Dear Friends

Lime-kiln on the bike path, and bikes in the truck (no more little kid bikes)
I posted this poem on this day last year, after a magical evening with a community of people who have held each other and listened to each other and played together for thirty years:

“Try this:
Sit in a circle at dusk with people you love.
Let it be when the swifts are flying.
Let there be a catbird with a whiskery voice in a spruce tree.
Speak your stories into the bowl of the space between you:
stories like a rich meal, the bitter, the savory, the sweet.
Let it get dark. The darkness will listen, too.
You can hear people listening when you speak in the dark.
You may light a candle if you have a candle.
Laugh together. Cry.
Let there be occasional questions,
occasional grunts, occasional exclamations of oh-I-hear-that!
Make a meal of the stories before you,
and eat your fill. Be nourished.
Be together in your stories.
Know that all these stories are your story, too.
Let there be a benediction,
words sung or spoken into the full dark,
accompanied by the chittering of bats,
good words to keep you always
in this circle where you belong.”
—Beth Weaver-Kreider

“Each of us faces a time when the holy well within needs tending. When we’re no longer able to bestow blessings on others because we’ve overgiven, or when something precious has been taken from us, or life’s demands are too great on our fragile system. But when the moisture goes out of our lives, and we’re no longer able to see beauty or converse with magic, we must ask ourselves how we can replenish our well-ness.” – Dreamwork with Toko-pa
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“We are not to simply bandage the wounds of victims beneath the wheels of injustice, we are to drive a spoke into the wheel itself.” –Dietrich Bonhoeffer
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“We never belonged to you. / You never found us. / It was always the other way round.” –Margaret Atwood
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“Would you like to have an adventure now, or would you like your tea first?” –JM Barrie
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“There is no agony like bearing an untold story inside you.” ~Zora Neale Hurston
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“…The knowledge of the heart is in no book and is not to be found in the mouth of any teacher, but grows out of you like the green seed from the dark earth…” -Carl Jung
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“Listen. . .with the ear of your heart.” –The Rule of St. Benedict
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“One child, one teacher, one book, and one pen can change the world.” –Malala Yousufzai

Gratitude List:
1. Biking in the woods with my boys–yes, again. Cool under the trees, cooler crossing the creeks.
2. That new vacuum cleaner! We can see how much dust is picked up when we vacuum a room. Thank you, Linda!
3. Sharing quiet moments in the morning with a smallish boy
4. Peaches! And ice cream.
5. The trees in the holler that help to keep the coolness in

May we walk in Beauty!