Category: Uncategorized

Here Is The World

The south end of Stony Run, looking north.

“Here is the world. Beautiful and terrible things will happen. Don’t be afraid.” Frederick Buechner

As I type this, Khristian is teaching cooking on Zoom to his pre-K class. Their shining faces jiggle and dance in their frames, and it’s hard to know if they are paying attention except when Khristian asks a question, and their sweet voices chime in.

It’s a good reminder on this, the last week in April, on a cloudy day with little sunny prospects, literally or figuratively. Have courage.

Be well. Wash your hands. Love each other.

Earth Day 2020: A Reminder

Leg from a baby doll peeks out of a dead log resting on dried leaves
This is a kind of nature, yes?

For you, on this Earth Day, a reminder:

The day you plant the seed is not the day you eat the fruit.

There are two sides of me warring inside as we continue with this pandemic, even as the earth’s skies clear and waters teem again with fish.

The first, as familiar as my favorite pair of jeans (which now have a rip and look terrible on me BUT I DON’T CARE), believes that we will not learn, that we will go on destroying the planet and each other. Because we are selfish, meminemy people who would not seize a learning opportunity if it slapped us in the face. We want what we want, come hell or highwater. #HellIsOtherPeople #Irony

The second side, odd but somehow also something I recognize, has hope that perhaps things might be different. That this situation will somehow show people the real way, the way of kindness and love. The only way that is actually sustainable.

And then Florida shows up. And Georgia. And South Carolina. Sigh.

As ever, be kind. Wash your hands. Love each other.

Sunday Poem: The Patience of Ordinary Things by Pat Schneider

Smoothie still life.

I am loving this poem for a variety of reasons, and I hope you do, too.

PATIENCE OF ORDINARY THINGS

It is a kind of love, is it not?
How the cup holds the tea,
How the chair stands sturdy and foursquare,
How the floor receives the bottoms of shoes
Or toes. How soles of feet know
Where they’re supposed to be.
I’ve been thinking about the patience
Of ordinary things, how clothes
Wait respectfully in closets
And soap dries quietly in the dish,
And towels drink the wet
From the skin of the back.
And the lovely repetition of stairs.
And what is more generous than a window?

 

Be well, be kind, and wash your hands.

Don’t Forget To Look Up

bare trees against a blue sky

So for now, here’s a picture of trees.

Bluehost, the company that hosts this lovely blog, has backed me out of my new version of WordPress so that I can at least upload pictures.

Much like coronavirus has laid bare all of the ugliness in our healthcare system (among other things), this incident with WordPress has made me see that my site has some serious underlying issues that I need to correct.

Probably not today. But soon.

Anyway. Nothing to see here. Just this view of these trees, taken about a week ago.

Be well. Take care of each other. Wash your hands.

If You Know WordPress, PLEASE GET IN TOUCH ASAP

This is just a test. And it has, in fact, failed.

WordPress has gone crazy.

You know what I mean – whenever I update anything, everything that previously worked seamlessly suddenly doesn’t work. This is why yesterday’s post has no picture and why what I am typing right now looks like my old Commodore 64 from middle school.

I am apparently unable to upload a picture to my blog anymore, which is disappointing, at least to me. I get a “The response is not a valid JSON response” message, which seems impossible to fix.

Hey, people who know WordPress. I will pay you eleventy million dollars to help me fix this. I am utterly flummoxed and more than a little hostile about it.