Alice in Wonderland

I live right by the sea, to my great delight.  I can walk out of my door and within a few steps, see boats resting dockside and clamber up on rocky cliffs that are currently full of miniature violets basking in the occasional sun and observing the waves below.

I also live near allotment gardens--small plots with little cottages that city dwellers like to retreat to when summer arrives.  Yesterday I strolled down the paths of this amazing little world within a world.  Colorful tulips and apple tree blossoms greeted me, walkways lush with purple blossoms, deck chairs pulled out from storage and cleaned cottage windows drew my enchanted gaze.

I stopped to chat to an old woman who was leaving her cottage to go back to the city center.

"I've been here since '35, when they brought me here," she chattered, with bright blue eyes and a purple knit cap resting on the back of her head.  "Of course, I didn't like to pull weeds as a child, but i had the mandatory carrot bed or weeded when my mother told me to.  Now I don't mind."

She has spent every summer of her life here.  In her little wonderland of brilliant blossoms.  We traipsed down a small lane together.  She agreed, as I marveled that she has surely seen many changes happen to the city through so many years.  "Back then that Kulosaari bridge was made of wood, and you had to pay 25 pence to cross it."

Way back then the area where I now live was considered "out in the country."  Now it is clearly city, but for these wonderful pockets of nature and gardens.  The city almost got away with taking the area for more apartment buildings, but thankfully, an uproar rose against it!

I will have to go visit my "Alice in Wonderland" lady again, dropping by for a cup of coffee on a summer day.

Cute Therapy

Because today was a rough day:

everyone looks good in a milk mustache

(photo pawned from the wide world of twitter)

Inspiration from Angelou and Frost

the makings of a phenomenal woman
enmeshed in mundane yet
important activity, little realizing
how each choice, maybe towards a
road less traveled or one
trodden black, will lead from
way to way, telling a story of
becoming--coming into being as a
work of art, fashioned by a Creative
Director whose idea of beauty is
not a fashion model's size, rather
the fire in my eyes, the joy in my
feet, the sun in my smile--the Life
he has breathed into me.  whether i
walk in a yellow wood, teetering at a
choice in the pale morning light,
my head won't be bowed,
for i know my Designer is proud,
delighted, in the span of my hips,
the swing in my waist, the
grace of my style. I don't need to
shout, jump about or talk real loud--
His eye is on me. and somewhere ages
and ages hence, I can say with a sigh,
He made me a woman, phenomenally,
and He has made all
the difference.

Rambles after a heavy day

It seems that spring arrived over Labor Day weekend.  Not in full regalia, but with the faintly shimmering green coat that makes you look twice to make sure you really are seeing it.  The weather, though, is still reminiscing about the good ol' days of winter and seasoning her breath with chill.

I've taken up some art projects in a therapeutic sense.  But you could also call it a highly disguised procrastination method to keep from doing my tax papers.  There they are.  On the bench.  Just waiting to be filled with correct numbers.   I will do them tomorrow.

On another note entirely, I read an article about people of character.  I had an "ah-hah!" moment as I read one section where it talks about how such people journey in life:

"People on this road see life as a process of commitment making. Character is defined by how deeply rooted you are. Have you developed deep connections that hold you up in times of challenge and push you toward the good? In the realm of the intellect, a person of character has achieved a settled philosophy about fundamental things. In the realm of emotion, she is embedded in a web of unconditional loves. In the realm of action, she is committed to tasks that can’t be completed in a single lifetime." -- David Brooks

Even now as I reread that, I instantly sense the many things I would like to extrapolate from it.  But suffice to say that I would not have said that my life is a process of commitment making or that character is defined by how deeply rooted I am.  I mean, I believe that to be true, but I wouldn't have thought to say it that way.  In the spiritual life, I see the connection with being deeply rooted in Christ.  But it was a new idea to think about being rooted: to people, a place, a calling, a time, and its effect on my character.  

It highlights the importance of community.  It's a topic I have frequently contemplated, desired, wanted to a new degree.  

Well, that is it for today.  No conclusions.  Just some thoughts on the scenery of this day.