Come into Presence: Make a List
Take delight in Summer and Resist Fascism too
Dear Ones,
I’m writing this first paragraph Saturday evening after returning home from our local “No Kings” rally here in Bellingham, Washington. It felt so good to be part of this national protest. I’m so proud of my town! We had a great turnout, much larger than the April 5th rally. I’m too tired to write any more about it, but here’s a photo.
Come into Presence: Make a List
It’s summer. I love summer here in the Pacific Northwest. It rarely gets too hot, unlike other areas of the country. It’s not humid. The sea is close by whenever we need a breeze or the touch of salt water on our toes. I find that there’s nothing better than going for a walk in the woods through dappled light, or sitting on my front steps inhaling the beauty of blossoms and listening to birdsong, or sitting on the beach sorting stones and looking for beach glass.
And, as you know, this week brought images upon images of new outrages to our screens and to our consciousness. This was a week of outrage and grief as well as a week of exquisite beauty.
I’m reading Suleika Jaoud’s The Book of Alchemy: A Creative Practice for an Inspired Life right now, very very slowly. It’s one of those books that I read with pencil in hand to mark up the margins, with my journal close by. I read a bit and it sparks a thought or memory that I have to write about. Then I go back to reading.
The book is a collection of short essays by various people, some famous, some not. At the end of each essay there’s a journal prompt. My favorite one for now is “Just Ten Images” by Ash Parsons Story. The idea is to make a list each day of ten images that caught your attention. “The value doesn’t lie in the image, but in my attention to it,” she writes. I love this idea — it’s simple and profound. It reminds me of Mary Oliver’s constant exhortations to pay attention, to slow down, to come into presence.
As I started doing this exercise, I found myself tweaking it. 9 instead of 10, because 9 is a favorite magical number (power of 3 times 3). I might take 48 hours instead of 24 to gather them. And I expanded it beyond images to anything sensory.
Here are nine moments I gathered these over a couple of days. I love this practice. I invite you to give it a try!
1. Seeing a swallowtail butterfly by the pond three days in a row.
2. Sharpening waxy colored pencils and applying the soft creamy color to paper, stroke by stroke. Building up layers of color, purring at the palest sage green on top of dark forest green.
3. Watching happy bees cluster around a friend’s hives, taking off in flight then returning. The low hum and buzz. The summer heat.
4. Opening my door at dusk (near 10 PM this far north) to see the full moon rising directly across the way. This only happens close to Summer Solstice, as my door is oriented southeast. My heart soars. La Luna Bella! Sending my love to you, old friend.
5. Coming unglued over images of children in Gaza, armed soldiers in the streets of L.A., and uniformed thugs manhandling Senator Padilla of California.
6. Laughing in delight over videos of demonstrators dancing and singing in the streets of L.A. My dad worked downtown for 35 years. I worked there too, during my college summers to make tuition money.