Long Night Moon, Lunacy, Peace

It’s the Full Moon. Only this one and one more Full Moon this year. Only one more time to be infected with the joyful Lunacy of 2015.

The Full Moon is a time to dare. It’s a time to accept encouragement. It’s a time for boldness.

Every Full Moon that happens, i say, Oh, this is my favorite one… and sure enough, this is my favorite one. (at least this month!)

It’s cold, it’s clear, and it’s beautiful. I am full of energy and thanksgiving.

Tomorrow, I get to do what may be my favorite wedding of my entire time. My 71 yo cousin is marrying her 78 yo beau and they are as giddy as any 21 year olds. And ain’t Love grand!

Peace be with you. Safe travels to all who are on the road this weekend. Safe home when it is over. And Hurrah! and Peace! and Joy! ‘Tis the season!

The Peace of Beloved Festival Foods

For most of us, Thanksgiving is one of those holidays filled with food and family.

For those without either, let us be generous in opening our hearts and our wallets and cupboards. If we’re going to be thankful, it’s good to be so actively — and there is so much need. Thanksgiving requires great thanksgiving. Some of us are so lucky. I’m humbled by the life I lead. Blessing counting is an important part of this day.

But let us also enjoy — unabashedly… and make plans to revel in the fun.

And the food. Ah, festival foods are the best. Everyone has a favorite food associated with Thanksgiving. We were all stunned when niece Jan chose stuffing as the one food she never had to eat (her brother chose broccoli, which I like, but stuffing, that great gravy conveyance?). The rest of us we all about passing the bowl around one more time.

But for some it’s the yams, for others the turkey itself.

And for me, right up there alongside the stuffing is any kind of cranberry!

I once hosted a thanksgiving feast with 8 different kinds of cranberry sauce. Oh, i was happy!

Today it’s Monday. In three sleeps, it will be Thanksgiving. Turkey. Cranberry. Stuffing.

And a lovely, lovely wedding to perform. Yep. I’m looking forward. (and i get to miss the football part, which I know is other people’s favorite piece.)

I hope your Thanksgiving is filled with thanksgiving.

A Quiet, Fall, Sabbath Peace

I spent yesterday cosseting a cold. I’ll do a few more things today. But not a lot.

My guess is that nothing I do will be visible — i’ll work on the infrastructure of my life. There are sweaters to be straightened, a cabinet that needs to be emptied and then rearranged.

There may be a walk outside in the newly changed season. It is now late fall, and the temperatures are where they’re supposed to be. The leaves have finally blow off the trees.

Nothing extreme… but little accomplishments that will give me time to think about the upcoming holiday season, the things i’m thankful for, the things that are ended.

Time to make space for that which is to come.

Peace arrives in such small incremental measures. But we must keep open to its possibilities. Enjoy your day. May it be filled with Peace. May it be filled with Love.

Oh, That Moon. What Peace!

I’m in love with the Moon’s Beauty. It’s not just that she changes with the cycle, she changes with the seasons as well.

I’ve spent a year looking at her, a year being blessed by her beauty. It’s been a year blessed by slowing down and being present to what is.

I keep thinking wherever we are, she smiles on us. Isn’t that a call to smile on everyone?

Isn’t it a call to smile. a call to Peace? May we offer Peace to the Moon so that she may shine that back on the world.

Pride and Peace

I have wonderful friends. I know wonderful people. People who do ordinary and extraordinary things. People who do things to the best of their abilities. People who stretch beyond what is expected of them… whether by others or by themselves.

We have this weird thing going on in today’s culture… we have both very low expectations of people, jumping up and down when you phone in a an experience — and ridiculously high ones: failing to notice when when people reach deep into themselves and pull out all that is bright and beautiful and put it to work.

When we do our halting best and do a good job, that means something.

Too often we don’t turn to those we love — or even to those we barely know and say good job you worked so hard, you really tried. Not even you succeeded — you worked your heart out on that. The least I can do is be present enough in the moment to notice and to tell you.

And it’s good to know that your friends treasure your work because they know what it costs you. We all do a lot of things that aren’t the easy things for us. We should be proud of ourselves. And we should be proud of people we know. And we should tell them.

I know this is dicey. I know that that pride can be a dangerous thing. It can become more about the pride and less about the doing what needs to be done.

But sometimes we need that encouragement. Sometimes we are so petrified at what we’re undertaking it means the world to have someone turn and say, yep. you’re doing a wonderful job. Keep going. You’ve discovered new possibilities. You’re working hard and doing good. A friend of mine always used to say 5 attaboys or attagirls for you. Yes, you.

My friends, I’m proud of you. Be Peaceful with yourselves. You’re doing the best you can — so much more than you imagined you could.

Music, BOLO, Peace

Oh, the silly way your brain works. I see my buddy on a high way billboard and think BOLO… but her music is so grand, it’s a good idea to be on the lookout because you want to catch her if you can.

She’s a great singer songwriter. Funny, generous, hot. She’s also an incredible performer. She totally owned a couple songs that she covered. She’s spoiled me for others on those, really. Listened to a young woman approach one of those songs the other day. I make allowances for her age, really I do, some songs it takes a long time to master, let alone own… but I kept hearing EG and kept thinking, go home, learn it, and then come back and try again.

It’s fun to have people you love be really, really good at what they do. It’s fun to introduce others to her music and have them be bewitched as well.

And it’s a bit sad, as her music in my mind is linked to another singer songwriter, a woman who died of cancer a few years ago. They sang together, these two very different women and just had the best time. An extra large time as EG would say. And while Ann Rabson was dying, EG Kight was being very sick with meningitis and encephalitis. At first they didn’t know if she’d die and then she didn’t know if she’d ever pick up a guitar again. Or sing. Or write songs. Or tour. But she is doing all those things and just touching heart after heart.

So, EG Kight BOLO… because I have to say, there’s Peace in the fun of her, Peace in the art of her, Peace in the friendship. And Hope. That’s a pretty heady combination and a great way to spend the weekend. Giving thanks. Counting Blessings. Aren’t I a lucky girl.

But why trust this, give her a listen and you’ll get lucky too!

Unexpected Peace

It helps to remain open. You never know what’s going to come along.

And when it comes, you must have left room for the miraculous, or you won’t recognize it.

It’s not all about love affairs, although this particular story was. It can be about jobs, or houses, or friendships, or new paths in our lives.

I think it helps to have a full life — and to appreciate what you have!

The practice of gratitude leaves openings; it allows you to see wonderful things when they happen along.

But being able to see isn’t enough. You have to be able to act, to dare.

Things don’t always work out well. But failure is simply information about better ways to try again. Hearts were meant to be risked (although let’s be clear, there’s nothing wrong with some calculations in those risks.)

But when they do work, the rewards are enormous. Love ensues. Joy does its happy dance. Peace gets its hopes raised. And people work together for both, which increases the odds tremendously, that someday there might be Peace. Both Peace or Magic require hard work and hopeful hearts.

The Peace of this Moment

We need to pay attention. Oh, we will, we assure ourselves when something happens…

And then life gets back to normal and we slowly become oblivious to the individual little moments that make life astonishing.

But life is fickle, fleeting. I was about to write momentous and then thought about what that meant… moment-ous… each moment.

And if we don’t pay very close attention we miss the moments that make life magic. We don’t make time to capture life with all those we love. We don’t notice the wonder of Mother Earth. or whatever.

We have to treasure what we have… because this moment is all that we know we have. Next year’s musings have been taking shape in my mind as Everyday Peace, watchword noticing…

It feels all the more pointed now when Ed Lund is gone from Selena and Grace’s life. He was an incredible gift. Always so present. He’ll be sorely missed. Ed, we loved you.

Peace be with those who loved him. Peace be with us all.

Electronic Detente

I know I strive for Peace. But sometimes with electronics, you celebrate detente.

I have a wonderful new computer. I am so lucky. But as often happens with electronic equipment, that which should be so easy is complicated. Even when you purchase for not complicated.

And better than anything, I have a wonderful friend who does great untangling. for a living. and knows the way my mind works and the ways it doesn’t.

so, I can hand it over and he doesn’t even think less of me.

It’s a wonderful thing. And within a week, it’ll all be computer Peace at my house. And that will be swell…

If only I can figure out how to do the next three things I need to do!

But, they’ll get done… and whoever thought Peace was going to be a quick fix? Not with people… and not with my learning curve.

But hurrah for detanglers and their mad computer licks. And hurrah for my job which offered me the opportunity to have this beautiful machine. I am a grateful woman.

Sky, Love, Peace

I am, and always have been, a concrete priestess. I’m not terribly comfortable with many things present in the out-of-doors… like bugs and slithering things.

But when you finally get me out there I have a great time. Because hey! Mother Earth. Nature.

And when Nature is at her most glorious, you have to just go with it, right?

I’m so glad i worked as hard as i did to get there on Sunday. And that I pried my beloved out his… oh, I’ll just stay home. Because this was the finest symphony of skies.

We live on this earth. we should be paying closer attention. I should be paying closer attention. It’s the explosive beauty of these moments that helps us grasp the importance of caring for creation.

This is the world we have and it’s wondrous. Why wouldn’t we take care of it? Why wouldn’t we spend a lot of our lives, pointing and gasping and saying, well, will you look at that? We should spend less time saying, well, would you look at that, gimme it its’ mine or oh, ho hum. another beautiful day, mountain, lake…

Peace. We need to be about the business of peace. Because a world this beautiful deserves nothing less.

Sacred Village

Building a World of Peace, Village by Sacred Village.

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