HAPPY FRIDAY!

Yesterday, a FB friend posted about this phone number: 707-998-8410.

If you haven't called it, you should do it right now.

It is an elementary school's take on surviving and thriving. It's called PepTOC, a pep talk hotline done by children who are surviving and thriving through all the madness. [You can donate to the effort here if you are inclined. They are crowdsourcing funds to keep the number going.]

This is important and amazing - not only because their pure energy can be felt through the phone line. But also because according to recent studies, children (along with the elderly) have struggled during the pandemic on many fronts, but they are soooo resilient. 

That doesn't mean we shouldn't support them. It's just so wonderful that these teachers realized these kids had so much to give the rest of us. And then they gave it to us. 

As an old high school teacher of mine used to admonish when I was down, "you think you have it rough," read this. [And he was right, and only reminded me when I was on the upswing.] 

This is the opposite sentiment -- we're in this together, here's some pure joy and energy.

The ROI for dialing a number [we do this so infrequently anymore] is ENORMOUS. 

If you want to read/hear more about it, this piece by NPR is lovely. This piece is also lovely. P.S. #5 was my personal fave.

Teaser on YouTube:

If small children are not your jam, try this piece on sound art from the DF. I also found it soothing and lovely to think of city sounds as treasures.

HAPPY WEEKEND! 

We Still Need Poetry, not Poetry Thursday

Faith
~Arthur Caswell Parker

There is a faith that weakly dies
When overcast by clouds of doubt,
That like a blazing wisp of straw
A vagrant breeze will flicker out.


Be mine the faith whose living flame
Shall pierce the clouds and banish night,
Whose glow the hurricanes increase
To match the gleams of heaven’s night.


This poem is in the public domain. Published in Poem-a-Day on November 30, 2019, by the Academy of American Poets.

Not so small victories

homage to my hips
By Lucille Clifton
these hips are big hips
they need space to
move around in.
they don't fit into little
petty places. these hips
are free hips.
they don't like to be held back.
these hips have never been enslaved,  
they go where they want to go
they do what they want to do.
these hips are mighty hips.
these hips are magic hips.
i have known them
to put a spell on a man and
spin him like a top!

Lucille Clifton, “homage to my hips” from Good Woman. Copyright © 1987 by Lucille Clifton. Reprinted with the permission of Curtis Brown, Ltd.
Source: Good Woman (BOA Editions Ltd., 1987)
Borrowed from Poetry Foundation

Today I mark 12 weeks of re-learning to eat healthy (and love the body I am in at any weight).

My not so small victory is that I have lost 20 lbs.

I am trying to change my relationship with food ... not just that I want to eat healthier foods. I want to use food as nourishment. I want to taste my food. I want the meals that I eat to feel satisfying.

I realized not so long ago (in relationship to my time on earth), maybe ten years ago, that I was an emotional eater. I realized it while I was on a meditation retreat. Going deep into myself caused me great anxiety, and I discovered that I tried to take refuge in food. Shoveling is what I called it.

What I didn't understand at the time was that coping with anxiety was not the only time I was compelled to shovel food.  [Subsequently I shoveled when sad, angry, grieving.]

I also did not connect shoveling with feeling deeply unsatisfied. I didn't note how I could not taste the food as I shoveled.

I thought the not tasting and not feeling satisfied had to do with how fast I eat.

I don't know if I will ever master mindful eating, especially as it pertains to slowing down the eating process.

But I can now say that after eating not just healthy but really good tasting food for the last 12 weeks (mostly thanks to my amazing housemates), I notice when I feel unsatisfied and when I don't taste the food.

It has nothing to do with what I am eating and everything to do with my emotional state.

I am getting much better at noticing my emotions; and my discomfort at having to deal with so many emotions.  Noticing the food I eat, tasting the flavor, feeling satisfied and nourished, is one way that I have accomplished this.

I am still working on how to more effectively feel my emotions. That is to say, how to allow my emotions to move through me without trying to stifle them by numbing.

I am learning to notice the desire to be satisfied and how food does not bring the salve my coping mechanism had led me to believe it would.

This not so insignificant victory of shedding unnecessary weight is a leap forward on loving myself, feeding my body and soul, and treating myself in the ways that will keep me on this road to self love.

Poetry Thursday

Scaffolding
~Seamus Heaney, 1939 - 2013

Masons, when they start upon a building,
Are careful to test out the scaffolding;

Make sure that planks won’t slip at busy points,
Secure all ladders, tighten bolted joints.

And yet all this comes down when the job’s done
Showing off walls of sure and solid stone.

So if, my dear, there sometimes seem to be
Old bridges breaking between you and me

Never fear. We may let the scaffolds fall
Confident that we have built our wall.


For a while, I collected Nobel Laureates in literature ... ok, not collected the actual people or even their books, but their public appearances. It is something for which I will be forever indebted to Princeton. Mr. Heaney is one of them. Magical. And this poem is gorgeous.

Quote Thursday

Be content 
with what you have; 
rejoice in 
the way things are. 
When you realize 
there is nothing lacking, 
the whole world 
belongs to you.
– Lao Tzu