the hawk didn’t move even as we rounded the bend in the trail. it stayed in the tree – watching – its clear vision taking in all that was below it, the lay of the land, so to speak. not swayed by anything other than what was true, it quietly watched, consciously aware.
it is what is striking about these times in our world. the amount of conscious avoidance – the ignoring of what is happening – the lack of question or research even in the face of the obvious – acting with eyes wide shut.
it is reprehensible that so many people deliberately ignore all of which is destroying this country, closing their eyes, not taking any responsibility for their inaction and for their complicity, their lack of seeking to learn the facts, their willful blindness.
it takes my breath away to know that people i know and love are consciously avoiding the truth and, thus, supporting the immense chaos that is now this country…even though every – suspicious or otherwise – single thing that has happened or is happening would confirm the existence of that very chaos.
we went around the bend and stopped. we looked back at the hawk and i took a few photographs, wishing i had a stronger telephoto lens.
and then the hawk – which had remained relatively motionless as we approached and stood underneath the tree in which it was perched – took off.
flying over the meadow and marsh below it, it was clear to us that it had set its sights on something, its focus zeroed in as it flew.
the hawk landed on a branch across the marsh from us. still laser-focused on its prey and the ground below, it had the tenacity that comes from clarity of vision.
with wisdom and power, this hawk had an instinctual plan based on being aware.
how is it that there are a plethora of people in this country who fail to function even at the level of a bird?
“symbolizes wisdom, intuition, and the ability to see beyond deception or hidden truths.” (google)
it was on our way back on an out-and-back trail. we had already had the good fortune of hiking in the sun, our shadows falling on reedy marshes and fallowed underbrush of the forest, deer crossing our path.
the trail was muddy. i was watching where i was stepping.
and there it was.
a solitary feather.
a search told us it was an owl feather.
though there are resemblances to hawk feathers, i’m not minding the idea of going with owl – particularly since the symbolism is timely.
so, let’s go with that. (of course, i do welcome any birder’s opinions on this.)
we left it there, on the trail.
but we carried with us the good news of its symbolism, the wisdom, intuition and ability to discern truth. heaven knows we all sure need that right now.
in these times of unbelievable chaos, unbridled deception and grift, rank, depraved cruelty, a country being unconscionably deceived by its appallingly incompetent leaders, we are certain to need to stand in earnest wisdom with clear-eyed views of what is real versus what is propagandized or outright lying. we need to move with grace through all these challenges, protected against vast negative energy, step by step toward transformation and renewal in our country.
maybe we should all carry a virtual owl feather in our back pockets as we walk through these days.
so we are in the habit of celebrating. not just the big stuff.
particularly in this time – when all the world is in chaos, when we all have no idea what horrific thing will happen next, when there is so much trepidation about losing this country’s very democracy, we – now – celebrate the little stuff as well. and, as you can tell by this photograph, we -big-time – know what we’re doing when it comes to celebrations.
we know that most people choose to, well, maybe go out to dinner as a celebration, or maybe go away on a trip or to an event of some sort, maybe go shopping and splurge on a purchase of something long-awaited for.
we tend to be a little lower-key than all that. but even our most modest celebrations are still celebrations.
it doesn’t take much. in our zeal, we hiked two loops of our river trail. though suddenly exhausted from the toll that anticipation takes on adrenaline, happy kept us going, step by step. breathing the fresh air and feeling the sun – warm enough to take off our jackets – was its own cause for joy.
yes…on this particular day – last week, i might point out – we were beyond excited. our celebration was actually quite thrilling and filled our hearts.
and so we splurged on a $2.79 bag of munchos (on sale at woodman’s) and poured two glasses of wine. we pulled two adirondack chairs from the garage and sat in the 50-plus-degree-sun out on the patio and clinked. when the clouds covered the sun and the wind picked up we went inside, to sit at the bistro table by the window in our sunroom. with dogga on the rug at our feet, we lit a new gift, a soy candle in beautiful cut glass.
and we settled into festivity.
“enjoy the little things, for one day you may look back and realize they were the big things.” (robert brault)
“it’s everything behind you that brings you to what’s ahead.” (visa commercial during the olympics)
in depicting the miscellany of experiences that makes up a life, we all would need large pieces of poster board placed side by side by side by side to create some sort of visual timeline, something that might represent life-to-this-point.
we would all have great paragraphs of explanation, large narratives filled with words that describe each event – each dit – on the timeline. we would have many adjectives, many sources, references to places and things, achievements and failures. we might have colors or foggy haze highlighting or distilling sections of our lifeline. we might have sections that make us look like hermits or sections that make us look downright rowdy. we might place large question marks over periods of time or, maybe, exclamation marks over moments of enlightenment.
there is one thing i know, though.
even though we are each – seemingly – the expert at our own life, there are few ways to explain it all. we attempt to connect the dots – deciphering some connections with reasonable reckoning, some connections serendipitous – but some things – the going-on from one time to another – are just, well, kind of unfigureoutable.
olympians, like artists, crawl and are catapulted by both tiny baby steps and big leaps into what’s ahead – the stuff of every nook and cranny lived part of the ingredients that place you at the starting line of next – the gate, the block, the apron of the stage, the blank paper, the record button, the empty canvas.
if you had asked me at 18 if i would ever live in the midwest, i would have firmly told you – in no uncertain terms – no. but there are things at 18 i didn’t know, things i didn’t know would happen to me, things i didn’t know i would choose, people i didn’t know i would meet, places I didn’t know i would go – all the obvious didn’t-knows. … every action, thought or event produces a corresponding result or consequence… uh-huh, yep.
but here’s another thing i also know.
when you gather all that it took to get to this point – the very point you are at right at this very moment – you should actually be a bit astounded at it all. for no matter all the specific details of your life – everything on your poster boards per se, you are still here now. there is still time – even this very minute – to do more, to say more, to make more, to move more. there is the ahead and every step takes us there. we have choices to make about what’s ahead. there are unparalleled surprises and calamities – both – in store for each of us. our poster boards aren’t done. keep the markers and crayons and thesaurus out.
we – here in the united states – live in a country with a rich – though rather brief – history. in the poster-board display of this country it would seem that we are currently lingering under a very big question mark.
i guess i wonder what in our lives would make any of us choose a dark route forward. what would make us choose cruel and abusive over kind and empathetic, with the light of hope for all? what – on this good earth in this finite life – would make us step into next, relishing adjectives of depravity and extremism?
“the road is long, with many a winding turn, that leads us to who knows where, who knows where…” (he ain’t heavy, he’s my brother – bobby scott/bob russell)
what do we want on the mutual poster boards of our country?
i tore out the page from the stio catalog because the words spoke to me: “chase bliss”.
a few days ago we spent some significant time in the emergency room. i told the youngish doctor there that i could count the number of times in my entire life that i had been to the emergency room, likely on two hands. i do not take going there lightly and i trust that the brilliant minds gathered there – in that tiny ecosystem – will help me…not only in my pain and confusion, but in my fear as well.
i told him this because he kept cutting me off mid-sentence as i was trying to explain my symptoms and as i was trying to ask him questions. he acted as if i was undermining his authority. i was simply being a patient. the more he stopped me from talking, the more i knew i needed to advocate for myself. i told him that the first step in empathy is listening, to which he defended himself by telling me he had spent more time with me than anyone else, including “the guy in the next room who died and came back.” wow. we are not talking equivalencies here. we are simply talking good bedside/doctor-patient communication.
the moments when i felt inordinate and unexplained constant pain that i hadn’t ever experienced before were frightening. all i wanted to do on that gurney was try to understand it, treat it, feel normal and go home.
it’s now the next day, friday, a bit before this blog posts. i am sipping coffee. i can hear the birds outside near the feeder, black-capped chickadees, cardinals. i am grateful for the quilt, the dogga at my feet, d next to me. i am cautiously checking in on how i am feeling and giving thanks for much less pain, and – hopefully – an end to the crisis.
though not ready to spring out from under the covers, i am ready to chase bliss.
no joke.
it doesn’t have to be grandiose. it doesn’t have to cost money or require dedication beyond what i am capable of giving right now.
but bliss nonetheless.
i just downloaded a new book for us to read together. this is bliss.
we will fill the bird feeder again today and put seed on barney and the potting stand. this is bliss.
we will watch the flurries fall. this is bliss.
we are making dinner tonight for 20, a day late. this is bliss.
i’ll have a phone call with a beloved old friend this weekend. this is bliss.
next week we will gather with our dear friends to start watching the entirety of the seinfeld show together. this is bliss.
we plan to make irish guinness stew for the up-north-gang in our stew-agogo early in the week. this is bliss.
we will wander about in our old house, cleaning and cleaning out. this is bliss.
we will bundle up and traipse out onto our favorite trail. this is bliss.
have a little text exchange with the girl and the boy. this is bliss.
lay on the floor and hug dogga. this is bliss.
listen to george, mike oldfield, john denver, james taylor, arvo. bliss.
watch the olympics. bliss.
dance in the kitchen with d. bliss.
dream aloud plans for a little bit later. bliss.
breathe. bliss.
it’s not decadent. it’s not complicated. it’s different for everyone, everywhere, i know.
but in a world that is fraught, a world that seems to be listing toward the ruthless, the uncaring, the oppressive, the tyrannical – a harsh world – it doesn’t seem to be overstating that bliss becomes even more imperative than it already was.
to recognize it, to seek it, to freaking – and whole-heartedly – chase it.
why wouldn’t nature – in all its magnificent glory – wonder what in the hell is going on?
why wouldn’t nature – in its most minuscule and its most vast – its most discreet and its most deafening – stare down humanity, shocked at the impunity?
why wouldn’t nature – in its chugging-chugging ability to keep on keeping on – shake its head as the people, living within its generosity, destroy it?
why wouldn’t nature – working around its infinite challenges to maintain a healthy and centered balance – be infuriated at so many unresolved conflicts, so much bigotry, so much extremist agenda?
why wouldn’t nature – in its symbiotic synergy – be aghast at such lack of cooperation, such disregard to interdependence?
why wouldn’t nature – in its innate ability to BE love – drown in tears of devastated sadness?
it was after a photo shoot – for pictures with which to list it for sale – that i discovered it.
this old rocking chair had been with him for decades. his studio chair, he bought it in a colorado mountain town and it traipsed along with him, re-homing down south, to los angeles, to seattle. it was one of the few items – outside of paintings – that made the cut when we moved him here in a budget truck.
when it arrived here it became a studio chair once again, tucked into his basement studio next to the rocking chair in which i rocked my babies.
but now, in the process of cleaning out and going through, he has decided it has run its course. this beautiful chair needs restoring. caning is missing and, if someone rathers finished over organic, it needs sanding and some good varnish. with really good bones and a decade of life-patina, it’s ready to move on.
we brought it upstairs for the shoot and i took photos of each angle and turned leg. doing research on mission style rockers like this i came across where to find identifying information. so i went back out into the living room to look more closely.
and there it was.
the word “wisconsin”.
to say i was a bit stunned would be an understatement.
diving into it, i discovered that this chair was made by the wisconsin chair company in port washington – just up the lakefront from us sometime around the early 1900s.
this chair – after a century of domestic travel – had come home.
i asked him if he wanted to keep it – knowing this new detail of the chair’s history. he said it was still time for the chair to move on, to be loved into renewal.
i’m wondering if this rocking chair had anything to do with david finding home – after a lifetime of living other places. if this chair somehow had strong enough ties to this place that it created the circumstances in which we met. if this chair had a gravitational pull back to wisconsin so strong that it brought david here, instead of the reverse. if this rocking chair brought him home.
about this week: there is a peril, it seems, to writing ahead these days. we had decided that this week – the first full week of a new year – we wished to use images of light as our prompts, we wished to linger on the possibility of light, of hope, of goodness. though our blogposts might stray from that as we pen them, it was without constant nod to the constant updating of current events – a mass of indefensible, unconscionable acts. we pondered what to do about these blogposts we had written and decided to keep them. we hope that – whether or not any absence of the happenings of the day, whether or not the chance these written words seem somewhat inane at this moment – you might know that those events – of corruption, illegality, immorality – do not distill or distort our intention – to bring light and hope to this new year – the first days of which bring more insanity and unnerving instability. we are still holding space for light.
and so…
on the coldest of days, in any weather, we have gone down to the beach to dig a big contractor-sized pail of sand. once you have waxed bags, sand is the first thing you need for luminaria.
we’d add a couple cups of grainy sand to each bag and then center a votive candle into it for a flame that would linger for several hours.
for a few years we’d line them up on the sidewalks along our street – on both sides – to bring light in the latest of christmas eve hours, to gather a whole bunch of people together, to celebrate around a couple bonfires in our driveway.
even on the coldest of nights, we loved our new tradition.
until the pandemic.
since then our luminaria have been set up in our backyard, small groups of dear ones or just us watching them glow into the night.
this year – a rainy eve – we lit them inside our house. and we simplified.
waxed bag, glass votive, tea light candle.
no sand.
there was no reason to believe that our luminaria might tip over or blow away. so, we simply didn’t need the sand. we didn’t need anything to weigh down the bags. they were still ever-so-captivating.
in these days now since the holiday we have continued to clean out, to sort, to ponder things to keep, things to no longer hold onto.
each and every thing we donate or sell or discard has made me feel lighter. even the tiniest bric-a-brac that finds its way into the “go” pile has given me reason to celebrate.
space.
more space.
less begets less. it’s invigorating, refreshing, addictive.
each new piece i am pondering ends up on our dining room table. it has become the staging ground for decision-making. it has become the weigh-station…the place to weigh if what is weighing us down holds weight for us.
this will go on for a while. there is much to sort. as you know, thirty-six years in one house – a house with a basement and an attic – means there is a lot tucked in all the nooks and crannies.
but there is time. and in this time during which i am touching all these pieces of the past, i have a chance to touch all the emotions of these times-gone-by as well.
and so, it becomes a time of letting go. letting go of stuff, letting go of unnecessary goopy angst, letting go of emotions that get in the way of greeting the new days of what’s next.
the three luminaria in front of our fireplace stayed lit for a couple hours. without the challenge of the wind, they burned brightly. we turned off the room lights and sat in a living room illuminated only by happy lights and tiny tea light candles.
sinking in under furry throw blankets, we reveled in this place we call home, grateful and cozy.
he asked me as we hiked the river trail on christmas day. it was brisk, but we had warm coats and gloves, turtles and boots so we were cozy enough to be out there for a few hours. “what would you like to see in the new year?” he posed as we rounded the icy bend in the woods.
heidi and i had a phone chat. it wasn’t really long but she told me of a sentiment she received in a holiday greeting card. “may peace gently find you and fall upon your heart.”
we talked about how – instead of going out to seek peace – this wish she had received was one that simply – and gently – graced her with peace. we talked about how feeling peace fall upon you – like the softest snowflakes falling from a winter sky – would impact us.
and so, this.
peace.
in answer to d’s question on the trail, i listed all the things i would like to see resolved in the new year. i listed all the things i would like changed in the new year. i listed all the things i might really want in the new year – to do, to accomplish, to try, to find. i could have also listed things that might make this a better world. i could have also listed things that might bring balance back into people’s lives. i could have also listed things that might make people conscious, compassionate, moral, in their right mind again.
and peace.
there are only two more days left of this year, three if you count today. i wonder what i might do with these days as i approach next year.
i wonder what i might let go of in order to allow space for peace to find me. i wonder what i might reflect on in order to feel peace falling upon my heart. i wonder what i might commit to in order to hold that peace close, to let it simmer and grow.
another. and another. they statistically stack up, these school shooting victims, the children – children – who have died at the hand of a lethal shooter with a gun.
it is beyond comprehension.
and it has become the norm.
all the empty rooms was released on december 1. we watched it a couple days after its release. the trailer alone had made me weep, so i was aware ahead of time that it would be gut-wrenching.
steve hartman is a reporter who has often been sent to the site of the innumerable number of school shootings that happen in this country. over the past 30 years, he has attempted to help the viewers “stay optimistic”. pushing back against whitewashing these horrific acts – against simply finding something of goodness in something so heinous – he decided to do something different.
he and photographer lou bopp went to eight homes where they photographed the bedrooms that used to belong to school-shooting victims. the short documentary depicts three of these bedrooms. every nook, every cranny, every tiny nuance. not wanting any semblance of their child to disappear – the trinkets, the scent, the aura, the essence – parents have kept the room the way their child left it – on their very last day on this earth – perhaps to – desperately – try and feel their child once again.
the colorful rubber hair ties wrapped around the doorknob did me in.
because there are two bobby pins on the old desk side table next to the couch in the living room, left there by my daughter in 2019 which i dust and place back, to feel her there. she – thankfully – is very much alive and well.
but those colorful rubber hair ties – elastics of a little girl killed by a school shooter.
if you aren’t already aghast, it should not take any more than this to stop you in your tracks.
and i agree with steve: “i wish that we could transport all americans to stand in one of those bedrooms for just a few minutes. we’d be a different america.”
though i now have my doubts about the morality of some americans – even if they watched this profound short – i hope that steve’s words – his if-this-then-that antecedent-consequent trigger-action conditional statement – would be true.
and though i now have my doubts about the government of this country – the government that has not protected the children of this nation – the government that has panted over the second amendment – the government that has lost itself in big lobby money and corruption – i would hope that steve’s words could be true.
and so, instead of zealously lusting over guns, we – as a country united by broken hearts – would raise up – value above all else – the safety of our children. every single one of them.
reverse threading 