Being Here
All the small improbable joys
Journal: 22 May, 2024, evening.
“The industry of distraction makes us forget that we live in a universe.”
That’s from John O’Donohue’s “To Bless the Space Between Us, a Book of Blessings”, which I read over and over because I need blessings, and his are particularly and beautifully poignant.
Our universe contains Mimosa blossoms, so deliciously fragrant that our entire back yard is perfumed. I want to remember that fragrance after they’ve stopped blooming but I never can. Only in the moment. But I walk under those gracefully arching branches and breathe in the scented air and I feel a little of the enormity of the universe, and the improbability of me standing there, thinking about it. Something of a miracle, that I am here, doing that, and realizing that I am doing that.
Tom brought me a pretty feather today, cream and tan and brown. I think it must be from a hawk. I love it that he does those things, and that he knows I am delighted with such gifts.
Shall I mention the somber and disappointing news of the day? No. I won’t. Instead I’ll recite some small joys of mine in this improbable universe of ours: pleasing fragrances, satisfying stretches after using my body, thinking about thinking, good food when I am hungry, sweet sleep waiting at the end of a long day, fried plantains, the mist on an early fall morning, kittens, roses, first kisses, slow dancing, fizzy drinks, soft cotton t-shirts, the smell of coffee brewing on an early morning, Bach, cathedrals, the song you think of when remembering that first love, a baby's soft downy head, grand libraries, riding down a country road in a truck, John Denver songs.
All the good things. All the sweetnesses of this place we share for a very short time. Say them to yourself, recite them like a mantra, an anthem, a prayer.
#journalingalife
