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Being Thankful in Difficult and Divisive Times
Ursula Le Quinn posted a lovely bit on 11/9 Election on her blog. It resonated for me and calmed me.
Here's a snippet:
Happy Thanksgiving for those who live in the United States and celebrate.
My own celebration will be rather low-key and small. Just me. I'm making rock cornish game hen, cauliflower rice, and yellow/green beans, I think. With Clean Slate - a German White Ryseling, and Gluten-Free Pumpkin Pie and whipped cream for desert. Simple, low key.
It's a gloomy and cold day in NYC, watched a portion of the Thanksgiving Day Parade on the tv, until it began to annoy me.
I'm on the fence as to what to watch next. Either binge more Gilmore Girls, or flip to Good Girls Revolt. Maybe a movie or two via on-demand, or some of the tv shows that I have saved to the DVR such as Westworld and Poldark.
I may also spend a bit of time writing.
I'm thankful for the little things this year. My grandmother, long dead, once taught me that -- to be thankful for the tiny moments. Like having a really good cup of coco, or a nice piece of pie, or taking a lovely walk through the trees. Or sitting in your armchair, peacefully reading a book.
This year, I'm thankful for the moments I spent relaxing on beaches with family and friends. Chatting. Or watching fireworks explode above my head. Watching the flick, The Revenant, during a blizzard with a friend. Spending time in Martha's Vineyard and in Clearwater Florida. Walking through the Berkshires. Listening to my niece describe a large snail with a sense of wonder. The brisk and refreshing coolness of a mountain spring pool up in the Catskills on a hot summer day in mid-July with like-minded people and friends.
Everything else fades away. Life is just a collection of moments, good and bad, and indifferent. Scattered like little pools of reflecting water. It's up to us which we wish to drown ourselves in or merely take a dip.
Here's a snippet:
I know what I want. I want to live with courage, with compassion, in patience, in peace.
The way of the warrior fully admits only the first of these, and wholly denies the last.
The way of the water admits them all.
The flow of a river is a model for me of courage that can keep me going — carry me through the bad places, the bad times. A courage that is compliant by choice and uses force only when compelled, always seeking the best way, the easiest way, but if not finding any easy way still, always, going on.
The cup of water that gives itself to thirst is a model for me of the compassion that gives itself freely. Water is generous, tolerant, does not hold itself apart, lets itself be used by any need. Water goes, as Lao Tzu says, to the lowest places, vile places, accepts contamination, accepts foulness, and yet comes through again always as itself, pure, cleansed, and cleansing.
Running water and the sea are models for me of patience: their easy, steady obedience to necessity, to the pull of the moon in the sea-tides and the pull of the earth always downward; the immense power of that obedience.
I have no model for peace, only glimpses of it, metaphors for it, similes to what I cannot fully grasp and hold. Among them: a bowl of clear water. A boat drifting on a slow river. A lake among hills. The vast depths of the sea. A drop of water at the tip of a leaf. The sound of rain. The sound of a fountain. The bright dance of the water-spray from a garden hose, the scent of wet earth.
Happy Thanksgiving for those who live in the United States and celebrate.
My own celebration will be rather low-key and small. Just me. I'm making rock cornish game hen, cauliflower rice, and yellow/green beans, I think. With Clean Slate - a German White Ryseling, and Gluten-Free Pumpkin Pie and whipped cream for desert. Simple, low key.
It's a gloomy and cold day in NYC, watched a portion of the Thanksgiving Day Parade on the tv, until it began to annoy me.
I'm on the fence as to what to watch next. Either binge more Gilmore Girls, or flip to Good Girls Revolt. Maybe a movie or two via on-demand, or some of the tv shows that I have saved to the DVR such as Westworld and Poldark.
I may also spend a bit of time writing.
I'm thankful for the little things this year. My grandmother, long dead, once taught me that -- to be thankful for the tiny moments. Like having a really good cup of coco, or a nice piece of pie, or taking a lovely walk through the trees. Or sitting in your armchair, peacefully reading a book.
This year, I'm thankful for the moments I spent relaxing on beaches with family and friends. Chatting. Or watching fireworks explode above my head. Watching the flick, The Revenant, during a blizzard with a friend. Spending time in Martha's Vineyard and in Clearwater Florida. Walking through the Berkshires. Listening to my niece describe a large snail with a sense of wonder. The brisk and refreshing coolness of a mountain spring pool up in the Catskills on a hot summer day in mid-July with like-minded people and friends.
Everything else fades away. Life is just a collection of moments, good and bad, and indifferent. Scattered like little pools of reflecting water. It's up to us which we wish to drown ourselves in or merely take a dip.
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For me Cornish hen, wild rice, stuffing, spinach, apple cider, and later when I have room, Key Lime pie. No alcohol for me, no guten for you, but not all that different. ;o)
no subject