The wheel keeps turning. The clock keeps ticking. The going around keeps going around, and the coming around seems slow to arrive, but inevitably will come around. The grains of sand in our mortal hourglass keep trickling away. It is another new day, another new week, and another series of imminent moments to live, to savor, and to remember later.
… What will you do with your finite precious moments, today….?
Me? I’m starting with a walk. The trail is dark, and it rained through the night. The neighborhood that surrounds this trail is quiet. The darkness is illuminated by occasional lights, and the quiet is interrupted by the distant hum and whir of HVAC systems. Humanity exists here. I sigh and keep walking. “Peace and quiet” is relative, I guess.
I slept well and deeply. The weekend of much needed rest was a worthwhile deviation from more typical weekends, when I commonly swap “gainful employment” for the greatly appreciated, but wholly unpaid, domestic labor of errand running, housekeeping, grocery shopping, and caregiving. I’m both grateful and relieved that my Traveling Partner needs so little caregiving now, at all. As his capabilities around the house with day-to-day tasks continue to improve, my ability to cover “everything else” (more or less, most of the time) also improves. The shared effort is a quality of life improvement, and made it possible to just set stuff aside this past weekend and relax. I can’t easily describe how much more rested and able to focus I feel this morning. I definitely needed that restful time.
I breathe, exhale, and relax, smiling to myself and enjoy the lingering feeling of being loved.
The world looks different before daybreak.
I walked the wet trail carefully in the darkness. It is slick with wet leaves, and dotted with puddles. I playfully stomp through a puddle or two before a grown up sense of safety vs hazards catches up with my sense of whimsy. I slip, just once, nearly falling because I carelessly stomped a puddle that was full of slippery leaves. I catch myself, feeling a brief moment of embarrassment, although I’m alone on the trail this morning.
I get to my halfway point and stop to take in the scene, rest a moment, write and meditate. It has become a cherished routine. It begins to rain, softly, and I am grateful for the tree cover that keeps me mostly dry. Chilly morning, too, I think to myself. I’m grateful for the fleece over my sweater, and its warm deep pockets.
… Monday…
I’ve got no particular sorrow or stress over a Monday, these days. A work day is a work day. I smile in the darkness. I sit enjoying the moment. I’m ready for whatever is next, as the wheel continues to turn. I’m ready to begin again.
Metaphorically or in life, sometimes it is going to rain. Pretty much a certainty, actually, that at some point we’re going to get rained on as we journey life’s path. lol This morning the rain is quite literal. The weather forecast suggests it will lighten up enough to enjoy my walk sometime very soon, so I take a few minutes to write, and wait.
…I won’t be writing on the trail this morning, too wet…
I breathe, exhale, and relax. I slept well, and took yesterday pretty easy. I’m glad I did, and I am grateful to have had my Traveling Partner’s encouragement. I feel more rested, and my body feels more recovered from the previous week. It’s quite nice to take the weekend off for real, instead of swapping one sort of work for another.
Don’t forget to take breaks! Make that time for yourself even when life feels “too busy”. This fragile vessel needs that care from us, even while we’re caring for others. These finite mortal lives deserve our attention. The payoff is worth it.
I sigh contentedly, listening to the rain and watching daybreak come. I even slept in this morning. Feels good. I feel good. Another day of luxurious rest, and I’ll definitely be ready to begin again. 😀 I hear the raindrops slow down, and stop… I’m ready.
I woke later than usual. It was almost 05:00 when I woke. I felt rested and positively merry. I dressed to head out for my morning trek down the marsh trail that circles the nature park.
As I checked the weather, and the time, I see I’ve got a message from my beloved Traveling Partner. The love and concern in his words is clear. He suggests I keep my walk short, maybe local, and proposes I maybe stay home entirely and get my miles on the elliptical, while watching a favorite show. He proposes that we could do something together, later, an idea that appeals to me. I feel loved. I sit with that feeling for a moment, letting it fill my consciousness.
The idea of a shorter walk and better self-care is a tempting idea, for sure, I admit. I really like being out on the trail, though, enjoying the short quiet interval of solitude… and my walks at the nature park put me nearby a favorite grocery store, and I generally stop there after my walk on a Saturday morning… The temperature is mild… I head out, remembering my commitment to one of the grocery checkers to share some items my Traveling Partner made, and deciding to keep my walk short, any way.
The drive to the nature park was quiet. No traffic. I enjoyed it, smiling to myself as I drove with my thoughts, grateful for my loving partner who cares about my well-being, and for the lovely morning. Before I reach the nature park, it begins to rain, first just a sprinkle, then as I reach the trailhead parking, a proper steady rain. I grimace, and laugh, betting my Traveling Partner had checked the weather report more closely than I had.
Now I sit, waiting for a break in the rain. I’m unbothered and relaxed. Hadn’t I already decided to make my walk a shorter one, anyway? No stress. No agitation. Just change. I breathe, exhale, and relax, listening to the rain on the roof of the car.
At its heart, resilience is simply that ability to bounce back in the face of change, uncertainty, emotional disregulation, or even trauma. Resilience needs development, as with things like muscular strength. Specific practices build resilience. Meditation, as a practice, helps build resilience. The practice of “taking in the good” is another that directly builds resilience. Forgiveness, as a practice, is another that contributes to resilience, by limiting how long our hurt feelings or injuries inflicted by another can dominate our thoughts. Practicing non-attachment and embracing related ideas such as impermanence, sufficiency, and building depth and breadth into our perspective on life, generally, are helpful for building resilience.
Resilience let’s us bounce back and carry on, without becoming mired in our pain, sorrow, or anger. Resilience is that quality that gets us quickly past a difficult moment, and on to enjoying the next. Well-established resilience, over time, may become the difference between having some troubling mental health episode or meltdown, and simply acknowledging a difficult experience, dealing with it, and moving on with things calmly. I don’t know about you, but that sounds pretty good to me.
…So I practice…
Sometimes, I fall short of my commitment to one practice or another, but that’s also why I see such things as practices in the first place, instead of tasks to be checked off as completed, or skills to be mastered. Mastery is inconsequential. Practice is ongoing. It is a doing that doesn’t really finish. Each practice with real world value in my lived experience becomes a lifestyle change, over time. Each practice becomes part of my routine, and part of who I am. The result? I am more resilient. It becomes a character trait, and in that regard, it also becomes easier to maintain. Such results don’t mean no practice is required, just that the effort and will involved in the practice itself is greatly reduced. Sometimes, though, I still find myself not practicing some practice or other, through circumstances or forgetting. I’m human.
… I just begin again, and get back to practicing…
The rain stops, but it’s not yet daylight, and I’m not in a hurry. There’s no need to rush my walk, or hurry home to barge in on my beloved’s quiet time over his coffee first thing. I sit quietly a little longer. Daybreak soon, and I’ll walk the short loop, and watch the sunrise – then, I’ll begin again.
The days have been sort of tumbling by in a blur. Some days I am so thoroughly exhausted by day’s end, I fall into bed feeling spent, and sleep overtakes me quickly. Other days, I make it to the end with enough left in the tank to prepare a pleasant meal, and even to enjoy it, and clean up afterwards. Regardless, and seemingly without any direct connection to my relative state of fatigue, I’m looking back on this blur of days and nights. The feeling of constantly scrambling to gain traction on a slick floor, or of treading water in the dark, describes it best, I guess.
I sigh to myself as I walk this trail in the darkness. Walking in the dark isn’t my preference, but it’s the time I have for it. Not walking isn’t an acceptable option (for me, in my opinion). There’s a metaphor in that, or perhaps a lesson.
I get to my halfway point before daybreak. No surprise there; I got an early start. My left hip aches, and it feels like arthritis pain. I frown to myself. I guess it could be worse. I distract myself , to avoid dwelling on pain. It isn’t helpful (at all) to let my pain occupy my mental space for long. Giving it that much attention tends to make it feel worse. I breathe, exhale, and relax, and redirect my attention to the strangely pink night sky. The clouds are illuminated by the community below, in the distance… but why pink? I think about it pointlessly awhile longer. A snapshot taken with my cellphone does not capture what my eyes think they see. There’s probably something worth reflecting upon in that experience, too.
…The pain I’m in persists in distracting me. I persist in letting that go…
I can’t make myself look at the news today. It’s not worth the stress to be informed about the latest new way our government has found to cause needless suffering, or to find out how else government insiders and Trump cronies are picking our pockets to fill their own bank accounts. I don’t need to be told that another billionaire grifter or criminal has been pardoned; this is the era we are living in. It’s pretty fucking horrible. Reading more details about the same old shit doesn’t make it easier to accept – and not reading about it doesn’t stop the terrible degradation of our democracy, as it spirals into authoritarianism. If you have the means, it’s probably a good time to get out, and go somewhere safer.
I sigh again, and realize I was holding my breath – or at least not breathing. I sit for a few minutes, just breathing, and focused on my breath. It is too easy to let shit get to me, to let the stress and anxiety seep into my consciousness and wreck my mood. I inhale the mild autumn air, filling my lungs with it. I exhale, and let the stress leave my body along with my breath. No, it’s not “easy”, but it is a practice that can be practiced, and with practice it becomes easier over time. After some while, it becomes really effective. (Think in terms of months and years of practice, though, not minutes.)
I meditate, watching the treeline for the first hint of daybreak. I breathe, exhale, and relax, holding myself in this present moment. At least for now, there’s just this timeless moment of presence. I’m okay with that, it’s a pleasant moment, and for now I feel easy, and my heart is light.
Over the past 12 years of this blog, I’ve come so very far! I’m grateful. I’m not certain I could have endured the world as it is, where I was with myself, then. I was thoroughly mired in chaos and damage, and there was a long journey ahead of me before that would change in a notable way. I took it in steps, though, and I just kept at it, practicing practices, and walking my own path. I’ve learned some things along the way, about life, about love, and about finding meaning and a life worth living. It has been very much worth it.
So, no doom scrolling this morning, no news feed, just a woman, a trail, and a moment of pleasant solitude before dawn on an autumn Friday morning. Later, there is work to do, and there are errands to run. I’ll do my best with all of that, and that will have to be enough. In the meantime, I’ll enjoy the moment I’m in. Later, I’ll begin again.
I’m grateful for this pleasant moment, here, now… It’s enough.
I walked through the early morning darkness alone with my thoughts. It’s a chilly autumn morning, and I’m glad I wore a heavy sweater. I am thinking about a recent demonstration that I found to illustrate a lasting concern I’ve had for awhile now. I’m not alone with this, a lot of people are concerned, though little is likely to be done.
…No, I don’t mean the wildly popular, well-attended, nationwide No Kings demonstrations over the weekend. Powerfully illustrative, no doubt, but not the thing on my mind. This other is… bigger. Deeper. Impacts more of the global society of humanity, and may be a warning of worse to come – things we’re not prepared for.
From Downdetector, around midmorning Pacific time.
I’m thinking about the AWS outage, yesterday. So many people and businesses now store data on, use services hosted by, or route traffic through AWS that the outage (which lasted many hours and disrupted many businesses and financial institutions) ground business to a halt in many places. A broad variety of services stopped operating. Companies whose support teams use browser-based digital communication tools suddenly couldn’t support the customer inquiries that were queuing up. Teams and individuals couldn’t get work done. Frustrated consumers unaware that this or that business now exclusively uses AWS for hosting and data storage became unable to function in the 21st century world of online everything.
Pretty wild that in such circumstances people so easily find themselves halted. Really? Do something else. Something real. Read a book. Go for a walk. Get some chores done. Leave the chaos to the engineers and devs who got this hot potato dropped into their laps in the wee hours, and get on with your actual life, damn. “Shit’s down, bitches! Let’s go outside.”
I laugh now, but I’m also concerned. Don’t we all have more to do in the real spaces of the actual physical world than anything online? Aren’t the precious few mortal moments we have in these finite lives worth more attention from us? Do we really “need” an online app to meditate? To read? To enjoy a coffee with a friend? To walk a lovely trail on an autumn morning? We are, perhaps, overly dependent on digital bullshit.
Before dawn, darkness and distant light.
I walked with my thoughts, and took a seat in the darkness, shortly before daybreak, to write and meditate. Nice morning. I’m not so exhausted, today. I definitely needed some rest, and it was a good choice to go to bed early last night. I woke ahead of my alarm this morning to the soft sound of my Traveling Partner calling out to me, “Baby?”, as if checking whether I was awake, or trying to get my attention. The house was dark and quiet and there was no sign my beloved was actually awake, at all. Probably just an “exploding head” sort of dream, although of a very gentle sort. Not uncommon, for me. These no longer cause me any stress; it’s just a dream.
Being awake, I got up and started the day, and here I am.
I breathe, exhale, and relax. Life. The autumn air is chilly and fresh. There is a mist clinging to the ground in the low places. The world is quiet, at least right here. Right here, now, I am indifferent to whether any given tech platform or app works, and I don’t much care about the clown show of American politics. I’m just a woman on a trail, on an autumn morning before sunrise. It is an experience that needs no app, and no connectivity. Fine by me. 😂
… What would you do if it all crashed, and didn’t come back? If you lost the Internet, could you still reach the people who truly matter to you? Would you get enough information about the goings on in your world to get by and live well? Would you be able to continue to do the job you do now, or would it suddenly be of no use or consequence at all? Would you easily entertain yourself with conversation, books on paper, jam sessions with neighbors, and impromptu block parties, or would you find yourself stalled, bored, and unable to function? Are you wholly dependent on a tech toy that became a tool, and is now a crutch? Who are you without your digital profile?
I sit here feeling okay, myself. My Dad didn’t have much trust in computer systems, software, and “helpful” technology. He taught us to fish, to hunt, to garden, to raise small livestock and make use of the resulting resources. He handed down recipes, and skills. He taught us a lot of useful things, long before the Internet was a convenience or a concern. I’m grateful. The Army taught me more. Life taught me still more after that. I mostly don’t care when or whether the Internet or some particular app or platform is down. I’ve got books. 😂
A frown passes over my face with a chill breeze. Life would be hard without shelter. Without power, heat, and potable water… disasters come in a lot of sizes. It could have been worse than an AWS outage, for sure. I think about Gaza, and Ukraine. It could be so much worse. Genocide. Warfare. Bombs. Earthquakes. Disease outbreaks. Disaster can strike anywhere, and takes many forms. Am I prepared? Are you?
I sigh to myself. Human primates make so much shit more complicated than it has to be… mostly over greed, or seeking power. Gross. Do better, humanity, your survival probably depends on it.
Daybreak comes, and I get to my feet. It’s time to begin again. I’ve got this trail ahead of me, and a destination in mind. All that remains is to begin.
Evening Light 