December 31--Happy to Leave 2022

The first and fundamental law of nature is to seek out peace and follow it. 
--Thomas Hobbes

    Heading into the new year, I like to review and thank the previous year. Or in this case, say "Good riddance!"

    You may wonder if I simply remember all this stuff. Actually, it comes from a review of my Win List. That's a daily note of all the good/blessings/joys in my life. Writing my Win List is part of my daily spiritual practice. Here are the 2022 items of note...

WORK
==Completed my seventh year of tax prep work.
==Taught MELT and yoga classes at the Clearwater Wellness Center and via Zoom throughout the year. One of my regulars passed away in June when I was on vacation--quite a shock to lose a student so suddenly.

FAMILY
==Son Derek and his wife Caila made me Grammie--Luca John Ember Hardin was born August 16, 2022.
==My husband and I celebrated our 36th anniversary in April.
==Sister-in-law Susan passed away suddenly and unexpectedly in September. I am blessed to have her (3-box) yarn collection to keep me busy thru the winter months.
==My niece and her son stopped to visit on their drive back to Ohio from Arizona. That was the first family to visit us here in decades.
==My brother moved into assisted living in October, a much safer place for him to be.
==This was the first Christmas since our sons were born that we were not together on Christmas day. I knew this would happen eventually, but that did not make it any easier.

TRAVEL
==There were several visits to Colorado including my favorite activity--golfing with my sons.
==I added the Diamondbacks stadium to my MLB quest in May with a quick trip to Phoenix.
==I put a lot of miles on our new RAV4. In June I drove to Ocean City, Maryland for a week at the beach with my niece and her son. Then I drove south, and on three consecutive nights went to MLB games in Atlanta, Tampa, and Miami. It was a bit crazy, but I've now made it to 28 of 30 teams.
==I made an unplanned trip to Ohio in early October for my s-i-l's service.
==Then I headed back east to the Philadelphia area at the end of October for a great-niece's wedding. Afterwards, I drove through the area of PA where I grew up and hiked my favorite spot on earth--Alan Seeger Natural Area in central PA. Saw my "best friend since jr high" too.
==I enjoyed in early December another fabulous 11 days of relaxation with friends at the Couples Swept Away resort in Jamaica.

HEALTH
==Completed my 25th consecutive year of swimming over 100 miles.
==I came home from the October-PA-wedding trip with the bizarre illness that is Covid, but fortunately I recovered quickly, and no one I was around contracted it.

DOG
==Barney kept us moving with twice-daily walks. He makes us laugh and his goofy antics never get old.

MISCELLANEOUS
==My husband took on the huge project of rebuilding our deck, tearing down the old wooden one and building a larger one with composite "lumber" and aluminum railings. There are also programmable built-in lights. VERY cool and SUPER sturdy.

Let's go, 2023!!!!

        Leta

December 30--Sometimes I Disagree

Like water, we are truest to our nature in repose.   --Cyril Connolly

    My brain is not getting this one. While the idea of still water is a peaceful one ("He leadeth me beside the still waters"), how many perfectly calm bodies of water have you ever seen? Rivers flow, ocean waves crash on the shore, winds ripple the lakes, there are usually critters in there stirring things up. Maybe a small mud puddle could be totally still. 

    I think our true nature is in repose when we are not in human form. That's heavenly. But when we are here on Mother Earth, we are designed to move. I think of my new grandson--he is all about movement--that's what babies are designed for. Most recently he's learned to roll over. Comically, having spent his whole life so far positioned on his back, he does NOT like being face-down. Once he figures out that it is essential to crawling, he'll be good with it. We are designed to move from day one, and that's a good thing. 

    Peace, 

        Leta

My dog friends have the "repose" thing nailed.

December 29--Light and Love

Darkness cannot drive out darkness: only light can do that. Hate cannot drive out hate; only love can do that.  --Martin Luther King, Jr.

    Mighty awesome words of truth. May we be light and love today, caring for ALL creatures, great and small. 

        Leta

The Japanese Friendship Garden
of Phoenix, May 2022

December 28--Light Returning

The good life is one inspired by love and guided by knowledge. 
--Bertrand Russell

    Due to weather and new-baby issues, my son, his wife and his son had Christmas to themselves this year for the first time. It must have made an impact on my son, because he thanked both his dad and me for making Christmases so wonderful for him as a kid and a young adult. It's what you do when you are "inspired by love." 

    I would offer that the best way to be "guided by knowledge" is to "know thyself." The more we understand ourselves, "warts and all," the more resources we have to create that good life. This past fall has been a deep dive into grief, failed expectations, and my shadow-self. I feel like there is a light at the end of the tunnel, and for now, thankfully, it's not a train!

        Leta

December 27--Enough?

There are two ways to get enough: One is to continue to accumulate more and more. The other is to desire less.  --G. K. Chesterton

    This is the working-life, retirement sort of scheme that I see playing out with our house and many friends. We work a large chunk of life to accumulate enough to support our families and create a thriving life. At some point all that accumulation becomes a burden (for us or our offspring), and we begin to desire less. I vastly prefer experiences over stuff. I'm very limited in what I will allow myself to bring home. Desiring less is very freeing, and I have never not had plenty of "enough." 

    I wonder sometimes about the billionaires in the news, so often categorized as greedy. How many billions are "enough?" This is a valid question as in our society, the rich get richer... and the middle class continues to diminish. The very wealthy and the very poor have no concept of how the other lives. "Enough" is defined very differently by those two groups. 

    What is your "enough"?

        Leta

Is beauty enough?
From the CSU Gardens, July 2022

December 26--Onward

Woke up, it was a Chelsea morning, and the first thing that I knew 

There was milk and toast and honey and a bowl of oranges, too. 

--Joni Mitchell

    Woke up, and thank the heavens, Christmas is over! Christmas 2022 was a GIANT "pothole" in life for me, very different from decades of Christmases past. My wise yoga teacher Ana Forrest said, "Never waste a good trigger." If something causes one to grow/expand/release, dive in! Actually, the past four months have been loaded with triggers, including Christmas, and I can say confidently that I did not waste any of them!

    Will this 2022 change make future Christmases easier? I don't know. I don't even know if I have any more Christmases in this lifetime. None of us can be sure of that. But I am ready to move on to 2023. There are adventures to be planned!

        Leta

December 25--Merry and Bright

Quiet is peace. Quiet is turning down the volume knob on life.  --Khaled Hosseini

Merry Christmas from Barney and me!