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Monday, July 30, 2007

Romantic...

pertaining to, or characteristic of a style of literature and art that subordinates form to content, encourages freedom of treatment, emphasizes imagination, emotion, and introspection, and often celebrates nature, the ordinary person, and freedom of the spirit. reference: dictionary.com

Sunday, July 29, 2007


“Home is a name, a word, it is a strong one; stronger than magician ever spoke, or spirit ever answered to, in the strongest conjuration.”
Charles Dickens
“How could drops of water know themselves to be a river? Yet the river flows on.” Antoine de Saint-Exupery

“What makes a river so restful to people is that it doesn't have any doubt - it is sure to get where it is going, and it doesn't want to go anywhere else.”
Hal Boyle




The Garden


Saturday, July 28, 2007


Elocution

I seem to be looking for words tonight. Funny, I never use to so much as stretch or search for them, they were always there in abundance, proudly seeking freedom from my brain's single-minded desire to line them up and lay them down. To tell epic kind of tales. Drama drama drama.

Perhaps I have relinquished the drama for dharma. (And to be quite frank, all the return on inner-peace has significantly reduced my entertainment value at a dinner party.)

My time on the East Coast is nearing an end. I'm ready to go home.

I miss my space.
I miss my friends.

Fuck, I even miss my husband.

Thursday, July 26, 2007

Know Thyself

Men and women are not prisoners of fate, but only prisoners of their own minds.-- Franklin D. Roosevelt

Wednesday, July 18, 2007

balancing precariously

awareness has been leading me. energy has been moving me. opening has calibrated me.

Life requires certain components for peaceful continuance and growth...

An acceptance of who I was and forgiveness for choices that I may no longer make. Kindness, gratitude and affirming of all that this moment (this one right now) holds, and that I am fully sated in its imperfect excellence. Openness and direction for tomorrow, not needing to know the details of its unfolding, but that in the time and means necessary to me, it will be splendid, indeed.

Monday, July 16, 2007

some words to suit

ON LOOKING UP BY CHANCE
AT THE CONSTELLATIONS
You'll wait a long, long time for anything much
To happen in heaven beyond the floats of cloud
And the Northern Lights that run like tingling nerves.
The sun and moon get crossed, but they never touch,
Nor strike out fire from each other nor crash out loud.
The planets seem to interfere in their curves
But nothing ever happens, no harm is done.
We may as well go patiently on with our life,
And look elsewhere than to stars and moon and sun
For the shocks and changes we need to keep us sane.
It is true the longest drouth will end in rain,
The longest peace in China will end in strife.
Still it wouldn't reward the watcher to stay awake
In hopes of seeing the calm of heaven break
On his particular time and personal sight.
That calm seems certainly safe to last to-night.
Robert Frost

Saturday, July 14, 2007

Philosophy

I think we live life in linearly forward progressing circles.

When I am a way from here, here seems nearby. When I am here, everything else seems far away.

Today I walked and walked and walked. And kept myself in good company with my own thoughts, the breeze and the beauty of it all.

Thursday, July 12, 2007

no pictures today but rather... books books and more books. I spent most of the day scanning the aisles and touching paper bound goodness at Chapters and subsequently spending ($$) many hours worth of grown-up work! oh but it will be so worth it once I am back to my northern climes with uninterrupted time on my hands.

so what did I buy you ask?

hmmm...

The Bhagavad Gita and The Principal Upanishads - I have never read either of these sacred wisdom books, and to be honest until a few years ago, never knew of their existence. Not exactly on the required reading list of the United Baptist Constitution.

The Mandala of Being; Discovering the Power of Awareness. Mandala is Sanskrit for circle and in Eastern traditions indicates the whole of the self. Mandalas, not unlike a compass have four directions around a central focus - this book focuses on NOW at the centre and the four directions that take us away from the present, these being future, past, subject, object. "Subject-object is the psychological term for the inherently dualistic nature of our ordinary consciousness, in which, as soon as we become aware of ourselves as the 'subject' me, we simultaneously become aware of the 'object' you."

Words and Rules; The Ingredients of Language. This one came from the bargain bin for 4.99! And primarily I want to read it for professional development seeing as I will be teaching grade 3 literacy in the coming school year - a seemingly radical departure from quadratic functions and trigonometry! My expectation was that this would be an unbearably boring read but thus far has been compelling and full of wit. The author (Steven Pinker) has published several meaty language research based books and writes in a conversational style. He is a native of Montreal and studied at McGill and Harvard. He currently teaches at MIT.

Math for Mystics. Okay, I'm still a bit of a geek! But this is cool - it is all about the mystic inspired mathematics regarding the moon, days of the week, magic squares, templar codes, Pythagoreans, Fibonacci, geometric solids...

Buddhism; A Concise Introduction. I've already devoured a good chunk of this book. On a personal and spiritual level, I'm highly interested in Buddhism. This is more or less Buddha for dummies but none-the-less is well written and has captured my attention.

Creating Money; Keys to Abundance. So who isn't into the law of attraction? This book seemed completely solid right up until the part I realize that it is 'written' by the authors' spirit guides! Just in case you were interested, the spirit guides' names are Orin and DaBen!

And to bring balance to this heavy load of pseudo-intellectualism razzle-dazzle, I also bought 5 funny/somewhat trashy hopefully lusty sex filled brain candy autopilot I can't quite believe this passes for fiction novels.

Wherever you are, breathe and smile!

Tuesday, July 10, 2007

Rocky


Round the Ol' Oak Tree


The Great Divide


Watered

My trip is going well. Although, I'm tired and seem to be having difficulty sleeping and resting. I sense much tension inside myself and was hoping that I would be able to let all of that go. I'm home for two short weeks and feel the pull of friends and family who want pieces of me - on a purely selfish level I would like to hermit away and be only on my time.

Just before leaving to come home I read an interesting article on how to make even difficult decisions in 60 seconds. The abridged version is that all of our decisions should reflect who we see our best selves to be. Rather than a laborious list of wants and needs to base our choices on, we should simply ask "Does it fit how I see myself? Does it make me happy?"

It is so easy to get caught up in duty - I fall victim to this all of the time. I am also recognizing fear within, fear of things that I could never have imagined living inside of me. And as much as I would like to think that the disappointment and or approval of certain people does not play into my decision making, it does. I hurt at the thought of being hurtful, even if the intent is not there - letting go, involves letting go of something or someone. Yet, I acknowledge that my pure and unaffected self has come to a few decisions here that need to be carried through.

The sucky part of adulthood is an obligation to take responsibility for and recognize who we are. Just a little black or white would be welcome. I look down one road and see a certain life - a good one, filled with good things and long-time friends who have chosen a similar path. The other road seems blurred. There are signposts but I cannot read them. There are too many Y's to count, some lead in and out of yellow woods and others don't. And sitting here right at this moment, all I want is the possibility of yellow woods. And right there, there is where the answer is - my 60 second decision. That I have know for such a long time but despite, keep clinging to the fertile soil of familiar, even though it suits me not.

Namaste.

Sunday, July 08, 2007

Friday, July 06, 2007

Journeying with expression

I'm home and it feels quite wonderful. There has been an unusual amount of rain, so everything is fresh and lush and humid. I spent the night previous on the red-eye between Calgary and Montreal. It felt good to touch down in Fredericton and even better to reach my final hometown destination.

On some fronts things are busy, town seems to have lots of activity today. And, on other fronts things are quiet - my brother and his family no longer live across the street and dad is still in the west. The old house is the same as it always is. My sister is growing at an alarming rate! Believe it or not, I've not yet ventured to the river but am headed there soon (I'm sure she is calling my name). My regret so far is that I forgot my camera cable and will be unable to post pics.

I'm thinking about trying to post daily while I am home.

My agenda is no agenda. I want to get lots of exercise (I tend to do a lot of walking whenever I'm home), eat well, breathe, do some yoga, hang out with my family (and extended family), sit at the river and meditate, visit with my dear ol' auntie Clara. I've just started a very restricted diet for the next 3 days just to help put everything right from the inside out.

Life is beautiful. And I'm going to enjoy every bit of all this beautiful.