1. Morning walks. This week we saw some herons and a baby beaver but the geese and ducks are still hiding their babies. The river is fast and full from snow melt so we rerouted a few times because it was spilling over onto some of the trails we usually walk.
2. Good friends and neighbors. I am a highly sensitive introvert and my favorite thing is to stay home, but that makes the few people I love and trust even more important to me. This week it was making art with Calyx and having our next door neighbors who are moving over for dinner and joyful movement with my gym buddies.
I made that!
3. Our lilacs. This is one of the only years they haven’t been immediately destroyed by a big storm, and they were glorious.
4. Consuming content. Reading books, watching TV and movies, listening to podcasts and music. All of it makes me so happy.
5. My tiny family, tiny home, tiny life. Eric is on summer vacation and it’s nice to have him home, not so tired or busy, even though it means Ringo doesn’t sleep as much during the day so he’s tired and sometimes that is like having a toddler who didn’t take their nap.
Image by EricImage by Eric
Bonus joy: cancelled plans, crossing off stuff on my to-do list, our whole house fan, sitting in the back yard with Ringo and Eric, having a clean house and good leftovers as a result of inviting people over for dinner, the lasagna Eric made last night, all the color now that things are budding out and blooming, a warm shower, clean sheets, a massage, being retired, the hydromassage chair, the sauna, the pool, small group training with Shelby, masks and vaccines, health insurance, raspberries and strawberries, granola, fine tip pens, watercolors, trash service, naps, texting, reading in bed at night while Ringo and Eric sleep.
14. The Strange Afterlife of George Carlinon The New York Times. “Nearly 14 years after his death, his provocative humor has been embraced by people across the political spectrum. What happens when comedy outlasts the era it was made for?”
16. Researchers Pinpoint Reason Infants Die From SIDS. “Sudden infant death syndrome (SIDS) accounts for about 37% of sudden unexpected infant deaths a year in the U.S., and the cause of SIDS has remained largely unknown. On Saturday, researchers from The Children’s Hospital Westmead in Sydney released a study that confirmed not only how these infants die, but why.”
17. Open Air with Cheri Huber, a podcast archive. “Cheri and Michael are on the air to facilitate a conversation to support the practice of conscious, compassionate awareness.”
23. The Honeymoon Phase Is Not Always A Miragefrom Andrea Gibson. “How to return to seeing our partners as sublime.” Going to see Andrea perform next week and also have tickets to a show in November. They are one of my very favorite performers, poets, humans.
24. The War on Our Bodies: the Phase of Cold Clarity. “This draft remains a draft and in most states abortion is legal, unincumbered (looking at you, Texas) and is rooted in the worst of our past. It represents regression, racism and tyranny. But this draft provides us the gift of cold clarity. We don’t need to wonder. Our bodies, our families and our communities are on the line. As many have noted, the privacy rights afforded through the Roe v. Wade decision underpinned many modern decisions that impact our daily lives. The right to contraception, interracial marriage, and gay marriage are left vulnerable through a majority opinion like that of Alito’s draft.” This post ends with a “what do we do?” section. In related news, Peaceful protests outside Supreme Court justices’ homes is good (“The Supreme Court should not be considered immune to citizen feedback”), and Groups fighting vaccines and masks fail to see hypocrisy in opposing abortions (“Judges are ignoring medical associations and scientists in favor of organizations pushing disinformation”).
28. Instagram video, “a discussion about how the pandemic has been affecting our mental health and what kind of relief is possible through mindfulness” with Rev angel Kyodo williams, David Perrin, jylani ma’at, and Ramsay Wing Okano Pierce.
29. Radical Self-Care Dharma Podcast with Lama Rod Owens, “author, activist, and authorized Lama in the Kagyu school of Tibetan Buddhism, invites us to a radical self-care, based not on cutting ourselves off from the world, but rather on engaging with it fully. We do this through the recognition and practice of spaciousness, first by waking up to the space between thoughts within our own minds, and then offering this spaciousness to others.”
32. The Trevor Project’s 2022 National Survey on LGBTQ Youth Mental Health. “These data provide critical insights into some of the unique suicide risk factors faced by LGBTQ youth, top barriers to mental health care, and the negative impacts of COVID-19 and relentless anti-transgender legislation. This research also highlights several ways in which we can all support the LGBTQ young people in our lives—and help prevent suicide.”
36. A Cook Who Never Used a Cookbook Now Has Her Ownon The New York Times. “Emily Meggett, the keeper of centuries-old culinary traditions in the Carolinas, has spent her life feeding others. At 89, she shares her kitchen wisdom.”
50. The late Norm Macdonald left fans a surprise stand-up special. “Actor and comedian Norm Macdonald, who was well known as a Saturday Night Live star in the 1990s, shot a secret standup performance in his living room before he died last year at 61. His producing partner said Macdonald wanted to have another appearance for his fans should his health take a turn for the worst.”
51. The Free Black Women’s Library/Reading Room I. “The Free Black Women’s Library is a social art project that features a collection of over 4000 books written by Black women, as well as workshops, readings, film screenings, & critical conversations. The Free Black Women’s Library is opening a Reading Room in Bedford Stuyvesant, Brooklyn that will serve the community as a literary hub and creative co working space. All ages, race and genders are invited to use this space to read, write, dream, rest, create and connect. Money from Reading Room T shirt sales is being raised for renovations labor and materials.”
58. Homework every night for the rest of your life from Austin Kleon. “Filmmaker Lawrence Kasdan once said, ‘Being a writer is like having homework every night for the rest of your life.'”
Open Space Practice, (AKA: A Thousand Shades of Gray) 