God paints the world
Gentle touches
Full strokes
Vivid blends
Vibrant colours give life
By the path grows
Nature’s tool.
One Lovely Blog Award
David nominated me for the One Lovely Blog Award.
Thank you to David at Lead. Learn. Live for acknowledging my blog. I enjoy his sense of humour and advice he shares.
This morning, when I got in the car The Sound of Sunshine was playing (Michael Franti is a wonderful singer/songwriter) and I felt energized. Just like a good song, I receive a gift each day from blogs I follow.
Here are seven facts about me.
(1) I’m a terrible swimmer (I stole this from David. Swimming is an alternative to drowning for me).
(2) My favourite breakfast as a hockey player was warm beer and cold pizza.
(3) I am a goalie in hockey which explains some of my quirky behaviour.
(4) I watch Simpson reruns and learn something new each time.
(5) Teaching is my second career.
(6) I was a banker in my first career.
(7) Kathy and I met in Prince George BC, but were born in Alberta. We moved to find each other.
I mentioned I struggle with this rule on an earlier post. I follow amazing blogs and feel I am leaving someone out. I nominate the following for One Lovely Blog Award.
- Gary at Gary Runn (spirituality and leadership)
- Matilda at Arts of Matilda (crazy artist)
- Monikah at The Life of Photos (photographer who lives life fully)
- Sean at Sometimes Nothing (a writer rekindling passion for writing)
- Justin at Walk and Talk (young student sharing a world of pictures)
- Susan at Writing Glimmers (writer, student, parent)
- Kolby at Kolby Skidmore/Photography (innovative young photographer)
- William at Stadler Style (writer sharing ideas)
- Ms. Hyland at Ordinary Days (teacher, student sharing her journey)
- Merlin atMerlin Spielen (poetry and photography)
To accept the award, the rules are:
- Link back to the person who nominated you
- Post the award image to your page. (Here’s the Link)
- Tell seven facts about yourself
- Nominate 10 other blogs
- Let them know they are nominated
Safe Haven
Kathy went to the farm yesterday and walked in from the road. Although it is overgrown, it is full of memories. One can think of the farmhouse as uninhabited, but visitors still abound. We sat at the kitchen table many mornings, watched the barnyard, and viewed assorted wildlife that found safe haven. Yesterday, this deer visited while Kathy visited and stirred memories.
The farm is in west-central Alberta and on clear days (yesterday was not) you can see the Rockies in the distance at various points on the drive out.
Sense serenity
Surrounded
By nature and memories.
Some visible
Others invisible
Each appears.
A home for being
A work place
A learning place.
A deer poses
Momentarily safe,
Human memories stir.
Calm Within the Turbulence
I awake each morning
Smile into the day
Soak in each moment.
Pause
Find calm
Let calm find me
Amidst the turbulence.
Transform
Since arriving home, it has been a slow process. I resist the routine or rut I was in when we left for Spokane. It is hard work, but one thing I noted today, I am not alone in my travails. It seems universal and I am glad for company. As I went through blogs I recognized transformation is a patient process, a slow process, and a personally purposeful process. I looked at the pictures we took on our travels and for all of nature’s ability to change rapidly, most change is slow and transformational.
I wait
Often impatient
Desire for something better
Lean into my steps
Transform
Slow, patient, with purpose
Without plan
An invisible blueprint.
Journey
With one’s self
Often with companions
Break bread together.
Trust
Moments of devotion
To each another
Change together.
Embrace
No need to explain
Words sometimes fail
A smile assures.
Turn back
A worn path emerges
Look ahead
Share paths.
Sabbath and Haiku Haven
I am unsure whether I will be back today. We are sorting out our home Internet issues. We think the router blew up in a recent storm. This was good, because it was an unplanned daily Sabbath for me.
On a routine morning drive, I observed the sun rising in my rear view mirror with the moon still visible. It was early in the school year and I had just returned from BC. I began that morning’s haiku class with poems which described phenomena I took for granted most days. I try to emphasize for students poetry is the routinely observed. Poetry lifts it to the extraordinary nature of things often taken for granted. I try model this through poetry chosen and shared i.e. Pablo Neruda and Mary Oliver and I write poetry on what I observe in life.
Majestically,
Touching endless sky above
Roots firmly grounded.
Greeting and adieu
Sun and moon share the one sky
Guide our daily drive.
The Woodcarver
When I walk in nature and see the panoramic creation, I recall this is a gift. Each day I am present and stop to meet what is there, is a day I move beyond my ego. I am grateful for simply being . It is the greatest gift.
The Woodcarver
Khing, the master carver, made a bell stand
Of precious wood. When it was finished,
All who saw it were astounded. They said it must be
The work of spirits.
The Prince of Lu said to the master carver:
“What is your secret?”
***
Khing replied: “I am only a workman:
I have no secret. There is only this:
When I began to think about the work you commanded
I guarded my spirit, did not expend it
On trifles, that were not to the point.
I fasted in order to set
My heart at rest.
***
After three days fasting,
I had forgotten gain and success.
After five days
I had forgotten praise or criticism.
After seven days
I had forgotten my body
With all its limbs.
***
“By this time all thought of your Highness
And of the court had faded away.
All that might distract me from the work
Had vanished.
I was collected in the single thought
Of the bell stand.
***
“Then I went to the forest
To see the trees in their own natural state.
When the right tree appeared before my eyes,
The bell stand it also appeared in it, clearly, beyond doubt.
All I had to do was to put forth my hand
And begin.
***
“If I had not met this particular tree
There would have been
No bell stand at all.
“What happened?
My own collected thought
Encountered the hidden potential in the wood;
From this live encounter came the work.
Which you ascribe to the spirits.”
***
Palmer, P. J. (2004). A hidden wholeness: The journey toward an undivided life. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass.
Parker Palmer attributed his source as The Way of Chuang Tzu by Thomas Merton and published by The Abbey of Gethsemani in 1965.
Metamorphosis
I struggled today. Starbucks’ Internet was intermittent and my day was cleaved in half with an appointment. I reflected on what my blogging and there has been a substantial change in the tone and voice of the blogger. When I began, I was doing it for all the wrong reasons and was driven from ego. Transformation is about my self and not about what goes on outside me.
I influence the world and as Gandhi wisely said, “Be the change you want to see in the world” is important.
Change
Occupies an idle mind.
Denies, oppresses
Another self.
Transform
Inner terrain.
Who is this self?
What life does this self live?
Mature
Through life.
Define
the self who lives this life.
Emerge
from chrysalis each day.
Present
A thoughtful gift
Transform my self.
Reveal through selfless acts
Flourish beyond rhetoric
Beyond fad.
Journey with others
Appreciate
Valorize.
Driftwood’s Wisdom
Kathy took this picture while we walked along Waterton Lake’s beach. She thought it would inspire me. I wondered what might emerge. Last night, I scribbled ideas into my journal about wisdom and its sources. I enjoy and enjoyed listening to stories told by my parents, Kathy’s parents, our grandparents about life in past generations, and many others I come in contact with each day.
Flotsam on the shore
Washed up and unusable
Life’s wisdom wasted.
Polished piece of wood
Fine tuned by life’s travails
Reveals the wisdom.
Life within a Panorama
Kathy took these panoramic pictures the first day we drove to Waterton. I often wonder about making sense of life without a fuller view. It is the stepping back that might allow the ‘hole in the whole’ to fade and show a panoramic view of life. Even at that, the life’s complexity creates mystery of and allows the ‘holes to make sense in the whole.’
Life
Still shot
One image at a time
Parsed and fits my definition.
Life
A broad view
Weaves a web without design
Fuller, richer, yet indefinable.
Reflection
Quilts life whole
Bound together moment by moment
Paradox of ragged and seamless.
Shared
Without losing self
Bound together by our commonness
Adhere disparate parts into one.
ivonprefontaine
Teacher as Transformer 