i gave one of the cloth baskets over for Emrie's toy basket. The smaller one inside, her birthday present from the Farmer's Market. By next spring, she'll be able to go to the Market with me. Walk, carrying her basket. For now, Bear and Rabbit get carried around. She practices Love with them
Toy basket has all kinds of stuff. Little plastic toy figures, bits of paper that she likes over and over, a torn cover of a National Geographic, plastic cups and containers of all kinds that fit in to one another or don't, spoons, her pencils, metal caps from her Nana's energy drinks, some of it's cute, some of it i'd throw out, but it's all stuff she really likes.
She learns a lot on her own. Gets an idea, somehow, and then puts it into practice. In the last week or so, she had begun bringing this little 1/4 measuring cup to me...holding it neatly by the handle. Setting it down on the floor in front of me so she could Sign (sign language) ....Want. the palm of one hand turned up, outstretched, the other hand, index finger tapping the up turned palm. Want. then she points to something. most often this week it would be some cheese cut in little pieces. a grape, maybe. a cracker. Want. I put things in the cup. She says Thank You. goes off. She doesn't choose to say a lot of words yet. But Thank You is very clearly enunciated.
What i am thinking about a LOt is how she lives within a context ....since she was born....that she is loved. What does that mean? That she is in a place and among others who will Care for her. Who will Take Care of her. She has absolute trust in that. Even when she has one of her melt downs, lies sobbing on the floor, her face pressed into the floor, she finally lifts her head and moves on. And we do too. And she is ok. We are ok. We often say...Love Love and pat our chests over our heart. Love Love, Emrie. We would do Anything for her to have a life. For her to have what is asked for with Metta. May you be safe. May you be healthy. May you be happy. May you live with ease. Loving Kindness.
i think this is it. Mo's pennant. Dreaming a world where love is the answer. Love is always the answer, yes???? Yes. The Dalai Lama would say so...Kindness is love.
Marti and Cheryl responded to the Post of 10~28 so Perfectly. and i have held their thoughts through these days since and on and will continue to.
Marti's telling of her exchange with her neighbor was stunningly elegant....stripped to stark of how things feel now....and i loved it because it tells the story of how we are, in this As Is world. So many things. How can we work it? How can we work the neighbor with his Happiness and his beautiful flowers on his porch, his caring. His extended hand simultaneous with his CHOICE??????? How can we look at him As Is? I thought about this a lot. Have been looking for things to read that tell me about why people may choose to be ok with the "other side". They have their reasons. I talked about this with Alyssia and saying it aloud helped. From Marti's neighbor, i was able to think from a different view point. I thought about how, even tho i didn't graduate college with a degree, how i didn't follow through with some kind of "profession",
that i knew i COULD have. I chose not to. it was a choice. and Entitled choice. How all the personal world around me had been entitled also, by their circumstance, at least. I moved through a world where you could create your own reality. I taught art and was part owner in a New Age Book store, then i got hired to direct the Child and Family Service at a Prison, things like that. Because i THOUGHT i could, i could. Because i "came from" that kind of place. Because i assumed a Lot.
What if, tho, you did not have that context? What if, for the first time, maybe the first generation, you were able to find yourself in a life you never had? Where your son was gainfully employed, your other son doing well in high school? What if your income from your Nursing Assistant job allowed you to have this home with flowers on the porch and blue over your doorway? What if it was NEW?
i think.
and for sure, he is both. He loves gardens. He loves his life. and he places gratitude where he does.
I am so grateful to Cheryl for the link to the Sounds True interview with Van Jones. I have looked for him elsewhere and he Rings True. I listen closely and follow his threads.
I've found a young woman, Alice Driver, CNN opinion piece about the "migration" , her other writings...Brilliant.
i am looking. looking.
We're all in this together. I always think of Echart Tolle saying: Evolve or die. Harsh. But it rises up always in times like these...and here we are again, in a time like this. And there's nothing saying for sure how it will go. There's so much in the Mix. But on Wednesday, we will need to just go. So, ok. ok.
