1 Inspiration Sunday

Oh, the comfort- the inexpressible comfort of feeling safe with a person-

having neither to weigh thoughts, nor measure words,

but pouring them all right out, just as they are, chaff and grain together;

certain that a faithful hand will take and sift them,

keep what is worth keeping and with a breath of kindness, 
blow the rest away.

Dinah Maria Mulock Craik

Just before sunset, Stainburn Forest

1 Inspiration Sunday

It took me a long time not to judge myself through someone else's eyes.

Sally Field

bumble bee on a daffodil; April 2010

3 Inspiration Sunday

I went looking for my dreams outside of myself and discovered, it's not what the world holds for you, it's what you bring to it.

Anne Shirley, Anne of Green Gables, L.M. Montgomery

Summer sunset in Nidderdale

1 Inspiration Sunday

St. Francis of Assisi was hoeing his garden when someone asked what he would do if he were suddenly to learn that he would die before sunset that very day. "I would finish hoeing my garden," he replied.

Louis Fischer

Dingle Peninsula, Republic of Ireland

0 Inspiration Sunday

It's that moment when the world becomes still

and the most pressing thing you have to do is nothing.

(oddly enough) International Coffees ad in the late 90s

Summer at Bolton Abbey

0 Inspiration Sunday

Today's quote is quite well-known, and for good reason.

We do not remember days, we remember moments.

Casare Pavese

This was at Brimham Rocks.  It's one of my latest favorites!

2 Inspiration Sunday

What we think and feel is all we really have...

no limit that I ever knew really matters.

Billy Corgan

View over Nidderdale from Brimham Moor

2 Inspiration Sunday

I give you my love more precious than money,

I give you myself before preaching and law;

Will you give me yourself? Will you come travel with me?

Shall we stick by each other as long as we live?

excerpt from "Song of the Open Road",

Walt Whitman

This was printed on the back of our wedding programs.  No, it's not our anniversary; that was in April. But Whitman is my favorite poet, and, as the years have passed, these words have come to mean much more than we originally thought. 

Paul got me flowers this week. It's a rare thing, although I tell him they'd be appreciated just as much if they came with greater frequency.

6 Inspiration Sunday

As those of you who follow me on Twitter know, we were in Scotland for the past three days.

We stayed in Oban, a pleasant little harbor town that connects to the Treshnish and Hebrides Isles, and we went to see Lunga, Staffa, and Iona. There will be many posts about this trip over the week. 

Something tragic occurred while we were on Staffa, though, and while it didn't happen to us and we were over a ridge when it happened, we heard the scream of a woman watching her husband slip and fall to his death.

Standing and watching the aftermath, there was no way to escape the thoughts that come flooding after a tragedy like this.  There are so many things that went through my head: retrospection ("I slipped on the steep slope on Lunga..." "I just walked over that same path..."), a flood of emotion ("What if that had been Paul that fell..." "That man got off the boat to see Staffa, never knowing this was it for him..."), and the gut-wrenching thought of the man's wife having to travel back home, alone, and continue her life with such an abrupt change.

All that is to tell you why I've picked today's quote out of my old notebook.

Whatever you want to do, do it now.  There are only so many tomorrows.

Michael Landon

Seagulls at Iona

4 Inspiration Sunday, Dog (and Cat!) Edition

 I talk about them a lot, and for good reason.  They're our kids. 

I often say Max is my toddler, as he has completely unreasonable fears (feet, things above his head, things on the ground, making the bed, etc.), is incredibly self-centered in his affections (he'll gladly lean on you and rub his head on you, but it's purely an exercise in getting you to scratch him), and is unfailingly stubborn (he turns into a solid, unmovable rock when he doesn't want to do something- you try budging an above-the-knee 75 lb brick wall).  He is also unfailingly loyal, has perfected the "puppy eyes", and has the most hilarious and ungainly crazy-run (he looks like a walrus on land).  He is my heart.

Sloan is more like a best friend- she will both listen to my conversation and mock me with her eyebrows.  She is self-sufficient, but would prefer to be around humans.  She is a passionate kisser/licker, to the point that she's turned my skin red from her scratchy tongue.  (No, I've never had a best friend do that- that's definitely a dog thing!!)  She believes all of life's problems can be solved with a tennis ball, that bikes/roller skates/skateboards are things she needs to save humans from, and can turn a bad day around just by laying her ten-pound head on you in a way that will inevitably lead to your limb falling asleep, or you needing to pee (you pet-people know what I mean!).  She is my heartbeat- and when Max's orthopedic issues are flaring, she often is the only thing that can distract me from falling apart. 

Mia is a weirdo.  There's no other way to describe her. She acts like a dog, but comes by it honestly- our other cat died when she was 5 months old and she's been raised by these two fools.  She believes breakfast is the most important time of day, and should occur the second the sun rises (3:30AM during English summer...). She is a great cuddler, and loves to be carried around koala-style, clinging to your shoulder and sitting on your hip- you don't even have to hold her.   She is a serial stalker of the local rodents and birds, although she prefers bringing them in alive to play with for a few days over killing them outright. Because of this habit, we're able to free her victims, unharmed, the majority of the time.  She comes when you call her, she has a vocabulary of 7-8 words, will eat anything that fits in her mouth, and thinks someone in the shower is a captive audience to listen to her stories.   As often as I threaten to punch her in the face (our favorite threat, although neither of us would dream of following through!), I tell her everyday I'm glad she came to us.

Here are a few of my favorite dog quotes (and a cat one, of course!).

There is no psychiatrist in the world like a puppy licking your face.

Bern Williams

If a dog will not come to you after having looked you in the face, you should go home and examine your conscience.

Woodrow Wilson

Way down deep, we're all motivated by the same urges.  Cats have the courage to live by them.

Jim Davis

I talk to him when I'm lonesome like; and I'm sure he understands. When he looks at me so attentively, and gently licks my hands; then rubs his nose on my tailored clothes, but I never say naught thereat.  For the good Lord knows I can buy more clothes, but never a friend like that. 

W. Dayton Wedgefarth

*In other pet news, I read a post today from The Daily Tay that reminded me so much of Max's story, which I'll get around to sharing someday.  His life-long orthopedic issues have re-shaped the way we live our lives, but the joy and love he's given back to us is infinitely more than what we've been able to give him.   We will be the first to tell you that a medical-money-pit pet can be a challenge, but will also teach you just who you are at your core- and show you the true nature of those who hear his story.

0 Inspiration Sunday

2 Inspiration Sunday

3 Inspiration Sunday

The meeting of two personalities is like the contact of two chemical substances:

if there is any reaction, both are transformed. 

Carl Jung

Ducks and geese at Swinsty Reservoir.

1 Inspiration Sunday

As I've been going through my filebox of nostalgia, I've found many things that have made me laugh at just how naïve I was, things that made me smile as I remembered the hopes and dreams symbolized, and things that have re-inspired me all over again.
Here's one of those.

A Psalm of Life

Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

Tell me not, in mournful numbers,

Life is but an empty dream! -

For the soul is dead that slumbers,

And things are not what they seem. 

Life is real! Life is earnest!

And the grave is not its goal;

Dust thou art, to dust returnest,

Was not spoken of the soul.

Not enjoyment, and not sorrow,

Is our destined end or way;

But to act, that each to-morrow

Find us farther than to-day.

Art is long, and Time is fleeting,

And our hearts, though stout and brave,

Still, like muffled dreams, are beating

Funeral marches to the grave.

In the world's broad field of battle,

In the bivouac of Life,

Be not dumb, driven cattle!

Be a hero in the strife!

Trust no Future, howe'er pleasant!

Let the dead Past bury its dead!

Act, -act in the living Present!

Heart within, and God o'erhead!

Lives of great men all remind us

We can make our lives sublime,

And, departing, leave behind us

Footprints on the sands of time;

Footprints, that perhaps another, 

Sailing o'er life's solemn main,

A forlorn and shipwrecked brother,

Seeing, shall take heart again.

Let us then, be up and doing,

With a heart for any fate;

Still achieving, still pursuing,

Learn to labor and to wait.

Angler at Fewston Reservoir.