I wake up to thick mists swirling up the path, around trees, structures, cats, thoughts...
The snow is gone. It's as if the weather horror, yes horror had never happened. Deep freeze? Frozen pipes? Dead cats? Fever, chills, such lethargy, such deep deep lethargy -- no, not here, right? Not at the beautiful November farmette. Not at this place of wet dirt, squishy fallen leaves, grass, still green -- I made it all up, right?
No, I did not. But honestly, in waking to this typical November day -- slightly wet, slightly dark (but the weather gods promised sunshine for Friday, at the latest!), it seems like I am in a different world.
Breakfast, photographed lovingly because always, always, in this meal there is color. And warmth. And hope for a good day ahead.
The good days becomes even better when the kids make their way here after school.
(Sparrow, on his own, finds the music box, gets it playing and dances...
It's sort of astonishing: this little boy who, a month ago, could not really take solo steps, loves to dance!
You go, little guy!
There was this silly rhyme that we used to write in our friends' autograph books (remember those?) when we were kids -- "good, better, best, never let it rest, until your good is better, and your better best."
We coach our little ones to always do better, do better, do better. Do we coach ourselves too? Or is it that at some point we conclude that we've done our work and this is as good as it gets?
I want to be honest here: I fall into this trap too. I may demand a lot of myself -- to care for the people I love -- but do I really ask myself to change? Improve? Or isn't it true that we all, say after age 59, sit back and say -- hey, I'm doing pretty well! I am older, wiser, I have myself and the world figured out?
There's a danger in growing older: you stagnate in your perceptions of others and of yourself, too. You don't look to improve anymore. "I am who I am!" You think you've learned all major life's lessons. I said this in my post when I spoke of sailing out to sea: can it transform an older person, or are we pretty much formed by now?
The fog lifts, the last leaves tremble and fall. November, in her old age, shows us that she can still throw us a few surprises.
The snow is gone. It's as if the weather horror, yes horror had never happened. Deep freeze? Frozen pipes? Dead cats? Fever, chills, such lethargy, such deep deep lethargy -- no, not here, right? Not at the beautiful November farmette. Not at this place of wet dirt, squishy fallen leaves, grass, still green -- I made it all up, right?
No, I did not. But honestly, in waking to this typical November day -- slightly wet, slightly dark (but the weather gods promised sunshine for Friday, at the latest!), it seems like I am in a different world.
Breakfast, photographed lovingly because always, always, in this meal there is color. And warmth. And hope for a good day ahead.
The good days becomes even better when the kids make their way here after school.
(Sparrow, on his own, finds the music box, gets it playing and dances...
It's sort of astonishing: this little boy who, a month ago, could not really take solo steps, loves to dance!
You go, little guy!
There was this silly rhyme that we used to write in our friends' autograph books (remember those?) when we were kids -- "good, better, best, never let it rest, until your good is better, and your better best."
We coach our little ones to always do better, do better, do better. Do we coach ourselves too? Or is it that at some point we conclude that we've done our work and this is as good as it gets?
I want to be honest here: I fall into this trap too. I may demand a lot of myself -- to care for the people I love -- but do I really ask myself to change? Improve? Or isn't it true that we all, say after age 59, sit back and say -- hey, I'm doing pretty well! I am older, wiser, I have myself and the world figured out?
There's a danger in growing older: you stagnate in your perceptions of others and of yourself, too. You don't look to improve anymore. "I am who I am!" You think you've learned all major life's lessons. I said this in my post when I spoke of sailing out to sea: can it transform an older person, or are we pretty much formed by now?
The fog lifts, the last leaves tremble and fall. November, in her old age, shows us that she can still throw us a few surprises.
