Evening Devotion

[greenstorm]

Ok, let's try counting a couple blessings before bed for awhile. Science says that helps, and it's not wise to neglect one's blessings.

My back pasture is really coming back to diversity with the geese grazing it, and having been indoors a little, as opposed to it having been I think mowed before I was here and cows before that. Strawberries and meadow rue and cornus canadensis and paintbrush and columbine have joined the chives, arnica, and white violets in blooming. Soon the rises will be out.

My close folks take great care to be explicit in communicating with me. It feels important and cared-for, or rather I do.

I might be able to squeak in a round of gaspe before frost if I figure this out real soon now? I have a lot more garden space now.

Shower and then a bed feels nice.

Two new goslings showed up today and it looks like the whole flock is protecting so they may survive the crows.

A coworker invited me for supper next week. It's nice to feel wanted?

Comments

[yarrowkat]

i do an every-evening gratitude practice, writing things on slips of paper and putting them in a jar, and at the end of the year, either burning the lot as an offering, or composting them, but also re-reading them to some extent and that is always time well spent. i think the practice helps me keep my head on straight and not fall too far into despair in spite of the world

[greenstorm]

With this new practice I learn that I see what I look for; I notice moments of enjoyment or things I like more when I'm thinking I'll need to record them. They seem to go less remarked otherwise. It's good to foreground this stuff right now.

I react poorly to the idea of burning them! Recording them "permanently" here feels like an acknowledgement, where burning them to me would feel like a rejection. I find that super interesting-- can you say more about how you are offering them, or how you feel/think about that?

[yarrowkat]

ritually, burning can do at least two things - eliminate something, or surrender it to the divine - think of the ancient greeks burning a choice slice of meat for the gods as a gift to them. i am using it, with conscious intention (the intention matters), in that way. sometimes it doesn't feel right to me, too, hence the compost! which is always a return to the soil, the earth, the cycle of growth. everything composts. :)

[greenstorm]

I need to think very hard about how I struggle to connect impermanence and gratitude, and think of ways to honour and cherish things that don't involve permanence. This is revealing a gap there for me, because as you say, everything composts. Why can I not honour gifts given me and also allow them to return to the earth?

Thank you! This seems so important.