Noticings - The Bench, Birds, a Beautiful Podcast Series, and a Stunning Quote

(and Sweet Scout!)

I’ve had an interesting time with the bench the last few weeks.  With the sun rising closer to 6:30 each morning right now, I’m finding myself drawn outside earlier and not finding myself at the bench at 7:45.  I’m wondering if my rhythm is more tied to the sun rising rather than to a specific time.  This image from about 7:30am, however, was just beautiful to me. Seeing the reflection in a different place and then also the conversation with the man who was fishing.  He and I chatted for a while about fishing and photography.  He said he was happy to be in the photo and so here it is.

I loved the reflection at his feet.  Just lovely.

The benches have been dealing with lots of water once again - here’s how they’ve been looking...

The first photo in this post was a few days after the flooded one above.  It is so fascinating how much these spots change from day to day.

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Birds

There have also been some wonderful bird moments the last week or so - beautiful herons, a touchdown by a goose, and then nature showing that moms are the same across species.

I love how the mama duck just stays there waiting for the last little one to make the hop up the curb before she starts off.  So sweet.

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Random Photos

And then a few more miscellaneous photos - the magic of fire and stoking up the smoker at 2am and then Scout being the sweet pup that she is. There’s something really amazing about the sparks from lit charcoal at 2am…

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A Podcast Recommendation - Learning from Conflict via Poetry

One of my “listen-to-every-episode” podcast is Poetry Unbound by OnBeing studios.  They did a series this week of daily podcasts centered on poems about conflict.  It was beautiful, challenging, powerful, and needed.   With all the ways in which conflict is being both inflamed and avoided in life today, it was refreshing to hear reflections that center on the ways that conflict can be healthy and necessary at times but also to challenge the simple binaries that we often desire when it comes to conflict.  But the whole thing is centered around the idea of Poems as Teachers so the question is what we can learn from these beautiful poetic words.

You can find all of them here at OnBeing’s website or also you can subscribe to the Poetry Unbound substack  with some additional commentary by host Pádriag Ó’Tauma.

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A Beautiful Quote

I read this in the CAC daily email today from Brian McLaren quoted from his newest book.  What beautiful, true, and resonant words

In my dream, the reverence we feel when we enter the most beautiful cathedral we would feel equally among mountains in autumn, beside marshes in spring, surrounded by snow-covered prairies in winter, and along meandering streams in summer. In my dream, even in our cities, we would look up in wonder at the sky, and a marriage between science and spirit would allow us to marvel at the sacredness of sunlight, the wonder of wind, the refreshment of rain, the rhythm of seasons. At each meal, we would feel deep connection to the fields and orchards and rivers and farms where our food was grown, and we would feel deep connection to the farmers and farmworkers whose hands tended soil so we could eat this day with gratitude and joy.

In my dream, our life-giving connection to each other and to the living Earth would be fundamental, central, and sacred … and everything else, from economies to governments to schools to religions … would be renegotiated to flow from that fundamental connection. In my dream, we would know God not as separate from creation, but as the living light and holy energy we encounter in and through creation: embodied, incarnated, in the current and flow of past, present, and future, known most intimately in the energy of love. ¹

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Imago Scriptura Book Club

Finally, just a quick reminder of what I’ll be doing starting on June 1.  I’ll be starting my first “book club” centered on the book Hope: A User’s Manual.  Here’s the initial post  for more information.   Participate however you’d like but my deep desire through this is to help deepen our experiences of needed hope.

Grace, Peace, Love, and Joy,
Ed

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Poetry Unbound

1. https://cac.org/daily-meditations/dreaming-of-a-harmonious-earth/