Waterfalls: Spring’s Wild, Dancing Peace

The rainy abundance of Spring has been filling up our mountain streams, sending waters merrily through the shallow channels. Then they come to the end of the plateau and plunge lacily to the next level. Ricketts Glen is filled with such falls and this time of year, it’s filled with a wild and particular Beauty.

The Falls are Rain’s gift to us. Spring and Fall the rains come and the streams swell. We need to be careful around it, but, oh, the delight.

Water is powerful, we forget that in its Beauty. as it plunges from heights into pools, the landscape is rearranged. Beauty can be powerful. We need to remember that.

It’s worth a visit to the places in your life where the water runs wild. The ions the water throws off will change your mood if nothing else. But to watch the power of water doing what it’s called to do is a wonderful thing.

Embrace the Wild Peace that Nature offers the Earth… drink it in, and then translate it into forward momentum for the Peace we all need.

Peace on and from our River

The Susquehanna is so beautiful. Your river is probably beautiful too.

As they bless us with their Beauty and their Bounty, we must also bless them.

We must care for them.

Clean water for everyone is a great start on Peace. Water you can drink, water you can fish in, water you can swim in, water you can walk beside… wait, am I sounding like my (Middle Susquehanna) Riverkeeper? You bet I am.

Clean Water for Peace. Us for Clean Water. Us for Peace. Pretty simple in theory. Let’s make it true in practice.

Roiling River Peace

When you live beside a river, it goes up and down. My brother- and sister-in-law have had to design their house because the original owners built to close to the river. Most of the time it’s a lovely place to live… and some of the time it’s a carry the furniture upstairs and call the moving van for the heavy bits. In the Spring you watch the water for floods and hope the snow, if you’ve had it won’t melt too fast.

That’s the river.

It’s sort of politics, too, isn’t it.

We have to make the Peace as we can. And we have to prepare ourselves to act. And then we have to act.

Finding Your Piece of Peace

What is it you’re meant to do? What kind of Peace are you best equipped to enact?

Or maybe a smaller question, what can you/do you contribute to the Great Peace Experiment… What thing that you are perfectly equipped to contribute, because of your particular skills and personality?

Who are the other people you know and love or even don’t know but admire who are contributing to Peace in ways that make sense, with whom you can contribute more greatly to Peace.

Suss is a simple case. He’s a water dog. He’s bred to scent survivors in cold ocean shipwrecks. Now he’s being trained to find sewer leaks that are polluting the River.

It’s a important job, one for which he is uniquely qualified. We’re all uniquely qualified to contribute to Peace. We just have to claim our place.

My friends, in a topsey-turvey worrld, let’s Peace.

 

Water is Life and Peace

Water is Life. We must care for it.

There’s no way around that. We come from water, are born from it. It is 60 percent of us. If we can’t process water, we die. If we don’t have clean water, we die.

My troubles dissolve in water. It brings me Peace. Clean water is necessary to me in ways far beyond the physical.

We must care for water. It is not an endless source… We have the water we have and we keep polluting it. It must stop. We must stop. We must demand that greed is not more important than our water. Water is sacred and belongs to the people. Let us bless the water. Let us be a blessing to the water. Even as it brings us Peace, may we bring Peace as well.

Water is Life. Water is Peace. Blessed Be.

Sailing Away and Staying Here for Peace

My first thought about this photo was that it was a temptation, but i think it’s more likely simply a reminder…

From time to time — on a regular basis — it’s important to get away from everything.

Finding our own Peace as we’re working for Peace is important.

It’s important as we consider the value of each precious life, that we consider the value of our own precious lives. We all need time away if we’re going to be effective at our work and in our personal lives.

And oh, doesn’t this boat and the cove in this lake make you think that, casting off for a sail is a good idea? There are some temptations which are not merely idle; some, like this invitation to breathe the air out on the water, offer a call to Life and an understanding of the Peace that reminds us that Peace is vital to the world.

Sail away, indeed! Peace it up!

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Love the Sturm und Drang, Could Use A Little Rain Peace

Back here in Central PA, we’ve only received about three-quarters of our annual rainfall. I’ve never seen the river and creeks this low.

And yet we’ve spent the summer with enough humidity in the air that seems to have no interest in making rain.

We, with a big finger point toward myself, need to be thinking about water conservation as well as other techniques to slow down global warming.

Water is precious… Everyone deserves clean water although an astonishing number of people live without it. People worry, and not without reason, that our next wars will be about water.

We need to get involved with our communities and work for good water treatment plants and processes. We need to stop using water bottles — even for special occasions.

We must make Peace with water needs so that all the people may flourish. We must care for our Earth enough to make a difference in the environment…

everydaypeacesaturday37sep10

 

The Peace of Water

I’m currently reading Blue Mind, by Wallace J. Nichols. Now I know why I love the water. Now I also know why I have a short attention span… oh, electronics, you danger…

Being by, in, or under water does wonders for us. Baths may literally be saving my sanity!

And apart from all that, or maybe because of all that, water is beautiful.

This guy is happy about the water he’s giving the world, it’s in every line…

Turns out it’s a great thing to have water features at schools and universities. it calms folks down and helps them center.

And here we all are… wasting water, not protecting it.

There’s Peace in Water and everyone’s need for water demands that we make Peace for Water. 80 Indian nations are at Standing Rock protesting a pipeline for the sake of water. 80 nations may be more nations than have ever gathered before… ancient enemies have united for the sake of water.

Let us Peace in the name of Water, which brings Peace in and of itself.

EverydayPeaceTuesday35Aug30

Fountains of Peace

I know it has something to do with the ions, but I don’t think it can be all of it. Water is mesmerizing. It’s amazing when it’s still and wonderful when it’s moving.

And lacy sprays of fountains are such a gift. I can watch and watch and watch.

This will always be one of my favorites. So happy it’s back in action in my home town. How lucky that Scott, who took the picture, lives in that town and is just as fascinated by water as I am! If you get a chance, go visit your favorite or any random fountain, let it give you some peace!

EverydayPeaceTuesday32Aug9

The Peace of Watermen and Women

You know me. I’ll wax eloquent all year long about the water. There is no time more special for me than the summer when I’m able to swim outside — I know, you’ve heard me say this often enough — but I like watching water almost as much as I like floating in it.

Its Beauty stills my soul.

But in all my water rapture, I often forget that there are those who make their living, a very hard-working living on the water.

Water is beautiful, but it can be dangerous. It can also just be unpleasant. When the cold wind blows frigid water or the boat is rocking in the tempest, it’s got to be a challenge. And yet this is the work they’ve chosen.

And so often (and lobsters are certainly a lovely case in point), the bounty they bring back is extraordinary.

Water is full of lovely gifts, but it doesn’t always make it easy to retrieve them.

So here’s to the Watermen and women and all they do for us. Here’s to their hard work and generosity. And here’s to the Peace they make with their work and the Water.

And oh, I am so grateful for Summer and the Peace I find in the laps I swim. I am so lucky.

EverydayPeaceTuesday31Aug2