that our great grandchildren died of hunger because we took unfair advantage of the bounty given to us today.

There is a balance in the natural world that we can sense, but we cannot always see. If the buffalo keep disappearing, and the deer and the flocks of winged creatures change their migration patterns, how will our generation survive? In assuming that there will always be more than enough, we have forgotten that we are ultimately responsible for what tomorrow holds. If we take without giving something back, we have robbed tomorrow of the energy it needs for renewal.

Observations from the Road

...or maybe questions, but definitely not rhetorical in nature:

1. Why isn't baseline and vaseline pronounced the same way?

2. Driving back from Texas, I hit Bucksnort, Tennessee at about dusk. There was a deer grazing peacefully next the interstate under the city limit sign. Redundant or shrewd municipal marketing?

3. Truckers...do they truly think pulling up next to me on the freeway and making cat calls loud enough to be heard over the roar of their engine is going to turn me on? Does this ever work for them?

4. Who is advocating for the geriatric community dealing with substandard rural healthcare?

5. Solidarity...a pylon or a pile driver?

Ich habe geweint

I cried.
I cried this week.
I cried over things seemingly disconnected.

Mournful tears

the fresh scars of tire tracks and ruts on the lower trail leading to the lake

having to resort to killing a wasp building a nest in the doorframe of the cottage when she/he was not amenable to being relocated

photos of the corpse of Abu Musab al-Zarqawi shortly after he was killed

loneliness

Joyful tears

Mocha running as fast as she can across the meadow with a crazed smile on her face

hearing and feeling in my marrow my own voice joining others in creating a perfectly tuned chord

remembering who I am

knowing what I need to be happy

I cried.
I cried this week.
I cried over things seemingly disconnected...

Scraps of Wisdom.7

My barn, having burned to the ground

I can now see the moon.

Gracias DC Comics

Ode to my Texas heritage

Bluebonnet, bluebonnet
with your coat so blue
your eyes are so shiny
through the silvery dew

I know you're my dolly
offered for the rain
I know you'll return again
to Texas in the spring.