How can finding one little word be so hard? Last year I noticed some of the discussion about OLWs and was intrigued by the idea of choosing one little word to define my year. Sure, I’ll do that next year, I thought.

Once in a while this year a word has drifted through my mind as a possible contender. Focus? Clarity? Embrace? All considered and rejected for one reason or another. As the end of the year approached, my search intensified. I frequently turned words over in my mind, exploring their nuances, considering their potential impact on my life in the year ahead, which feels charged with a potential for change. I wanted to come up with a word that was unique, inspiring and layered (and preferably multi-syllabic). A “wow!” word! Looking back, I think I wanted the discovery of my OLW to do all the work of the year for me in advance—to be an epiphany of sorts which would chart out a clear course. I think I was missing the point.

At any rate, somewhere through the process I realized it was important to me to choose a verb. I wanted an action word. I’m too apt to go with the flow and follow the path of least resistance and I’m determined to make active, conscious choices this year. And, there it was, I realized, my one little word: Choose.

The more I thought about it, the more I realized that must be it. It’s not a “wow” word to be sure. It’s nothing too fancy, rather pedestrian really, but it’s a one-syllable word packed with potential. Because to choose, you have to make a decision. Even staying where you are is a choice, but this year if I choose inaction, I want that to be an active, conscious choice. I want to know that I’m setting my foot on a certain path, or choosing not to set my foot there, because that’s the path I want to follow. Or not to follow. I want to pack my choices full of intention.

Choosing is powerful.

My OLW for 2016: 

With everyone home for the holidays, I’ve spent more time than usual in the kitchen. Even though I’m delighted to have my children home, I’m not always thrilled to be cooking, cleaning, cooking, cleaning…. The other night I discovered a wild musical mix on youtube and with the volume blaring, I set out to make dinner. I expected drudgery but the music, from big band to zydeco to gospel, transformed the chore into a sheer delight and inspired this poem–my own version of a dinner dance. 

Dinner Dance

My finger taps the button
And music starts to play
I crank the volume higher
And quickly start to sway

Upbeat and lively only
no dulcet tones today
The cupboard doors start rattlin’
Dinner is underway

I can-can to the cabinet
retrieve some garlic there
Then shut it with a hip bump
Fists pumping in the air

R-E- S- P- E- C- T
Aretha belts it out
While dicing up the tofu
I sing and swing about

I jitterbug with ginger
’til grating is complete
Then mince the yellow onions
gyrating to the beat

I salsa while food simmers
I cha cha while I chop
While waiting for a boil
I do the bunnyhop.

I jazz-hand in the spices
Then add a wee bit more
Choreographing wildly
I hip hop ‘cross the floor

I bump my hips in tempo
While stirring my sauté
Bellowing out a chorus
I improvise ballet

I twirl around the island
Dancing with my spoon
Happily cooking dinner
This December afternoon

Mary Lee Hahn at A Year of Reading is hosting today’s Poetry Friday Roundup. Make sure to stop by to enjoy some poetry to bring in the New Year.  May your year be filled with unexpected moments of joy and sparkle, like an impromptu dance around the kitchen!

I’ve taken a lot of pictures over the past six months or so. We live in a beautiful place and it’s hard not to find a spectacular natural scene.  I’ll wake to the drama of a red-streaked sky or sparkling frost and off I’ll go. Some mornings I just get into the car and drive, keeping my eyes open to whatever may be there. And something always is.

This December we’ve had a lot of rain and chilly, dreary weather. It’s not particularly inspiring, and like many others, I’ve been lamenting the lack of snow.  There’s something magical about the hush of a fresh snowfall and those sparkling blankets of white cover the brown, muddy detritus of fall and seem to promise a fresh start. And after the snowfall, when the sun comes out and the skies clear… Is there anything more beautiful than a brilliant blue sky over hills and valleys of fresh fallen snow?

One day last week it was yet another misty moist morning with a haze of fog. The colors were muted. No dazzling snow, or crimson leaves, or brilliant azure skies. I set off with my camera, anyway.  I drove the back country roads aimlessly, and eventually parked by a bridge over the river. Out of my car, I looked intently around me, walking, pausing, noticing. And the more I looked, the more I noticed: an intriguing alignment of rocks, the impressionistic reflections of tree trunks in the river behind blowsy cattails, the unexpected splash of green moss mounded around a white-lichened trunk, a trio of contorted trees mirrored in shallow water, and the golden tones of a marsh of cattails. Slowly, surely, the quiet wonders of nature unfolded around me.

This seemingly unpromising morning yielded great beauty that was perhaps even more rewarding for its gradual revelation.  Once I tuned in and adjusted to its nuance, it was everywhere. It makes me wonder how many times I’ve missed the subtleties when dazzled by the spectacular.

When I was in middle school, I distinctly remember looking out the school bus window at a random pedestrian and thinking, “Wow, she’s ugly.” And then, for some unknown reason, something shifted inside me and I was suddenly aware of (and ashamed and horrified at) my own thoughts. Was this how I wanted to see the world? Did I want to be someone who casually picked apart everything, derisive and smug?  What an ugly way to live. From that point on, I made a deliberate attempt to change my outlook, or at least my conscious reaction to my world. I worked to see the positives and the potential, rather than to mock and dismiss. And yes, I realize this all sounds a bit PollyAnna-ish. And no, I wasn’t always successful. But I’ve always thought of that moment on the bus as helping me to positively change the way I responded to and interacted with the world.

But lately, I haven’t been comfortable with myself. My thoughts and my internal dialogue have been dark and unkind and I’ve felt vaguely uneasy. Then, yesterday, something shifted again. I recalled that long-ago pivotal moment on the bus and realized that, so many years later, I’ve once again tuned in to the radio frequency “Negativity”–quick to complain rather than to compliment, to see ugliness rather than beauty, to denigrate rather than too celebrate and to dwell on loss rather than on good fortune.  I have allowed pessimism and fear to seep back into my world like ink wicking into cotton paper, coloring my outlook in unsightly blotches. But more importantly, yesterday I also remembered that I have a choice. I can turn the radio dial and change the frequency.

And so that’s what I’m doing. I will seek to compliment rather than to complain, to seek and acknowledge beauty even amidst ugliness, to celebrate rather than to denigrate and to treasure my good fortune rather than to dwell on what has been lost. I have promised myself to embrace the positives and reject the negatives and to be thankful for all that I have and hold in my rich, comfortable life. For there is so much.  

My cousin’s e-mail subject heading caught my attention immediately. “Some pics of your mom.”  I opened the e-mail, skipped the message, then clicked on the digital attachments eagerly, one by one. The first two pictures were familiar to me. They both show my mother, a vibrant bride, gowned in antique lace on her wedding day. She was 19 years old, and so much, that I know of, still lay before her.

The third picture was new to me. 34 years after her death,  I don’t often encounter a new picture of my mom. She was 38 when she died unexpectedly and I was 14.  She died unexpectedly. I just realized that I always link those words when I speak of my mother’s death.  Perhaps I just want everyone to know, without going into details, how blindsided we were and that we never got to say goodbye.

This third photo framed in a golden oval is a candid shot, close-up, of her smiling. It looks like it was taken not long before she died, or at least she looks like I most remember, warmly familiar, but also somehow like a stranger in this new context. A beloved stranger. How odd. How unsettling.

Now, a decade older than my mother ever was, I study this new photo. I look into her eyes, so similar to mine, and wonder about all that never was. I realize that my grief isn’t static–it’s dynamic–constantly evolving in a way my mother never had the chance to do. I never knew all the women my mother would have been and was. I knew her only as my mother. When I miss her now, I’m missing not only who she was, but also my version of who I think my mother would have been, and a relationship that I am only imagining. How odd. How unsettling.

We settled into our balcony seats at the University of Maine Yuletide Concert, looking forward to a couple of hours of holiday music and a chance to touch base with our youngest child. Shortly afterward, the lights dimmed and a recorded announcement thanked everyone for coming and noted the location of emergency exits.  Pretty standard. Then, the recording added that in case of an emergency, audience members should stay in their seats and listen for and follow instructions which would be announced over the PA system. Not so standard.

Immediately, my thoughts skittered to San Bernadino, Paris, Roseburg, and to the sites of other recent shootings. I shuffled uneasily in my seat and looked around, noting others doing the same.  What kind of world are we living in that we gather to hear music and wonder if this gathering could be a target? The warm glow of expectation dimmed and I felt besmirched with awareness. And throughout the performance I remained aware–of opening and shutting doors, shuffling exits and entrances. Just slightly, peripherally aware.

My daughter’s choir performed in the second half of the show. Stage lights dimmed and the choir members revealed small lights that blinked slowly, off and on, twinkling on the dark stage. After a few moments of expectant hush, they began to sing and the beloved glistening notes of “Silent Night” spilled into the air. As their voices soared to fill the hall, my eyes unexpectedly filled with tears. I was moved by the beauty and energy of these united voices, my daughter’s amongst them, but also by a concurrent sense of loss and sorrow.

The echo of that earlier announcement and the resulting awareness still lingered.  How has our world become one in which the shadow of terror has managed to penetrate even this small performing arts center in rural Maine?  I looked at my daughter. I looked at all the beautiful young students, with their beautiful young voices weaving together with such power and glory, and I was simultaneously thrilled by their amazing potential, and frightened by the uncertain future that lies before them. Before us. And my tears spilled over.

Matt Forrest of Radio, Rhythm & Rhyme offers a Poetry…Cubed poetry challenge this month. The basic rules are that he provides three photos and your poem must include reference to them, either concretely or abstractly.  Any poetic form is allowed. The pictures for this particular challenge were of a wood stove, flowering bittersweet and an antique wooden New England Patriots football player figurine.  It was a fun challenge trying to figure out how to link these three images!

A Seasonal Game

Autumn offers sweet solace
as Summer fades away
lulling us into complacency
while Winter lurks on our doorstep
Like syrup coating a bitter pill
it distracts us in early days
with brilliant splashes of color,
maple leaves and bittersweet,
the pulsing heat of a wood stove,
and camaraderie in the stands
where frosty cries fog the frigid air
as fans cheer the flying pigskin
Autumnal beauty hovers,
a neutral zone before
the full blitz of Winter’s winds,
But inexorably Winter slips in
and picks off those vibrant leaves
one by one
In its unrelenting offensive march
it drives forward and blasts us
into our homes to await
the tender shoots of Spring.

Molly Hogan (c) 2015

Thanks to Carol at Carol’s Corner for hosting today’s Poetry Round-up.

Today, all three of my children arrived home from college for Thanksgiving. At one point this evening, dinner was bubbling on the stove, and my son was playing guitar in the living room and singing along. My older daughter chimed in from the kitchen and my husband added his voice as well. I simply smiled. Warm, happy, lovely.

After we enjoyed dinner together, I stumbled upon a spine poem on a blog I follow and introduced my daughter to the concept. We rummaged through the bookshelves, made a great mess, and together created our first spine poem.

(Since the glare has obliterated some titles, I’ve transcribed it below.)

This I Believe
There Is A Tide
The Highest Tide
Invisible Horizons
Gathering Blue
Gossamer
The Remains of the Day
The World Below
Within Arm’s Reach

All in all, a lovely evening.

On Sunday, my soul was aching from the events in Paris and the sad state of our world and guided by Wendell Berry’s poem, ” The Peace of Wild Things,” I turned to nature for some solace. I set off in the morning cold, half-heartedly plodding along my chosen route, mittened hands bunched in my pockets. Autumn’s flash of brilliance has faded here and there’s a dull patina of ash brown across the land. Even with a blue sky above, everything looked and felt muted.

My mind wandered as I walked and initially, the scenery unfolded around me unseen. I was lost in thought, weighted with sadness, ignoring my surroundings. Suddenly, red flashed and a cardinal darted to the tip-top branches of a leaf-stripped tree. He postured a bit and then flitted away, a splash of brilliance in the morning sky.  His quick visit jarred me from my reverie, shifted my focus, redirecting it outward, back to the world that surrounded me. I began to pay attention.

I continued on my walk, taking note of frost rimed leaves, the rustle of skittering squirrels and chipmunks, varied bird song and the colorful skirts of windfall apples spread at the base of trees.  Further down the road laden branches bent and their bounty of plump crimson berries dangled before a building glowing in the early morning sunlight. Vibrant. Saturated. Intense. A visual feast.

At my turn around spot I stopped to admire the sheer perfection of reflection in the still waters. Serene. Tranquil. Isn’t it a wonder to see vaprous clouds captured in liquid water?

On my route toward home, burst milkweed pods with tumbling gossamer strands lay adjacent to the road. Ice crystals lightly coated their dessicated hulls, but a few valiant seeds still poised for flight, their silky filaments awaiting a timely breeze to waft them toward fresh soil.  And in a nearby field, frost winked in the sunlight, setting the field dancing with vivid, sparkling flashes. 

Close to home yet another flicker of movement caught my eye. I stopped. A solitary bird had flown to a quaint birdhouse, silhouetted against autumnal leaves. She pushed her way in and moments later, poked her head out of the house, clasping debris in her beak, and tossing it away so that it scattered to the ground.  She did this over and over again, with occasional flights to a nearby tree to disperse materials there. Such an industrious little bird, cleaning house on a brisk fall day. I was transfixed.  Somehow that purposeful little bird, diligently putting its world into order, soothed me. Who knew such delight could be found watching a nuthatch busily cleaning out a birdhouse?  I stood and watched and watched. When I finally pulled away, the birdhouse must have been almost empty and my steps toward home were just a bit lighter.

Nature does offer sweet rewards when I pay attention.  There is always beauty to see in our world and heading out into the woods or down a country road can serve as a balm when one is steeped in despair. Though my soul still weeps for this torn and tattered world, to paraphrase Berry, ‘for a short time that morning I rested in the grace of the world, and was free.’

More and more I look to the skies and the beauty I find there offers sweet solace in my busy days.