sea of blue (-bells)

I finally got my essay done and went off in search of bluebells….

                                               

‘ah, heaven you are, pretty little bells, heralding Spring, beauty and all that is good in the world… bring your delicate beauty and fill our lungs with your breath…’

Multi cultural joy/’My Britain’

This is my Britain…. (at it’s best)….

Today I sat reading my beautiful poetry book in Trafalgar Square. Children in school uniform chatted happily whilst sitting on the sides of the fountain. Suddenly there was a commotion and at least 40 children whooped with the joy of recognition and shouted a name.

A woman with a lovely smile was beseiged by these lively children. As they rushed towards her – children who are Black, White (blond, brunette), Asian (hair flowing, hair covered) – their joy was united.

How much I loved Britain in that moment – this place where we can enjoy, respect, accept, and certainly expect differences, and yet learn to share our joys and sorrows regardless – not because the differences don’t matter (they do, they’re part of who we each are), but because as we share life together.

I believe it was Moltmann who was among the first to write that effective Interfaith work needed to be undertaken for shared causes and actions, not just for it’s own sake (not ‘we must get on together’, but ‘let’s do this/solve this (whatever) together’); and it was C.S. Lewis who wrote that Friendship had to be ‘about something’ (“…even if it is shared enthusiasm for white mice…”).

It is in sharing life, that we find points of unity, common feeling, connection, purpose…

…and when we share life with each other, we can get to move on to being people who, In the words of Paul McCartney, ’side by side, hand in hand, we all stand together’.

So thanks to the children and the popular teacher in Trafalgar Square this afternoon – you did my heart good!

(I just re-found this – wrote it in November! so here it is…finally!)

Crazy Amaryllis

Someone gave me an amaryllis bulb for Christmas… I finally planted it and look what happened!

I haven’t seen the ‘candy-stripe’ flowers before. Why does God bother with so many designs? bit of a show-off perhaps?!

smell the roses…

Generally, in every day life, I’m pretty darned good at ’smelling the roses’ – I notice little beauties of life and even literally stop to smell the roses when I’m walking through a neighbourhood and plants overhang the pavement/walkway.

What i’m being reminded of just recently is that I need to do that in my whole life too.

I have things i want to happen in my life – and i get impatient. I try not to ‘go on’ to God, but I kind of end up being just a tad repetitive in my requests (sorry God!).

What’s so easy to miss though, is the love and blessedness in my life now.

To be looking forward impatiently to a future i dream of, and miss the fact that my life right now (though not untouched by pains) is actually blessed beyond my imaginings. In fact, I’m ridiculously over-blessed.

For my future hopes, I have felt God tell me so many times, ‘It’s all in hand’, yet I find it so hard to ‘leave it there’ and get on with today.

 

                                          

I want to be better at ’smelling the roses’ in my friendships, enjoy and savour every moment of joy that comes my way, to abandon myself to God in the ‘now’, to learn the lessons God is teaching me directly and through my amazing, beautiful friendships right now.

I mustn’t waste the lessons of now, or miss the fun of now, by only waiting impatiently for hoped-for future joys.

 

Grey waters

Someone wonderful recently introduced me to R.S. Thomas… here’s one of his poems that I already love! (thanks SL!)

Sea-Watching

 

Grey waters, vast 

                        as an area of prayer

that one enters. Daily

                      over a period of years

I have let my eye rest on them.

Was I waiting for something?

                                          Nothing

but that continuous waving

                             that is without meaning

occurred.

              Ah, but a rare bird is

rare. It is when one is not looking

at times one is not there

                                  that it comes.

You must wear your eyes out

as others their knees.

               I became the hermit

of the rocks, habited with the wind

and the mist. There were days,

so beautiful the emptiness

it might have filled,

                          its absence

was as its presence; not to be told

any more, so single my mind

after its long fast,

                          my watching from praying.

- R.S. Thomas

in Laboratories of the Spirit, 1975 

The Monastic Way

“When we look at the world around us we see

the earth,

the sky,

the water,

the plants,

the trees,

the animals

and people.

But what we have to do is look behind all these phenomena

and discover their hidden source.

Most people stop with the phenomena:

they appreciate the earth or sky or flowers

or the sun or stars,

they admire the beauty

but they do not try to find the hidden source of the sky and flowers,

of every single thing.

We see beyond only when we look with the eyes of the heart.”

- Bede Griffiths, OSB  

 

excellent investments…

Yesterday and today I’ve had the joy of spending time with one of my favourite 4 year olds (and his lovely parents!).

As a result, I’ve discussed dinosaur bones over dinner, filmed his ‘dancing’ (on request) and his air-guitar to Bob Dylan songs (where did he learn about air-guitar?!), been told I buy THE coolest presents ever (I scored mega with a £2 transformer toy I took for him!), and have pretended I couldn’t see him countless times today when he was ‘hiding’ in a garden (he giggles too much to be a good hider!).

Since his birth, he’s been one of the most healing presences in my world – there’s something about connecting with his wild world that completely ‘takes me out of myself’ and helps me to see a different perspective.

I thank God for that ‘little bundle’, who’s growing into a ‘big boy’…(or if he had his way, growing into a ‘Power Ranger’!). He gives so much love, and is like a literal tonic – everything seems better after a few hours with him! :0) 

I love his parents, and was quite settled that I’d love their child when ’it’ arrived, whoever he/she turned out to be - I don’t think I ever realised I’d gain quite so much back. Good returns eh! Better than any other kind of bank I know!

 

weeds?!

of all the lovely things in the garden, I confess I have quite a soft spot for some of the alleged weeds…

     

Eleanor Blakely Dickinson’s poem, ‘Forget me not’ ends with these words:

….Like thoughts of home in climes afar;
Like evening’s still returning star;
Like tears which fall when the heart is sad,
Almost as sweet as that heart were glad;
Like friendship found where we sought it not;
In bower and garden, in field and grot,
Spring thy fair flowers, Forget me not.

 

It’s not an original thought to wonder who decides which things are weeds, and who decides what ‘the right place’ for them to grow is anyway… maybe something beautiful always finds itself in the right place?

 

new life in old twigs

i literally jumped for joy when i saw that the tree outside my window was starting to leaf and showing tiny signs of blossom!

i love this time of the year when things are ‘coming alive’ or ‘waking’ again. it’s wonderful… and nature’s parable re-enacted: that the cold barren days, the waiting in darkness, the dry brittle twigs weren’t really signs of all-is-lost, but of things waiting for their time (their ‘kairos’).

this is the kind of thing i meant before (over easter) when i wrote about death and resurrection – the experiences in the ‘here and now’ which feel like endings and loss, the cold/lonely/barren times that feel like wasted time, that are sometimes actually just the gateway to something new. not always what we expected, or what we think we’d want, but somehow blessings of new life.  

legacy

                     

                                      

with thanks to people I don’t know, who used to live in my house, and had the kindness to plant bulbs in the garden that I now enjoy…

what a nice legacy they left  :0)