It’s been a stunning morning here. Once again, the sky is full of stacks and clumps of clouds and the wind is strong and brazen. My world is flickering in and out of light and shadow as the wind rearranges the sky — the elements are always toying with each other. I woke up chilled and have been shivering at the kitchen island, sipping cups of coffee and tea while doing some writing. When the furnace kicks in, it blows hot air directly up my pant legs. It feels like heaven. I’ve been reading from Anne Truitt’s Daybook again (and again and again), revisiting the pages I dog-eared over the summer months. This morning I passed over her writings from August 12:
“Unless we are very, very careful, we doom each other by holding onto images of one another based on preconceptions that are in turn based on indifference to what is other than ourselves. This indifference can be, in its extreme, a form of murder and seems to me a rather common phenomenon. We claim autonomy for ourselves and forget that in so doing we can fall into the tyranny of defining other people as we would like them to be. By focusing on what we choose to acknowledge in them, we impose an insidious control on them. I notice that I have to pay careful attention in order to listen to others with an openness that allows them to be as they are, or as they think themselves to be. The shutters of my mind habitually flip open and click shut, and these little snaps form into patterns I arrange for myself. The opposite of this inattention is love, is the honoring of others in a way that grants them the grace of their own autonomy and allows mutual discovery.“
ZING!
Doesn’t that pass through your heart like an arrow made of white truth with flaming fletches?!!! It does mine. How often have I pinned someone in place and prevented them from being who they are? Likewise, how often have others pinned me in place like a squirming butterfly on a white card, unable to rise into who I am? Gosh! We need to quit it! Just quit it.
________________________________________________
Three other things:
1. We have one pumpkin left. I will turn it into soup.
2. I will take the dogs walking in the sunshine and wind this afternoon. There will be quadruped riots in the snow and cheatgrass.
3. Do you ever feel yourself rising, like the first star at dusk? If so, imagine how many people out there have cast a glittering wish at the broadness of your twinkling back. You’re beautiful. Because you are. And because I say so.
xx
*twinkle*
You are beautiful. Thank you.
so elegantly and truthfully put, both your words and hers…
thank you for sharing, i needed this post today.
enjoy your afternoon adventuring!
xo
little owl
Rise up, you shining soul! I needed this today, thanks.
I could not agree more with Anne Truitt. I am imagining a quadruped riot and liking it. Love pumpkins. Have to write in Morse code because I am up to my neck in things to do. As I run from one to the other I ask myself if it really mattered if I let it all go and I think it does not. As I walked from the garage towards my lab I felt that I saw a second of my life in front of me and I asked it if it had achieved its mission. It was not sure. How crazy is that? I got to slow down. I love pumpkins a special sort of love and one of my favs is wind rearranging clouds. Stay warm and fuzzy! xx
You are just as lovely as the light you soak in. I adore this time of year, where the air is crisp, but the sun warms us still to the very bones. xoox
wow, sometimes you just seem like a ‘living legend’ for how you weave words with such heart-piercing, soul-stroking beauty. I never regret reading a post from you – you enrich me everytime, and for that, I am grateful. Keep flying butterfly plume! ;o)
xo
Mel
http://www.needleandnestdesign.blogspot.com
Hark!
Z
i
n
g
!!!!
I adore you because you are so attentive to your soul, to self growth, to being a poem in this world
And I do not believe for one nanosecond that you ever been pinned to a white card
no
not
ever
you may FEEL like it when others are not so evolved in this world…but you
turn around and shoot winging arrows all around this world dipped in the ink of love
Miss Chandler is so right
you are beautiful
One more thing
oh that daybook
I bless the day you told me to read it ~ I can’t believe I found a first edition
hardcover for just a mere few dollars!
oh, amen.
[i know that this summer you were clinging to that book, and you remain falling into it with deep fervor and need. i just ordered myself a copy of it.]
xx
that third picture is so beautiful.
those words are so true
it takes effort and awareness to stop the shutters from fixating…but what one is free we are all free
why do we humans feel the need to box things? fear? control? craziness???
I am going for craziness
the sooner we all realize we are crazy the better off we will be!!!
thanks for the beauty here today
love and light
thinking of your walk with the wind at your back… i love the way you see your world.
i have come to rely on maddie for her wonderful music and book recommendations (somewhat in a cultural void out here) but have just ordered annie truitt’s book online, will be waiting for me when next i’m in england. thank you 🙂
you are so very beauty-full and i am always happy when you have both inspired me AND given me something to ponder as well. i, too, am reading daybook and marveling at the sudden realizations of absolute truth that take time to digest.
and my three things? the four days of gale force winds have 1. finally 2. stopped 3.blowing.
A gentle reminder to me to let my 16 year old daughter just “be”. It’s so hard not to inflict my “hopes for her” on to her….
Just need to pay attention and watch her grow into the person she is already becoming…
Thank you.
(trying not to envy the snow you are having….it’s too warm here for November – my Welsh blood is not used to it!)
I swear, what you post dials in so perfectly clear – always what we (I) need to hear!
thank you for being here, Jillian!
Thanks so much for posting that bit from Anne’s book. It was crazy good and exactly what I needed to hear today. It was a zing forsure. Thanks for bringing the truth Jill!
Okay, now I am searching for this book, Thank you.
And….
You are beautiful.
I can’t seem to be following you any more. I still am a bit though. I just can’t seem to find your followers and follow even them. I know that I might discover how soon. Anyway you perplex me a bit and I like your turning head phrases so.
Well, I’m not about to quell out yet.
Jane,
I moved my blog from Blogger over to WordPress.
It’s in a new space now which has made it a bit tricky to find, for some.
The easiest way to find me now is to simply use this address:
http://www.thenoisyplume.com
Beautifully expressed, as usual. Your blog is almost like a devotional for me (which I truly hope doesn’t make you feel odd or infringed upon!!). I appreciate your gift of words and Spirit-connection so much.
You’re a beauty. Thanks for being here.