Tag Archives: writing

MY DAILY STUFF/CUPS OF TEA

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Sometimes I feel that I’m up to my eyeballs with stuff, that I am biting off more than what I can chew with my daily challenges of #the100dayproject, April Love -posting a photo/day in April, and writing a blog post daily for April’s Ultimate Blog Challenge. But when I get down to it, it is not really so much. There are many things that we have to do daily to have a healthy and good life. We have to sleep every day, get up in the morning, wash our face, brush our teeth, eat, go to the bathroom, bathe, move, go to work and exercise. Those are the basics. How much and how well we participate in those activities depend on how well we want our lives to be.

I’ve been having different light bulb moments lately in my present life stage. I’m more acutely aware of defining moments. It’s a good thing because my moments are decreasing each day. I want more value from them. I do not want to waste time on things that don’t matter or things I can’t change. My daily challenges/projects help to sharpen my awareness. Sometimes they make me sad before I get glad. I am learning to change and make detours. I am learning to be still, listen and wait before reacting because things have a way of correcting by themselves without interence from me.

I’m rather glad/fortunate to have all these challenges. They give me purpose and rhythm to my day. I have a list of things to do when I wake up in the morning. It’s like having a cup of tea, meditating, doing Wordle, looking at my world to find a photo, finding something to draw, finding words to write a post… They’re the kind of things that won’t give you a rush like jumping out of an airplane, but they excite me.

BELIEFS and DISBELIEFS

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So it’s Easter Sunday. The sun is shining brightly. The snow is slowly melting away. The nights are a bit warmer. I no longer have to board up and cover in the greenhouse. It saves some time and energy. I’m feeling a little crunched these days, not being able to show up here daily and reading others’ post in this month of the Ultimate Blog Challenge as planned. As they say, the best laid plans often go awry. I do the best I can. With my limitations, I choose carefully to do the musts and what I truly love.

Those quiet, magical early morning moments are gone from me now. I hope they will return. Things and life change. I have to roll along with tide. What hasn’t changed is that life is always full of challenges, no matter what life stage. It is not true that I’m not getting older. It’s true that I’m getting better at navigating what life throws at me. It is resilience from experience. The valuable thing I’ve learned is that it is not good to feel another’s pain. It weakens and renders me useless. It does no one good. Each of us has our own cross to bear. We can help but cannot carry each other. Maybe we can carry one another over a short period but not forever. It’s like Caroline Myss says, If you are the life guard, you save the person from drowning. But you don’t take him home after.

What does that mean for me? I guess I don’t believe that Jesus die on the cross for us. He did it for himself. That thought just came to me. I’m open to other thoughts. Happy Easter.

WHO THE HELL CARES?

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Photo by mohamed abdelghaffar on Pexels.com

April 5. I’m missing my daily ski – being in the great outdoors, the sky, the sun and clouds. I’m feeling the beginning of my moody blues. It’s not that I’m idle or lacking things to do. In the midst of doing, the question of what’s the point/purpose comes up. I’m lacking that joie de vivre, the joy of accomplishment. Maybe I’m just tired. Maybe it’s the weather. And then there’s the who the hell cares. I wonder if this kind of feelings drives people to drinks, drugs, affairs….Anyways, they don’t appeal to me. Not even snacking. Am I in trouble or what?

I can be happy that tonight is the last cold night I have to worry about for the greenhouse. And today was a very sunny day. It is nicely heated up for the night. It is still 18.6℃ at 6:30. The shade cloth is down and the front vents are covered with cardboard to mininize cold drafts. Even with the little electric heater, it still went down to 3.4℃ last night. But it’s suppose to go down to only -20℃ tonight. We’re almost home free now.

Well, I am feeling a bit better. Supper is almost ready. I can smell the sweetness of the Sweet Mama Squash roasting in the oven. I got a little carried away last year with how many I planted. I still have 5 down in the basement. I’ve been busy cooking, mashing and freezing them for pies and muffins. It is April and they’re getting close to their best by date. Guess what I will be doing tomorrow? They do freeze nicely in my silicone muffin pan. They pop out easy, too.

WEARING ME DOWN

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April 4. Winter seems never ending this year. Just when I think ok, I don’t have to worry about my plants in the greenhouse, I have to – again. The weatherman is forecasting a low of -21℃ tonight and -20℃ tomorrow night. At least it was sunny today and the temperature got up to almost 30℃ with the shade down. The thermal wall and the pails of water will help to moderate the cold tonight. Just to be safe, I threw a row cover over everything. Everything is looking too good to lose now.

Our funky weather is wearing me down. It’s hard to think of the possibility of a garden when I’m faced with high piles of snow and minus temperatures. I really have to push myself but I did seed 5 more kinds of tomatoes this afternoon – Long Keepers, Red Alerts, Sun Rise, Sun Gold, and Red Torch. Where the heck will I plant them all? But that’s a problem to be worked out later. Oh, yes, I do have some bitter melon seeds prepped, wrapped in wet paper towels in a plastic bag. It’s such an easy way to get them germinated that way.

Life is hard. The going is tough. I’m still chugging along though, a few tomatoes at a time, one drawing and one blog post a day. So far, so good.

LIVING IN THE MOMENT

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April 3. All is well though winter is still with us. We got more snow yesterday. Spring feels far away though the forecast is for a high of 20℃ in a week’s time. How crazy is that? Should I be happy or should I be worrying? We are living in an age of uncertaintly. I can’t afford to waste any energy or time worrying. This is the time to live in the moment on things I love to do and on things that will make a difference.

What do I love to do? What things make a difference? The first is easier to answer. I love words, reading and writing them. I love drawing. I’m doing both at the present time. I think they both make a difference. Writing is a form of communication, helping to spread ideas and connect with each other. I write purely for my purpose and needs. But I like to put it out there. I like to think I’m having a conversation with the Universe. If it touches and helps someone, more pleasure for me. I have found others’ writings and other forms of expression very helpful.

I’m drawing my path and life for #the100dayproject. I started the project with drawings of my holiday in Ghana of 2011. After 30 days I moved onto a different theme – myself as a child and some members of the family. Those were from the times in China and Hong Kong. It was a very wonderful way to get acquainted with the child in me through the lines of my pencil. I didn’t know that was going to happen. It’s very comforting and healing.

WILD GEESE

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April 2. It’s a grey snow falling on the cedars kind of a day. Not one speck of sun. The temperature was still in the minuses this morning. We thought we would go for one last ski. What a foolish decision! It wasn’t full of joy. I caught myself thinking ‘how fucking stupid is this!’ several times as I picked/slid/skid carefully and gingerly along the miserably bumpy, icy, gutted tracks. I felt somewhat like Tiny Tim as he tiptoed through the tulips. As I uttered my last expletive a flock of geese flew overhead. I couldn’t help but think of Mary Oliver’s Wild Geese. Two of the birds came down to perform a dance for me.

It changed my thoughts completely. I was very happy to be out on that f’g! track. It was so worth it. I wasn’t being good. It wasn’t as bad as if I was walking on my knees. It felt magical being out there with these wild creatures, the snow, the bare trees and the grey sky. I felt part of it all.

You do not have to be good.
You do not have to walk on your knees
for a hundred miles through the desert repenting.
You only have to let the soft animal of your body
love what it loves.
Tell me about despair, yours, and I will tell you mine.
Meanwhile the world goes on.
Meanwhile the sun and the clear pebbles of the rain
are moving across the landscapes,
over the prairies and the deep trees,
the mountains and the rivers.
Meanwhile the wild geese, high in the clean blue air,
are heading home again.
Whoever you are, no matter how lonely,
the world offers itself to your imagination,
calls to you like the wild geese, harsh and exciting –
over and over announcing your place
in the family of things.

MY CUP OF TEA

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It’s April 1 and Fool’s Day. It is the first day of the Ultimate Blog Challenge wherein we are required to write a post/day for the month and share it on the UBC Facebook page. There are a few rules and not hard to abide. I’ve been participating for quite a few years now because I love the challenge of showing up every day for a set month. I love words and writing. Tapping on my keyboard is a meditation for me. I have no set format or theme for this month. My goal is to show up every day and ‘chat’. Perhaps it is not your cup of tea but it is mine.

The rhythm of my fingers on the keyboard soothes and smooths me. It makes me happy to see the letters and words march across the screen like good little soldiers. Perhaps that’s not such a good analogy. Soldiers remind me of war and there’s just too much of that in our world now. So axe that. I’m trying for a feel good month. That reminds me I have 30 days to file my income tax and it is time to pay this month’s bills. Writing brings up my memory list of have-to-do’s. It is good for my brain as well as emotional health.

I want to do and write my best for this challenge but I’m not going to kill myself doing it. April is a busy month. Aren’t all months busy and tough though? I’m going to do my best but I’m not participating in the thread this time around. It will relief the stress of have-tos and must. I generally do read more than 2 other posts in the challenge. I like to do that on my own schedule. It will also be nice to know that someone is reading my post because it caught their interest and not because they ‘had’ to.

Well, here’s luck to us all.

ON DOING NOTHING

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I took a day off from skiing. There’s quite a few things that need my attention. While skiing is a very good activity, it is also an escape for me. I’m chasing the skier’s high and I’m always get it. Everyone thinks I’m so dedicated. What I am is addicted. Once in a while I make a deliberate effort to take a day off. It’s good for my muscles. It’s good for my brain and mind. The house gets tidied and cleaned. The bills get paid.

Sometimes I need to just stop and do nothing. But that hasn’t happened yet. I’m on the treadmill. It’s hard to get off. For now I’m happy if I can just slowed down a little, sit, sip tea and read a book for an hour straight without my mind thinking in every which direction. Once upon a time I was an expert at that. What the hell happened to me?

Well, I will let that sit for awhile. Maybe the answers will unravel for me. And maybe I need not know and just practice on doing nothing for short spells now and again. There’s no place I need to be. There is nothing that needs fixing. Let it be. Let it be.

The STRANGE AND ORDINARY

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It’s another day, another dollar. Life is strange and ordinary. Another shooting at a school in Nashville, killing three 9 year olds and 3 adults. It is the 90th school shooting this year in the United States. Strange that there are no stricter gun control laws after all these shootings and killings. I guess lives are dime a dozen, contradictory to mantra of every life matters.

Our spring is rather strange, too. It’s almost April and we had temperatures in the -20sC last night and this morning. I thought it would be a good day to bake bread and warm the house at the same time. It was a very relaxing and meditative process, mixing all the ingredients and then kneading the dough. It held the outside world at bay. I was happy in my own little bubble.

I love the ordinariness of my life- of watching dust mites in sunlight. I sometimes do wonder why I don’t have alot of wants and yearnings of more, more, more. But I can’t seem to make myself want more than what I have. So why bother?

MY DAILY CHAT

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I’m beginning to enjoy my daily chatter as much as my daily draw. So far it is pleasurable and relaxing. There is no one to interrupt my steady rhythmic tapping of the keys. I get things off my chest and work out a few kinks in my head. It’s all good stuff. It’s a good practice. It’s much better than seeking understanding from another. We all want to be heard and understood but it is very difficult to see and hear with an objective eye and ear. I find most people can’t even wait for the other person to finish his sentence before jumping in with their own story. We are all too human. We want to tell our stories much more than hear someone else’s. It is wise to pay for a therapist when we are in dire need of being heard and understood.

I’m feeling a little more joie de vivre today. I’m feeling a little more peppy and it’s not all due to the spicy and sour wonton soup I had for lunch. It helps some. Every little thing helps. So no matter how I feel, I get up, dress up and show up. Most mornings I show up at the Wildwood Golf Course to cross country ski. And this morning I did the best and longest ski ever since I took up the sport in November of 2020. I am still not what you call a good skier but I have the ambition and drive to improve myself every single time I’m out there. I’m feeling jubilant having skied the whole inside track, minus one very steep hill. I walked up, then down that one. There’s no shame in being safe and smart.