Noticings of the Week

Noticing great wild mercies this week in bugs and Jesus-imitating birds, a Barbie sunrise and water patterns, meeting Picasso on a hike, the wisdom of flowers, and the obligatory Scout photo...

So, for now I’m sticking with the “noticings” - I like the fact that my computer doesn’t like the word (hello red squiggly line) and it just seems to fit me.  Anyway...this week.

The soundtrack of my week comes from

Carrie Newcomer

and her first single from her new album called “A Great Wide Mercy.”  She released the single on Monday and it is just a beautiful song about what she’s seeking in this crazy time in which we live.  It is an upbeat, hopeful, and beautiful song.  You can view her lyric video of it here:

The chorus especially has been staying in my heart a lot this week:

There’s a big wide sky filled with stars
That feels so close but feels so far
I’m tired of all the rage
I’m tired of all the worry
I’m ready for a great wild mercy

The whole song is wonderful but that chorus.  Wow.  I’m excited for the rest of the album when it releases in a few months.

I am also excited because this week I found out that she is playing a CD release concert nearby on my 50th birthday coming up in the fall!  Suffice to say I know how we’ll be my birthday!!!

So where are my great wild mercies this week?  Lots of places. Bugs and Jesus-imitating birds, a Barbie sunrise and water patterns, meeting Picasso on a hike, wisdom of flowers, and the obligatory Scout photo.

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Birds & Bugs
I think that herons are my spirit animal for this summer simply because I keep seeing them and seeing them in interesting places.  I don’t know if there’s any kind of deeper meaning to them other than noticing but this week I saw them in trees, saw one up close, and saw another looking like it was doing its best Jesus impression.

In addition, I got to see another bird having what looked to be a pretty healthy-sized breakfast. I was walking on the bridge over the lake and could see this one bird that looked really weird.  Even when I zoomed in with my camera, I wasn’t sure what it was until I really zoomed in when I downloaded the photo.  Here ‘tis

From that same bridge the next morning, I saw a duck doing its best imitation of the heron doing its Jesus imitation.

Sometimes noticing is the big things like the above and sometimes it is noticing the little things that are all too easy to miss such as this tiny millipede (thank you macro lens) and these bees doing their vital work.

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Moments

Two photos from the same place on different days.  One seeing patterns of the clouds in the rippling water and the other taking in the fullness of a Barbie-inspired sunrise.

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Picasso in Real-Life

One of the highlights of my week was going with my wife and daughter to an art exhibit of landscapes painted by Pablo Picasso.  I had never really thought of Picasso as a landscape painter but as one who loves landscape photography, I was excited to see the pieces on exhibit.  There was so much beauty but one painting really stood out to me for the simple reason that I had seen the “same tree” along one of Scout and my usual hiking trails.  The painting is “Landscape La Rue des Bois or Paris” from 1908

There was an immediate recognition of this tree when I saw Picasso’s painting.  I love this tree dearly as it always speaks of an open hand reaching up into the sky.  I wonder what Picasso’s tree looked like decades ago...

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Obligatory Majestic Doggo Photo

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Reaching Toward The Great Wide Mercy

From the same place as that Scout photo as well as the Barbie sunrise, the ripples in the water, and the close-up heron was this.  This one flowering plant that is along the shore.

This is just one part of the larger plant and the many blooms on it right now.  What spoke to me was how all the flowers know how to open to the rising sun to receive the light that they need.  Some were more open than others but all were pointed towards the east as the morning light was growing.  Going back to Carrie’s refrain that has been in my heart through the week... Do I seek the rage and the worry that is very real around us?  Do I open myself up to those and soak them in  as if I need those to feed who I am?  Or so I seek the great wide mercy that is also present?  The great wide mercy that is in herons in trees, Jesus-imitating birds, a bird having breakfast, connecting a century-old painting from France to a local tree I have seen hundreds of times, and there’s a great wide mercy in a great dog who loves to pose for photos.  And through it all I feel the great wide mercy of the creator who is somehow behind, through, around, and within it all.

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PS - A Few Book Recommendations

I finished one book this week and am about halfway through a slow read of another.

• Life in Five Senses by Gretchen Rubin - This is a wonderful read inviting readers to a deeper experience of each of their senses.  As one who tends to focus on one sense in particular (sight) and who genetically doesn’t have the strongest senses of taste and smell, this was a great book to remind me to try to slow down and take in the fullness of the world around me.

• Hope: A User’s Manual by

  MaryAnn McKibben Dana
  - I am taking this book very slowly - one short chapter a day.  This book has been such a gift of wisdom around how we live hope in our lives.  She writes with such realness, depth, humor, and she also has thrown in multiple Star Wars references so that always helps.