I want it to be known that just after I posted this newsletter, a chorus of coyotes struck up a song in the fields beyond my window. So don't just take MY word for it when it comes to the beauty of this life....
We took advantage of my partner not working today to go to a “birdsong fairy trail.” My toddler was entirely delighted with the many little houses and doors along the trail, and we brought sunflower seeds and spent about 45 minutes watching black capped chickadees fly about and decide they felt safe enough to fly down to eat the seeds we set out for them. Later, a few flew to my hand to grab a seed or two.
I also saw a few tufted titmouses and white breasted nuthatches. The beauty of the tufts on those titmouses, the nuthatches hopping upside now, my toddler’s delight watching a deer with large antlers leap through the forest... it has filled me with such a deep and joyful peace. Thanks for asking us to share, for giving me the chance to reflect on just how lovely this afternoon was with a collection of some humans I adore and some sweet bird friends.
A seven year old boy named Fox showed up at a thanksgiving dinner I went to at a friend's house. I was with my daughter, who's nonverbal and in a wheelchair. Fox asked why she didn't talk, and when I told him that something in her brain prevented her from learning how to talk, he said, "Huh! I've never heard of that condition, but talking isn't everything."
Nov 25, 2022·edited Nov 25, 2022Liked by Chris La Tray
What made today in a way was the teens. One of them looked around the room and saw that all the 30,40, 50, and 60-something year old family members were looking at their phones, and quipped "You old people are always on your phones!" Many laughs. Then the teens dumped a load of balloons into the room and all of the ages played with them --batting them about, keeping them afloat, for longer than you may expect a room full of 13-85 year olds to do so. Movement and laughter and laughter and laughter. Blessed be the teens. They woke me up this day.
I love that poem you posted and thank you for your words.
Tonight after dinner my husband and I were. playing a board game and my sons wanted to play chess but they couldn’t find a chess board or even a checkers board. My husband looked and looked with them. Then finally he took a piece of oilcloth and drew a grid on the back of it. And one of my sons colored in the dark squares with marker, and then they played chess. And the sound of their voices and their laughter with each other was really beautiful.
Yesterday I was out in the woods just before dawn after an overnight snow of a few inches, and had a number of chances to follow fox tracks, two of them to dens. It made my day. It was so beautiful, and there were no people, and near the end of my time out there I came across a flock of chickadees and hung out with them for a while.
I like this day because it's almost the only one we're allowed to at least attempt to take as rest, to not consume in the capitalist way even if we're consuming too much food.
"I like this day because it's almost the only one we're allowed to at least attempt to take as rest, to not consume in the capitalist way even if we're consuming too much food."
Exactly how I feel about it. And I love those spirited little chickadees too!
For the first time in the history of my family, we didn’t cook. We bought chips and dips and cheese and cupcakes and drove to a beach and we just sat there and ate sandy food and laughed and dug holes; we did madlibs in the car both ways, we ended it by watching a movie cuddled on the couch. It was perfect.
I am always a bit saddened with everyone's wishes to have a Happy Thanksgiving. EVERY day is a day to be thankful, for whatever reason each of us have to be thankful. Just this morning that thought came to me: every day is sacred and worth being celebrated.
Thank you always, Chris, for your honesty and openness. Always good to "read" you.....
[I am a bit envious that you heard coyotes singing. There is a lynx that hangs out on Coyote Hill and when I snowshoe I see its tracks: that, alone, makes THIS coyote want to sing!]
What a day to remember cosmic magnificence (especially as one of those folks who had to work today). Much love (of the irritable kind, perhaps!) to you, Chris.
Thanks for mentioning Ada Limón - I just picked up one of her books after checking it in for someone else at the library the other day. What an incredible poet! I have anxiety and need to work on meditation every day to keep it at bay. After many tries to start regularly and stopping, it's finally starting to really help. The holidays are especially stressful this year as I'm going through some bigger changes. I'm so very grateful for the way my life is slowly and eagerly morphing into the one I've always needed. It's wild how sometimes lovely paths just open and events unfold despite your best negative expectations. Change is still stressful but going in the right direction is blissful.
I relate so much to this. It's the opening up to slowness, I think, where one really turns the corner. Which isn't easy to do. Strength to you in all your changes, you certainly seem to have the right attitude.
Today I read my first Ada Limon poem—so very tardy but before I read your post—and felt a piece of my heart flutter. Since I came down with COVID last week, this was this first good flutter, the kind that comes from seeing a ‘waddle-thieving’ groundhog and feeling joy in its juicy slipperiness. Thanks for asking. Thanks for sharing.
I read this last night from Amy Leach's The Everybody Ensemble - And all this happening and non-happening has brought us to the present hour, when you have cats running around younger than churches and trees standing there older than churches. And we are still innocent of time. After all this time, to be innocent of time. Though maybe there are some things you can't realize until your name is Grandmother, like the tempo of time, like those grandparent types who go around insisting, "It goes so fast." Maybe all those slows add up to fast.
Maybe all those slows add up to fast.
Sandhill cranes are here for the winter and their bugling and purring bring me great joy
Thank you for the article and the video clip. That is such great news 29,000 cranes double last year's count. The video clip helped satisfy my craving. Mr. Kleinhans is 100% correct. “It's amazing to see, and you never get tired of the sound,”
Every once in a while, (but not every year) during the early summer a handful will hang around a little 5-acre marsh on the property and stay a few days as long as the coyotes leave them alone.
I’m so glad you liked it. It’s really a sight to see. My kids had colds on Wednesday so I drove them out to the refuge hoping they could kind of rest upright in their car seats. The cranes were all gone, and the place looked eerily still. Then, we rounded a corner and there were three otters goofing off around a patch of open water. They didn’t seem to mind the quiet at all. 😁
I've had some difficult conversations with one of my offspring in the past few days and we ended up with just the two of us (husband and self) and one daughter, vegetarian. I like the T-day foods but I bought 3 frozen dinners, and instead of hullabaloo, we just relaxed all day. He watched football, I read, baked a pie, and we ate the frozen dinners later. It was as peaceful a T-day we've had in years.
I want it to be known that just after I posted this newsletter, a chorus of coyotes struck up a song in the fields beyond my window. So don't just take MY word for it when it comes to the beauty of this life....
We took advantage of my partner not working today to go to a “birdsong fairy trail.” My toddler was entirely delighted with the many little houses and doors along the trail, and we brought sunflower seeds and spent about 45 minutes watching black capped chickadees fly about and decide they felt safe enough to fly down to eat the seeds we set out for them. Later, a few flew to my hand to grab a seed or two.
I also saw a few tufted titmouses and white breasted nuthatches. The beauty of the tufts on those titmouses, the nuthatches hopping upside now, my toddler’s delight watching a deer with large antlers leap through the forest... it has filled me with such a deep and joyful peace. Thanks for asking us to share, for giving me the chance to reflect on just how lovely this afternoon was with a collection of some humans I adore and some sweet bird friends.
Ah, this is what it's all about, isn't it? These birds you name are all regular parts of my life too, and I adore them. What a day you had!
A seven year old boy named Fox showed up at a thanksgiving dinner I went to at a friend's house. I was with my daughter, who's nonverbal and in a wheelchair. Fox asked why she didn't talk, and when I told him that something in her brain prevented her from learning how to talk, he said, "Huh! I've never heard of that condition, but talking isn't everything."
Fox has it all figured out, doesn't he? I can imagine your smile in response.
Fox has got that right! : )
What made today in a way was the teens. One of them looked around the room and saw that all the 30,40, 50, and 60-something year old family members were looking at their phones, and quipped "You old people are always on your phones!" Many laughs. Then the teens dumped a load of balloons into the room and all of the ages played with them --batting them about, keeping them afloat, for longer than you may expect a room full of 13-85 year olds to do so. Movement and laughter and laughter and laughter. Blessed be the teens. They woke me up this day.
I love that poem you posted and thank you for your words.
Thank you for reading, and thank you for the story. Those old people!
I am terrible at sleeping at night. So, today, when I should have been cooking, I was sleeping
And I woke up, my husband had cooked the lamb roast to perfection, made sweet potatoes.
I am thankful for him. And I praise his mother, who I never met.
There are other people who have influenced my life, but he has made it worth living.
What a wonderful testimonial to someone. Thank you for sharing.
Pleasantly taken aback your comment, "I’m not anti-science but all too often science is just a white person who won’t shut the fuck up."
I'm a scientist, I'm mostly white. And, I appreciate the advice. I'm shutting up now and smiling as I do so. Thank you, Chris
Thank you, Alexandra.
Tonight after dinner my husband and I were. playing a board game and my sons wanted to play chess but they couldn’t find a chess board or even a checkers board. My husband looked and looked with them. Then finally he took a piece of oilcloth and drew a grid on the back of it. And one of my sons colored in the dark squares with marker, and then they played chess. And the sound of their voices and their laughter with each other was really beautiful.
Adapt and overcome. What a great story.
“Every day, every day, is holy and blessed and exploding with cosmic magnificence.” 💓
Yesterday I was out in the woods just before dawn after an overnight snow of a few inches, and had a number of chances to follow fox tracks, two of them to dens. It made my day. It was so beautiful, and there were no people, and near the end of my time out there I came across a flock of chickadees and hung out with them for a while.
I like this day because it's almost the only one we're allowed to at least attempt to take as rest, to not consume in the capitalist way even if we're consuming too much food.
"I like this day because it's almost the only one we're allowed to at least attempt to take as rest, to not consume in the capitalist way even if we're consuming too much food."
Exactly how I feel about it. And I love those spirited little chickadees too!
Antonia, your post reminded me of three excerpts from Mary Oliver's poem, October:
"I said to the chickadee, singing his heart out in the green pine tree:
little dazzler,
little song,
little mouthful."
...
"Look, I want to love this world
as though it's the last chance I'm ever going to get
to be alive
and know it."
...
"One morning
the fox came down the hill, glittering and confident,
and didn't see me - and I thought:
so this is the world.
I'm not in it.
It is beautiful. "
Mary Oliver. Every damn time! She never fails to get to the heart. Thank you.
EVERY time. Like few, if any, others.
Like she just sees into ... everything. Somehow.
For the first time in the history of my family, we didn’t cook. We bought chips and dips and cheese and cupcakes and drove to a beach and we just sat there and ate sandy food and laughed and dug holes; we did madlibs in the car both ways, we ended it by watching a movie cuddled on the couch. It was perfect.
Chips and dip are always a key ingredient to our family pre-feast. I envy your trip to the beach.
This sounds like an awesome day. : )
Doesn't it?
I am always a bit saddened with everyone's wishes to have a Happy Thanksgiving. EVERY day is a day to be thankful, for whatever reason each of us have to be thankful. Just this morning that thought came to me: every day is sacred and worth being celebrated.
Thank you always, Chris, for your honesty and openness. Always good to "read" you.....
[I am a bit envious that you heard coyotes singing. There is a lynx that hangs out on Coyote Hill and when I snowshoe I see its tracks: that, alone, makes THIS coyote want to sing!]
I have never seen a lynx and hope to! I once had an opportunity but my eyes were turned the wrong way and my companion saw her. I was so jealous!
What a day to remember cosmic magnificence (especially as one of those folks who had to work today). Much love (of the irritable kind, perhaps!) to you, Chris.
Thank you, Maddy. I'm sorry those dirty so-and-sos made you work. 🤬
Thanks for mentioning Ada Limón - I just picked up one of her books after checking it in for someone else at the library the other day. What an incredible poet! I have anxiety and need to work on meditation every day to keep it at bay. After many tries to start regularly and stopping, it's finally starting to really help. The holidays are especially stressful this year as I'm going through some bigger changes. I'm so very grateful for the way my life is slowly and eagerly morphing into the one I've always needed. It's wild how sometimes lovely paths just open and events unfold despite your best negative expectations. Change is still stressful but going in the right direction is blissful.
I relate so much to this. It's the opening up to slowness, I think, where one really turns the corner. Which isn't easy to do. Strength to you in all your changes, you certainly seem to have the right attitude.
"It's opening up to slowness where one really turns the corner." That really resonated right now. Thank you, Chris!
Today I read my first Ada Limon poem—so very tardy but before I read your post—and felt a piece of my heart flutter. Since I came down with COVID last week, this was this first good flutter, the kind that comes from seeing a ‘waddle-thieving’ groundhog and feeling joy in its juicy slipperiness. Thanks for asking. Thanks for sharing.
Thank you for sharing! I love all of this. I saw two muskrats out at the river early this morning!
I read this last night from Amy Leach's The Everybody Ensemble - And all this happening and non-happening has brought us to the present hour, when you have cats running around younger than churches and trees standing there older than churches. And we are still innocent of time. After all this time, to be innocent of time. Though maybe there are some things you can't realize until your name is Grandmother, like the tempo of time, like those grandparent types who go around insisting, "It goes so fast." Maybe all those slows add up to fast.
Maybe all those slows add up to fast.
Sandhill cranes are here for the winter and their bugling and purring bring me great joy
Thank you Chris
You lucky dog, one of my very favorite sounds in nature. Hear a few croaks for me please.
Same!
The sandhill cranes (some 30,000 of them! https://www.mprnews.org/story/2022/11/13/record-flock-of-sandhill-cranes-at-sherburne-refuge) just left the Sherburne National Wildlife Refuge here in central MN. Maybe some of them and their racket travelled to you!
One of my many dreams is to witness one of these gatherings. Thank you for sharing this!
Beth,
Thank you for the article and the video clip. That is such great news 29,000 cranes double last year's count. The video clip helped satisfy my craving. Mr. Kleinhans is 100% correct. “It's amazing to see, and you never get tired of the sound,”
Every once in a while, (but not every year) during the early summer a handful will hang around a little 5-acre marsh on the property and stay a few days as long as the coyotes leave them alone.
Thanks again for the article - made my day!
We've been getting them more and more around me in the summer, it seems. Either that or I've just been paying closer attention.
I’m so glad you liked it. It’s really a sight to see. My kids had colds on Wednesday so I drove them out to the refuge hoping they could kind of rest upright in their car seats. The cranes were all gone, and the place looked eerily still. Then, we rounded a corner and there were three otters goofing off around a patch of open water. They didn’t seem to mind the quiet at all. 😁
I love Amy Leach's writing and I love sandhill cranes.
I've had some difficult conversations with one of my offspring in the past few days and we ended up with just the two of us (husband and self) and one daughter, vegetarian. I like the T-day foods but I bought 3 frozen dinners, and instead of hullabaloo, we just relaxed all day. He watched football, I read, baked a pie, and we ate the frozen dinners later. It was as peaceful a T-day we've had in years.
This sounds great to me. Makes me hungry for a frozen turkey or chicken pot pie, heh.