Author: onehopefulyear

full

~ onehopefulyear ~ 4 Comments

January’s been … long.

And full. Purposeful. Mindful. Meaningful. Grateful.

I’ve felt powerful: building my physical strength and stamina. Resourceful: planning relevant experiences for my students. Sorrowful: remembering the first anniversary of my mother’s passing. And, of course, hopeful: beginning each and every day this month filling the pages of my journal with gratitude, guidance, goals, and hope for grace.

I’ve lived faithfully: honoring my commitment to #the100dayproject with at least a photograph a day – – showing up at the gym more days in January than not – – devoting time and effort to my health, diet, and overall well being.

There’s been wistful days, joyful days, and stressful days. More ups than downs, thankfully. A few trips and falls, painfully. Many new insights, realizations, and emotional turn-abouts, helpfully.

In other words, life’s been plentiful. And I’m taking one more deep, full breath of January and the fresh, clean air of a new year.

Thirty-one days.

Heart full.

3

habit

~ onehopefulyear ~ 4 Comments

I think it’s true: the more you write, the more you write.

Writer’s write. It’s habit. It’s pen in hand. Laptop open. It’s simply showing up. The words, I’m discovering, will take care of themselves. It’s work, of course. Equal parts determination and devotion. Sometimes, delight. But mostly, it’s a decision.

So, I write.

I’ve been writing every morning. Journaling mostly. Lists. Notes. Phrases. Quotes. Ideas. Seeds. 

As a child naturally seeks boundaries in order to feel safe enough to grow beyond them, so does the structure of my morning page first fence me in and then free me to roam beyond.

Ideas arrive, much to my surprise. Pages fill. I think bookish thoughts. 

My notebook travels everywhere I do. Sometimes the words arrive in the spaces between. The space between leaving for work and arriving. There’s space too, after writing what I want to say in which I sometimes discover what I need to say.

I am not the sum of my words, but the subtraction of them. I take away what I mean to say from the entirety of what I wrote, so what’s left is what’s necessary, real, and true. Somewhere in all those words is my tiny moment of knowing. 

And sometimes, simply sitting with stillness and silence feels just right. There’s faith the words will come, because the habit of writing proves this to be true. 

The more you write, the more you write.

drawers, doors, cupboards & closets

~ onehopefulyear ~ 5 Comments

After a rough walk-around count, we’ve just about 70 hide-aways in our home. Places where we tuck away the often used, useful, and very nearly used-up. Out of sight and out of mind, these drawers, doors, cupboards, and closets stash our stuff: the flotsam and jetsam, the random, and miscellaneous.

And December seems like as good a time as any to poke my head into each and every nook or cranny to take stock of what we’ve collected. I can knock off a quick drawer or two or even three each day of the month so come January the first – we’ve whittled away the unnecessary and organized whatever’s left. Closets and cupboards take longer, of course, but totally do-able in this long season of indoors.

Refrigerator door shelves need an annual purge of expired dressings, marinades, and forgotten vegetable stock. Medicine shelves need review too. Socks need sorting. Supplies need updating. In the process, the forgotten will be found and the accumulated reduced to the required.

Odds and ends. Bits and bobs. Remnants and paraphernalia. Pieces of our shared lives stored here, there, and often forgotten altogether. Each room, each drawer, closet, and cupboard with its own purpose, stuff, and substance. I’ll be going day by day, room by room, drawer by drawer, and item by item. A fun little focus for a dark, cold month.

Open. Empty. Evaluate. Discuss. Decide. Keep. Toss. Recycle. Donate.

All December long.

time travel

~ onehopefulyear ~ 2 Comments

Stepped out the back door with my camera yesterday afternoon, seeking a moment or two in the last of the light. Feeding my soul, I’m learning, needn’t wait. If I’ve a bit of opportunity, an open few minutes, that’s exactly the right time to take the time. Life will wait, the light won’t.

Time travel: soul searching, to soul feeding, to soul filling.

In only ten minutes.

Out the back door.

a saturday sort of wednesday

~ onehopefulyear ~ 2 Comments

This morning, I’m living like it’s a Saturday instead of the Wednesday of a very busy week. I’m living like I’ve got all the time in the world and Sunday to spare.

If I’m living a Saturday sort of Wednesday, tasks typically saved for a Saturday morning feel just as do-able on a Wednesday before work. I can start tonight’s dinner, change the sheets, and tidy up some of the things that are down. There’s no stress on a Saturday sort of Wednesday – in fact, it’s a little comforting to set things to right. Some sort of mid-week coziness and delight in the ordinary. A momentary stay against busy.

There’s a sense of leisure on a Saturday sort of Wednesday. The realization that work can wait. That work almost always gets the best and most of me. That sometimes … sometimes … I want to give the rest of my life a turn. Make room for the writer, maybe. Show up for the part of me that feels better – feels best – when life slows to a Saturday sort of pace.

The difference lies, I think, in the decision making. In the perspective taking. In the understanding that I am in charge of my own life and how I choose, or need, to live it.

I know Wednesday’s really only a few minutes and a shower away. Just now though, I’m enjoying another cup of coffee — like it’s a Saturday.

how do I love you

~ onehopefulyear ~ 2 Comments

How do I love you?

Let me bake for you and show you the ways.

I love to cook for you too, of course, but baking is how I’ll love you by the dozen. How I’ll thank you. Honor you. Welcome you. Or encourage you.

Cookies mostly. These for friends. Family. Church. These are especially to thank our custodian at school; they’re his favorites. And in the fall? Crisps. Cobblers. And by frequent request: pumpkin whoopie pies. (Let me tell you: nothing says love like the thick, whipped cream cheese frosting stuffed between those moist pumpkin pies.)

There’s love in a firmly packed cup of brown sugar, a leveled cup of flour, and some very special vanilla. I’m thinking about you with every spin of my spoon around the bowl, every slow pour of molasses, every sift and shake of confectioner’s sugar. Today my love smelled like freshly ground nutmeg. A first for me, and maybe for you too.

I hope you feel the full measure of my love coming from the warmth of my kitchen.

I hope you know baking is one way I love you.

in case of overwhelm

~ onehopefulyear ~ 2 Comments

ride it out * go with it * this too shall pass * one day at a time * first things first * do the next right thing * take something off your plate * tomorrow’s another day * do something for yourself * do something for others * self-care * don’t worry, be happy * rest * relax * meditate * breathe

count your blessings * start with gratitude * it will all be there tomorrow * walk it out * talk it out * work it out * be

progress over perfection * create something * build something * clean something * move your body * organize * strategize * prioritize * trust the system * believe in yourself * have faith

unplug * disconnect * recharge* ask yourself: how important is it * will this matter: in five minutes, five hours, five days, weeks, years * follow your instincts * trust your gut * surround yourself with people who love you* spend some time alone

pray

postcard: pittsburg nh

~ onehopefulyear ~ 3 Comments

I’m quiet here. From inside to out. Pittsburg is a place you feel in the deepest part of you. There’s a richness to the air here, a deeper breath, and a grateful exhale. I am surprised by the slowing of me. The softening of me. Internally, there’s an easing of some sort. I feel the taut places in me go slack. I stretch my arms wide and high overhead … I reach, breathe, gather, pray. Here, I am a verb of being.

Good morning from Pittsburg, New Hampshire.

Given its 291 square miles in area, Pittsburg tops the list of incorporated New England towns as the largest. The town’s also tucked in at just about the 45th parallel — the most northern town in New Hampshire — bordering not only Canada, but Maine to the east and Vermont to the west. The longest river in New England, the Connecticut River, begins its 410 mile journey toward the Long Island Sound at Fourth Connecticut Lake in Pittsburg, a literal stone’s throw from the province of Quebec, Canada.

If you’re in need of a little soul-searching, I’d start here.

Away from home and out of the regular life loop, Pittsburg transforms me. I am different here from there. I think it’s important to notice what a place offers in these moments of the experience, but also what it has to teach me. Who am I here and can I take her home with me?

In Pittsburg I find a rare kind of hope – wild, wide-open, and free. There’s hope in the tremolo of a loon and the unexpected flash of white across the broad chest of a deer. I measure time by the movement of clouds and the flow of water. Even the scolding of a red squirrel stills my soul somehow – or maybe it’s me, myself, still enough to hear it at all. Though we hardly ever meet, moose, bear, fox and I walk the same trails and it seems certain we’ll all find our way bettered from just venturing out in the first place.