this i believe...redux.

I just stumbled upon something I wrote a few months ago.  I rarely go back and read stuff I've written, but often when I do, I have no recollection of writing it.  I don't mean that in a 'she's losing her memory' sort of way.  I mean that sometimes when I write, it can be sort of a pure process...like I set my head down for a few moments and just let it flow.  You'd think I'd do it more often just for the pleasure of that experience.  :)  Anyway, this is recycled from May 9th of this year...(but the collage is new)... 

i believe in poetry rest stops.  i believe in taking showers by candlelight and losing myself in the zen of baseball.  i believe in the right to be wrong.  i believe in letting go of the need to be known in my pursuit of the knowing of me.  i believe thrift stores could more accurately be called treasure shops.  i believe in 'make-a-tions'...in the ability to see a vacation in even the narrowest travel window.  i believe there's a powerful lesson in beach glass...that no matter how ordinary we were starting out, being buffeted by life carves each of us into a unique find.  i believe in postcards...especially old ones with stranger's handwriting.  i believe in sacred thoughts and hope-bombs and wishful dreaming.  i believe wisdom is the most valuable currency.  i believe the love of a good dog can cure most ills.  i believe "amelie" is one of the best films ever.  i believe in making a spectacle of one's self.  i believe a splash of color is always a good thing.

Comments

[Rachel]

I loved this when you posted this the first time. I just got inspired to join you and posteda list of my own with a mosaic, too.

[mari]

I, too, remember when you first posted this. It's just as good - no, better! - the second time around.

I know you twitter. But do you Plurk? Plurk.com. I'm waiting for you to try this one, Marilyn. I guess I'm like Woody Allen and his friend Eggs Benedict. You know that one...?

[linda]

Wonderful.

[lisa]

I'm here via Rachel. I love this post. It just resonates.

[Dawn]

Ohhh your beach glass resonated. I HAD to share this amazing piece i found yesterday ... sorry if it's overly voluminous but I hope you love it as much as I did.

bowl of stones with blue earring
~By Greg Fallis

In the quiet eloquence of stones can be heard echoes of the persuasiveness of water and the sharp rationality of wind. Other forces can shape stone; the zealotry of volcanic heat, the implacability of tectonic motion, even the lesser passion of the hammer and chisel...but those are violent acts inflicted on the stone. Wind and water, in contrast, are unhurried, patient, allowing the stone itself to influence its final shape.

Goethe tells us stones are mute teachers, and that the most valuable lessons we learn from them are lessons we cannot communicate to others. In this, I think, Goethe was wrong. We can pass on the wisdom we learn from stones, but only at the pace at which the wisdom was acquired. Stones are calm, eloquent teachers and they require patient students.

These stones were shaped by water. How long they lay silent in a riverbed nobody can say. What they learned was composure and constancy. What they learned was to give up what it is necessary to give up and retain what can be retained. What they learned was they can be rolled down the river by currents over which they have no control. What they learned was that rivers can run dry, or they can be caught up by man or machine and deposited miles and miles away. What they learned is wherever they find themselves, they are still stone and there is no way to know where they'll ultimately end up.

The water taught them that.

[LeLo]

Beautiful.