I’m working with my eyes, resting them and expanding focus and peripheral vision.
In that, I feel the center of my being vibrate like a spindle twisting threads of my life into the unique being I am, one of many, many of one. I round a carpet, a curving of time-space. The world may once have been thought to be flat but anyone watching a ship sail off to sea would see the drop, the rounding, the curve.
I follow the curve, a ship following the horizon, the curving meet of earth and sky like the ball of my eye, the perception of being.
My grandson and I share a love of the book Little Bear by Else Holmelund Minarik and Maurice Sendak. My sons and I loved and love that book too but grandson has taken it a step further.
In the book, Little Bear puts on a hat of his own creation and goes to the moon. Since Grandson’s visit to the U.S.S. Hornet, he has decided he is an astronaut. His tent has become a rocket ship with a control panel created with the help of his parents.
Inspired by his vision and trust in what’s possible, I’ve decided to add a little more spark to my view of the world we share.
It’s fall. Leaves are turning and here where I am, we celebrate with rain.
The landscape wraps a moist tongue touch.
I’m watching Bell Hooks speak about her book All About Love. I honor her wisdom and clarity as she shares how to change the conversation personally and politically on the power, necessity, and value of gratitude, forgiveness, compassion, and Love.
Love is a combination of six values: Care, Commitment, Knowledge, Responsibility, Respect, and Trust.
Because I’m in the process of transitioning from the hard contact lenses I’ve worn for sixty years, my focus is on vision, and the beauty, intricacy, and intimacy of the eyes.
There’s no longer protective glass between my eyes and the world. My eyes are moist, naked, exposed.
In doing exercises to improve my vision, my vision is changing as is my awareness. It’s quite a practice to go from a coating over the eyes to fresh air moving in and out, and a constant changing of glasses to adjust vision for near, far, and intermediate, so I can read the computer screen.
I’m aware of choice in what I see and of nourishing my eyes with rest and soft seeing. My teacher of Sensory Awareness Charlotte Selver once told a woman she used her eyes like forks. I’m aware of receiving even as I reach for clarity and definition, whilealso beckoning open focus.
In balancing, I nurture connecting eyes to heart, hands, and feet, portals with which to give and receive.
Yesterday I made a reservation for two nights at at an Airbnb. The rules were very clear – no pets, noise etc. and I was accepted with an acknowledgment of my former good reviews but then I got another note asking me to sign and agree that I would “treat it like my own home”. I’m not sure why that hit me wrong as I treat my home very well, and certainly would have done the same with this place, but it led me to thinking of what it means to treat a place like our own home. Perhaps we’re comfortable with our home being a mess. Signing felt meaningless and though I knew what was meant, I decided this was not the place for me.
Reflecting on why I was triggered, I realized that we should treat every place as our own home, and that includes how we treat ourselves and the earth. It goes back to what I posted recently:
“The way we do one thing may reveal the way we do all things.”
That led me to contemplate language. A friend was speaking to her 8 year old granddaughter about her first day of third grade. She asked about the teacher. The child responded that “they” were nonbinary and would assign no homework. She equated the two with a happy priority on no homework which her older brother would be doing. My friend, a woman married to a woman, persisted in wanting to know if the teacher was male or female. The question had no meaning for the child. She said again that “they” are nonbinary.
The child lives in a progressive suburb outside of Chicago. Change is happening as we move toward a nonbinary world. I’m excited by this child’s view of the world, a world created to be greeted and treated with love, respect, curiosity, enthusiasm, and delight, and yes, may we treat where we dwell and ourselves as a place to be and feel home.
Today I pause and knit patterns of presence. I reflect and integrate what shapes and informs intention, honoring reception.
I’m with these words of Wendell Berry:
It may be that when we no longer know which way to go we have come to our real journey.
Waves of light flow through. Like trees and flags, I receive the wind as it moves, patterns generous in weaving change.
My mother, who passed in 2005, was born a year after Queen Elizabeth II. I remember her talking about playing with paper dolls that were the young Margaret and Elizabeth. I think of how we each have our own path, both imposed and created. Elizabeth was born into a role, as are we all, and then we have choice in how we respond and flow, give and receive, move and pause.
As a child, I cut out paper dolls with my grandmother. I would be impatient and sloppy. Though she wouldn’t comment directly, she would example by holding her scissors precisely and cutting carefully around the curves, and say words that repeat in and out of me these days.
“The way we do one thing may reveal the way we do all things.”
Memories slide in and out; gentle guidance weaves the day.
Morning WeavesTrunks of trees wrapped in yarn Fluidity
I was outside last night with the moon and stars, and now this morning the sky was still bright with stars. Light comes and the birds sing and flit joyfully these late summer days.
This morning I read Garrison Keillor on his experience at the Mayo Clinic. He exclaims over the care he’s receiving and how many of the nurses these days are male, a vocation carefully chosen, appreciated, and enjoyed.
I remember my mother’s care from a male nurse, and the care I received when I went through radiation treatment. The male nurse who handed us our gown, always made sure they were newly warmed. He prayed for us each day.
Celebrating the dedication of teachers and medical workers, male, female, and evolving choice is a way to deal with challenges in the news.
Today I dance with the words of one of my favorite authors: A.A. Milne:
“What day is it?” asked Pooh. “It’s today,” squeaked Piglet. “My favourite day,” said Pooh.
Avocets at low tide in the marsh Serenity Reaching for Touch
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