I want….

Jun10

“Do your little bit of good where you are;
it’s those little bits of good put together that overwhelm the world.”
Bishop Desmond Tutu

(small hands reach out to oneanother /Julie Cook / 2020)

In a world gone mad…
writhing in the throes of the pain, anger, and hate…
I want kindness.

I want kindness over the mob’s desire for retribution.
I want kindness over the mob’s desire for retaliation.
I want kindness over the mob’s desire for contrition.
I want kindness over the mob’s desire for revenge.
I want kindness over the mob’s demands for lawlessness.
I want kindness over the mob’s desire for destruction.

I want life and not the taking of life.

Kindness is the first step to healing.
Kindness is the first step toward change.

Kindness is not weak.
Kindness is not passive.

Kindness requires courage.
Kindness requires action.
Kindness is not reactive.
Kindness is proactive.
Kindness takes more effort than anger or hate—
Anger and hate are reactionary…kindness is control and thought-filled.

Kindness is the path less traveled
but it is the only path that will lead to both healing and eventual resolution.

But love your enemies, and do good, and lend, expecting nothing in return,
and your reward will be great, and you will be sons of the Most High,
for he is kind to the ungrateful and the evil.
Luke 6:35

Spent the day with the Mayor

Feb24

“The family is the first essential cell of human society.”
Pope John XXIII

You don’t choose your family.
They are God’s gift to you, as you are to them.
Desmond Tutu

The Mayor and Chief Aide / Julie Cook / 2019)

Small hiatus today from the heavy important posts…opting to share a
few happy moments with the Mayor.
I do fret just a tad when, in two months time, her new sheriff in town arrives…
and her little world will be rocked beyond her understanding…
but as the consummate leader that she is, I trust she will rise to the occasion
of big sister with impeccable grace…

But for now, she remains the queen bee—
as we see how she takes to a new birthday chair given to her by her great aunt…

(I think she’d like it to recline)

Mugging for the camera with Moppie…

Back to the serious stuff tomorrow…
Yet oddly… this seems to be the most important “stuff” for now…

But you are a chosen people, a royal priesthood, a holy nation,
God’s special possession, that you may declare the praises of him who called you out of darkness
into his wonderful light.
1 Peter 2:9

fragility

Jul20

“We are fragile creatures, and it is from this weakness, not despite it,
that we discover the possibility of true joy.”
Desmond Tutu

(a spent monarch butterfly lifeless in the yard / Julie Cook / 2017)

You may remember that I once wrote a post about the life expectancy of butterflies…
and surprisingly, it is very brief.
Often times just a matter of a few short weeks.

Which is a bit hard to wrap one’s thoughts around when this yard of mine
is awash with the comings and goings of what seems to be hundreds of
butterflies in every size, shape and description.

I also know that some butterflies even migrate from life here in the south down
even further south to Mexico and as far as even South America.
I don’t know much about the life expectancies of those particular travelers
but for such a southerly jaunt, I’d imagine stamina is key.

Yet despite their brief lives, it is always sad finding one having given up
the ghost…

I don’t think I really need any more reminding on the fragility of
life…
however, having spotted this dead Monarch in the grass,
that’s exactly what I got when I was out watering the plants…

It is amazing to me how I can look at a dead butterfly and feel such a sharp pang
of sadness.

For despite my own spate of life’s current sadness, which is currently running
amuck in this little world of mine,
seeing a butterfly lifeless, in a fading clump on the ground, sends a rush of
melancholy washing over my heart.

Life, be it a butterfly’s or our own, is oh so fragile…
And yet we rarely think of it as such.

Our own ego and bravado coupled by the current run of angst and anger…
all run counter to any notion of life being fragile…

Life which is actually something to be savored caressed and
counted as a joyous gift not merely taken for granted or even worse,
purposely attacked.

I wonder what it might take for the majority of this angry Nation of ours,
what could move the hearts and minds of those filled with such hate
and intolerance…
what could possibly stir in the hearts of the gang members, those who
choose to relish in causing pain and suffering …
what could open the eyes of man to his fleeing fragile nature as he races
forward toward his own death and demise….

(a daredevil Tiger Swallowtail / Julie Cook / 2017)

“Show me, Lord, my life’s end
and the number of my days;
let me know how fleeting my life is.
Psalm 39:4

“either you’re with me or agin me”

Nov8

“The hottest places in hell are reserved for those who, in times of great moral crisis, maintain their neutrality.”
Dante Alighieri

“If you are neutral in situations of injustice, you have chosen the side of the oppressor. If an elephant has its foot on the tail of a mouse, and you say that you are neutral, the mouse will not appreciate your neutrality.”
Bishop Desmond Tutu

The power of choosing good and evil is within the reach of all.
Origen

(the waning of summer’s bounty is found fading in a golden afternoon of Autumn / Cades Cove, TN, The Great Smokey Mountains National Park / Julie Cook / 2015)