Animatedstardust

Gone 'fishing'

Clearing the decks, inner and outer, time to ask what is necessary and life enhancing even life giving in this life I call and claim as mine.

This year has been one of many stops and starts on all levels physically, emotionally, spiritually and the motion has made me feel pretty sick some of the time and perversely elated at others sometimes there has even been balance and then the word bliss seems to fill space and time and I know its where I need to be.

This motion has been caused by the external and the internal of environment, the environment of home and heart. Place and pace seem to have become key words and they have gradually been opening doors I had not even noticed were there before or else were doors I had ignored or shied away from. All this walking through and unlocking has left me tired and a little hesitant so know I need to sit a while and rest.

Over the months of my designated celebration and commemoration of arriving on the threshold and walking into the country of the 50’s I have been discarding and regarding much of my life and living. Not in any sense as relinquishment of life and living, or the responsibility and resplendent joy I feel this to be but as means to walk more squarely, strongly and securely with sensitive steps towards the Earth, the lives I come in to contact with and my self. Compassion and kindness are all very well and good being offered and given to others but the giving to myself is important too.

Sunday Smile 36

This is why I call Rhys and Banon the toothsome twosome. It’s one of their regular daily contests to prove who has the whitest, sharpest teeth without leaving a mark on each other, though Banon if she feels she is in some way losing the contest will grab hold of her brother’s cheek and see if she can stretch it in to the next day! Rhys is all very laid back about this, often literally on his back as Banon seems to have inherited some Northumberland wrestler genes and can flip him over with seemingly no effort on her part and then pounce on his neck for the kill…. thankfully it is all play if sometimes a little rough to human eyes and she becomes absolutely rigidly still if she actually closes her mouth hard enough on his ear to make him yelp, though it doesn’t stop her repeating the exercise when big brothers delight in the game gets too much for her sense of being boss.

Their other favourite game is to run as fast as they can side by side and deliberately swerve into the other to try and knock them over, seeing they can get up to quite some speed it is always effective save for those times when two minds are thinking as one and they both swerve into each other at the same time. The technique is not to head butt but hip swivel and bottom bash; so effective is this that when they strike in unison they both come to a standstill and then topple over like some still from a Wile E. Coyote and Road Runner cartoon.

For me there are moments when their virtual disappearance into that canyon which Wile E. Coyote seemed to inspect from a great height, at great speed and with a puff of dust signifying arrival at the end of his ‘tour’ down to the bottom is actual but young dogs being young dogs are not young humans and there full on battle mode can be replaced in a split second with sniffing and snoozing together.

Their absolute joy that seems to be expressed to me at being young dogs able to let rip and wrestle and roar keeps the heart beat a little slower than it might otherwise be but there are times when ‘mum’ has to step in and inform them enough is enough and we three continue on with a little more decorum but just as much joy.

Real Decoration

Midst glazed tiles, adhesive, grouting and some anglo saxon :0) there was time to walk, to take in the glory that is nature and understand we humans can only graze the delight the Earth showers us with in the decoration and display of so many other lives around us.

Walking along the forest track with three dogs and good friend was a real treat for us all as the sun had blessed us with its presence which was gift for drying washing but not so easy in a very small bathroom with equally small window. I did little in the tiling department save for getting them, and all the other various tools and materials together and making sure the 'worker' was regularly fed and watered. Because the light was so intense outside I was unable to be in the garden during much of the day but RnB and I got out there for a few hours each morning before anyone else was awake and even if I was only up to sitting and listening rather than doing any work out there finding the colour and design of the Earth so freely shared before my eyes made me smile not only in thanks but at the attempts of one woman, with a dear friends help, to decorate a bathroom with light born on the wings of colour.

Decoration

The cob nut harvest this year looks set to be bumper as even the smallest tree is showing signs of plump 'fruit'. I am making note of the diferent trees I pass whilst out with RnB and look forward to enjoying picking and using the nuts in the autumn but for now I watch RnB enjoy the long grass and each othere and smile at our good fortune to have the feedom and safety to wander as we please without fear of bomb or bullet.

It could be so easy to become weighed down by the capacity for the human mind to conjure up barbarity and bloodshed before ploughshares and peace but when I turn my face to the sun each morning and catch glimpse of the beauty and bounty the Earth offers if one walks slowly with some sense of the moment I find heart and mind lifts with the sun and another day is found to be rich in gift.

Rhys and Banon seem to agree especially when playing 'hide and seek' in the long grass.