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Category: perspective

Flower Power

Flower Power

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Saturday I impulsively bought two hyacinths at the grocery store. They were tidy little plants then, barely open at all. But even on the short drive home they filled the car with their scent. Now they’re doing the same in the house.

I thought they would make a pretty Easter centerpiece, but they’re opening so fast that I may have to buy another arrangement before Sunday.

The point is, they are blooming now, I tell myself. So enjoy them. Savor the blooming and the bending. Prop up the heaviest flowers with skewer sticks so they stay upright. And then … inhale deeply.

A Moment

A Moment

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Yesterday before my own evening walk, I took Copper for a short stroll. It was warm and breezy. We did our usual, torn-doggie-ACL-shortened amble. Before heading home we walked into the Morrison’s yard so I could pick up a throwaway paper that was left there.

And then, without warning, I had a moment. The wind was lifting pink blossom petals from the weeping cherry and swirling them around in a kind of pink snow. Two strings of wind chimes were rattling in a disjointed harmony. Copper, who can be cantankerous, was being sweet. I was aware of the softness of his fur and his big brown eyes.

I was overcome suddenly with a feeling of fulfillment, a realization that this is what it’s all about: walking the dog at the end of a long day, dinner still to get, labors ahead of and behind me — but in this moment free to breathe deeply, to listen and to think.

Downton Sandwich

Downton Sandwich

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This winter I’ve continued my binge-watching spree, plunging back into Downton Abbey after catching up on Victoria. Time permitting, I head down to the basement beanbag chair after dinner for 45 to 60 minutes of immersion in another world.

Add in elliptical-machine morning-exercise sessions, which require that one watch something to make the minutes pass more quickly, and my days lately have become what I’ve come to think of as a “Downton sandwich”: Twenty minutes of Lord and Lady Grantham in the morning and 50 minutes of Lord and Lady Grantham in the evening.

In between I must dress myself, drive my own car to Metro, commute on an overcrowded train with people of all classes, work a long day, then come home to make my own dinner. Oh, the indignity! I’m sure the Dowager Countess Violet Grantham (Dame Maggie Smith) would say something to buck me up, something like, “Don’t be defeatist, dear. It is very middle-class,” one of her many splendid zingers.

Still, my “Downton sandwich” makes me think about the modern world that was shaking the estates of the rich and titled in post World War I Britain. Makes me compare my life with those of the people upstairs (and downstairs, too, but upstairs is more fun): Where is the ladies maid to do my hair every morning? Where is the cook to prepare me a scrumptious breakfast that will be brought to me in bed? Where is the butler to open the door and dispatch all those horrid telephone sales calls?

These service personnel are scattered to the four winds, I guess. They’ve become engineers and baristas, doctors and teachers. They’re living their own lives. Poor me: I’m left to fend for myself!

(Highclere Castle interior courtesy Culture Trip)

“Green Book” and More

“Green Book” and More

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Over the weekend, as Virginia’s governor struggled for his political survival, I went to see a movie about race relations in 1962. It was difficult to watch “Green Book” and not understand the intense reactions to Gov. Northam’s yearbook page, which contains a photograph he’s now denying depicted him, with one person in a KKK hood and another in black face.

Northam has been a good governor so far, a rare Democratic moderate willing to work across the aisle. He’s gotten excellent reviews from people of all races. Which is why we should not drive the man from office for this affront. We should judge him by the totality of his actions and not by one unfortunate offense, something which, if it occurred at all, would not have carried the same weight then that it does today.

What I took from “Green Book” was not just the necessity for change but also the need for forgiveness, for learning to see the world from another’s perspective. Both men — the African-American pianist and the Italian-American driver — came to see the hollowness and futility of their positions. Both men changed.

What’s happened now is that we have hardened into such rigid postures that we can’t change; we can’t see the world from other perspectives. There are certain boxes that, once ticked, result in total elimination.

If we keep this up, it will drive even the last good people from the pursuit of public office. We are reaping what we have sown.

(Photo: Wikipedia)

The Whoosh

The Whoosh

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For almost a year I’ve heard a whooshing sound in my right ear.  It didn’t bother me at first, but then I made the mistake of googling it. After that, I tried to ignore it. This worked for a while, especially when I was occupied by other worries. But as I approached the one-year mark I decided it might be wise to have it checked out.

“Ah,” said the doctor, “this kind of tinnitus can be caused by brain tumors and aneurysms and carotid artery blockages. You’ll need a CT scan … but no rush.”

I’d like to say he was kidding, but I don’t think he was. I made an appointment the next day, had a scan within the week — and heard yesterday that my tinnitus has a benign cause, thank God.

So now I can write about the whoosh and how it has become a companion of sorts. It’s the sound of my heartbeat, amplified. It’s the rhythm of life. The whoosh is a constant biofeedback session. When I’m aware of it most, in quiet moments, I try to still myself to make my heart beat more slowly. It’s a constant reminder to take life easy — even though I seldom heed it.

I wouldn’t wish a whoosh on everyone. But in a strange way, I’ve come to count on mine.

Binge-Watching

Binge-Watching

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Yesterday I spoke with a colleague. We discussed the government shutdown and other matters. She wondered aloud why more people aren’t up in arms about what’s happening to our country. I posited an answer: binge watching.

Of the two 20-century dystopian novels most in vogue when I was growing up, Brave New World was most on the money. Not for a moment underestimating 1984‘s Big Brother or the surveillance under which we now live, I think our peril lies in our pleasures, in our need for entertainment.

Enter binge-watching. In the last week, as my body has been trudging through January 2019, my mind and heart are lodged in Victorian England as I binge-watch the PBS series “Victoria.”  It’s a relatively innocent pleasure as pleasures go—and don’t get me wrong: I love it! But  I’ve noticed it makes me care a little less about present-day reality.

Binge-watching a show is addictive. I’m absorbed in my show just as the denizens of Brave New World were absorbed by their walls. All I need now is a little soma.

(Photo: Courtesy PBS)

Gimme Shelter

Gimme Shelter

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As the snow fell Sunday I glanced out the window to see a little bird fluttering in the azalea bush behind the house. I didn’t see it clearly enough to note the type, but it was probably one of the many flooding the feeder these days, a chickadee or junco. (Look closely at the opening center left and you’ll see its little head and eye.)

What a small, quivering thing it was, preening and rustling in the brush. Seeing it there made me remember fairy stories about animal homes in thickets or under ground and how as a child I could imagine nothing more exciting than exploring tucked-away places like that.

Now I consider the goal that all living things have, which is survival, and how difficult it can be this time of year. There I stood in the warmth of my house, with its insulation and forced air heat and hot water flowing from the tap.

Yes, a part of me wants to beat in the breast of that bird, to be part of the living landscape. But I know enough of cold and ice to appreciate the comforts I have, the comforts I share with other creatures, as a matter of fact, including … two birds.

January Sky

January Sky

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It’s a good time of year to look up. I snapped this shot just before getting on Metro yesterday. It was later than I would like to have been leaving, but it gave me the chance to see the sky on fire.

It was a quieter sky this morning, one mottled with clouds but striking in its own way.  I took this photograph while walking around the block at the Courthouse Metro Station, which it how I occupy myself when I’ve just missed the bus.

Two mornings, two cloudscapes, both ripe for the picking. All I needed to do was stop, point and shoot. But it can be hard even to take the time to do this.  How many other sky shots have I missed?

Revelations

Revelations

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In classical Greek it meant the manifestation of a deity to a worshipper. But now the word epiphany can mean other revelations, as well. Just as our society has become more secular, so too have our revelations. We can have epiphanies about our work, our families, our politics.

But to me, all epiphanies have a bit of the divine in them. And it is in part because of epiphanies, the aha moments that come from nowhere, that I believe in the divine.

Because one moment the world is pitiless plain—and the next it is lush mountains and valleys. What can explain the difference? No atoms or molecules, no assemblage of 1s and 0s.

It is wonder, plain and simple. It is waking inside the rainbow. It is the star, a light in the sky that leads us to the divine.

Slow Cooker

Slow Cooker

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Today it will be not turkey, ham or chicken …  but beef. Beef bourguignon, to be exact. An old crock pot recipe, a meal started in the wee hours to be served 10 hours later.
I wish there were a slow cooker setting for life, a way to slice and dice early, set the dial on “low” and let simmer all the thoughts, happenings, talks, tears and laughter of a year. 
Because that’s what I’m wanting now. To digest what has happened. 
Every year is like that,
but this one…
more than others.