Counting steps

Every day, every hour, during my workday, I go downstairs and walk up and down the massive entry area into the inner court garden. Back and forrth, 5-10 minutes per hour. Ffitbit counting my steps, along the massive stone floor that once horse and carriage drove through.

Months and months… nearly a year and a half now, I have walked the corridor into the garden and back along the corridor… endless number of times. My fitbit might be counting, but not I. Instead, I listen to teachings, talks, and ramblings from educational sites (e.g. LinkedIn Learning or Blinkist) or podcasts or audio books. Sometimes I just do walking meditation.

Generally, it is a solitary pursuit. Yes, there are some apartments looking over the inner court, but for the most part, I am alone in my wanderings. Every once in a while, someone will wait until I notice them and we wave.

(This post is part of my "Growing Up & Growing Old" project.)  

30-day challenge

In our theme year group, we have decided each to do a 30-day challenge. My Year of Freedom challenge is to read or listen to poetry every day. I truly feel as if poetry is a healing balm in life. It quiets pain and soothes suffering. I also believe that whether reading, hearing, or writing poetry, these simple acts are as close as I get to communion.
 
My three most common current sources of poetry are Poetry Unbound podcast, Poetry Archive, and an incredibly old, tattered paperback "Poems of Wang Wei". This later I have had so long and have read so often, it is falling apart as I read it now. Today's poem...
 
Bamboo Grove House (Wang Wei)
 
I sit alone in the dark bamboos
Play my lute and sing and sing
Deep in the woods where no one knows I am
But the bright moon comes and shines on me there.
 
This week's listening highlights... 
 
Matthew Olzmann
Mountain Dew Commercial Disguised as a Love Poem
 
Jean Binta Breeze
The arrival of Brighteye – an extract
 
Hanif Abdurraqib
When We Were 13, Jeff’s Father Left The Needle Down On A Journey Record Before Leaving The House One Morning And Never Coming Back

Back in time

I have sat in the cockpit of many a boat
Gazing in awe upon the beautiful 
Bountiful blues of seas and oceans.
Today, during a short lunchtime walk,
I am transported by the carpet 
Of spring greens back in time,
Decades and a lifetime ago of sailing
Miles upon miles of open water.

The Dead of Night

On the ocean there is no
Dead of night, instead 
Only one unending moment
Of life. There is a tapestry of
Stars wrapping the undulating
Waves in an embrace that
No man's arms can ever hold.
Or the dancing moonlight
Shimmering off the dolphins'
Backs that swim with ecstasy
Across the bow of the boat.
And I, at the wheel, gaze up
Around and within in wonder
And must remind myself
To breathe in the night air
Filled with salt and stardust.

(This post is part of my "Growing Up & Growing Old" project.) 

I yearn to be somewhere else

 

Gazing out on blue

Water, waves, and far away

Deep breath and another.

I am in love

The rush of excitement
Knowing the day will bring
New adventures. 

Just the two of us, 

We leave the house 

Not knowing where we go. 

Neither do we care. 

What counts is the joy 

Of our shared company.
We go forth without hesitation, 

On the spur of the moment, 

Out into nature. At last I am free.

(After a year and a half of moving only around in walking distance from our home, I have a new bicycle. I have a feeling of new love.)

Sitting at the lakeside

Mother’s Day present
Children’s laughter all around
Breeze tickling my nose.

Quiet abandon

I gaze out the window and watch
The buds on the branches sway 
In the wind. The sun tantalizes
The green tips to peek out 
Of their covers... Then the wind
Coaxs them to burst forth 
In quiet abandon.

Me and my bicycle underway

By the lake at dawn

Fathers finishing with their sons

Swans swim by with grace.

Desert Days

“Daniel said, ‘If the body is strong, the soul weakens. If the body weakens, the soul is strong.” ― Benedicta Ward (Desert Father)

Since a young adult, I have been fascinated with the history and the works of the Desert Fathers and Mothers. The question of how to live the life of a modern urban contemplative has been my companion for over 40 years now. One of the practices that I learnt from a meditation program, where I go on retreats, was to take a Desert Day once a month.

The idea is to pack a small backpack of necessities and leave your front door in the morning, not know where you are going or what you are going to do. I often start such a Desert day by simply walking to the train station and stepping onto the next train leaving the station. Some of those days I travel to new places. Some I walk known paths or sit on one of my favourite benches and watched the time go by.

My husband and I just picked up two sparkling new e-bikes. After a year of not moving out of a 5-10 square kilometer radius (we do not own a car), I yearn to pack a backpack and head out anywhere and everywhere.

Inspired by Markus Spiske on Unsplash

(This post is part of my "Growing Up & Growing Old" project.)

Erasing history

She was due to have a cesarean in five days’ time. Unlike the first time, the doctor did not even consider a spontaneous birth. They were lucky nothing happened last time. This time, they scheduled a cesarean right from the start. Even so she was worried about complications.
 
So, late this evening she gathers up all her diaries. Carrying down two boxes full from the attic to the living room. Alone, before the fire in the fireplace, she stacks twenty years of her journals like pillars around her and her belly. She reads about the past happenings of her life… her rebellious youth, her “biker chick days”, her countless and reckless numbers of lovers… especially considering that was the AIDS era… until finally finally falling in love with a good man.
 
She sips her herbal tea, Quiet Lullaby, reads each journal… page by page… memory upon memory… at the end of each journal… she throws it into the fire and raises her tea cup up to the gods and gives a cheer.

(This post is part of my "Growing Up & Growing Old" project.)

Morning meditation