Last week, in between Thanksgiving (the day)
and my beloved aunt's memorial service (another day), I watched this.
(It takes ten minutes to watch, friends, but it is such a lovely ten minutes…)
And I came away from it with a new mantra:
The only appropriate response is gratitude.
The only appropriate response is gratitude.
The only appropriate response is gratitude.
This is not easy to feel in every moment of everyday, but that's the point of a mantra, isn't it?
To make something habit.
To make it real.
And now, lo and behold and speaking of habits, here is darling Jote doing her 30 Days of Gratitude, just like she did last December and the December before. I'm joining her, and maybe you want to, too? Because it is when we are busiest, rushed, overwhelmed or grieving that we need gratitude the most. And who isn't busy? Or rushed? Or overwhelmed? Or grieving? Or something???
Today, today I am so grateful for the rain.
It clapped on our dark roof and deck and I stayed in bed an extra 30 minutes.
It filled the wheelbarrow out back.
It turned to mud to track into school this morning and all the kids and teachers laughed, outright, at that mud.
And in honor of the rain, here's today's poem, which doesn't mention rain except for in the title but oh my mercy it is a poem of levity and gratitude and it makes me smile:
Gee, You’re So Beautiful
That It’s Starting to Rain
Richard Brautigan
Oh, Marcia,
I want your long blonde beauty
to be taught in high school,
so kids will learn that God
lives like music in the skin…
(And read other Poetry Friday poems at Carol's Corner.)