Laine's Blog, Thinking Out Loud

Love...

 

Here I am surrounded by giant old oak trees,

dripping with spanish moss,

living with a joyful dog

and a handsome cat,

while it feels like the world is coming apart at the seams.

 

It is not.

 

The birds still sing.

The frogs still croak and slap themselves onto the windows at night.

The moon rises and shines.

The sun too.

 

All that is worrying us will change,

and soon.

One way or the other.

 

To quote Wendell Barry,

 

Be joyful even though you have considered all the facts.

 

Be joyful and see the world around you with fresh eyes and love.

 

"Love is why we have hope"

 

 

Love your world!

And hope for the very best for all of us.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Inspired by the book by Anne Lamott,  Almost Everything, Notes on Hope.

The quote about love is from the back cover and the Wendell Barry quote is found on the inside front cover.

She is fearless and funny and inspiring!

Photo is a view outside of Lake Lure, NC. ©Laine Quinn 2015

 

Kindness is Contagious...

 

 

In his book, "Humankind, A Hopeful History",

Rutger Bregman writes about cynicism vs. realism.

And I quote:

 

Isn't it telling that in modern usage the realist has become synonymous

with the cynic - for someone with a pessimistic outlook?

In truth, it's the cynic who's out of touch.

In truth, we're living on Planet A,

where people are deeply inclined to be good to one another.

 

So, be realistic. Be courageous. Be true to your nature and offer your trust.

Do good in broad daylight,

and don't be ashamed of your generosity.

You may be dismissed as gullible and naive at first.

But remember, what's naive today may be common sense tomorrow.

 

It's time for a new realism.

It's time for a new view of humankind.

 

 

 

 

It's a good book, with lots of examples of goodness that outweighs the craziness.

Photo of Treaty Oak, in Jacksonville Florida, ©2020 Laine Quinn

They say that this Southern Live Oak tree is over 200 years old, but I would offer that it is way older than that!

 

Step 2 is Kindness...

 

"If kindness takes a little longer,

it's worth the extra time."

                                   Eleanor McEvoy

 

When we develop kindness towards ourselves,

we can change the atmosphere of our days and lives;

the atmosphere of our homes and work environments,

and our relationships.

 

Kindness, first for ourselves.

All love and peace radiate from our tender hearts.

 

 

They say we have ten years, it might be less, to get this right, to turn around the dire need that the earth is in.

 

If we wake up everyday with a kind heart and gentleness towards ourselves,

then we can appreciate the beauty that is all around us.

 

This appreciation for life can carry us to the finish line,

one day at a time.

 

 

The kindness quote is from a song by Eleanor McEvoy. I recommend the book "Loving Kindness" by Sharon Salzberg for some kind inspiration.

Flagler Beach pier love notes, ©Laine Quinn

 

 

 

 

Why Parallel?

 

Well, the rest of the story from yesterday's post is this:

when I am reading a book and have to put it aside to do other things,

 the characters stay with me,

sort of like parallel lives.

I am wondering how that date is going to go

with the hired assassin and the waitress from the diner who he is obviously falling in love with,

and I have to wait a long time to find out, because the story takes a lot of detours,

and so do I!

So they are here, next to me...

Parallel!

 

I have discovered a fascinating author,

Andrew Vachss,

who's books are complicated and intriguing, and seedy and uplifting!

The assassin and the waitress are from the novel,

Two Trains Running

not the easiest read, but well worth the trouble.

 

 

 

It's the fourth book of Vachss' that I've read and I want to read more and more. He is very prolific, so there are no worries there!

 

Parallel Worlds...

 

That's what a good story provides,

 a Parallel universe.

Introducing characters and places

that you never imagined or would ever bump into in your everyday life.

 

 

Between books and some of the marvelous shows streaming on television,

you can be in outer space one minute, in Kabul the next,

or on the seedy streets of New York,

all of it giving you a window into the imagination of your fellow travelers

in your universe.

 

"Fiction as we currently think of it, the novel and short story...offers one the very best

means of understanding people different from oneself, short of experience.

Fiction is often really much more useful than lived experience;

it takes much less time, costs nothing (from the library), and comes in a manageable,

orderly form. You can understand it. Experience just steamrollers over you and you begin to see

what happened only years and years later, if ever. Fiction is much better than reality

at providing useful factual, psychological, and moral understanding."

 

That's a quote from Ursula K. Le Guin, who has recently departed this world,

but left us with a treasure trove of other wildly imaginative worlds.

 

 

 

 

 

Quote from the wave of the mind, by Ursula K. Le Guin. 

 

 

Heartening...

 

There is a book by Michael Meade that I am savoring, sentence by sentence.

It's a gold mine of insight into our human life on earth,

that connects us to the threads of eternity.

 

A quote from the book,

The World Behind The World...

 

 

 

Happy Valentine's Weekend!

 

With love,

Laine

 

 

A Trip To China

 

 

There was a very short story,

written years ago by Susan Sontag with a title similar to the title of this post.

Once you have finished that story

you discover that the author had never been to China after all!

 

Same thing here,

neither have I!

 

 

 

 

The China Pavillion at Epcot Center, Disney.       

Susan Sontag's short story appeared in "I etcetera", from what I can glean doing a google search! If anyone knows otherwise, please let me know!

 

 

Wouldn't It Be Great?

 

Considering love,

romantic love is all that you hear about,

either beginning or ending,

but the best love is the love you have for your world-

your world, not THE world,

but your world which includes you.

 

 

What that can mean is seeing the beauty that is all around you,

but especially in your own heart.

 

This excerpt from a Neil Jordon novel, Shade,

describes a woman who might be loving her world in this way.

 

"But she was easy going, Maggie,

things that would have bothered others didn't bother her a bit;

she was part of the grass that grew and the world that turned

and she woke up each morning like it was her first.

Her first day in a whole new world"

 

 

 

Wouldn't it be great if we all lived like Maggie?

 

 

 

 

 

Days of Summer

 

There's nothing half so much worth doing...

 

 

 

 

If you can finish this phrase from The Wind In The Willows, then you will know that it doesn't go with this photo, but is equally true!

The Moments Will Find You!

 

 

Are humbuggers as much a part of Christmas as sleigh bells and carols?

Charles Dickens' A Christmas Carol is as perennial as Christmas itself.

So too Dr. Seus' How The Grinch Stole Christmas,

and John Grisham's Skipping Christmas.

All of these vehicles attempt to circumvent Christmas and all of them fail.

 

Is Christmas inevitable?

If it didn't exist, would we have to invent it all over again?

Perhaps.

 

What is it that makes Christmas Christmas?

How often have you heard someone say, 

"It doesn't feel like Christmas this year"?

What does that mean?

The immediate answer might have something to do with the weather,

followed by an,

"I don't know, it just doesn't seem like Christmas."

 

If you really ask yourself this question, what would the answer be?

What would reawaken the magic of Christmas that seems to be missing for you?

There might not be an obvious answer to that.

 

Perhaps there are moments that sneak up on you and before you know it, you've created a Christmas memory

that you will long for during a future Christmas season.

It could be a smile from across the room that makes your heart swell to overflowing and boom - it feels like Christmas.

Maybe someone steals a cookie from the batch cooling by the stove and sets off a string of laughter and silliness.

Is it the moments then, strung together like a garland for the tree, that make Christmas,

and all the rest, the madness of shopping, and baking, and being ready in time,

is just a backdrop - the stage set for the moments that provide the magic?

 

Whatever part you play in the Christmas pageant, be patient and

"believe that behind Christmas is something greater than what stands before us."

 

Don't look for the moments, they will find you.

 

 

 

 

 

The bah humbuggery of this post was inspired by a google search for Bah Humbug that led to a charming post by Stephen Arod Shirreffs.

Other parts were spun off from a conversation with Lauren, my godchild who is no longer a child child.

The rest is from my own attempts to skip Christmas, which I now regard as the immovable feast. Try as you might to ignore it, stare it down, or even curse it, it won't go away! In the end, when you make it your own, it kind of works!

So, trust that the moments will come and that the magic of Christmas lies dormant in your heart.

The critter in the photo at the top of this post might have been a whitness to Scrooge's nocturnal visits. He was found hiding in the Southern Lights Candle Shop in St. Augustine, Florida. There are many such remembrances of things past at this unique gift shop.

 

All the very best!

Laine

A Good Book Can Help

 

 

It is so much fun to spend a day reading, even if it is loaded with guilt, it is pure pleasure!

Writers of fiction are magicians who conjure up characters and places and whole lives of people we believe exist.

We root for them, or we want to know them, or we are afraid of them.

 

This photograph, taken in Mt. Dora, Florida, is the charming facade of the Dickens-Reed bookstore.

Two children are depicted sitting under a shelf of books, reading together.

They are surrounded by books.

 

In the windows are reflections of the vehicles that take us in and out of our busy lives.

Finding balance between the busyness and the quiet is challenging.

A good book can help.

 

 

The facade was created by artist Thomas Merrell. 

The Lighthouse Stairs

 

 

Looking up or down?

You...

...today,

looking up or down?

 

(That's the short version of today's post. Here is the long one.)

 

If you're feeling good today, happy and cheerful, be sure to share that

somehow, because you never know how much a heartfelt smile might mean to

someone, how just a smile can save a life.

 

If you're not feeling happy or cheerful, breathe that in

and try to connect to other people who aren't feeling happy,

who are probably trying to figure out why, and how to "fix"

or get rid of it somehow.

If you sit with the feeling and trust that it will pass,

(and you know it will),

at the end of that you will be softer, because you made the

friendship with yourself stronger.

Instead of rejecting that part of yourself, you have

embraced it and your shadow grows smaller

and your heart grows bigger.

 

So, up or down,

It's still you there,

and you're fine,

right where you are.

 

 

Fishing, Reading...

 

On a warm January day off, sitting on the beach,

enjoying the skimmers, pelicans and gulls, and a family fishing nearby.

 

In Vietnam each seaside village has a secret fish sauce recipe.

 

Reading Vietnamese-American, Andrew X Pham's

Catfish and Mandala -

a very brave piece of storytelling about  one man's search

for his bearings, that takes him back to the village in Vietnam

where his life began. Through foreign yet familiar landscapes,

the author bicycles his way across memories,

encountering dangers he hadn't imagined and finding

the grace that his soul so badly needed in a simple encounter.

 

It is a true hero's journey.

 

The family scurries off the vanishing sandbar and gathering my book and chair

I head to my favorite Chinese restaurant for some scallion pancakes.

 

 

 

MOM?

  That's not Mom.                                                (Why are they staring at me?) 

        Are you sure?            

  It's not Mom.                                     (Hey, guys, I didn't do it, whatever it is,

        No, too tall, I guess.                                              I didn't do it, okay?)          

 

         Mom?                                                   (Why are they standing so close?)

 

   It's not Mom.