appreciation – The Hermits' Rest

Family Gratitude

Describe a positive thing a family member has done for you.

I can’t really say one positive thing about family member has done, because I have many kind and generous souls in my immediate and extended family. I don’t know how I’d be coping right now without their support.

This story has no illustrations, so you get today’s nature. First, two flowers and two bugs.

One recent positive thing has come about because my stepmother, who really resembles my late mother in so many ways, has moved into assisted living, this needing to downsize again. So, my stepsister got the fun job of going through her inheritance, or at least some of it, to see what she wanted and what could be passed on in some way.

Oh look, a butterfly. It’s a Phaon or Pearl Crescent.

When I got the call about Flo going into the smaller, safer, apartment, I never expected to be told that my stepsister wanted to give me all the jewelry my dad had given Flo. This is her inheritance, not mine! I was so touched at the offer. I’ll treasure whatever I receive. Dad had good taste in jewelry for a boy from the hills of Georgia.

The next call I got indicated there’s more than jewelry and that we need to meet somewhere to transfer it. Ooh. I guess I’m glad we have that storage container (really the issue is that Flo mainly owned very breakable objects that shouldn’t be shipped – I think I have enough big things already.

Anyway, this generosity is appreciated deeply. I admire Flo’s good taste so much, and I love her paintings. I’m so lucky that both she and Mom were painters (and other artistic endeavors). And yes, you can tell I’m a Baby Boomer, because I love family heirlooms. I don’t expect my offspring to be too interested in my treasures; they’ll make a GREAT estate sale, though.

And that’s my story! Today was another good one, and I’m glad I could help out my family a little myself!

Happy ladybug season (with silky evil ukulele and medick).

(Yes, D&L, I’m trying to come up with a plan. Love you both.)

Complimented and Content

What was the best compliment you’ve received?

I’ve had some much appreciated compliments during my life, though like so many others, I tend to discount compliments (oh, that can’t be true!) and dwell on criticism. That’s not a healthy pattern!

I took this photo before we left the state park to remember when I need to settle my mind.

So I’ve been trying to pay more attention to any compliments that come my way, soak them in, and express gratitude for them. One I loved came when I had only been at my current job for a few months. One of the subject matter experts told his colleagues how much he enjoyed my training videos, because I have such a soothing voice that it makes even project management software interesting. That was unexpected! I do think I have a pleasant professional voice, and I had good training thanks to all my singing and tips from a former supervisor who reads books for the blind.

Visually impaired people can enjoy honeysuckle because it smells so good.

One reason I enjoy my current job is that not only do I enjoy the work, but people let me know they appreciate what I create for them. Of course there is criticism, but it’s kind and helpful. I can improve! Win.

Hawthorn looked like a bridal bouquet to me. My compliments to the plant!

Here’s my big takeaway. The thing I find most important about compliments is how good it can feel when you let someone else know something that you like about them. A compliment that’s sincere, unexpected, and insightful can really brighten someone’s day. I most assuredly get more out of delivering a well deserved compliment than receiving one (though both are good!).

What I can do without are insincere compliments that aren’t even well thought out. That’s more like flattery designed to get you to do something or buttering you up for some unpleasant request. Like talking to a poor salesperson. Yuck. If you can’t compliment someone accurately, don’t try.

But I was glad to get home. I missed the horses and Fiona. (And dogs!)

And that’s my advice after a long day of work and travel down roads so bumpy that my watch gave me exercise credit for them!

It was hard to crochet, too but I finished this bag to hold my phone in Seneca. The truck cab lacks amenities like cubbies.

Speaking of Love – and Hawks

Can you share a positive example of where you’ve felt loved?

Woo hoo. Today’s prompt goes with my day’s experience. So, let’s blog.

I’ve figured out that one of my “love languages” is the one about giving time and effort. When someone spends time doing something to make my life better, I feel love.

One example is how incredibly grateful and loved I felt when I came home from a trip expecting improvements to my horse area, but was blown away to see that two portable buildings we had were now a beautiful and large hen house with the interior painted “my” colors and a HUGE new tack room that would hold all my horse supplies and have a sitting area. I was blown away.

Note that they painted the hay storage container to match the building.

Every time I go in either of those buildings I have warm feelings about the two guys in my family who worked so hard on it. They were my son’s first two carpentry projects, so there are imperfections, but they’re charming to me. And I think of the stories behind how they got all the furnishings and built the saddle racks and pegs for halters, etc.

The other time I felt loved like this was when Lee gave me my bird journal. I couldn’t believe he’d spent so much time collecting bird photos then made the book by hand. I get to feel loved every day when I write in it!

He also made this cute book cover for the journal.

Love Birds of the Day

The highlight of my day today was all about love. After making many trips back and forth to the horse trough with water, I decided to go listen to birds for a while. Today got down to 12°F but then warmed up to 45°. That felt balmy!

You probably can’t tell, but the pond iced over.

As I headed towards the woods with my empty water containers, I saw movement. It was the pair of red-tailed hawks I’ve been watching for a few weeks. They were doing an awesome love dance. I was transfixed as I watched them soar and glide, then dive down near the ground and up through the trees.

The only photo I got of them flying. I was too busy watching most of the time.

It was so graceful yet strong. I felt privileged to get to see this up close. It was the closest I’ve ever been to flying hawks. They flew right past me a couple of times. At last, they rested in the trees for a bit.

They are both in this picture. One flying low in front of the trees, one higher, behind trees.

Then, off they went, flashing their wings at me. That made up for the hard work. I loved those love birds.

I made it a loop

PS: thanks to everyone who tells me they read my blog. I feel like the lady on Romper Room (a television show from my youth), who would look in her magic mirror and say, “I see Susie and Donny…” or whoever’s parents had sent her a postcard.

I see you, Mike, Donita, Lory, Libba, Catherine, Barbara, Debi…and so many more!

We Made It! 15 Years Married!

It’s significant to me that Lee and I made it to 15 years of marriage. When you get married at age 50 you just hope you get some good years together!

Is the day after the wedding, opening cards. Lee looks like someone I don’t know. We’ve both gone a lot grayer.

We have done so. There have been times when we were both out of work and times when we were doing better than we ever expected. Now it’s medium! I’ll take it.

The emotional highs and lows have evened out, too, and I’m glad for that. It took a lot to get through some of the drama in our families, and that hasn’t changed. We just cope better now.

We’ve both done a lot of soul searching and gotten more emotionally stable, which helps when you have two people who don’t argue with each other well. It’s good to be able to step back and not react to each other’s quirky ways of being upset. You learn that through time.

I think this is the only time Lee has been clean-shaven since I knew him.

Anyway, I’m happy to have Lee to face the coming “interesting” times with. We are each other’s stability, I think.

We went to dinner in Rockdale, the next town over, where there’s a new Italian restaurant off the lobby of a motel. Yep. Small town living. It was excellent and a good change of pace since we still don’t go out much since COVID. All good.

Daily Bird

Today I’m going with the white-crowned sparrow, another friendly winter resident. They’re all over the place right now, with their white-throated friends. They don’t sing as much, but they have a pretty song in addition to a lot of chirping.

Mostly I enjoy watching them in the brush piles scratching for food. The younger ones completely blend in with their surroundings. See if you can find any immature birds in these photos of shiny adults!

Early Anniversary Gift – WOW

I am completely bowled over by the wonderful gift Lee made me for our 15th wedding anniversary. It may be “only” 15 years, but we’re very pleased to have had such a great time in our late-life relationship.

I’d been seeing Lee messing around on his computer a lot lately and I was really wondering why he was putting so many photos of birds in his journal. It’s not that he doesn’t like birds, but he’s not crazy about them like I am.

I knew he’s been practicing book binding and has bound a couple of books he wrote and plans to bind recent journals. On top of that he’d asked me a few questions about my own journal. But I didn’t think anything of it until he spilled the beans that he was making me a journal for an anniversary gift!

There is a great deal of hand work involved in book binding. Lee decided to tell me what he was doing so he could hang out with me while he hand sewed all the signatures (units of a certain number of pages) together. Otherwise I wouldn’t have seen him last weekend. He sewed it with red thread, too. I like red.

I’d have been impressed just with a blank book, having watched how hard it is to press all the pages together, create the cover (with genuine book cloth), and affix the cover to the book (I think that’s the actual binding part—gee, I worked for a book publisher in my twenties and still don’t know all the terms).

But no, he made a bullet journal with dots on the pages, a pretty place to write headings, and lovely images on each page, which he cut with his scary killer paper cutter to go all the way to the edges.

And it has a cute title page. It’s really a labor of love, which I truly appreciate. It means SO much to me to get a handmade gift, especially one so carefully thought out. I’m going to use it as a bird journal, so it will be in use a long time.

What did I get him? I also gave him his gift early. It was a bunch of tasteful linen book cloth from a library supply company. I guess we were thinking along the same lines.

Lee got a really good new printer that will print in high quality on large paper, so now he’s working on book sleeves. I just want to print horse pictures, of course.

I said the above to Lee and a minute later he handed me this. It’s pretty impressive!

Daily Bird

I thought I was going to have to do the cranes again, because until late in the evening the only birds I’d heard or seen were dozens and dozens of them. The day had started out very windy and cold, so no one was flitting about.

But, as I was putting Apache’s saddle away and listening to cranes, I heard something else interesting. I started the Merlin app and finished what I was doing and let the horses out of their pens.

I was right! I was hearing owls. Multiple owls. Great horned owls! The only known predators of the barred owls who are usually here! Where did all these owls come from? I don’t have an answer, but this was my first time hearing them here. They make the “normal” hoo-hoo owl sound, among others.

To add to the wonder of the evening, all the black vultures started heading to their roosts for the night. There were 25 I counted. It was lucky that the wind had died down and there was no traffic noise from FM 485 for once. I could hear their wings beating. I love that sound.

The sunset was also beautiful, but I was too busy listening to take a photo. Here’s last night at Tarrin’s house.

It’s Horse Appreciation Day

I thought that was every day.

Maybe it should be horse butt appreciation day.

Horses can teach us all something, even if it’s simple, like powerful animals can be full of fear, just like powerful people who’ve been mistreated.

Horses may even teach patience better than children can. You can at least try to reason with fellow humans.

The joy of cooperation, though, is what working with horses truly brings to us humans. I do so appreciate their willingness to cooperate with us to feel almost like we are one intertwined being. I hope they like it, too.

Dear horses, I honestly just appreciate being with you daily. You calm me down and I help you feel safe and healthy. Ahh.

Grateful for Little Smiles

I’ve been needing something to smile about lately, and the Universe has provided. First, I’m grateful to have spent a few low-stress days with my household members, with lots of laughs and encouragement. You can’t beat that!

Even Lee’s ice cream bucket was smiling.

Besides that, one of my niggling worries is much lessened now. It looks like I’ll have another year at my job. Such good news! I do like my job and the people I interact with, for which I am also truly grateful.

My portulaca plants are growing, which makes me glad!

I’ve watched friends being kind and supportive of each other all week. In today’s combative climate, small things like opening doors for strangers, giving tokens of affection, and offering to help someone struggling mean a lot. I can’t be specific but it’s helpful to make the effort to notice these things, and to instigate them when you get a chance!

Lee made me this image. That was nice. It’s a scan of part of a poster.

What little things made you smile today? It’s worth the effort to try to recall those moments and appreciate them. Since I take so many photos, I can share a few more with you.

Enlarge to see the cheerful wiggly honey mesquite seed pods

Stop and Pause

I came up with a goal today that I truly want to achieve. I want to stop my frenzy at least three times a day, pause, and notice what I’m grateful for wherever I am.

Yesterday I noticed the golden sun on swirling grass.

Here’s a thing many religious traditions get right. So many ask practitioners to pause to pray, reflect, chant or perform a ritual at intervals throughout the day. Think of all those nuns, monks, and traditional lay people who rise to pray, bow to Mecca, ring a bell, or whatever. They stop what they are doing and appreciate what they’ve got.

I paused to watch the sun rise this morning, as did many of my friends.

Slowing down to the speed of life is so good for the soul. It’s a gratitude practice any of us can do. Or it’s a way to stay close to our Source, whatever we call it.

This afternoon I paused to be grateful for a very odd dog and her beloved possum skull.

One thing we’ve all become aware of lately is how quickly things change. It’s more obvious to me every day. So tonight I’ll appreciate the wool running through my fingers as a sweet, white dog curls up in my chair. I won’t have it forever, so I’ll treasure it now.

Chickens don’t live forever, so go ahead, Bertie, peck my shoe.

Every day, at least three mindful pauses! Go, Suna.