Hello again … again

A few of my favorite things

(Listen to the extended version of this blog post on my podcast today!)

As I write, glancing up to the window overlooking the farm, I see snow falling quietly, gently as it has been off and on since Sunday afternoon.

Our autumn has been the longest-lasting, most breathtaking autumn in the twenty years I have lived here. Every walk, every drive has been a glorious excursion through nature’s bountiful eye candy. 

The lawn and driveway have appeared as bejeweled the past couple of weeks with brightly colored leaves blessed by cold but not frosty temperatures so their colors last, and last, and last. Even with the current snow, brightly colored leaves continue to decorate the lawn and driveway.

Yesterday afternoon, sitting in the chaise in my room looking out the window as snow fell, I thought of the lyrics to “My Favorite Things” from the movie, “The Sound of Music”.

My lap was full of my current knitting project (a gorgeous, Christmas tree green shawl), the house and the world outside were peaceful and quiet, Charlie boy was sleeping in his cozy dog bed snoring softly, and I felt truly relaxed in body, mind, and spirit enjoying some of my very favorite things.

When I was a little girl in fourth grade, our chorus teacher taught us, “My Favorite Things”. I loved singing that song even though it would be years before I saw the movie.

“Raindrops on roses and whiskers on kittens,
Bright copper kettles and warm woolen mittens,
Brown paper packages tied up with strings … “

I could definitely agree … those were a few of my favorite things as well! 

Now, with many more years of living under my belt, my list of favorite things is full, even overflowing, with far too many items to catalog—autumn colors followed by the first snow are definitely top items on my list.

As you might have noticed, I have not written a blog or produced a podcast episode since about midsummer. Oh, I was on such a roll in July with the relaunch of the blog and just starting to “get my feet wet” as a podcaster. 

Then, life said, “Um … excuse me dear, but before you get too far into this new adventure there are some matters you really must deal with first.” 

And so, I began dealing with some very challenging and scary realities of my life being responsible for an aging husband with a variety of health issues that seemed to hit all at once. Boy, oh boy. What an adventure that has turned out to be. It will be a good story sometime, which I believe will be of benefit to those who hear the tale. 

For now, I’m going to just enjoy the fact that such a difficult time has passed—in a sort of amazing way—and sometime I will find a way to tell the story in a nonintrusive way. For now, please know that I was absent for good reason and now things are much better and more settled.

Now, back to my favorite things…

People come to me for advice, and recently a good friend came for advice and comfort when she was feeling very discouraged and negative about her life. She is a single parent who lost her job at the worst time for her family. Her job search has been fruitless, she has seen her resources dwindling, and in the midst of needing to stay on top of all of that she was struck with a debilitating bout of back and neck pain. She couldn’t stop thinking of her problems but was also in a situation of not being able to do anything about those problems because of her unabated pain. 

It was challenging even to attempt to offer comforting words because she was feeling so down and very thwarted by her overwhelming problems. 

I did end up thinking of something simple and doable, even when all the chips are down. Here is what I said:

“Since you can’t do anything about your problems while this pain persists, try putting your attention on the most basic, fundamental blessing you have that is abundant and limitless—love. You are loved, and you have people to love.”

I advised her to focus all of her attention on the love her family feels for her and the love she feels for them. I pointed out that no matter what scarcity life and pain and the economy can inflict on a person, the one thing that is your own, truly abundant and limitless commodity is your capacity to love and to be loved. 

This one simple idea actually helped her, lifted her spirits, and gave her hope there was something she could do even though she was in such pain. 

Later I thought more about that concept of love being our greatest commodity. Love can’t be regulated by governments, it can’t be taxed, the price of it can’t be raised beyond reach, it can’t be owned or controlled by someone or something else—unless you let it be.

Love is yours to own, to generate, and to flow out in any quantity you desire. 

Over the past couple of decades “social media” has encouraged a decline in social graces and too much of a me-me-me mentality in my humble opinion. More than anything I believe it has been destructive of the love that was an integral part of our social fabric. Love used to hold us together as a society, but now on some levels we face unprecedented division even though we are more “connected” than ever. But, that division does not have to last … we have it in us to undo the division, one act of kindness or love at a time. And we can, each of us, refuse to submit to the division social media has made way for.

The beauty of it is, in fact, that our capacity to love one another cannot actually be altered. It might not always be tapped into, but that is only because of human frailty. Native to who and what we are, each one of us, is this capacity to love and be loved. Whether we tap into that capacity or not, it is there.

We can, at any given moment, generate a thought and a feeling of love and just whoosh … send it out into the world, into the universe. Unclaimed, unnamed, just love generally flowed out into the world.

Right now, if you would, close your eyes and get the idea of a large bubble of love generated by you—very, very large. Next, get the idea of launching that huge bubble full of love out and away and off into the world at large. Whoosh!

It might sound overly simple, and it definitely is not scientific, but it is my belief that doing the love bubble thing can actually create an impact of some kind, somewhere in the world.  have faith that randomly generated ethereal love bubbles sent out into the world will land, pop open, and let loose a feeling of love and kinship in whosoever it may encounter.

And frankly, I don’t care if anyone thinks of me as being silly for thinking or suggesting such a thing because it certainly would bring no harm. And I like to think that it can create the beginnings of a tiny little gentle ripple effect.

Who knows, perhaps it will make a difference we never know the specifics of but it will make a difference.

Someone, somewhere might feel it.

Someone, somewhere, might have a better moment because of it. 

Their better moment can lead to better interactions with others, strangers especially. And when strangers touch each other’s lives with a bit more kindness, an unexpected smile or kind word, even love of one’s fellows emanating from one stranger to another—it can make a difference and the ripple effect might eventually be enormous and profound.

If 10 people read my words and try this, who knows what the ripple effect of their outflowing of love will be over the next few minutes, few hours, days, months, or even years. We will never know, but isn’t it worth giving it a try even if we have no proof that it did a thing?

Let’s have faith. Faith in each other, faith in love.

I believe love is the key to the universe and to life.

Here’s my love bubble, I am sending it out to you and yours!

I hope you can feel it. 

Until next time, this is … ~ firefly, out.