more thanks

306. Rain watering the earth, which must smile a silent thanks after a good soaking

307. New baby peach tree, planted with love as a Mother's day gift, right out the front door where I can see it every time I walk down my hall

308. Green! Rich and full, everywhere!

309. Offspring willing to help out

310. Coffee in the morning as a rare treat

311. Working out and feeling strong

312. Seeing Husband love what he's doing, and be so good at it

313. Beloved friends who join me in celebrating thankfulness and daily delights

314. fresh-made pizza to take home to the hungries after a long, long day

315. wildflowers with jobs to do...healing jobs

316. lilacs smelling like heaven, I bet

317. discovering that the little heart-shaped leaves of the wood sorrel are good to eat!
...they taste lemony.

Singing Anyway

Today is rainy and cold.... and windy. I wonder what the wind chill is today. It's not comfortable, it's nasty out, and frankly I would like some warmth and sunshine.

So I'm sitting here on my laptop and I hear a bird outside my window. Chirping! Happy-sounding little guy. How sweet!

And I think, "There he is out in the cold, wet rain... singing!" And here I am complaining about the darkness, the cold, the wind, the weather. Inside, where it's warm. With the lights on.

I'm not saying I have to pretend I have no preferences. I still would prefer nice weather... but I can sing! Can't we, even when things are not comfortable, choose to see what is good, choose to be thankful anyway?

Can't we sing?

Granted, there are times when life gets so heavy we have no song in us, but that's not most of the time. Most of the time we let little things get to us, and we lose our joy, or we ignore the joy that lies dormant in us.

Quit it, people, ok?

Let's sing!

Let's allow joy to prevail!

Day After Mother's Day

So did you all have a good Mother's Day? I hope so. If I'd gotten on this blog sooner, I'd have wished you one, so consider yourself belatedly wished a happy mother's day!

What did you do to celebrate? I had a good day here - we went out for dinner with the grown children who live near enough and their children. So there were 14 of us at Applebee's for lunch. I love being together with all of my children (or as many as possible). What a good day. And for a gift, my children all went together and bought me a peach tree! I am excited about that!

As wonderful as this day can be sometimes, there are two groups that I think about on Mother's Day who I think must ache as we celebrate: the women who long to be mothers but aren't, and the children whose mothers abandoned or otherwise seriously let them down.

It is important for us to celebrate; it is important for us to honor mothers. Where would the human race be without mothers in general, and where would we each be without our mothers in particular? And what kind of people would we become if we stopped saying thank you? It's good for us to take a day now and then to think about the people who helped us get where we are today. It's not like any one of us made it on our own.

But as we mothers are honored, how do the women feels who desperately wish to have children but have none? I know their hearts ache. Mother's Day can be very hard for them.

I think we need to honor the heart of mothering. Women who mother the children of others in so may ways, showing unconditional love... those women deserve honor too. Teachers and choir directors and childcare workers, and the neighbor down the street who loves on the kids after school... they show a mother's love the children in their world, and they deserve praise for that. So on Mother's Day I wish a Happy Day to all the Mothers and to all who have mothered in their own way. If I get a chance, I give my rose to the young woman with the heart of a mother who waits with tears through months of infertility treatments, and when she says she doesn't deserve it, I tell her yes she does, and I explain why. Mothering is about the heart.

But what about the kids whose mothers have left them, or kids who feel abandoned by their mothers? Kids who live with mothers who don't show a mother's love? Or kids who don't even know their mothers? Or kids whose mothers have died and they are still grieving? These kids are around us, and on Mother's Day they say nothing. They have no one to thank, to praise, to honor, while we celebrate. We don't see them because they are quiet on this day.


This must be a hard day for them. (Same as Father's Day is for those who don't know or have deep issues with their fathers.) We need to be sensitive, not in a way that diminishes the respect and appreciation we need to show for our mothers on this day, but somehow we need to try and not make it worse for these kids. Hard to balance that. I don't know how to do that. Do you have any thoughts? 'Cause I could use some practical ideas here.

the mailbox, the deer, and the car

In the last post I mentioned that after selling some land our mailbox might need to be moved, but that the Post Office said we could leave it where it was for now.

Well, guess what...

I had gone to bed a little early and was sleeping soundly enough that I never even heard the noise outside, but a soft knock on the bedroom door woke me at about 11:30pm.

"Mom?"

"Yes?" I scuttled to the door quickly in the dark and moved into the hallway.

"Did you hear it?"

"No...hear what?"

She took me to her brother's room, across the hall from mine, and through his window we saw that a car had gone off the road and had it's headlights pointing in a direction no headlights should point. We live at the top of a hill, and in the black of the cloudy night, it was hard to tell what had happened way down on the road, but they both told me of the sounds they'd heard: first a loud screech... and she thought then she heard a "thunk, thunk, thunk". Two cars had already stopped to help -- they must have been close behind. I called 911 and they thanked me but told me they had already been called. We watched as flashers pulled up -- first a police car and later a "flatbed tow truck" as we called it. No ambulances. This was a good sign. We watched from the window, we watched from the deck, we watched from the porch, but we did not go down there because there was already help and we would most likely just be in the way.

An our or so later the phone rang, and the deputy was on the line. He was calling to let me know that there was some damage to our mailbox. Well, to the post. And mail had been scattered but he'd picked it up already. And here, he said, is the driver's insurance information if you need it.

Turns out that a deer had caused the accident, there were no serious injuries, but the car was a mess. We went down the next morning to look things over and discovered that our mailbox post was broken in two places, one below ground level! Snapped right off below the ground!! The little tree bush right by the mailbox is pretty skinned up, too.

Do you know what this means? We are moving the mailbox, that's what. We will not wait after all, because half the work is already done! Husband went out and bought a new post and paint, and new numbers. (I have to find that insurance info tomorrow.)

And as convenient as this is for us, I feel bad for the woman who must have been scared to death when that deer ran out in front of her, and thankful that she wasn't hurt badly, sorry that her car was totaled and thankful that the deer got away.

But also, it makes me keenly aware, once again, that life has changed. The place where the mailbox was is no longer our land. It belongs to someone else now. It's funny how grief rises up at the most unlikely moments after a loss, even a loss that you chose, and sort of smacks you when you least expect it. Grief is not polite.

Spring Rain

Thunderstorms rolled through here yesterday, loudly announcing the arrival of spring! The sun rose but we didn't see it though the clouds, and about midmorning, it got dark again as those clouds turned black. There was lightening and thunder and all kinds of fun, and we watched out the window and didn't get much else accomplished.

About 11:25am, some 15 minutes after the storm passed and all that was left was the gentle rain and the brightening skies, the power went out. I love when that happens. The world gets quiet like no other time. Usually I don't call the power company right away. I expect some neighbor already has and anyway, why spoil the fun?

But this time I happened to call within about 2 minutes to report the outage. I called again later to get an update on their automated line. Some time after that I received a phone call from the power company asking about our house.

Ok back up a minute - until January, we have owned 15 acres here. The mailbox is at one end of the land and the house is at the other end, which places the driveway around the corner from where the mail box is. We have sold some land and maybe at some point we will have to move the mailbox closer to the house, but the Post Office says they are fine with things the way they are for now. Our address is where the mailbox is. Not where the house is.

So I got a call from the electric company asking me where is my house?? I told her and she said that the guy was in his truck looking for my house. I could see his truck out my window, so I understood the situation. "At the top of the hill", I told her. I could hear her pass the info to him. I asked her if any other houses were without power and she said no, only ours had reported... but she said there could be others that didn't call in because people sometimes figure other neighbors would have already called. Hmmm... yes they do, don't they?

About one minute later a nice young repairman rolled into my driveway. He told me, "Your house doesn't... it isn't..." I think he wanted to say, "it isn't right!" but was trying to be nice about it. I finished his sentence for him and agreed that the house is not where you would expect. He told me it was frustrating (twice) and I apologized(twice). I told him I get calls from the UPS guy sometimes, asking the same questions.

He went out to look at the power pole on the side of the house and sure enough there was a broken switch. "Must have broken when lightening hit it, and then took a few minutes to burn through." I nodded as if I had a clue what he was talking about. I understood enough to know I didn't need any further explanation.

He couldn't get his truck close enough to the pole, so he called another truck to come and he left. When the other truck full of power company men got here they went right to work. They climbed up the pole with those spike-things they have on their boots. Two of them at a time on that pole and one on the ground. They got it fixed -- we were only without power for 2 1/2 hours.

I went outside to tell them thank you, and found the truck alongside the driveway, sitting quietly. "Hey," I said, "I just wanted to say thank you... we have power now."

"I know that," he said. (Well of course he knew, he's the one who fixed it.) "But we can't go anywhere. Flat tire."

Yes indeed, that huge blue and white had a flat tire and sat right there for another Idon'tevenknowhowlong until the another truck -- the tire people -- came and helped them out.

Couple hours, I'm guessing?

Fun day.

Sugarbush time

The weather is changing. It feels good to see winter wane. After being cooped up all winter, I felt we could use a change of pace, so yesterday we went to the Nature Center,
then out to lunch, and after that, to the library.

It was a good day.

We saw the animal hospital, where wild animals are rescued and their injuries treated. Once healed, they are returned to the wild if at all possible. If not, they stay here.
There are several types of owls here. Very interesting.


There are also turtles. Big sis got right down there to see them.



After that we walked along the trail to the sugar shack. Sunshine and temps in the low 40s have melted a lot of the snow, but there is a narrow strip of it right in the shadow of the fence.



In the sugar shack, we watched the maple sap being boiled down into syrup. We lstened to explanations of hygrometers and fires, how to stoke them so the newly made syrup won't burn as you draw it off.


Outdoors, there's the "Pioneer Sugar Camp".


It shows the old way of gathering the sap...


and cooking it down into maple syrup.


We also saw falcons, hawks, and a bobcat, each in its own large enclosure there.
We saw and heard lots of other birds, singing the songs of early spring.



Here's a cool looking sculpture with my offspring behind it


At the little general store, we bought spiles for tapping our own maples, and pixie sticks. My kids thought I was crazy to buy them a treat like this. They are used to my telling them how important it is to eat healthy. But this was a fun day and I wanted them to enjoy it.

We did enjoy it. It was great.

We even saw a heart shaped log. Kind of reminded me that love pops up in the most surprising places sometimes. I love my my kids a lot. Spending time doing fun things together like this celebrates that love and gives us all chance to enjoy each other's company. It makes love grow.

See how the light shines through this heart log? Isn't that what love is all about?
It's letting the light shine through us onto others.


fun day...good day

time for thanks ...

What a crazy full week, with full schedules and full heart, and head full of things to figure out, and feeling full-up-to-here! NOT the kind of week I prefer, that's for sure!! We finished the week with two concerts at different places, different styles... now that was good. Music is good for a weary soul, don't you think? And now... as I begin another week, I want to take a minute to be thankful. Gratitude pretty much cures what ails ya. God is good to me, always. Always. And if I am willing to see it, there are fun things, pretty things, silly things -- things that make me smile -- everywhere. OH, but sometimes I am so exhausted, it is too much work. That is the time it takes some effort, but choosing joy is wise and good and right. So here we go... some favorite things in no particular order...

~~~~~~

289. dark brown, shiny bald heads

290. people dressed in their very best. or in jeans.

291. multi-colored light show on the walls

292. a good concert

293. leather coats

294. going someplace fun with the family

295. dry roads, so much easier to drive

296. the hat matching the coat, sort of

297. symphony concerts

298. friends who help out when you need them to

299. love

300. having a secret snack stashed in the purse for indulging myself when I need it

301. bargains at the thrift store for both of the kids

302. being warm enough in the winter

303. gluten free brownie mix

304. coming to the end of a way too full week, finally!

305. feeling successful, or better...knowing you are successful even when you do not feel like it.

(when life is full I don't write much. do you? I just deal with stuff first. maybe afterwards then I can. but anyway, have a good week, everyone.)