Tag: Journal

The ones who circle

~ windinmywheels ~ 2 Comments
.

We shall be known by the
company we keep
By the ones who circle
Round to tend these fires
we shall be known by the
ones who sow and reap
the seeds of change, alive
from deep within the earth

It is time now, it is time now
that we thrive
It is time we lead ourselves
into the well
It is time now, and what a
time to be alive
In this great turning we
shall learn to lead in love
In this great turning we
shall learn to lead in love

Karisha Longaker Mamuse

During the course of the pandemic, in early 2021, I was sequestered in a dear little flat beneath Arthur’s Seat here in snowy Edinburgh, hugely grateful to meet up for a walk with my lovely downstairs neighbour every 10 to 14 days or so, but otherwise learning the enormous value of ‘virtual, distance friendships.’

I’ve been thinking a lot about Liz, a gifted artist, musician and much else besides; a giving person who was utterly full of life and hope for the future of our world who, nonetheless, was diagnosed with a return of cancer a few months into our conversations, and with whom, virtually, via Instagram and WhatsApp, I went on to have the privilege of sharing her journey from it.

Liz kept on drawing, knitting socks, painting, playing and singing until her last ounce of strength. We became valued friends and would exchange songs and poetry and daydreaming about future post-pandemic freedoms – what a joy it would be to not need to wear a mask in supermarkets …

Today I’ve been thumbing through my journal and I came across a song that Liz had been singing with her ‘virtual choir.’ The remembrance has made my eyes water – with both sadness, great gladness, and profound gratitude. I have missed you, Liz. I have missed you. But, yes, ‘here, there and everywhere’ we shall be known ‘by the ones who circle / Round to tend these fires …’

.
.
.
Sketch from a photograph | Liz Thompson
.
.

.

archive – a list of all earlier posts

HOME

Wonderment

~ windinmywheels ~ 4 Comments
.

more @gardenstudiogram | click photos to enlarge

.

I think I first came across the word ‘wonderment’ at storytime in primary school at the age of 5 … ‘and amazed, she stared in wonderment …’ and I’ve had a fancy for the said wonderment – ‘astonishment, awe or puzzlement’ ever since. And a certain Mole, from another story, comes to mind again:

Then suddenly the Mole felt a great awe fall upon him, an awe that turned his muscles to water, bowed his head, and rooted his feet to the ground … he felt wonderfully at peace and happy – but it was an awe that smote and held him and, without seeing, he knew it could only mean that some august presence was very, very near.

Kenneth Grahame, The Wind in the Willows

This blog made its first appearance back in June 2015. The creation of this online space has encouraged reflection, remembrance and gratitude in me. Its existence remains in the background of my contemplative mind. It is a source of joy to me that some family members and dear friends around the world are regular readers. Above all, though, the ‘conversation’ I have with this journal calls me to ‘astonishment, awe or puzzlement’ in much the same way that my camera lens does. Each calls me to attentiveness. And close attention, more often than not, will reveal some cause for gladness and gratitude.

We humans are incomparably fortunate to have a built-in capacity to reflect upon ourselves, upon our experience of others, of the environment, and of The Other. We can clearly recall holding a newborn infant in our arms – stunned by the miracle of another tiny complex life brought into the world. We laugh and cry in joy when the little one opens his or her eyes for the first time – nose wrinkling as miraculously formed eyes attempt first focus. And we notice the tiny fingers and toes, conscious of our own being somewhat older, and wondering where time goes. And we remember our own grazed knees, joys and delights, regrets and disappointments. And the excitement of holidays and the smell of fresh baking, autumn bonfires, frost, snow, ice cream, summer, and autumn leaves falling. There was a time in all of our lives when, even fully engaged in a million and one things in the present, still we had time to reflect, to notice, to be glad, to store away memories that would always bring to mind what an extraordinary thing it is to be alive.

Forgetfulness walks onto the stage of our lives though, at some point, we know not quite when. Our astonishment, awe or puzzlement might easily have been utterly forgotten had someone not encouraged us to keep a journal, to try our hand at photography, or poetry, or painting, or praying, or meditating, or simply looking around and about us – ready and willing to get down on our knees, in a dew covered sunlit morning, to notice the tiny hairs and stamens on and in flowers, the hitherto unnoticed insects, the French beans, the rosy apples, the lake, the stream, the ocean, the singing blackbird. Innumerable evidences of life’s surging through every atom in the Universe – including us. We journey as we journal. We know ourselves loved and loving and alive and thankful. We notice. Gazing upon a lake, in old age, a thoughtful journal-keeper once wrote

I have time to think.. That is the great, the greatest luxury. I have time to be. Therefore my responsibility is huge. To use time well and to be all that I can in whatever years are left to me. This does not dismay.

May Sarton, From May Sarton’s Well

.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.

.

archive – a list of all earlier posts

HOME

Dance

~ windinmywheels ~ 5 Comments
.

The journals of our lives (like this one) are filled with very ‘ordinary’ chapters aren’t they? – accounts of daily life that quite often – very often – feel a tad mundane, on the surface at any rate. And yet somehow, in many of us, there’s still an impulse to record some of our experience of the hours – aide memoire – a tool for later reflection and remembering. And it’s often the ‘ordinary’ stuff that comes most readily to mind.

Walking home, at nearly 10pm on a balmy Edinburgh summer evening that feels like early afternoon – peaceful, happily aware of surroundings that make me feel good, conscious of other walkers headed home, slightly out of breath after the uphill stride to the bus stop. Thinking of contact with a number of family and friends during the course of the day. And of flowers and gardens. And the Poetry Library. Noting the bright Italian restaurant for future possibilities. Grateful for the interested friendliness of the lady bus driver on the 113 for Pencaitland, and the many familiar repetitions of the ‘Stop’ bell and the phrase ‘Thanks. ‘night …’ And from somewhere unseen come strains of ABBA –

I’m nothing special, in fact I’m a bit of a bore

If I tell a joke, you’ve probably heard it before

🎶 (Thank you for the music …)

– and I smile, recognising the sentiment. Yet blood and energy is coursing through my veins. I’ve been engaged in non-verbal connection with other ‘ordinary’ humans for a couple of hours. There’s nothing mundane about the dancing class, nothing boring about a hall full of people glowing and gliding and laughing and smiling and seeing and hearing and feeling their hearts beating in their chests like drums. Hearing car tyres on the cobbles outside – because the windows are open – I’m reminded in this dancing of the ‘ordinary’ dance of life, and my experience of that ordinariness is lifted here. Transformed. This journal, this record, this reflection, remind me that if I move myself, if I’m engaging with others in all the myriad ways I and they might choose to engage – then I’m alive! And aware of that, grateful. Profoundly, warmly thankful.

.
.

archive – a list of all earlier posts

I am grateful for …

~ windinmywheels ~ 2 Comments

click photos to enlarge – a second time to zoom further

… lingers awhile along borders for a translator to savor secretly,
borrowing from both sides, holding
for a moment the smooth round world
in that cool instant of evening before the sun goes down

William Stafford
from Walking the Borders
The Way It Is – New and Selected Poems

I write a few lines in my meditation journal each day, and from time to time review what I’ve written – looking for patterns and repetitions. One of the most frequent notes that appears in the ‘I am grateful for …’ sections is what I often describe as ‘nature’s art and light’.

And I realise that the poets I regularly turn to have eyes and ears for the detail in the natural wonders that surround them; some having especial penchant for the sky, or sea, or lakes, or mountains, or sweeping plains, or animals and their particular, chosen, encouraged or given habitats, flora and fauna. I delight in all of these.

But most of all I am entranced by light, always changing, writing, painting, softening, sharpening, defining, reaching, touching, listening – full from earth to sky with metaphor and parable, reaching onwards, upwards, and into the heights and depths of the Universe. And into my soul.

So it was during our after-supper walk this evening. So it was a million aeons ago. So for a million, million more. Meditating in and upon light I stand time and again in awe.

SaveSave

SaveSave

SaveSave

SaveSave