.My favorite constellation is the Big Dipper, it's easy to find and from my backpacking and camping trips in my youth, it was always for me a way to get my bearings while in the dark of the mountains. I look for it every single night as I stand barefoot on the damp ground no matter where I am. My feet on the Earth and star watching centers my soul no matter what the day has handed me. The Big Dipper looks over my mom, my siblings and their families, my children who are scattered around, their spouses and my grandchildren. It looks over my girlfriends, it watches over me me and everyone I care about. It looks over our dark world. and just over the handle of the Big Dipper is a big dark empty spot in the sky. Or so I thought... this is what is really there.
Can you even believe that beauty???? We can't see it because it's so far away but the Hubble telescope can because it sits and waits for the light to come through. Someone on Earth created the tool to see farther than we can imagine. I find that to be a wonderful thought. There is so much more than what we can see. Let me say that again.... THERE IS SO MUCH MORE THAN WHAT WE SEE.
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You guys... I wrote the above on a Sunday October 1... Thinking about amazing stars and things like that. I was texting with a dear friend who was in Las Vegas. At the Route 91 Harvest concert. And then her texts changed... at 10:38
"OMG There is shooting everywhere"
There was more but none of it made sense. My friend, her husband and another friend had been in the middle of one of the worst mass shootings in our nation's history and my blood turned cold with fear and worry. I got a call from her from the airport the next morning to let me know they were okay and heading home. Exhausted, scared, traumatized and so ready to hug their children. I didn't even know what to say except that I loved them and grateful that they were safe.
It's taken me a bunch of days to find words and even now as I type it feels so insignificant, far better minds than mine have contemplated the nature of our collective anger, hurt and shock. I don't have the ability to do more than offer my perspective and thoughts.
I wasn't at the concert, I have never had to run for my life or be so afraid, yet I feel changed... This shooting....fires all summer in the Northwest, floods, hurricanes and now my state of California is on fire...it's all grabbed my attention. So much real suffering and loss. I've allowed myself to be the hostess of some ginormous pity parties lately...which is craziness because life is pretty sweet for me and I am ashamed that at times I have taken the best of it for granted and wallowed in the stuff that isn't meeting my expectations. I've let stupid petty words and actions undo me and given away time and energy to situations that aren't deserving of such time and energy. I've allowed little things to be bigger things and dwelled when dwelling served no purpose. Wasted time and emotion on things that didn't matter much. What can I do in the face of everything that is going on? Stop it . That's what. I can do better first for myself so I am available as a human being for bigger and more important things. I can love my people even deeper and show them every chance I get that they mean the world to me. I can be kinder, slower to anger and goodness, I can stop holding one bit of judgement or assumption in my heart. I can raise my standards of behavior and fix the words that slip out of my mouth. And every morning when I wake up in a warm home with enough food for my children, I can remember that these things at not to be taken lightly.
I can do small things rather than nothing. People's lives have been changed in all the rolling disasters that we are experiencing right now. I can't fix it all but I surely can love a little deeper and appreciate a whole lot more. Appreciate wildly the gifts and blessings in my world. Be positive and shining in all things. Stop whining and just live my best life... regardless. Give more than I get, love more than I cry, let people know that they are seen and that they matter. Appreciate Appreciate Appreciate. Because there at in the midst of all of this, I believe there are still days upon days of goodness and possibility. I believe in the middle of chaos, the best of us comes to the surface and we will learn to hold on to each other a little more and find what binds us together and reach out a hand in anyway we can. I believe in the middle of it all, we are changed for the better...
So above the Big Dipper, when you go out and look at the stars, you will see that big blank space, remember it is actually filled with the brilliant and colorful light of a few trillion stars and galaxies, you can't see them but they are most certainly there, waiting patiently for us to look hard and long enough. And in the midst of what feels like endless disaster and tragedy, there will be trillions of points of light that will carry people through, I know I want to be that..... Perspective, gratitude and love....count on those....
Love Wildly, Radiate Love
Barbara
...indeed!!!
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