I believe the sunrise I saw this morning holds the same rank as the snowflake that dotted the tip of the windshield wiper at noon. I believe I feel best when I am rooted where I stand, when the frozen cedars whistle in the wind, when the smell of chocolate chip cookies baking in the oven slips through a hole in the screen and calls me to attention. I like to believe I will live a long life, foolish to ponder. There are no guarantees and that takes me back to the sunset, the flip side, the underbelly of a Moon on the rise.
I believe it’s 30 degrees colder than it was yesterday. I believe the crow I saw on Highway 10 mixed it up with a flock of sparrows making me pay attention to the dew tipped grasses on the edge of the bowling alley parking lot. I believe I’d like to go back to St. Simons Island, the place I walked with Liz and Mom, the lighthouse, the restaurant where we ate fresh shrimp and Liz ordered a Po’ Boy and the sweet tea melted in my mouth. The shore was flat and hard, stiff enough for bike tires to travel. There was one lone white chair against the horizon. We ran down by the Atlantic and slipped our hands in the undercurrent. I felt the pulse of the world.
I believe in time I’ll accomplish my dreams. They seem simple to me now, simple minded, not complicated. I’m not looking for fame or fortune. I want to be content with what I have. I believe we will move to a new home in the next five years. I believe in my dreams even when I don’t know exactly what they are. I believe in the circle of life, in living and dying and living again in some kind of spirit form. I believe I carry the dreams of my ancestors. Their sins, too. Not in a heavy way, but in the way all cultures pass down their dreams and sins and complaints. I believe in 7-year cycles, 7-year itches, 7 months and it’s summer, 7 months and it’s my birthday, hottest time of the year.
I believe in deja vu, rules of thumb, the law of threes, not superstition, but belief. I believe in the weather, not in the scientific sense, but in the long extremes that happen in places like Minnesota, the middle land, the hinterlands, the mountainless bowels of America. I believe in working hard at every turn. A work ethic passed down to me, the same one that takes parents out of the house, trying to make a living for their families. I believe it should not be so hard to make enough to pay the mortgage, eat well, and have good healthcare. Access to good healthcare should not decide where a person works. I believe the richest country in the world can also be the most benevolent, gracious, and kind. I believe in the Wind that chills me to the bone. The cold exhale of the Dragon, breathing down my neck.
NOTE: WRITING TOPIC — I BELIEVE… is the latest Writing Topic on red Ravine. QuoinMonkey joined frequent guest writer Bob Chrisman, Laura, and Sandrarenee in doing a Writing Practice on the topic.
Thanks for asking me to write with you on this topic. It was nice to think of what I believed as opposed to what I don’t believe w hich would have been a much easier topic to write on. Perhaps it reflects on my life. I’ve thought about tha a lot since doing the writing practice and reading that of Sandrarenee and Laura and now yours.
Enjoyed the nature images. The crow mixing it up with the sparrows, the dew on the grass next to the bowling alley parking lot, the idea of you and Liz running along the shore of the Atlantic Ocean together.
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QM,
I love that first line, “the sunrise I saw this morning holds the same rank as the snowflake…”. How often I get into useless comparisons and miss what’s available to see in every manifestation of this life.
I also liked how you believe in your dreams even if you don’t know what they are. It’s so true, sometimes dreams are hazy, like fog, we feel that they are there, but can’t get them into focus. Perhaps this is a good thing….it allows the dreams to have a life of their own, without our ceaseless interventions to make them what we think they should be.
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Bob, I appreciate you doing Writing Practice with me. And also the practices that sandrarenee and Laura posted in the comments on the Writing Topic. I was surprised about the nature images and where they took me. I am longing for a long vacation with Liz at the ocean one of these years. It was so much fun when we went to St. Simons. Maybe that dream will keep surfacing in my practices until I get back there.
One of the things I noticed about the Topic of I Believe… is that it led me to write abstractly and it felt good to then see those images and details pop up where I could find some ground. For me, the places I stand can be really grounding. I am thankful to notice them each day. And untouched places like Wilderness and the Moon ground me. To imagine there are places that hardly any humans have walked makes me feel calm and hopeful.
This is off the subject, but how’s the weather down there? Are you in the deep freeze that returned to Minnesota the last few days?
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writingintoradiance, I agree about the comparisons. They are really not helpful but so human. You are wise in your words about dreams. When I try to control my dreams too much, they don’t come to fruition. When I let them evolve over time (in the slow ways that they seem to do for me)I am much happier and I find my dreams are full of surprises. I try to write details more in my visions, practical ways I can reach my goals through dreams. So hard to balance. Thanks for stopping by!
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QM, Wednesday evening after a daytime high of 45 the weather changed to true January weather. It snowed less than an inch overnight but the wind howled and the temperatures dropped.
Yesterday (Thursday) it “play” snowed all day and the wind made walking a horrible experience. By Sunday it will be in the high 50’s again.
The weather forecasters advised people during the nice spell to water their lawns due to the lack of moisture. still the squirrels are the fattest I’ve ever seen them which Mom always said meant a very cold winter.
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I’m surprised about the advice to water the lawns. Here, they advised us not to because the ground is so frozen. Maybe we are a little further North. The local squirrels here look very fat, too! We put up a squirrel feeder this year to lure them away from the feeders. We have to climb up and put a corn cob on the feeder every once in a while. They love it. That could be why they are so fat! It’s about 16 here today and very cloudy. I feel chilled to the bone though. I think I’m not quite used to Winter yet.
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[…] Comments « PRACTICE — I Believe… – 12min […]
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Your first paragraph pulled me in so hard and fast and wonderfully that I wanted to keep reading forever, yet felt satisfied with the Dragon’s breath ending.
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Robin, thank you. I’m fond of the Dragon. Befriending has been harder than I first thought. I had hoped to write a new piece yesterday but got distracted by Jewel the black bear (Lily’s sister). She went into labor yesterday and I’ve been watching the Live DenCam hoping to catch her having cubs today. It’s a beautiful day in Minnesota, sunny and blue. Hope you are well.
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QM and Bob,
I enjoyed both of your practices! It is good for people to “take stock” of where they are in their lives…not every day, just occasionally.
I believe I’m at a “brink” in my own life. Not a scary one like a precipice; more like when I was a kid and standing at the edge of the ocean’s shore, about to race into the water and dive under the first wave that is tall enough to swallow me up! I know it’s going to be cold, but learned, after many summers, that it is easier that way. My best friend, (Santa Barbara Liz,) would be behind me using her entrance method, which was to accustom her body to the “wet and cold” inch-by-inch.” This Friday will be my last day of my work as an Archivist. I enjoyed serving the people who came to us to solve a mystery, to trace an ancestor or find just the right photo to use in the book they were writing. I am eagerly looking at new horizons!
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oliverowl, I thought of you yesterday when you were celebrating your last day of work as an Archivist. It’s exciting and scary at the same time. I know you will find your rhythm with it, and hope that you sink into the writing. What a gift to have that time, time that you’ve worked for your whole life. I can’t wait to check in with you and see how the transition is going. When it comes to the water, I am a dive in head first person. Never could do the inch by inch thing. I have come to see that in matters of employment, I am a dive in person, too. But in other areas of life, an inch by incher, slow and steady. Here’s to new horizons and following dreams down their windy jig-jag roads. A toast to new beginnings!
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