Things That Make Me Happy

~having this hour or so to write!
~saying YES ! to big things
~hearing laughter, especially from the boys, men, friends and family I love
~getting mail from someone I haven't heard from in awhile
~being in salt water
~learning how to surf, even if it is hard hard hard
~traveling
~great books that suck me in and don't let me go until they are done
~wonderful love making in the morning ... what a great way to start the day !
~well, wonderful sex anytime, actually
~a delicious meal, eaten outside, in the summer, with loved ones ..... yummy
~being called yummy
~sculpture
~finding some "new" clothes for free, or on the cheap, which fit perfectly and look terrific
~a great movie
~going for walks
~exercising hard in some way I love
~sculling, climbing something fun or I didn't think I could, playing tennis even though I am TERRIBLE at it, biking, other good exercise
~riding a beach cruiser bicycle
~seeing cool stuff at the beach, like crabs that make beautiful designs in the sand, or little green rock crabs, or California sea lions
~when the boys are excited to tell me something
~when the boys are silly
~when we can cuddle up for a book together
~reading and reading and reading and reading and reading
~reading about writing and writing about anything
~dreamgroup and how it works ..... it blows my mind sometimes
~sweatlodge .... singing, sweating, and letting happen whatever is going to happen
~Just knowing something is true in my heart, or yours
~listening to my body
~yoga
~paintings that stop me in my tracks
~yoga retreats ...... hmmm maybe soon soon soon
~airports! crazy, I know, but I guess it is simply because I'm on my way somewhere!!!! away, or home sweet home
~hugs
~sunshine through the leaves
~windy days
~rainbows shining through one of those deep blue skies .... gorgeous
~sweet, tiny babies .... the way they smell, the way they remind me of the fragility of being human, how perfect they are, no matter what
~dancing
~singing in the car
~a new favorite song I cannot hear often enough
~good energy in places where there are a LOT of people
~and dancing and dancing and dancing and dancing
~hiking
~laughing and laughing and laughing and laughing
~meeting new friends
~buying Local
~thinking the world has a good chance of getting it right after all. It makes me happy to see the glass not only half full, but half full of the most satisfying drink you ever tasted . . . . maybe just water, maybe something else, but so thirst quenching and delicious!
~playing a good game ...... any kind
~deliciously outrageous fantasies . . . . all kinds
~kicking crispy fall leaves along the sidewalk
~watching certain bugs for a bit
~playing frisbee
~saying "I love you" to someone I love
~hearing "I love you" from someone I love
~getting lots of fun comments on FB when I've posted something ...... *sigh* it's true, sad, but true
~drama! .... Theatre that takes me right out of myself and makes the world feel sublime
~feeling sublime ...... and the way those moments are completely without time ..... I LOVE that!
~knowing you want to love someone, and you can
~friendships that span the years
~the way our personal characters seem intact throughout our lives .... who we are doesn't really seem to change too too much, though everything else changes all the time ..... the way I AM or we ARE just is what it is, even as we do so many different things
~telling a good story and knowing others are enjoying it
~when the phone rings (and without seeing the phone) .... just knowing who is on the other end of the line because I was JUST thinking about them .... Or being surprised to be able to talk to who I was JUST thinking about ......
~being surprised by someone in a good way
~a thoughtful gift when it was given and received with a pure heart
~being able to listen well, and remembering, sometimes, it is all I need to do
~helping out someone I don't even know in a little way, like helping someone cross the street, or up a few stairs, or holding a door, or just being friendly
~smiling
~road trips, bus rides, and being able to watch what is around while I pass through
~writing in my journal
~when a dream tells me something important, and I feel like I "get it" even for just a little while
~knowing everything is going to be alright
~shoving snow
~having a poem hit you in the middle of yourself
~feeling the sun warm my skin
~getting a massage
~avacado .... the perfect food
~the perfect summer peach
~when I listen to myself and know what I'm doing is authentic and right for right now
~when I can be kind to myself (some days it seems so rare or so fleeting, but I'm trying to change that)
~you reading this, so thank you

A good day for Declarations

Another Independence Day is here. I decided to read the Declaration of Independence. Okay, not all of it. I decided to read the beginning of it to the boys. And of course, I couldn't get through the first line without crying.

I have to ponder this a moment . . . . the way that I cry over this document, as well as the Preamble of the Constitution, the occasional John Phillips Sousa song, going to a ballgame for the first time in the season when I haven't gone in a long while. Really, it is sentiment most of the time, and the sweeping drama of politics, and the evocative way some speeches feel more like a sermon of a certain variety.

But I also believe it is something deeper than that. Maybe it is simply hope. I do have hope for our country as messed up as it is, as messed up as we are, as messed up as the world is. There is beauty in all that mess. Just like the rest of the world, too; we don't have a corner market on beauty or truth or justice or happiness, or even messes. When we think we do, we are only fooling ourselves. America has much to offer, and much of that promise is about hope, about courage, and about standing up for our beliefs. It is about saying no to what is wrong, making declarations of all kinds; even positively silly ones, like the President shouldn't kill a fly. Making simple, but important declarations, like voting. But we also have so much to learn.

About a month ago I was with a few friends, sitting on a porch. In the course of the discussion my friend Sue mentioned a book called Forgotten Founders, How the American Indian Helped Shape Democracy, by Bruce E. Johansen. She explained what she had read: Benjamin Franklin was a friend to the people of the Iroquois Nation. In understanding the ways the Six Nations (of the Iroquois) worked together, he was greatly influenced and impressed. And being so influential in the creation of the Declaration of Independence and our nation as a whole, Franklin communicated much of the Iroquois' best principles of governance to the men that forged the new government of the United States. As she went into this in more detail, I found the tears streaming down my face.

Growing up in Connecticut I had heard much about this Revolutionary battle and that one, 'George Washington slept in our town!' kind of stuff, but the only things I ever heard about the American Indians were the things my Dad told me. Things that had to do with his love of the Indian stories he had read at the library, and playing with his friends in the woods of Old Wethersfield. Or in school, they shared food (and information about food), so the pilgrims didn't die in the first few winters on this continent. I had not been told of this delicate, yet powerful relationship that had the influence of forming the words, of shaping the ideas of our "more perfect union."

Benjamin Franklin wrote in 1770, "The Care and Labour of providing for Artificial and Fashionable Wants, the sight of so many rich wallowing in Superfluous plenty, whereby so many are kept poor and distressed for Want, the Insolence of Office . . . . and restraints of Custom, all contrive to disgust them [Indians]with what we call civil Society. --marginalia in Matthew Wheelock, Reflections, Moral, and Political on Great Britain and Her Colonies

And far before then, Franklin wrote to James Parker in 1751, "It would be a very strange thing if Six Nations of Ignorant Savages should be capable of forming a Scheme for such an Union and be able to execute it in such a manner, as that it subsisted Ages, and appears indissoluble, and yet a like Union should be impracticable for ten or a dozen English colonies."

Fortunately for us now, the dozen English colonies did work something out, made their way to saying, "enough!" to King George, and 233 years as an independent nation isn't anything to sneeze at, though I know we still have much to learn if we are to make it many more. I'm grateful for the courage of those men to risk their lives in seeking to build something new, from ideas gleaned outside themselves, as much as any inspirations within.

And I have hope we can figure out how to live in this world together, not only as a nation, but as human beings. To live in our mess, the messes we have made of our lives, and our planet. Our lives are on the line, certainly our pursuits of happiness, but unless we begin to address some of the issues of clean air, clean water, non-toxic food and sustenance for all people, understanding among people with different ideas or lifestyles, it will be our undoing. We cannot ignore those we may disagree with, nor plow them over with our tanks, nor lock them away; we must listen to one another, and learn from one another, tolerate our differences in order to be free in our own lives. So I'm thanking Great Spirit for this nation where there are people who are still saying, "enough" . . . . Or "I am standing up to be recognized for who I am in all my uniqueness, with my valid beliefs, and personal choices." Courage, brothers and sisters, children, and mothers. We still have much to fight for.

Happy Birthday, America. Best wishes for Health, prosperity, and every Happiness life has to offer.

I have to go now because it is time to be with the boys much more than I have been while writing this. zach wanted to write his name (and he just did right there). There are things to take to the barbecue, and fireworks to watch .....

Won't it be an amazing world when the only fireworks are for celebration rather than the bombs and fire cracks of war?