April 13, 2021 a thought for today: Jails are always closed yet full, while temples are always open yet empty. Chinese Proverb

I looked at my calendar over the weekend and saw that I had a pretty uneventful week coming up. That was until Monday morning when I started making calls to set appointments. I used some of  Monday morning to do most of the bulletin so that was well on it’s way. After the phone calls, I had an appointment for today to have the oil changed in the car and an appointment for a hair cut the end of the week. I made another eye doctor appointment but I couldn’t get it for this week, or next week or the week....it is a month away. I also found out that Sue has a couple of appointments to add to our list of outings. 

I made the appointment for an oil change as early as I could get for today so that I would have the rest of the day free for....whatever. “Whatever” follows below. 

The photo of the day for yesterday was “mirror”. I have a few around the house. Not to mention the full length one I wrestled with yesterday to hang in the powder room. Try after try to get a new hanging wire on with no success left me aggravated and worried that if I kept up I would break the mirror. So with my hair every which way as I checked the health of the mirror, I gave up and used command strips to brace it against the wall while sitting it on the floor. Anyway, this one seemed better for the photo of the day. 

Photography helps to or leads to a more than casual observation of surrounding visible matter. I have developed it with  more and more of a strength as the years have passed. Recently I have added an even greater stimulus to that effort. I mentioned the other day that a news article about an amateur photographer in my city grabbed my attention. He photographs what some would call “junk” or “trash” and found (and has shown) a kind of beauty in it. I decided to give it a try. Wow! Did that ever expand my field of photography and visual story telling possibilities. It’s amazing what people throw away and intentionally (or unintentionally) change or destroy (objects or landscape). Now that the idea was born for me, I am even more aware. It’s sad, that is, the disrespect and destruction. Now every time I leave the house, like this morning, I look for these “treasures”. I must have shot at least twenty or so occurrences this morning alone. It  amazes me to think that maybe some parent didn’t teach their child about their own hygiene or that of their surroundings. I guess that’s bad, thoughts like that I mean.

The photograph of the day for today is “ water drops”. While I was sitting in the waiting area at Midas I watched the coffee maker as the water dropped. I took a couple of shots of that. Later after I got home, I noticed that the cup of iced tea I had sitting on my desk was “sweating”, perfect water drops. 

Last week I volunteered to add another hand out to our guests of the free meal on Saturdays. I waited for some response from the first effort to see if we would proceed with more. I didn’t get any response for a few days. Since I begin the work on the data needed for the coming week early on Monday morning, I gently pushed with more texts and emails to get a feel for what we were going to do. I finally got one of the two answered this morning and it was a go. So when I got home this morning, I got the handout for this week done. The information to finish the bulletin was also on my email so I got that done too. Now I have one more hand out to do and am waiting for that information.

The word for today is think.  I often think that the night is more alive and more richly colored than the day. Vincent Van Gogh.  When you arise in the morning, think of what a precious privilege it is to be alive - to breathe, to think, to enjoy, to love. Marcus Aurelius. Reserve your right to think, for even to think wrongly is better than not to think at all. Hypatia. We are shaped by our thoughts; we become what we think. When the mind is pure, joy follows like a shadow that never leaves. Buddha. The less men think, the more they talk. Montesquieu. Very little is needed to make a happy life; it is all within yourself, in your way of thinking. Marcus Aurelius. Thinking: the talking of the soul with itself. Plato. Thinking is a habit, and like any other habit, it can be changed; it just takes effort and repetition, John Eliot. The soul never thinks without a picture, Aristotle. Thoughts rule the world, Ralph Waldo Emerson. A moment's thinking is an hour in words, Thomas Hood. Life consists in what a man is thinking of all day, Ralph Waldo Emerson.  Our minds are lazier than our bodies, Francois de La Rochefoucauld.  We ought to do good to others as simply as a horse runs, or a bee makes honey, or a vine bears grapes season after season without thinking of the grapes it has borne. Marcus Aurelius   The soul becomes dyed with the color of its thoughts, Marcus Aurelius. Language is the dress of thought, Samuel Johnson.   

This article sounds like an exciting adventure. I know of several people who have expressed a desire to do it but alas.... However, I do have a cousin who has and is doing it. I dream of what it would be like, there is a part of me who would like to do it for at least a set period of time. On the other hand there is something to be said for staying with the roots, staying where family, friends and “familiar” are and always will be. The article is about a family who sold their home, renovated an RV and traveled the country during the pandemic and plan to for at least a year. The kids in the family watched an alligator eat another alligator in Louisiana. They danced with the Easter Bunny in New Orleans, played on the beach in the Alabama earlier.  The mother and father of the family “traveled the world” before they had children. Before the adventure began, they wondered “how can we explore.....but do it safely?” A friend of theirs was selling a 2001, 35-foot camper. They bought it and made a few updates to make it “home”, adding a wood kitchen table and bunk beds and a desk.  The RV has hardwood flooring, a fireplace and a photo-gallery wall. One of the adults took a break from his job, the other is writing a book while traveling. As for where they plan to stop next, they know some stops will be national parks and the children have a say about what they want to see and experience. They are not in a rush to get to any place in particular. They don’t drive any more than five hours at a time. They have a membership in a website called “Harvest Hosts” that lists places that allow RVs to park overnight.

We had meat loaf last. I think we will have the left over in gravy with mashed potatoes. 

Joy

Someone’s emptied candy wrapper with nowhere to go but on the pavement? At least it makes a storytelling photo adding color, shapes and textures to its demise.