quality of life

notice

~ onehopefulyear ~ Leave a comment

At the top of a morning, I notice the energy of possibility. Hope, wide awake and willing, greets the day face-forward. Counting on roadside petals, life loves me and I love it right back. How fairy-taled the deep green velvet of a moss-covered path. How gladly sunlight dances with daisies and trumpets daylilies. How fun to chick-a-dee-dee-dee with chickadees and honk with geese flying over the lake. How gently the fog lifts as the day warms. How delicate a thread of web stretches from flower to flower to flower, a tell-tale trail of one spider’s travels. I marvel at the intricacy of a gravel road, two miles into my day. And returning, notice now how I feel right this very minute, tip-tapping on keys. Happy.

one hopeful year

~ onehopefulyear ~ 6 Comments

An unusual activity for me, but I did a little math this morning.

In one year, time passes accordingly:

  • 31,536,000 seconds
  • 525,600 minutes
  • 8.760 hours
  • 365 days
  • 52 weeks
  • 12 months
  • 4 seasons

From one season, month, day, hour, or minute to the next, there are so many opportunities to learn. To explore. Experiment. Create. Build. Design. Discover.

Imagine all there is to see, do, conceive, or dream up in the time it takes the earth to travel its 92.96 million mile orbit around the sun.

Think about all I can learn from new moon to full moon. From Fall to Winter and Winter to Spring. What new challenges can I meet from sun up to down? Who will I become from this one hopeful year of my life to the next?

Let’s find out!

Having just turned 60, I’m aiming for 60 new experiences. Recipes. Destinations. Classes. Books. New friendships, new challenges, and goals. New knowledge. Questions answered. Dreams fulfilled.

Maybe 60 is my once upon a time. My someday when. One thing’s sure and certain, it’s my next hopeful year.

As of today, it’s been 604,800 seconds, 10,080 minutes, 168 hours, and 7 days since my birthday, so it’s time to get started. I’ll share along the way … and feel free to offer suggestions and ideas for me to try.

New experience number one: Lemon Blueberry Scones.

sixty

~ onehopefulyear ~ 2 Comments

Growing is growing – especially if it’s growing older.

Turning sixty wasn’t as bad as the anticipation of turning sixty. Or maybe now that it finally came and went – my biggest birthday ever, I mean – maybe being sixty is not as bad as the anticipation of being sixty. A mere flip of the page on the calendar. Sunday to Monday. July 10th to the 11th. Fifty-nine to sixty.

Still the same me.

All those years, one added to the next, equal a living sum of who I am right now. Shy. Curious. Loyal. Sensitive. Sometimes weepy or worried. Strong, but anxious. Always hopeful.

Devoted to love in just about any form I find it.

Six decades of learning.

I suppose I thought I’d be wiser in the whys of the world. After all this time. All of my experiences. Relationships. Mistakes. Do-overs and never-agains. After mothering and daughtering. Sistering. Friending. I was a teacher. Still a wife, full to the tippity-top with love for my husband. Role after role, day in and year out.

Turns out, what I know best – now – is me.

It sounds strange to say, “I like me.” But I do. And I guess it took adding up all of those years to be able to say those words and mean them.

Sixty and growing. A great gift, being sixty.

Even better than I anticipated.

feelin’ groovy

~ onehopefulyear ~ 4 Comments

Slow down, you move too fast
You got to make the morning last

Laze. Window gaze.

Stretch. Smile. Be.

Here. Now. And nowhere else.

Just kicking down the cobblestones
Looking for fun and feeling groovy

Walking. Talking. Seeking. Finding.

The first wild daisies. My favorite.

“There’s only a handful of days like this in the whole year,” I say.

“Could the sky be any more blue?” you answer.

Ba da-da da-da da-da, feeling groovy

Hello lamppost, what’cha knowing
I’ve come to watch your flowers growin’
Ain’t you got no rhymes for me?

Hello peace and peonies. Peaches and berries.

Hello to the what’s possibles and the always predictables.

Hello to the maybe I wills and the probablys I won’t.

Good morning sun, I see your shine for me.

Hello Monday, make some hope for me.

Doot-in doo-doo, feelin’ groovy
Ba da da da da da da, feelin’ groovy

Thanks to the breeze. The green, the growing.

Coming to be the me I’m knowing.

I’m humbled and happy and couldn’t want more.

Life I love you, I’m ready to soar.

I got no deeds to do, no promises to keep
I’m dappled and drowsy and ready to sleep
Let the morning time drop all its petals on me

Life, I love you, all is groovy

*The 59th Street Bridge Song (Feelin’ Groovy) by Paul Simon

spring mandala

~ onehopefulyear ~ 4 Comments

Gather. Meditate. Center. Breathe.

Circles and cycles. Bud and bloom. Belief and doubt. Celebration and grief.

Faith.

Move inward, out. Outward, in.

Still. Sacred. Spiritual.

A revolution, a resolution, a plan, a path, a prayer.

A journey.

Start here. Or there.

No destination in mind or notice of arrival. Back where I began, here I am returned. Again. Both renewed and changed by the experience of the walk itself, a guarantee that no matter how familiar the path, I am in fact a different person than I was the last time I walked it.

Spring too, here again. Another spin around for both of us. So familiar, but so new and ever hopeful. Both transformed and transforming.

From the one to the many. From the many to the one.

Here, at last.

in the morning kitchen

~ onehopefulyear ~ 2 Comments

In the morning kitchen, evening memories linger. Too tired to wrestle with dirty dishes, I’m more likely now to leave it all be. Gathered eggs nest in a basket on the counter next to the remnants of last night’s dinner and a pile of plates. Just lately, I’ve come to love the quiet calm and purpose I find in a morning kitchen. Despite whatever state of chaos I might find upon my arrival, I’m so happy to be there.

I’m done with the guilt I’ve given myself over the years – choosing bed over tidying up. Yes, it’s lovely to brew coffee in a clean kitchen, but there’s delight in a warm bed after a satisfying meal too. I don’t mind the morning mess, and finally how I actually feel is taking precedence over how I think I should feel.

There’s hope in a morning kitchen, a kind of promise to the day ahead as the room’s set to rights. This morning I lit a candle on the counter as I began to clean. A long, white dinner-party taper lit simply because I like candlelight – even in the morning – and especially in the kitchen. The act of lighting – a prayer – a pause – a moment of appreciation and offering, lighting whatever world-weary darkness may be on mind.

I’m home in the morning kitchen. There’s a flavor of peace. Leftover nourishment. Contemplation out the kitchen window over a sinkful of hot, soapy water. I watch the bounce of a bluejay from feeder to branch. The trot of a turkey hen across the yard. The greening of grass.

When I arrive home again at day’s end, the comfort of a clean evening kitchen will greet me. I’ll no doubt light the candle again. Feel happy again. Home again. Content. Right there in the kitchen.

to do

~ onehopefulyear ~ 4 Comments

one thing I’m proud of … one thing I’ve been procrastinating … something in service to others … … add to my general knowledge … bring something up the stairs I find languishing there at the bottom … follow through … grow as a human … read … write … acknowledge someone else’s efforts … use what I have … tidy up … pare down … waste nothing, not time – energy – or resources … right a wrong … reach out … lift up … let go … make the phone call … breathe … simplify that which I’ve made complex … face a challenge … believe … honor those who came before me … create … hope … learn … love …

bloom

~ onehopefulyear ~ Leave a comment

I have so many writing ideas when there’s no time to write.

Truly, I have ever so much more to say once upon a work day, and despite my whenever I have day off intentions, I hardly ever follow through. I’ve netted many a willow wisp of an idea in the hour or so before my shift starts, but I live onward in the day and in the days after that without looking back to whatever thought I captured.

I have to believe if I had something important to say, I couldn’t help myself but say it.

Still, ideas I’ve left unexplored feel like hopes neglected and a voice – my voice – ignored.

I’ll need to meet myself face-to-face at this intersection of what I say I want and walking what I talk.

I wonder why the commitments to myself are those I’m least likely to honor?

Hope is hardy though, especially and always in spring. If ever there was a time for new growth, this is it.

So look for me nestled … and writing … among the branches of the forsythia, anticipating the bloom of the lilac, my words, and me.

balance

~ onehopefulyear ~ 5 Comments
There comes a tipping point in my balance.

When what’s good for me becomes just one more thing to do, and I am no longer one of my own priorities.

No amount of candle lighting or journal writing can recenter the weight.There’s only the passage of time, hope for a good night’s sleep, and the certain knowledge this time too shall pass.

In the meantime, there are negotiations. Trades. This for that. Time borrowed here and spent there. Adjustments.

And the truth is, imbalance is just as unsustainable as balance.

Because there arrives a day when the pressure subsides. Responsibilities lift. Check marks ink all the to-be-dones as done. And I wonder what all the fuss was about.

Hope emerges from underneath the pile on the desk.

I turn a new page in the journal, flip the calendar to April, and finally choose to pack the camera after all.

I breathe in. Exhale. And smile.

Every little thing’s gonna be alright.*

Thanks to Bob Marley for the reminder.

one moment

~ onehopefulyear ~ 4 Comments

When I awoke this morning, two complaints I remembered from the day before perched on my lips like two plump robins ready to fly aloft. 

It was a conscious moment. A powerful pause  –  mid-thought –  in which I interrupted my own self before I spoke.

I closed my mouth, and I think my heart smiled.

The collective energy of us really needs me to pause more often. The greater good needs more … good …  or at the very least, one less litany of who and what’s lacking. Obviously, I’m still becoming the person I’d most like to be.  

Sometimes, one hopeful year is lived one moment at a time.