Deeper things - gratitude stew

My soul is satisfied as with a rich feast,
and my mouth praises you with joyful lips
when I think of you on my bed,
and meditate on you in the watches of the night;
for you have been my help,
and in the shadow of your wings I sing for joy.
My soul clings to you;
your right hand upholds me.
----- Psalm 63:5-8

I woke up today around 5:30...my first thought was...hey...I slept! I last remember reading around 11PM, and I didn’t remember waking up at all during the night, though that seems unlikely. I took a few hours to lie in bed before getting up at 8:00. I started thinking about, what else...food...but then my thoughts drifted toward things other than eating...I started thinking about God and all I am grateful to Him for. Having a few hours (often more) in bed to think over the course of each night has become a daily ritual. I think, pray, read, but mostly I just think. Since I wont be eating for awhile, I thought about creating a different sort of meal...I had this idea this morning that each day I have an opportunity to create a kind of soul-meal...completely unique, completely new... each day...a gratitude "stew" for the soul...adding ingredients throughout the day, letting it all sort of simmer and send up a beautiful aroma.

There was a time I would have thought getting up at 5:30AM on a Saturday morning was robbery...of sleep. Now, it felt like a gift...of sleep! Same event, different perspective.

I also woke up with minimal pain...add that right away to the stew, as it will only last a short while.

No trip to Omaha today...instead...I can open the window shade and watch the beautiful sight of the sunrise (somewhere under the clouds) on the season’s first October snow (an inch or so) fresh on the pine trees and fence posts. Right in you go, beautiful morning.

Today friends Jeff and Lina are getting married...actually, as I type this they likely just finished the ceremony and are now heading to the reception...I don't have it in me to make it ... but I am happy that Kathy is going...they are a great couple and they will have a great life together...all the best, friends!!! Somehow, you have found your way into the stew....I think the metaphor is starting to break down, now that people are floating amongst the veggies, snow, sunrise, and a good night sleep.

Here is a poem I love.. it captures the small things that (if we allow ourselves this vulnerability) daily, we can fall in love with.



Aimless Love

This morning as I walked along the lakeshore,
I fell in love with a wren
and later in the day with a mouse
the cat had dropped under the dining room table.

In the shadows of an autumn evening,
I fell for a seamstress
still at her machine in the tailor’s window,
and later for a bowl of broth,
steam rising like smoke from a naval battle.

This is the best kind of love, I thought,
without recompense, without gifts,
or unkind words, without suspicion,
or silence on the telephone.

The love of the chestnut,
the jazz cap and one hand on the wheel.

No lust, no slam of the door –
the love of the miniature orange tree,
the clean white shirt, the hot evening shower,
the highway that cuts across Florida.

No waiting, no huffiness, or rancor –
just a twinge every now and then

for the wren who had built her nest
on a low branch overhanging the water
and for the dead mouse,
still dressed in its light brown suit.

But my heart is always propped up
in a field on its tripod,
ready for the next arrow.

After I carried the mouse by the tail
to a pile of leaves in the woods,
I found myself standing at the bathroom sink
gazing down affectionately at the soap,

so patient and soluble,
so at home in its pale green soap dish.
I could feel myself falling again
as I felt its turning in my wet hands
and caught the scent of lavender and stone.

~ Billy Collins ~