LESSONS LEARNED

My two pairs of pants are shortened and hemmed. Hallelujah! Miracles do happen. It was not so difficult after all. I need not have waited 20 years to do it. Lesson learned. Nothing happens when I am frozen with overwhelmed and indecision. They hung in the closet, gathering dust. So any action, even if it is not the best or perfect, is better than none. Now that I’ve tried them on, I think they’re a tad too short. They’re tighter than when I tried them on last week. Ah, the waxing and waning of the waist line! They might have to go into the donation bag after all. But I will see. I can still let the hem down a bit on each. Maybe I can suck in my tummy.  More work but that’s what I get for not trying them on after pinning. Another lesson learned. So many damn lessons!


That was a few days ago. I ran out of steam and words after that short conversation. That’s how it is. Now I’m back to continue. That is the secret – to keep coming back. Life is not smooth sailing. It’s full of starts, delays, holdups, detours, rerouting, restarting, etc. My garden is the same this year. We had hardly any rain till these last weeks in June. Even the weeds were not growing. There was the cool temperatures. Everything was slow. Then there were the birds and bugs that ate what did come up. I lost half a bed of broccoli and 2 rows of beans never showed. Peas and carrots are seeded in the empty spaces. But my bed of greens is excellent. We had plenty of spinach and lettuce. The spinach is done and new seeds put in for a second crop. The onions are standing straight and tall. The kale is coming up.

So that’s how things are. Some things thrive. Some don’t. There’s evil in the world but there’s also alot of good. Just when I’m really down and despondent about our humanity, I learn of people with huge loving hearts and great courage. Trevor Green’s story moved me to tears. Then there’s Melissa Fung’s speaking On What We Owe. That made me put away my small troubles, for a little while at least, and think about the larger world. And I think again about what can I do to help.

 

GIVING THANKS – Day 79 in a year of…

Day 79, October 9, 2016 @10:26 am

wewb3750Thanksgiving.  Here I am with my cup of tea and the dog.  There’s much to be thankful for.  Each morning is an opportunity  to do different, to do better. The decision lies in me and no one else in how and what direction I will travel. I am responsible for the results and consequences of my actions.  At least they are from my conscious decisions.  I’m not letting life happen to me.

It’s Sunday, ‘a day of rest’.  I shall sit and linger awhile, sipping all the good stuff that is in my life.  I shall contemplate and muse upon synchronicity – all those whispers that come to me when I am quiet and still.  When I am willing and ready to listen and hear.  I know there is much that I need/want to change.  There’s much I need to question with:  Is that really true?  I recognize those moments that I need to ask.  I recognize those times I’m fighting them.  There’s a stubbornness and a twist in my heart.  No, I don’t want to!  It’s a big signal to ask:  Is that really true?

Recognition is a gift to be thankful for.  If I don’t recognize myself, how can I go forward?  How can I be/do anything?  On this Thanksgiving Day, I am grateful for this poem by Derek Walcott.  It says everything that is in my heart at this moment.

Love After Love

The time will come
when, with elation
you will greet yourself arriving
at your own door, in your own mirror
and each will smile at the other’s welcome,

and say, sit here. Eat.
You will love again the stranger who was your self.
Give wine. Give bread. Give back your heart
to itself, to the stranger who has loved you

all your life, whom you ignored
for another, who knows you by heart.
Take down the love letters from the bookshelf,

the photographs, the desperate notes,
peel your own image from the mirror.
Sit. Feast on your life.