The biggest lessons I have learned are to slow down and notice…things oft ignored, walked over, stepped on, simply missed. And patterns are everywhere and in everything. The patterns of clouds blowing across the sky on a cloudy day, the patterns on a dragonfly’s wings, the veins in my husbands hands, the intricacies of a spiders web. The unseen patterns: of fear, of an unstructured day, a silent phone, a smile lost behind a mask. And the broken patterns… the empty calendar, the road as if falls apart, the church bell that rings but no one comes, the cancelled events, the comfort of a good solid hug. Slowing down and taking more notice has lead to appreciating the mundane more…slicing carrots and noticing the inside pattern radiating out, the stitches of the mending I’ve finally gotten to, watching a bee crawl into and out of a flower. My gratitude list grows daily.
March 7, 2022
Forcing forsythia. It is still wintery here, but I derive a sign of hope from cutting early forsythia branches and bringing them indoors. This is called forcing, because it causes the branches to bloom weeks earlier than they will outdoors. One year ago I did the same with many vases of blooming forsythia placed around my apartment. This marked the beginning of the pandemic, and I hope that the flowers now mark the beginning of the end.
March 17, 2021