irony

My youngest son and I have been coloring a large poster together (see our work!). My oldest son looked at it and said:
"That's ironic. Cut down a tree to make a poster that says 'Save the Rainforest'."
Isn't that ironic? Good point...

Snowed in or out as it were....

So true:
Remarked to me by my nine year old son today upon our first big snow storm -
"Snow sure wouldn't be such a treat if you lived in Alaska. And recess would really suck because I bet they wouldn't let you even throw a snowball. You'd probably be lucky if you got to build a snowman. It's pretty great for us though, huh, mom?"

Pretty good perspective...

Warm Weather Friends

Last week the weather was incredibly warm here in Washington DC. It seemed to be that way across the nation. In a matter of days, we went from 7 degrees to almost 70 degrees.

My running partner and I were out one morning and she said, "Listen. It's a bird - a sign of spring." It really did sound like spring, and with the warmer weather, even at 5:30 in the morning, it felt like spring.

I said, "Yeah, it's just a tease though. I can't really enjoy it because I know it's not going to stick around."

"I don't know. I think of it more as a respite. We have 7 more weeks of winter regardless - might as well get a break to help us get through the rest of it," she said.

Hmmm.....a respite, not a tease. I think she's on to something. Enjoy the moment. Take the gift that offered. I consider myself a "half-glass full" kind of person, but in that moment I realized I was wishing parts of my life away just because they are filled with darker, colder days. And - when I was given the respite, the chance to bask in a little warmth, I wouldn't even take it in because I knew it wouldn't last.

I've had some darker days, some days that I wish had never happened. I think we all have. I've also seen some amazing things come out of the darkness and cold. Do I wish some of those harsh winds hadn't blown into my life? Yes. Have I seen beautiful gifts of warmth and song come about? Yes. Is there a certain sweetness to the smell of spring in the very midst of death? I think so.

You know, the cold weather's back. The respite is over. But I have this new perspective. The twist of it all is: having had the warmth, having had the break, having had the brief encounter with tranquility and birds singing, I know it'll be back again. And that, that promise of good things to return is something to hold onto. It's not a tease of something you can't have for good, but a promise of what is always around the bend.

Green Beans

The other day I bought a new snack at Trader Joe's...green beans. Now, these are not your regular, run-of-the-mill green beans. They are crunchy and salty and very tasty, did I mention they are fried in canola oil. So, essentially, they are a potato chip made out of a green bean. I sort of fooled myself into thinking it's healthy, it's a green bean. But seriously, with 7% of the daily value of fat and salt, how healthy can they still be? They were at one time good for me, but then, something went terribly wrong (okay, yes, I am being a little dramatic)....but why is it we go and mess with things which are perfectly good as they are? A green bean is just a little example, but we all have our own personal and global examples of when we try to "fix" or "improve" something and it ends up either becoming something unhealthy or just worse than it was. And sometimes, I don't even think we realize we are doing it. Often our intentions are good. I guess what the green beans made me think about is how much time we spend altering and fixing and improving things, rather than appreciating and accepting and listening. Just a thought.



This is not me (way too profound for anything I would write), but Dante: "When he had slowed the hectic pace that mars the dignity of any action, my mind, at first withdrawn into itself, now eagerly took in the wider landscape."



So, what do I do about the green beans? Love 'em or toss 'em? It's a little quandary I'm in...because I am not really sure I can make a stand on a green bean, but they could cause me to slow down and take in the bigger picture.