Friday, February 19, 2010

SHOVELING

You know, you can learn a lot about life from the seemingly monotonous things of everyday ...IF, and that is a very big IF, you pay attention and listen to your life. Today, as I have seemingly done at least once a week now, I went out to shovel the snow that had fallen yesterday and through the night. I enjoy the outside so very much, so this is not a job I dread, rather one that I do indeed look forward to doing! I know, that in itself should prove my insanity. Nevertheless, as I shoveled this deep and dusty snow, so many thoughts started to ramble in my head, which is not unusual for me, but it is rare that I remember them long enough to write about! These thoughts are not earth shaking, but for me, thoughts like these need to be mulled over and meditated on so that I can squeeze out of them the nectar of knowledge that seems to elude most of us most of the time. So.....what the heck ARE these thoughts I go on and on about?!! Well, they are the thoughts of silence...about the things we miss all around us because we are so busy with theTHINGS around us....the huge crow up in the tall pine that caws at me each time I wreck his silent world by the shovel scraping the ground...It seems as though the sound of it is like our "nails on a chalkboard" sound to him...because he is silent when I am and starts making racket every time my shovel does its work.
Another thought that occurred to me is that shoveling snow is like my life....the snow comes only ever so often as do the troubles and trials that come to me...the snow, like my life, must be scraped off or else when we drive across it with the cars, it turns into ice that can not be shoveled but must melt with the warmth of the day. Like my life...when these trials come, they must be dealt with in the proper way, with the proper tools, in the proper time or the traffic of my life will only make it harder to scrap the hardened parts off....and they will only go away with time and the warmth of my Son....I have learned over the 50 plus years of my life, that I better get on it asap because I KNOW what it is like and I KNOW the difficulty that it is to deal with the ICED places of my heart and of my mind...it takes twice the energy and twice the time and is twice as hard if I don't deal with them as they come....as they fall like snow on my driveway.
It is also a great time to meet neighbors whom you have not seen or do not know yet. As I was shoveling in my newly acquired neighborhood, one of my neighbors came out to shovel her drive. We talked and shoveled and talked some more about our lives...I heard her stories and she heard mine....we found we have a lot in common and it was a JOY to speak with her. That would not happen if I was not out shoveling snow... and so it is with the "neighbors" we travel life's highway with whether they live in our house, our town, go to our church or work with us...if we do not shovel our own snow by sharing our lives and hearts and troubles and trials, we will never know their thoughts or hearts or minds...perhaps we don't WANT to know and if that is the case, we are worse off than we thought! I will never forget my mother in law telling us after her husband died that as he was dying and they were sharing their last moments together, that she told Rick, that she SO wanted to just say to him "a penny for your thoughts" but never did and how she SO regretted NOT asking him that question. Sad. But we are SO like that today in SO many ways...whether out of fear, or ignorance, or rushing around, or time, or (as is the case with me) don't want to "impose", BUT we loose the opportunity to know the others that come through our lives. We don't take the time and effort to know the ones we have been given and the ones that we are given to. So...take time to shovel, to think, to clear your soul mind and heart, to know the ones our lives touch...to know yourself. And please don't wait till those driveways of your soul become iced over.....go....now.

Saturday, February 13, 2010

PROCRASTINATION

You know, I am amused by this word....why does this particular word, whose meaning is not very positive, begin with the word PRO?!!!! It is not PRO to PROcrastinate!!! Anyway, all that to say that I MUST get to work on my art!!!! I have no excuses now but the ones I make up in my head....I have a specified room ready....I have it organized...I have TIME if I choose to....BUT,(and that is a big word here)...for some reason I have been putting it off. The LINK to the right of this blog titled by this same WORD, helped me today tremendously!!! So....I pass it on to you out there, whoever you may be,in blog land....perhaps it will help you in whatever area you are prone to this vile dis ease.....(yes, I meant to separate that word). I seem to be able to come up with so many excuses, reasons and virtual whinings but am realizing that it is just a matter of doing...of priority...of discipline.....all of which seem so elusive at times....BUT (there is that massive word again!) it CAN be done.....even I HAVE done it on several occasions!!! YES, it is a mind set...a habit...something to be lived and not disscused....to be grasped and not grovelled in...something to protect and not shoved back into the recesses of my life....SO, why am I even blogging about this? So that I can read it myself...remind myself...reprimand myself...reiterated to myself...regain FOR myself, the lost days and hours and minutes of sloughing off my LIFE!!! My LOVE!! My ABILITY!! To make myself accountable TO myself because in the end, that is who we are indeed accoutnable to......cheers my friends!