as salamu alaykum

Mouse in the House

/ Beth Weaver-Kreider / Leave a comment

radish
The room is a little dark, and it’s a Chromebook photo, but you can get the idea of the sweetness from this.

Gratitude List:
1. Tabea’s radish mouse
2. Steadily working on the “slow, gentle ripening of the human spirit.”  –Cynthia Bourgeault
3. Distilling thought into words
4. Listening to 9th grade short stories
5. Moderation.  Balance.

As salamu alaykum.  Walk in Peace.  Walk in Beauty.

Heart

/ Beth Weaver-Kreider / 1 Comment

Barn

Gratitude List:
1. This is what I signed up for.  I don’t know quite how else to say it.  It doesn’t sound quite like a gratitude, perhaps.  More a statement of intention.  The gratitude comes from knowing where the priorities lie, I think.  It’s not about being comfortable or happy or at peace.  It’s not about fulfilling the needs of the ego.  It’s about doing the work that I am here to do.  That’s when it feels right.  That’s when it clicks, when I know I am in the right place. I am grateful for that, even if it challenges the equilibrium.
2. Heart Prayers
3. Green
4. The renewed courage and fortitude that dawn brings.
5. Humans of New York.  When I get overwhelmed by the viciousness and bombast of the political rhetoric, I scuttle over to Humans of New York and read the comment threads.  These days they are full of people’s open-hearted offers of help and connection and friendship to people who are in dire need.

As salamu alaykum.  Peace be unto you.

Camel Coaxing

/ Beth Weaver-Kreider / Leave a comment

Stones
Establishing balance.

Gratitude List:

  1. There are people in Mongolia who have a cultural tradition of camel coaxing, a ceremony of singing and tender handling of a mother camel and an orphan, to get the mother to take on the orphan as her own.  That there are people who ritualize and pass on this sort of cultural knowledge from generation to generation–this fills me with great joy.
  2. The music concert at Wrightsville Elementary last night.  Those shiny, shiny kids.
  3. The giant pine tree that someone on the darkest stretch of Cool Creek Road has decorated with lights.
  4. Breathing prayers.  Breathe in gratitude.  Breathe out love.  Breathe in gratitude.  Breathe out peace.
  5. Voices that call for reconciliation and dialogue and peace amidst the clamor.  This morning I am grateful for the voice and vision and courageous leadership of Loren Swartzentruber, the president of Eastern Mennonite University (another southern Christian College), calling for dialogue and sensitivity and action that leads toward greater understanding between people.

As salamu alaykum.  Shalom.  May we walk in Peace.