A Beautiful Day 1 (A Day Late)

(Tingle ranch right before a huge thunder storm--beautiful despite or possibly because of the storm . . .)

I fell asleep last night as I was about to write my day's beautiful thing (it was a beautiful thing in itself--one of those sleeps that sneaks up on you and steals you away without you even really knowing it--and lasted nine uninterrupted hours)

I am changed with this week's intention of finding a beautiful thing in each day. I hold and examine every seemingly insignificant part of my day and ask over and over, Is THIS the beautiful moment? I've realized that by focusing so carefully, I've been living quite differently and deliberately all day long. Each day is full of challenges, daily, sometimes hourly challenges. And they, I have come to realize have their own beauty as well.

Which is why yesterday's beautiful thing was a bitter hard beauty.

It happened when I ran into my parents house after a cold walk with my sister (which was really really good) and found my mother doubled over in pain. Shaking and pale and unable to function well. I sat down beside her and felt--how I've felt on many many occasions and know I will feel again on many more--like I desperately wanted to take some of her pain for her. I am younger and stronger and I can bear it. But I couldn't. So I held her arm and asked her about what exactly was going on and calmly told my father that she needed to go to the hospital right now.

She was not happy nor was he, but there was a sense of resigned rightness about it. All of us knew, in that moment, it was the right choice. And as I watched her walk, so slowly and with great difficulty and pain to get dressed and ready to go, I felt the connection of love of the generations.

As I left, I knew that this is the pattern we will all follow and that as we age, things, treasures and trophies and accomplishments, they fade away to nothing. But the love of our family, how ever that looks, becomes the most beautiful thing we have.

Comments

Forced Frugality

We are going on ten months of looking for a job. Last September, after a rather horrid ten months, John got the boot. It was oddly and rather unfairly done, but a great relief to all of us. Working at that company had become a puzzle that grew harder and harder each day until it was in fact, impossible. The stress of it took a wild toll on John's mental and physical health. By the end, he was neither eating nor sleeping. He had strange episodes of racing heart and an inability to tell what was real and what was imagined. I sat him down and told him I would use up every penny of our retirement and sell the house if it meant he could stop working in that environment. And it may take all that. And I still won't regret it. When I feel rather sorry for myself, I remember what life was like for him a year ago and then I don't feel sad that I am once again digging through my closet to find a new way to wear old things. In fact, there is part of me (small though it

The Best Kind of Tired

My often daily life . . . (John is two feet away—I can’t do all of them by myself) Last week, every single time I sat down, I almost instantly fell asleep. I kept telling John, I have the sleeping disease. What is going on? Am I getting old? Is it the covid after effects? What on earth? He didn’t have any answers for me because he was doing the same thing. We didn’t really do anything for seven days straights. And our kids joined us in the sleepy, do nothing, lazy slug bug state. It wasn’t until this morning as I was looking over the pictures of the summer that I realized why. . . We literally haven’t stopped ALL summer long—one awesome amazing trip/visit/fun after the other. It’s like we are making up for last years “staycations.” Holy hannah have we ever made up for it. Just about did ourselves in playing and hugging and kissing and caring for babies. Highlights of the summer (in no particular order): Cousin sleepovers have resumed (most missed activity since the pandem

Midlife-Cri-sis

It's been a year. I'll sum it up by saying that food no longer tastes good to me. The last time that happened, I had lost three pregnancies in a row and John had lost and found a job and we had moved three times. The feeling is very similar. There have a been a lot of losses or near losses. Enough that when the phone pings with a text or vibrates with a call (I long ago turned off the ringer), I take a deep breath and think, you can do this . More times than not, I need that deep breath. I am probably in the second half of my life and I feel it. 47. My children are nearly grown. My house is established. Our bank accounts don't fluctuate like they used to. I don't go to the store and dream of being able to buy things. I walk into my closet and wonder what I can do without. I feel the finality of my existence and I wonder . . . what do I really want out of all this? For book club, we read A Million Miles in a Thousand Years . It's about re-writing o

The Phoenix: Epicuriousmothering Rising

Search This Blog