Wishes or Weeds?

"The power that comes with being a parent is both awesome and minute.

We get to be vanquishers of nightmares,

granters of wishes, and readers of minds,

with eyes in the back of our heads,

and kisses that heal.

We are also poor gods, petty dictators, and bad Santas.

We are helpless to keep the world, or even ourselves, from ever inflicting pain on our children.

Love isn't enough.

Instinct isn't enough.

Our good intentions aren't nearly enough.

The best we can hope for is that it all counts for something, when the jig is up, when someday comes around, when our children finally do understand, and see."

~Kyran Pittman, Planting Dandelions

Katie was wishing on dandelion fluff. I asked, presumptuously, what was she wishing for? 

More dandelions she said, as she blew the seeds skyward.

Imagine if your actions matched your wishes.

If your wishes matched what you most loved to do.

Might have more wishes come true... 

"A good parent owes it to a child to teach manners

as an interesting and useful skill,

and not as a subject that is invoked to condemn

whatever the child happens to be doing

when the adult is feeling irritable."

Judith Martin, "Miss Manners", in Guide to Raising Perfect Children

a gift from Michael O'Sheel

Miss Manners has looked into my soul. How did she know?

carry my heart

Anna Ellis Brown and Geoffrey Eden Grant, Day Two

i carry your heart with me(i carry it in

my heart)i am never without it(anywhere

i go you go,my dear;and whatever is done

by only me is your doing,my darling)

                                                      i fear

no fate(for you are my fate,my sweet)i want

no world(for beautiful you are my world,my true)

and it’s you are whatever a moon has always meant

and whatever a sun will always sing is you

here is the deepest secret nobody knows

(here is the root of the root and the bud of the bud

and the sky of the sky of a tree called life;which grows

higher than soul can hope or mind can hide)

and this is the wonder that's keeping the stars apart

i carry your heart(i carry it in my heart)

~e.e. cummings
from In Her Shoes, so shoot me, I didn't know it before

Four years ago, my daughter was born, out from under my heart and into this world. One year ago, my mother died. Her heart stopped beating and she slipped out from under my hands. Tonight, my oldest asked, "What happens to your heart when you die?" As we floated in the glowing pool, counting the stars, (Mama, how many did you get?), I tried to give an answer. But I hope she holds onto the glow, and the stars, and my heart, rather than my words.

Traveling Home

Blackeyed Susans in a Mason-Dixon Garden

"The 180,446 square miles of the Mid-Atlantic region comprise an enormous spectrum of natural delights."

National Audubon Society, Field Guide to the Mid-Atlantic States

Sailboat Race - St. Michael's, Maryland

"When we have 

accepted 

the worst, 

we have 

nothing more 

to lose. 

And that means 

we have 

everything 

to gain." 

Dale Carnegie, taken from Patches of Godlight by Jan Karon

Bridge at Callaway Gardens

If we have been pleased 

with LIFE, 

we should not be 

displeased 

with DEATH, 

since it comes from the hand 

of the same master. 

 

Michelangelo

Taken from All Shall Be Well by Jane Cavolina and Matthew Bunson

Monday Musing

"Go confidently in the direction of your dreams. 

Live the life you've imagined."

Henry David Thoreau, as quoted by, well, everyone.

This has long been one of my very favorite quotes. I have it copied out in innumerable places. It is emblazoned on paperweights, frames, and my favorite, a mirror. But somehow, sitting in my bedside table stack, hiding in The Happiness Project, by Gretchen Rubin, it changed meaning for me. (The change could not have been in me - the words must have been rearranged or something.)

I had concentrated on the NOUNS all this time. 

Not the verbs. 

THE VERBS. 

GO. LIVE. 

General direction, fuzzy imaginings. Those are not the key elements that need to be nailed down and codified in a five point plan. I had been waiting for those to come into clear focus before I started off. 

Silly, Jenny. Just GO. Action is always more powerful than location.