Happy Holidays, friends! “Let this be the time we wake to life.”

WINTER SOLSTICE

Perhaps for a moment    [Continue reading]]]> It’s the Winter Solstice, happens every year about this time…. And honestly, I can’t do any better than re-post last year’s Solstice message, with Rebecca Parker’s beautiful Winter Solstice poem.

Happy Holidays, friends! “Let this be the time we wake to life.”

WINTER SOLSTICE

Perhaps
for a moment
the typewriters will stop clicking,
the wheels stop rolling
the computers desist from computing,
and a hush will fall over the city.
For an instant, in the stillness,
the chiming of the celestial spheres will be heard
as earth hangs poised
in the crystalline darkness, and then
gracefully
tilts.
Let there be a season
when holiness is heard, and
the splendor of living is revealed.
Stunned to stillness by beauty
we remember who we are and why we are here.
There are inexplicable mysteries.
We are not alone.
In the universe there moves a Wild One
whose gestures alter earth’s axis
toward love.
In the immense darkness
everything spins with joy.
The cosmos enfolds us.
We are caught in a web of stars,
cradled in a swaying embrace,
rocked by the holy night,
babes of the universe.
Let this be the time
we wake to life,
like spring wakes, in the moment
of winter solstice.

~Rebecca Parker

The yoga babes connect and head for the 10:15 ferry, which is currently at the “yellow” threat level, according to TSA. Given how peaceful it is here on the water, I’m inclined to think that refers to the yellow-green pollen, which is coating    [Continue reading]]]> Here’s my Sunday world, in about 25 miles and five hours.

The yoga babes connect and head for the 10:15 ferry, which is currently at the “yellow” threat level, according to TSA. Given how peaceful it is here on the water, I’m inclined to think that refers to the yellow-green pollen, which is coating houses, cars, and the interior of nasal passages with irritating chartreuse dust. We are at the chartreuse threat level. It’s one of the few complaints I have about spring.

White herons stalk and work the shoreline for fish as the ferry pulls out. The birds pay us no mind, acting as if the ferry zips to and from the island on a regular basis. Which it does. Cormorants sit on the channel markers and watch us head off the tip of the island. Later they’ll disappear under the water for way too long, popping back above the surface nowhere near where they dove down. I worry about them down there, but they don’t seem to care. They dive anyway, again and again.

Screaming seagulls follow the ferry, jockeying for thrown food and good camera angles. (Note to tourists: If God had intended seagulls to eat Wonder Bread, the ocean itself would produce that crap. Just don’t do it. Please.)

From the ferry landing, it’s a pretty straight shot: You take the main road (might be the only road) out of town until you come to the “Worms & Coffee” sign (I am not joking) at the little gas station, and turn down the side road there.

Mobile homes, brick ranches with dog pens out back, long dusty driveways. We drive a couple of miles. We pass the Antioch Baptist Church, whose sign warns: “You can spurn the Lord for only so long.”

Soon we pass the Praise the Lord Beauty Salon, a Pentecostal church, and the Midway Gun and ATV Club.

A curve in the road, a “Visitors Welcome” sign and we’re there, at the Thai Buddhist Monastery, Wat Carolina.

It’s Songkran, the Thai New Year’s Water Festival. There are dances, chanting, a dharma talk. I watch; I listen. I don’t understand a word of the various ceremonies that appear to be taking place simultaneously. I eat wonderful food – hot, aromatic, and much of it unrecognizable to me.

I don’t understand a word, but I feel positive energy everywhere around me. We march around the outside of the temple, and I can figure out how and when to shout and clap with the others. I am splashed with water for good luck and prosperity in the new year. Lots of water.

We sit again inside the temple and a man with a huge ball of twine wraps it around us all. I am on the inside of the circle, and for a while I feel like I belong here. I suppose I am a sightseer, a tourist, but I don’t feel like one. I am peaceful. I feel part of this circle. The man unwraps the twine, but I am still part of the circle. Later the monks will wrap prayers into the twine and people will tie the prayer-filled twine around their wrists.

Soon it’s time to leave, and we make our way back to the ferry. We drive, a little too fast the last few miles, and our car is the last one to make it on the ferry before it leaves. We are grateful.

The TSA sign still says the threat level is “elevated.”

Somehow I don’t believe it just now.

Senator Hagan was in town today. That’s me in the pink baseball cap (from the local TV news).

I’ll be back tomorrow.

A is helping me streamline and simplify my blog, so stay tuned for some improvements.

Namaste.

Yeah, I know that’s a picture of Ozzy and Sharon, but this is the    [Continue reading]]]> The Wall Street Journal featured an interesting article yesterday: Happy Couples Kiss and Tell. The author interviewed several couples (including her own parents) who have been married for decades and asked them the secrets to their success.

Yeah, I know that’s a picture of Ozzy and Sharon, but this is the comment that struck closest to home for me, since the chances of A. biting the head off a bat are pretty slim (I hope).  It’s from Rosalynn Carter, who’s been married to former President Jimmy Carter for 63 years now:

“First, well, let me just say: Don’t ever write a book with your husband.”

Thoughts?