Monday, September 29, 2014






It was a busy week, - here, there and everywhere
but now it's Monday again and a brand new week 
with sunshine and showers
forecast and nothing terribly pressing.

Oh well, is anything really very pressing anymore?

When I came home from church yesterday, and after I had had a bit of lunch
I stretched out on the couch where the sun's rays were warm and bright (with the cat)
and picked up Anne Lindbergh's 'Gifts from the Sea' which I had put out to re-read.

And I remembered when I had first read it, back in the 50's.

What an amazingly wonderful time it was!  Family, husband, community,
 a new orchard, sheep, great quantities of friends
 - veterans on a DVA project, poor but excited with a new life.
All of us squashed into tiny houses which was all we could afford to build at the time. 
And the children! Big ones at school, small ones at home.  
Charles so fantastically busy, and life stretched on forever and ever....

That is when I really appreciated 'Gifts from the Sea' - 
when each day was a great kaleidoscope of
fragmented activity and distractions,  
and there seemed little or no time for meditation or inner stillness.
 And yet when I look back at what I was reading and the opinions I remember having, 
it couldn't all have been a domestic mishmash....

Now it is a time of great nostalgia,
 and quiet moments of reflection and meditation are an important part of my life,
 - in the music I play, the books I read (and re-read), the photography of still life I indulge in, 
-  an hour spent spinning, my time in the garden. 
As I read Anne Lindbergh's words 
and follow her search for simplicity and stillness
 I think about centering and contemplation 
and I think perhaps I have reached that time in my life when this is a possibility.

But it comes at a price.....

And I still have all that 'STUFF' to dispose of
 before I can truly live the pure and simple life......
but more about that later!

Is there anyone who would give house to this lovely pot my sister
bought for me, years and years and years ago....


5 comments:

Sallie (FullTime-Life) said...

I must read that book. I actually remember my mother reading it and talking about it when I was still at home. She belonged to a study club and it may have been a topic as I seem to remember a lot of conversation about it. I probably glanced at it then, but as a teenager would have been too young to understand or want to understand the message.

We have simplified our lives in a rather different way, but I can empathize with the need to find new homes for 'stuff' ... even stuff that was once precious, but that one has no room for any longer.

Penny said...

I have a big house full of stuff, at the moment I am slowly taking old paper backs to the 2nd hand book shop, but sadly they don't want hard covers, what to do with them ? Not worth anything but precious to me.

Barb said...

I read and reread Gifts from the Sea. I interpret differently depending on my life circumstances. I am busy sorting through stuff at the present moment, Hildred. Much has already been re-gifted. I still have some Denver belongings here in the mountains that I will either assimilate or give away. Many, many book are off my shelves and hopefully resonating with someone else.

The Weaver of Grass said...

An interesting post Hildred. When one looks back on one's life - the pleasures, the worries, the wonderful times all enjoyed (or got through in the case of the worries) I always wish I had enjoyed them even more, because they are but memories now. Sadly life isn't like that - everyting passes and leaves us with just the memory.

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