Spiritual Journey Thursday: Words to fall back on

Karen is hosting this month, and has asked us to  

reflect on "words we fall back on" this Spiritual Journey Thursday.

Her post is here.

In difficult times, some like to say "This too shall pass."  I prefer the prayer of St Julian of Norwich, part of which is engraved on a spinner ring I bought when I had a lot of plates in the air at once:

"All shall be well, and all shall be well, and all manner of thing shall be well."

Those words give me hope, and remind me that all experience generally works out for the greater good, the Universe is on my side, "the arc of the moral universe is long, but it bends toward justice", as Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr so eloquently stated.  (Come to think of it, that quote is a great one to fall back on, too.)

Speaking of experience, I just revisited one of my favorite quotes, by Alfred, Lord Tennyson from the poem "Ulysses":

I am a part of all that I have met;

Yet all experience is an arch wherethro'

Gleams that untravell'd world whose margin fades

For ever and forever when I move.

How dull it is to pause, to make an end,

To rust unburnish'd, not to shine in use!

I used to just end the quote at "when I move."  But re-reading the stanza, the next two lines speak to me now more than ever--the need to continue moving, learning, reaching for that fading margin.

The actions from our experience lead to some kind of result.  This line from Kelly Barnhill's The Girl Who Drank the Moon will just not let me go:

"Consequences.  Everything was consequences." (page 370)

For now, these are the words I'll fall back on.  That no matter what I'm going through, it will turn out okay.  That it's important to keep going, being mindful that my actions have consequences that can steer my path for better or worse.

Thanks, Karen, for the thought-provoking prompt and the hope it has sparked in my heart.

 

SOLSC '23 Day 2: This old lady

I guess I didn't see it coming, but it's getting clearer year by year.

I am one of the "old ladies" on campus now.

How did this happen?  I started teaching at 21, a baby, really.  Unmarried and childless and still occasionally partying on the weekends.  Was that really so long ago?  I mean, there was the six years of teaching, then the six year hiatus when I finally decided to have those kids...and then the eleven years at the DAEP, and three back in resource, and those seven years behind the circulation desk in my first library, and now in the final few months of year three in this one....

I can't be that old, right?  But it hit me square in the face this year when I found out that one of my assistant principals is a year younger than my oldest child, and I know the principal isn't much older than that. So I started counting how many of my colleagues were most likely over 55...and I'm pretty sure we have less than ten. 

At one point, I looked around the room during a team meeting, and realized that I was the oldest one there, by far.

Me, the old lady on campus.  Can I really be considering retirement in six years...already?

 

SOLSC '23 Day 1: Straws

 

Today is the first day of the 2023 Slice of Life Story Challenge, in which we commit to writing a post daily as well as reading and commenting on the posts of other participants.  I hadn't planned on starting my month with a post on frustration...but it was an apropos end to February, and a nudge to roll up my sleeves and tackle March with a better attitude.  Writing can be so cathartic and therapeutic!  I hope everyone can relate to this poem.

I had a day

When straw

After straw

After straw

Landed 

On my hunched

Shoulders

Furrowed

My brow

Clipped 

My words

Stole

My joy

Even a

Target run

Couldn't stop

The volcanic

Eruption from

My mouth when

I got home

Profanity 

Expressing my

Frustration

I couldn't

Sit down

Until the lava

Slowed

The flames

Doused with

A cold libation

Once again 

Conscious that

Money spent and

A glass poured 

Won't keep the

Problems at

Bay for long

Best to arm myself

With a hot

Shower and a

Good night's

Sleep and

Get the

Pitchfork ready

For tomorrow.

Tuesday Slice: Fifty-six going on six

 

On a whim--or maybe in response to the cruddy first half of February--I bought myself a Pipsticks birthday countdown.  

I'm a paper planner person, and love using stickers in my planner for function and decoration.  These stickers are more the latter than the former.

I struggle with the concept of play in my personal life, but I think my use of stickers qualifies.  I definitely buy them to use, not collect, though I probably have more than I could exhaust in a decade.  (I tend to shop as playtime--a topic for another post.)

As of this today, I'm halfway through the countdown.  It's providing a spark of whimsical joy each morning, and retrospection too, as I fill in the short journaling prompts.  I'm cutting those out to save in a notebook as a little time capsule of fifty-six-going-on-fifty-seven.  Or six-going-on-seven, giggling over a new sheet of stickers each day. 

Tuesday Slice: Two weeks

 

An ice storm threatened central Texas 

on Monday, January 30th. 

This is how it impacted our lives for two weeks;

the work to recover continues.

It's Monday

early morning

blood draw

some masked

some not

(I am)

Work day

temperatures dropping

afterschool cancelled

home office

online meetings

Now Tuesday

Ice starts

husband works

no school

work emails

texts sent

checking in

looking out

trees bending

hunkered down

It's Wednesday

Ice continues

husband home

no school

branches popping

power okay

(cautiously grateful)

warmer forecast

plans confirmed

loud noise

house shakes

open door

tree split

blocked porch

roof landing

plans cancelled

no internet

Overnight rain

couch sleep

damage worries

Thursday comes

no school

no work

more ice

insurance calls

power blinks

weather warms

roof okay

eaves ripped

gutter gone

no internet

help search

Now Friday

no school

no work

widespread damage

tree graveyard

power outages

(ours on)

find help

one fever

positive test

yard cleanup

couch sleep

It's Saturday

another fever

positive test

two sick

yard cleanup

texts sent

calls made

appointment made

couch sleep

Now Sunday

PCR test

tree clearing

all afternoon

large bill

tired bodies

tired minds

bed sleep

Monday comes

schools open

quarantine set

no work

stay home

yard cleanup

log piles

insurance adjuster

check cut

internet back

curbside groceries

Tuesday, finally

rest day

sleep in

virtual doc

take meds

self care

fever leaving

Wednesday, Thursday

at home

fever gone

night cough

little rest

no taste

no smell

laundry done

Friday's here

at work

feel numb

drift through

end of

two weeks

still recovering

more cleanup

to come.

Tuesday Slice: Seed on the path

Then he told them many things in parables, saying: "A farmer went out to sow his seed.

As he was scattering the seed, some fell along the path, and the birds came and ate it up."

--Matthew13: 3-4

A bitterly cold

and icy day

prompting schools to close

I spend much 

of the morning staring

out my back window

at the birds

quickly devouring

a feeder full of seed

They need more, I think.

I fill up the seed container

put on my coat and

trudge outside

'round the house to

the backyard

frozen grass crunching underfoot

Pour seed into the feeder that

hangs where a swing once swayed

toss peanuts and corn on the

end of the green plastic slide, now 

covered in a frosty glaze

Heading back 'round to the

front of the house, I spy a

swallow, or is it a wren, hopping on

the roof

So I pour a bit of seed on

the path to the door, thinking

the bird will see, call its friends, and

fill their little bellies

But it's been hours now, and

I look through my peephole, finding

the seed still there, as

freezing rain lightly falls

I call my husband at his work to

warn him of the icy rain, and

tell him not to crush the

seed underfoot on

his way to the door.

Tuesday Slice: My first bujo

 

I have a mile-high stack of blank journals, culled from warehouse sales of big-name planner companies, stationery sites, and bookstores. When I get brave enough to fill the pages of one, it's almost always for penning gratitude lists, morning pages, or some sort of diary. 

I've never tried bullet journaling, though.  I've attended mini-workshops about it, even bought the book (that I haven't read yet).  I already use a pre-printed, customized planner from a favorite website, so why recreate the wheel?  The dot-grid notebooks in my stash call out to be filled...but with what?

Two things happened in the last two weeks to get me to dip my toes into "bujo"--my friend gifted me with a beautiful dot-grid journal, and I went to my first appointment with a new general practitioner.  I walked out of the latter with two pages of tasks to complete--appointments to make and stats to track.

Bingo.

I made a list of what I would put in the journal, starting with a table of contents for easy reference--the first four pages.  I numbered the next dozen or so, and dove in.  On page one are my notes and to-do list from the doctor's appointment.  Page two is a weight tracker with Sunday dates filled in.  Page three is a general list of doctor and lab appointments, with date and reason, for quick reference.

That's as far as I've gotten, but I've got other trackers to enter (blood pressure for one--the doc wants me to keep a diary of that for the next annual visit).  It will all go in there:  exercise, dental and eye appointments, lab and imaging results.  My own little medical record, embellished with stickers and paint pens and maybe even watercolors and fancy lettering, when I get brave enough to attempt those.

As I was perusing the internet for health-related trackers, I discovered that pre-printed journals for such already exist.  But where's the fun in that?