Archives for posts with tag: gratitude
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Making Changes

November 16, 2024 //
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I’m sipping the last of my now-mostly-cold coffee, after my morning walk, and before I head to breakfast with a friend I don’t see often. I’m thinking about life and love and things of that sort. I’m thinking over conversations with my Traveling Partner, and our earnest mutual commitment to the life we share and the love we feel for each other.

… I’m thinking about how much actual work it is to create the life we want to enjoy with each other, and how much work it also takes to create a world worth living in…

What are you actually doing to “be the change”? What kind of experience of community and family do you want to enjoy? What are you doing to make that a reality? Yes, you. I sit with these questions myself. They seem worth answering.

When people decry “woke” culture, what are they actually objecting to? Because it’s become some kind of buzzword or verbal shortcut, I think examining the intention behind it sometimes gets overlooked. Isn’t racial equality a good thing? Isn’t gender equality a good thing? Don’t we want everyone to have access to good healthcare regardless of the neighborhood they live in, the color of their skin, their gender, or religion? Of what possible relevance is a person’s sexual preference or marital status when they are seeking healthcare, housing, or a seat in a restaurant? When people shout down “being woke”, are they making a frank admission that they are comfortable with a very non-equal society, of the sort that explicitly disadvantages and “others” some people? Who gets to decide who is “in” and who is “out”?  It’s on my mind. Maybe for obvious reasons (as we all watch the clown car of the new administration fill up, in the background of our lives).

I sigh and bring my thoughts back to matters closer to home. How do I do my own humble best to be a good partner? A good friend? A good community member? I definitely have room to grow. It’s never too late to get a little closer to being the person I most want to be. There’s a lot to consider and probably a few good opportunities to make changes in how I approach conflict resolution, boundary setting, and communication. I’m no saint. I’m often in tremendous pain, more than I’m inclined to complain about. Sometimes I’m just fucking exhausted, with much still left to do that simply has to get done. “Doing my best” is all I can do, and realistically sometimes it doesn’t get everything done – or done in a way that I could celebrate. I’m very human. Prone to temper and moments of irritability. My cPTSD is pretty well-managed, but it’s still lurking in the background. My brain injury is many years (decades) behind me, but I’ve got some brain damage that I still have to work around day-to-day. “My best” has limitations, and my results vary. How do I do more, better?

I sit with my thoughts. Self-reflection is a useful tool. Practicing self-care improves my chances to be the best version of myself. Practicing gratitude, non-attachment, and loving kindness help me create and maintain a resilient and positive mindset. I breathe, exhale, and relax. This human life is quite an interesting journey. So many verbs. So much work to do.

I watch daybreak become a new day. I’m fortunate to have this moment, and so many opportunities to grow toward being the person I most want to be. Feels like a good time to begin again.

What will you do with your moment? Where does your path lead?
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Categories Allegories, Anxiety, autumn, Brain Injury, breathe, forgiveness, gratitude, health, Healthy Living, Love, meditation, Metaphors, Mindfulness, Moments, Oregon Trails, pain, Perspective, Post Traumatic Stress, Practices, Relationships, solo hiking, The Art of Being, The Big 5, women, Words

Good Fortune and Gratitude

November 13, 2024 //
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Sometimes we get lucky. It’s that simple. This morning I was tremendously fortunate. Lucky. Circumstances were in my favor. I’m sitting with my gratitude, because it could have gone quite differently.

The unseen pickup truck that pulled out from a side street, speeding to cross the busy state highway during a rainy morning rush hour was close – so close. I had only seconds of reaction time, not enough for actual decision making, and barely enough to respond. I took my foot off the gas pedal, swerved right, around and behind the truck, into the street he turned out from, his lights off in the darkness, and then I turned back onto the highway on the other side as he pulled away. It was one smooth motion, no harm done, although I was startled and briefly angry with the other driver’s poor decision making on a rainy morning. No commute is worth dying for.

I drove on to the trailhead as the rain beat down on the car, and the traffic churned up the water on the road into a fine dense mist. I could have been terribly injured or worse this morning. I wasn’t. I breathe, exhale, and relax. I’m grateful for my good fortune. I reflect on my good fortune as I lace up my boots. The rain has slowed to a drizzle and although it’s wet and dark, I’ll manage to get a walk before work. Truly, I am fortunate.

I breathe the rain-fresh autumn air and smile, as I step onto the trail. I am grateful for the new day, and the chance to begin again.

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Categories Allegories, Anxiety, autumn, breathe, Free Will, gratitude, meditation, Metaphors, Mindfulness, Moments, Perspective, Post Traumatic Stress, The Art of Being

Giving Thanks and Celebrating

November 7, 2024 //
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In spite of an upsetting (for many) election, I am giving thanks, feeling grateful, and preparing to celebrate. The holiday season is approaching. In my house that kicks off with Thanksgiving, which isn’t about pilgrims, indigenous people, or genocide – it’s about feasting and gratitude. It’s an opportunity to sit down as a family, enjoy a great meal, and appreciate how fortunate we are to have all that we do. Then…on to Giftmas (and my Traveling Partner’s birthday in between).

The wintry weather I’ve come to expect this time of year is beginning to settle in. This morning was just at the freezing point, and there was frost on the ground and a thin layer of ice on my windshield. I wore a heavy sweater and a fleece, and wrapped a scarf around my neck before setting off down the trail in the pre-dawn darkness, a circle of light bobbing ahead of me as I walked. I don’t prefer to walk with a headlamp, but I wouldn’t be walking in the darkness without it, and I’m grateful to have it. The morning is cold and quiet. I laugh at myself; I bet I could have slept in this morning.

It took months to pick out a birthday present for my Traveling Partner this year, and it won’t be a surprise. Machinery for the shop can’t generally be a surprise, it’s specialized and he’s the one who understands what he really wants and needs. It arrives today – I’m excited about it (so is he). Neither of us find it awkward or problematic that it is arriving weeks ahead of his actual birthday. lol The timing doesn’t feel particularly relevant. I like the idea that he may actually be in the shop using it on his birthday. His recovery finally seems to be progressing in a way that is apparent and visible. As I think about that a tremendous wave of gratitude and relief washes over me. I’ve been consumed with worry and dread for much of the year. If I get nothing for Giftmas but the certainty that he’s “going to be okay”, it would be enough, and feel like a lavish holiday.

I’ve got a long weekend ahead, then a couple weeks later (the weekend before Thanksgiving) a short getaway to the coast to paint, then the long Thanksgiving weekend, which my employer gives us as a holiday. It’s nice. It’s been a good year for getting enough time off (although much of it was spent on caregiving, quite a lot was healthy restful downtime). I breathe, exhale, and relax. I briefly wonder what next year might hold before I let that go. No point becoming invested in some future outcome that is not yet.

I walk the trail thinking about life, love, and art. It’s a season for celebration and gratitude, sure, but also for getting things done that have lingered too long on my to do list. I think about the garden, abandoned in the summer as my partner needed more and more caregiving support and time in a day became insufficient to do everything; it would benefit from a quick clean up and preparation for the Spring that isn’t even on my mind yet. The hot tub had been shut down and drained in the late Spring so that my partner could more easily sleep. It could be refilled and made ready for winter use. I walk and think about finite time and energy, and how best to make use of it.

Life and circumstances aren’t always what I want them to be, but I’m grateful for the good life I have, and the opportunities and choices my circumstances put in front of me. I walk on, and get ready to begin again.

I see daybreak on the horizon…

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Categories Allegories, art and the artist, autumn, Brain Injury, breathe, forgiveness, Free Will, gardening, gratitude, health, Healthy Living, Love, meditation, Metaphors, Mindfulness, Moments, Oregon Trails, Perspective, Post Traumatic Stress, Practices, Relationships, solo hiking, The Art of Being

Places I’ve Been

November 4, 2024 //
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Memory is a funny thing. Mine can be a little hit or miss (probably a consequence of head trauma and brain damage). Visceral detailed memories of places, events, and people are often triggered by qualities of light, or some scent on a breeze, or some little thing that seems entirely unrelated, until the memory unfolds to the point at which the dots are connected. Sometimes troubling, often delightful, the memory pours forth and I have a new opportunity to remember and reflect.

… I take a lot of notes, keep a careful calendar, and for many years (decades) kept an exceedingly detailed journal, just to cope with my shitty memory…

Yesterday, as I sat with a coffee at a local cafe, the recollection of a sidewalk cafe on a sunny morning in Paris surfaced. I sat enjoying the recollection for a pleasant while.

A couple days ago, as I walked through the small local library, the smell of books mingled with the librarian’s fragrance, and the late morning light filling the room called to mind some very different long ago place – a visit to the Dom Cathedral in Augsburg, Germany, which I visited several times as a young soldier.

These aren’t particularly rare memories. Hell, I doubt they are even unique to my own experience, considering how popular these places and experiences are. I just happen to have them (also). Other days, other recollections. I sometimes find myself thinking I should write them down,  otherwise, when I go, they go with me…

… But I’m not certain they even “matter”, really, they’re simply a small part of who I am…

I sit quietly with my coffee letting the recollections flow by. Recent memories like sharing dinner last night with my Traveling Partner and the Anxious Adventurer. Chili – it was good. More distant memories, too, like elaborate Thanksgiving dinners at Grandmother and Grandfather’s house, which were a really big deal with the cousins from Texas and the Dakotas coming for the holiday. The Christmas Market in Augsburg. Softcrab sandwiches at the harbor in Annapolis. Long walks in the mountain foothills near Grants Pass, Oregon. Orienteering with my unit at Ft AP Hill in the summertime. Hunting with my Dad on cold autumn mornings. The war. My first paycheck.The first time my now-Traveling-Partner ever touched me. That afternoon he asked me if I wanted to get married.

…So many memories make up a lifetime…

I sip my coffee grateful for my memories. I put on my boots and grab my cane to go make another before the work day begins.

… Isn’t it time to begin again?

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Categories 2024 Election, Allegories, autumn, Brain Injury, breathe, Free Will, gratitude, health, inspiration, Love, meditation, Metaphors, Mindfulness, Moments, Oregon Trails, Perspective, Post Traumatic Stress, Practices, Sleepless Nights, The Art of Being, War and News of War

This Isn’t About That

November 2, 2024 //
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I’m sitting in the cold. It’s a foggy autumn morning early in November. I’m perched on a fence rail, not especially comfortable, but not uncomfortable enough to be worth complaining about or changing. It’s still dark. When I sat down I turned off my headlamp. I don’t really prefer walking with a headlamp; the spooky shadows in the periphery of my narrow view are sometimes unsettling.  I can hear the traffic on the nearby highway, although there isn’t much of it, and the predawn darkness is so quiet, my tinnitus ends up being the loudest thing I hear. I sneeze unexpectedly, and somewhere nearby I am answered by the “gronk!” of a goose on the marsh, as if telling me to “keep it down”. It’s early. It’s quiet. The moment is mine.

The clouds overhead leave room for stars to peek through. I sit with my thoughts awhile. A raccoon and her youngsters walk past me, on the other side of the trail. She sees me, but doesn’t seem concerned or even particularly interested. She clearly has places to go. I sit quietly, watching, breathing, listening. I see the first hints of daybreak on the eastern horizon, a jagged sliver of sky between strips of cloud.

…How am I in this much pain??…

I sigh to myself. I meditate in the cold and watch the sky slowly lighten as dawn approaches. I think my mortal thoughts. Life is too brief, I find myself thinking. By the time we mostly figure out the stuff that matters most to us individually, we’re nearing the end of our precious (and limited) mortal lifetime. Seems a bit unfair somehow. I think about my Granny, my Mother, Grandmother Doris, Meemom, my Dear Friend, my girlfriend T, Laura-the-actress, other women in my life, gone now. What did they leave unfinished? What has been lost to time and mortality, gone forever because what isn’t shared may never be known? I think about art, and paintings yet to be painted, inspiration yet to be acted upon, and how irksome this finite mortal lifetime can seem. There’s so much to do, and to feel, and to experience! Where will I find the time?

The trail has slowly become a slightly paler smudge of darkness between meadow and marsh. I don’t feel like turning my headlamp on, and I’m not in a hurry. I have the moment to myself. I decide to sit awhile longer before I head back up the trail to begin again.

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Categories Allegories, art and the artist, autumn, Brain Injury, breathe, forgiveness, Free Will, gratitude, health, Healthy Living, inspiration, Love, meditation, Metaphors, Mindfulness, Moments, Oregon Trails, pain, Perspective, Post Traumatic Stress, Practices, Relationships, solo hiking, The Art of Being, women
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