Starry, Family, Sabbath Peace

Every once in a while you should have loaner kid sitting on your couch. Not that I have my own kids, but loaner kids bring another take. If they’re nieces and nephews, there’s trust and laughing and fun things to do, so you’ve already cut through any awkwardness.

You learn a lot about each other. They get another look at adulthood. You get a dose of what’s up right now.

And then, if it’s this fabulous young woman, she reshapes your hair, goes uncomplainingly to party’s with 70 yos and to smokey bars to see a new band. She then demands you stop and take a gander the stars (she IS an evans child… my parents would be so proud! and so will her bennett/hermanson parents be!)

And the next morning, she uncomplainingly goes to church with you. That’s a niece! And a darling. Lucky Auntie.

She’s my cousin’s kid. Back when we were losing family at a fearful and awful rate, the cousins one generation down from mine were saying, our family is too small, we’re claiming one another and my generation was saying, we didn’t know one another growing up, we’re going to know one another now. We live into that every chance we get.

So, a visit from a niece. It’s a wonderful way to spend a weekend. and a great way to spend a beautiful, brisk fall Sabbath.

Enjoy the day. Today I’m celebrating the Peace of developing family. Whatever you’re celebrating I hope it’s lovely.

Sweet Little Gift of Peace

He was at the church to attend his grandpa’s funeral. He’s a boy bursting with curiosity. He never stopped moving.

You could tell, his parents worry — what will he get into?

Answer: Everything he can.

And he’s not the first child in that place to be hyper-inquisitive.

But he’s sparing with his words. He’s not always a child to get the nuances.

So when his first words were to recognize what we do here… it just made my heart swell.

Thanks, little guy… we work hard to make that so. Yes, it’s an old office building. Yes, we do church here.

There’s Peace in the making of religious community and Peace in being recognized for what we do at a very deep level. We loved his grandpa and we celebrate his life and mourn his loss.

There was Peace in our being together doing that and in using our talents to honor our friend. There was Peace in this little boy’s blessing.

Peace on the Threshold

Fall has been dancing back and forth between warm sunny beautiful fall and cool, damp appropriate fall.

This recent weather has been time out of time, completely outside the normal scheme of things, and glorious for all that.

Probably if we think closely about it, we realize it’s an indication of change that isn’t good. Why is it so warm in November? Why is there no rain in California? Why are there floods other places? Climate change.

And we don’t think about that when we’re rejoicing in what’s glorious or complaining about what’s usual. Why is it November. Because it is.

This is November. Time of the grey skies and the silver rains. Time to dive for those warm sweaters and just be comfortable with what is. Time for the leaves to litter the ground and lay like the mulch they are to make new soil for the year to come.

So that we have this weather means at the very least we must enjoy it. Rather than clutch it to our chest complaining that it might go away, let us throw open our hands and hearts and dance around, one last time.

And then let us welcome the Peace of the Silver Rains and let’s celebrate that!

So Few Who Tend the Peace

I’m still haunted by that very quick conversation with the emigré… You don’t know what hard is…. You don’t know.

I’ve seen a lot and, yet, I believe him. Because I’ve heard stories filled with pain about things we cannot comprehend. And we live in a country where a lot is wrong, and still, we don’t know.

And I work hard at helping us see those things that are wrong, I look hard at myself and my great, great privilege. And I’m sure I miss plenty.

But I think we who search for the wrong, get so earnest that we forget to celebrate the right… and lavishly… We forget to let people know that life is grand and everyone should have access to the grand things…

We forget our rights (privileges) and we forget our responsibilities. They expected less than 30 percent of registered voters to turn out. Less than 30 percent. And this was the only sentence I could find about how many citizens are registered to vote. “Among eligible voters, some 30 percent of African Americans, 40 percent of Hispanics, 45 percent of Asian Americans, and 41 percent of young adults (age 18-24), were not registered to vote in the historic 2008 election.”

So I found this conversation enraging. Wanna be an american and be all up in my face. Vote, dammit. Peace doesn’t make it self. We do. So let’s do it.

Peace in the Pool

Normally when I write about the Peace I find in the pool, it’s all about me — the water, the rhythm, the quiet.

But yesterday’s Peace was brought to us by a 92-year-old Hungarian emigré.

It’s one of those decisions I juggle. Do I speak to people I don’t know when I’m wearing a few ounces of nylon. It’s a vulnerability thing. I once had a woman introduced to me, who decided based on the introduction what my politics were and why she abhorred them, and i thought, what? I’m in my happy place and you’re going off? blah.

But, my natural curiosity makes me susceptible. And in this case, it was a lovely contact.

We who whine often don’t stop to think about why this place is valuable. We often spend more time whining than making things even better. Because truth to tell, if you travel at all or live abroad, you realize how many things are good here…

So why not work to make them better. Wringing our hands never did much to make things work…

and then, after Monsieur L’Emigré climbs out, my other favorite nonagenarian dropped into the pool. Another political conversation ensued.

What a delightful world we live in.

Peace is waiting to be picked up and celebrated. It’s in our hands.

And, along those lines did you vote? Because Peace is in our hands, and it’s lucky we are that’s so.

Breezy, Leafy Peace

So many of the leaves are down, but plenty are still clinging to the trees. Enough that we’ll be raking for days to come.

Driving yesterday, the sun picked out color on the burnished hills. Here and there there were still a few golden spots although the color was darkening toward copper.

It’s November. Time for beautiful, empty, black branches upthrust against a cold, grey, rainy sky.

Although we don’t seem to have much rain, just beautiful, beautiful blue, blue skies and unseasonably warm temperatures. It’s the time of the Moon when you have to get up pretty late at night (or pretty early in the morning) to catch the moon resting in the embrace of those empty branches. But if you do… it’s worth it, and the skies have been clear and starry.

I’ll take the Beauty and say thank you. I’ll take the Beauty and say Peace on Earth.

Misty Autumn Sabbath Peace

It’s a day for raking leaves and sweeping sidewalks. It’s a day for mysterious walks in the foggy woods, It’s a day for lighting candles and enjoying a book.

A Sabbath in Autumn. I’ll take it. And enjoy it.

It seems, given last night’s remembrances, that it will be a reflective day for me.

How lovely.

Hope yours is lovely too and filled with Peace — and not too much of the Halloween candy.

Goblins, Ghosties, Memories, Peace

For some it’s about the mad or the weird, for me it’s about remembering.

I have a pretty full altar, The past 20 years have been hard on my heart. A lot of beloved friends have gone on before.

In several traditions this is the time of year that the veil between this world and the next is seen to be the thinnest. Souls are thought to be able to slip back and forth, to visit those they loved with a touch.

For me, it’s an opportunity to commemorate those lives. And to just be present.

I’m a zoomy kinda woman, so it’s hard to give myself that space. It’s hard to give my loved ones that attention. So, today, I will just take this one Sacred Day.

The rest of you will be out being wee goblins and ghosties and looking for sweet loot. I hope you have a great time.

Peace , we need to remember, looks different for different folks! Hope you’re living into yours… Happy Halloween! Happy Peace.

Brisk and Beautiful Peace

Fall. It’s just lovely. And today’s as good an example of that as any day we’ve had.

This is one of those times I want to say to folks, slow down, be careful, don’t miss this.

People start to fret about winter. How cold it’s going to be, how dark. Yes (and i admit, I embrace that — and hey, we should maybe all examine the possibility of a little more vitamin d in our lives), but winter has a purpose. and it’s beautiful.

But right now. Right this very minute, it’s fall. and it’s gorgeous. Let’s be present right now. Count today’s blessings, worry about tomorrow, tomorrow.

Pretty soon they’re going to turn back time… and maybe I’ll start getting up in the morning!

Okay. Maybe not.

But today it is beautiful. Today, I look around and am overcome with the Beauty. Today I am at Peace where I am in space and time. I hope you are too.

Prisoners Deserve More Peace

People do bad things. I understand that. And there are consequences for your actions. I understand that.

In a better world, in my estimation, we would rehab the people who could be rehabilitated and safely house those who, for whatever reason, can’t be.

Things are bad enough when the government runs prison industries and gets labor done for pennies on the $10. But things are so much worse with the privatized prisons. So much worse.

I just looked up fire-fighting. It’s actually not very well paid for the danger people are in. Annual salary ranges from $26-34,000. I find that shockingly low. But when you’re paying people $723 a year plus two dollars a day — and then forcing people to buy from the company store where things are outrageously overpriced, shame on us. shame on us.

There have always been forest and wildland fires. Now thanks to global climate change there are more. So, it’s expensive. But this is the piper to be paid. To leverage our unwillingness to admit any complicity or to make any changes that might ameliorate or at least stop the situation on the backs of the imprisoned is outrageous.

Do I have answers? No, I don’t.

And these prisoners, being heroes out on the fire lines, may not respond when spoken to. When someone says thanks for saving my house, have a cookie, they must say nothing and walk away. Why? What does that gain us?

We seem to have decided this is who we are as a country. I’m willing to help us think differently about ourselves. Are you? Whatever people have done, however badly they have coped with their lives, they are people. Each one has worth and dignity. When we say and act differently, we attack our own humanity. To use them without any allowance for their humanity demeans us.

There must be some kind of Peace that can be found. I believe in possibility. I believe in Peace.

Sacred Village

Building a World of Peace, Village by Sacred Village.

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