...Pressing on regardless.

Well what else is there anyway to do? life seems a strange and wonderful adaptive series of evidence for whatever one says it is.

It’s full of so much everything... composed of repeating patterns.

so many times to start over

so many times to invent something

so many minutes to plant something

so many chances to go back and apologize

so many opportunities to persist

so many invitations to swing out

so many signals to hold back

so many instances to jump in

so many cycles to come around

so many reasons to stay put.

Yesterday i saw the blueberry bush sign again. i was driving by down near Kathy’s house and there it was “fruit bushes for sale”. i thought all the years i wanted to add some blueberry bushes to a few we have. i thought of all the ones i saw. i thought of all the times i said “oh, not now. i will buy them later.”

i was thinking about how gorgeous big and tall the lilac bush Steve put in years ago... how long it took to bloom, to bloom well, to be so impressive. it takes awhile. plant it first. of all the plants, i thought the trees and the lilac bushes... were a major source of rich harvest.

How grateful i feel for who put in the three pear trees. there is a kind of grace that helps to plant what keeps on going. it’s a gift to the future.

I stopped the car. I purchased two blueberry bushes. Why wait?

It is not always so easy to see... which things done now will have value later... Which things need attention to get rooted and begin producing results not apparent now.

Pear trees, blueberry bushes... We didn’t plant those but we are thankful
someone did. this autumn we installed sixteen more blueberry bushes for a
future unlike the past.

everybody acts for what will happen next, imagination is always at work.

already, it’s a “given”... without a name, it lives as a shrug or a breathless joy... there’s a blue print of what’s thought. its called what’s expected... sometimes unconsciously we inherit it.

a blueprint is a pattern, a template to view from. what am i expecting? that is what will be seen without exception.

i know a lady who expects the worst. she gets it. she spends a good deal of time returning things she has purchased. she tells stories about how disappointed she was. it continues. she groans.

something is already expected... search the body to find signs of stress, or satisfaction... search the mind to find thoughts of woe, or wonder... compassion or criticism... what the plans really are, can be detected in the language of a speaker.

what’s expected can be an ingrained attitude, so deep it isn’t seen. it takes a group situation for it to surface... and then, only if someone’s awake to spot it. it could be a shrug when someone asks “are you going to buy that house?” it could be a glare if one is asked “are you going to get married this year?” it could be sarcasm that tips someone off that you don’t believe what you are intending will really happen.

What fits on a computer screen is a small part of everything that is... in the same way, a chinese paper place mat at your little lunch table does not tell everything about your dinner companion just because he is born in the year of the snake and you are a monkey. it’s more complex than that.

Sound bites are not the whole story. a bright beam tightly focused is exciting, but it leaves out more... than it shows.

avoidance of complexity leads away from wisdom which arrives after complexity. understanding demands mastering complexities and bringing it all back to something simple.

People push cute stories across e-mail addresses, as if it meant they were enlightened, but accumulating data does not imply understanding, wisdom or mastery.

We can all do everyone a favor and shut off the computer. we can turn on relationship. get in the garden. build a picnic table. pat the cat. make a meal with someone else. have a conversation. we can get personal, involved, and complex by overlapping lives more often.

I find life gets more fresh and cheerful when i leave my desk more often...

our stories are similar to the frog. who comes from tadpole, to fully functioning frog!

it looked impossible. it wasn’t.

we always had it in us... we always had it with us... but much more responsibility comes when we prosper. we have to become,

able to deal with it.

this is more than an overnight tale.

this is more than one insight.

This is more than one habit changed.

our stories include much of what we give up, we give up much, we give up all of what-we-didn’t want...

to have what was intended.

someone bought a restaurant in Vermont. she moved from a big city and became a country woman... there was something big to account for. to become a business-owner, one has to produce everyday. not just on the days when there’s “a job”, not just when she feels like it, but every day. a dream come true costs something.

someone got hired to manage a bookstore, becoming someone whose decisions affect a lot of others she holds an important post everyday. not just a few hours a week, now she’ll be in the limelight, everyday. she gives up the right to hide away everyday. she gives up comfort of lack. there’s more expectations... more is expected from the winner.

a dream come true
costs something.

someone moved into a big house and acres of property like they were wishing for. the huge lawn has to be mowed. the forest needs trees taken down. the house needs painting and fixing. the pond needs care. the roads need tending. gardens require care.

a dream come true
costs something.

sometimes people must have time to learn persistence and discipline before

a dream comes true so they can grow gracefully into required changing, without animosity. sometimes animosity is lived through as demands are met over and over.

we need something big and impossible to do so that we jump up challenged each morning.

give up the comfort of lack, find something impossible to do. begin work on it... when it costs something, don’t imagine there has been a mistake.

we were on our way.
it was a bright and cheerful day.
no problem animating happiness.
we felt happy.
zipedeeee dooo daahh... driving down Route 104.
hills and dales, river edge winding all the way...
music, sun, good company...
the road all to ourselves,
one of the best bonuses:
not a car ahead or behind.
it was easy to see,
the everywhere of the road.

there was a TURTLE, crossing the road.
he didn’t even see or know,
he’d be run over in a second’s time going across that road!
we saw him. there he was,
on a big road unknowing...
he couldn’t see the big picture.
he was in it.
we could see how little he was,
how precarious his route.

we stopped the car.
“it is not safe to leave TURTLE on the road.”, Steve said,
Steve went over to transport him
into the clear rushing river where he was headed.
Steve picked him up.
turtle was angry, frightened, wondering,
“How is this being done to me? i am being lifted.
i am out of control. What are they doing to me?
How could a bad thing like this,
happen to a good turtle like me.
i don’t deserve to be treated
in this disrespectful way.
how can i believe in God
if things like this happen?”
what a seeming upset...
for one with small perception.

little TURTLE had the privilege
of sudden transport.
he was helped beyond his wildest imaginings,
kicking, screaming and TERRORIZED BY HELP,
he tried to get away.
righteously angry was how he welcomed help
he didn’t know he needed.

help doesn’t always seem
as we’d like it.
lots of times it makes us angry, irate, righteous.
we run right away.

by the time Steve put TURTLE in the river,
TURTLE was totally insulted.
TURTLE left with a splash.
he had been “detained” against his will,
in his little TURTLE mind.
he spit back at Steve.
he huffed and left quickly,
leaving his helpers standing behind...
without any Thank you
for saving his life.

if you are planning
to be a help,
making a real difference,
don’t expect thanks…
and plan-on
being thought badly of…

what’s happening is getting more into what folks in Vermont do. . .
to get to survive through a 6-month winter, they GO INTO WINTER MODE.
turn down the wish to over manage everything. . .turn off the need to have everything like one thought it would be and take what comes instead. . .
turn around the direction, instead of outer. . .
make it inner, make it stay home, make it stay warm.

 i am glad of it. i am glad to learn this great skill, this advanced tactic, this simple truth how to be so at peace with self that being stopped is a little vacation,
rather than a big insult. after all, i know a woman in Boston who is a single Mom. she will go out in her driveway in high-heel boots and shovel it herself
,just so no one can keep her in. i am not kidding. her little kid watches from
the window. he’s not even two. he must think, “what is she doing?”,
or, “why do you have to move snow?”.

 it took me a very long time to be okay with the ways of winter. i am thankful
to learn how to lay back, let it go. . .lean to the side awhile, very grateful.
these skills will come in handy on a deathbed someday.