Thankful Thursday: seedless oranges

Thankful, yes - for SO many things.

Just now while peeling my orange I suddenly found myself once again remembering the orange groves around Fillmore, California.

I remember the neighbor who gave me oranges from her tree.

And she let me pick some of them!

I remember learning about the netting the growers put on the trees to keep out the birds - to produce seedless oranges… 

I do not understand all the details about cross-pollination 

but I do love seedless oranges.

And I am once again so dang grateful for those months in that place.

For those years and those places that we were able to call home for a minute 

A season 

A month

What an extraordinary thing 

A great privilege

I continue to be astonished

And grateful

Octobers I have known

 

“I'm so glad I live in a world 

where there are Octobers”

- Anne of Green Gables 

The current place...

from the new place...

Feeling grateful for the seasons

'Tis the season for seasonal change.

The autumnal equinox... 

And today is World Gratitude Day! So it seems like a good time to express my gratitude that I get to live where we have four seasons.  

Yes, there are things to dread when the days get shorter, but there are also things to enjoy.  

Eventually spring brings flowers...

And then summer brings berries...

And porch sittin'...

And ridin' the rails...

And walks in the woods...

And visiting animals

And maybe even superhero rescues

There is so much to love about the seasons.

All kinds of beauty

Family times

Fun adventures

Even peace & serenity...

I love this life!

These seasons.

'Tis the season

I have not participated in Five Minute Friday for a while.  Every Friday FMF sends out a word for the day and writers write for five minutes.  Just set the timer for 5 minutes and write. No editing, no back-tracking, just write.  So I did.

...

Five-Minute Friday

The word is SEASON.

And… go!

…

’Tis the season!

To do what?

To be jolly?  

Maybe, but the nightly news lately certainly does not encourage jolliness.

To get back on track?

To take on a new project?

Maybe to start cooking healthy stuff.

Certainly to tackle those archives.  The boxes and bins full of old books, papers, files, and other leftovers from a busy life.  A life too busy evidently to stay current on pitching stuff no longer needed.

For me of course, ’tis the season for NaNoWriMo.  

Lately I have been thinking about the seasons of life.

’Tis the season for…

• Letting go of some things… to make room for better things
• Figuring out what matters most
• Finding some wisdom for prioritizing

Yep, certainly need wisdom - for so many things, but yah, priorities are a biggie. I want to pay attention to what season it is.

Seasons of life

“My writing goal for this month is

to spend less time writing.” 

Wait; did I really say that?

A common question in writing groups might be something like “how’s your writing going this week?” Or “what is your writing goal this month? Good questions.

 

Our answers were often predictable about trying to find more time for writing. That’s why I was surprised to hear myself say that my writing goal for this month is to not spend so much time writing.  

Maybe I shouldn’t have been surprised. 

After all, I had been spending more time writing.  

Maybe too much time.

I had kept my head down and pushed myself to get that writing project done.

For months writing had been pretty much my single focus.  My top priority.

I was depleted.  My project was intensely personal and had been mentally and emotionally exhausting.  It certainly made sense that I needed a break.

So I took a break.

A week or two.

A month, maybe three.

Eventually I became aware of another thought that also caught me off-guard.

It was as if I didn’t want to be a writer anymore.

Or at least that I wanted to be something else besides a writer.

I had worked hard to become a writer. 

• I decided to start thinking of myself as a writer. 
• I slowly built a consistent writing habit. 
• I chose to focus on writing as one of my highest priorities.
• I started a blog… and have posted regularly for well over a decade!
• I wrote and self-published a book… and then another.

I gave up other things to become a writer. By prioritizing my writing, I set aside other things that I now want to value.  I don’t regret my writing focus, but that’s not all I want to be in this next season.  I want to be more than a writer.  I am ready to move writing to a lower spot on the list because other things need to move to the top - for at least this season.  I no longer want writing to consume the biggest chunk of my time or energy - nor to be my main identity.

A writer friend called it balance - implying that balance is a good thing.

Another writer friend said that balance is a myth.

So which is it?

Maybe it’s about balance through the seasons.

About big pictures and small details.

Maybe there will be times for a single focus… 

AND times for balanced perspective.

And so I pause... to ponder... the seasons of life.

Month-end

Looking back, looking ahead.

Grieve the losses.

Sadness, failures, discouragement, defeat.

Celebrate the good stuff.

The opportunities, the options, the possibilities.

The victories.

Steps taken, even the tiny ones.

The beginnings and the endings.

The starting and maybe especially the finishing.

Completions.

Conclusions.

Letting go.

Closure.

The end of a chapter.

Turning a page.

Things done well.

Things barely done.

What works?  What doesn’t?

What worked this past month?

What needs to change for the coming one?

Why do I keep noticing the date?

August 31…

Why does it catch my attention and give me pause?

Maybe it reminds me of my feelings about September, which has always felt like a new year.  When you are teachers and have kids in school, that’s the way life goes.  Maybe it will always feel that way.

We seem to need interludes.

Week-ends.

Maybe month-ends even more

A pause to note. To notice. To reflect.

To notate the shift. 

An alternative to just marking time.

Good-bye, sweet summer.

Good-bye, August.

Happy month-end.

Hello, new month. New year.

New season.

New opportunities. New unknowns.

Fresh starts.

Fresh focus.

Fresh gratitude that life goes on.

Here’s to more beginnings and endings.

Here’s to another new chapter.

Happy month-end to us.

The lights and delights of winter…

Poinsettias and twinkly lights and snowmen aren’t just for Christmas anymore.  The Christmas village on the mantle has transitioned into a winter village casting its alpenglow on my morning ritual of sitting in the pre-dawn stillness.

The red and green storage bins no longer contain only Christmas decorations.  They have organized themselves into a seasonal system where some of them still carry the Christmas baubles and stockings and the heirloom nativity scene… while others now hold space for all kinds of other winter decor like poinsettias, snowmen, the Alpine village, and any number of lights and candles.

This paradigm shift has offered a chance to pause…

To sit with tiny pinpricks of light in the pre-dawn quiet…

To ponder the mysteries of darkness and silence...

I have come to cherish these quiet winter moments.

I am no longer in such a hurry for the seasons to move faster.

I can find things to celebrate in each one.

Beaches and lighthouses… and exploration and memories

Let’s explore that trail and see where it goes.

Okay; well, that didn’t take long.  The trail stops at a garbage can!

...

We had scheduled a beach day for the last day of September. 

 

Beach walking - a couple miles of it.

Beach sitting and relaxing.

The traditional bucket of chicken...

A bit of exploring - mostly ending up on dead-ends with “no outlet.”

Lots of comfortable conversation and camaraderie.

Reminiscing on old times and speculating on future times.

…

We never did find the lighthouse we were searching for.  Some would say that a trail ending at a garbage can should have served as an omen.  Others would say that at the very least it was an enigma.

Either way it added humor to the adventure. And I think we’ve learned by now that exploring need not be fruitful to be fun.  And that adventures most certainly do not always go as expected.  We didn’t find THIS lighthouse, but we are grateful for all the others we’ve visited and especially the one we lived in for a couple weeks!