Welcome! Nearly three o’clock in the morning, and I have finished off my coffee for the night and switched to water. The selection of virtual beverages, however, is almost endless, so help yourself to whatever appeals to you. There is, however, a package of strawberries in the refrigerator, and Greek yogurt to go with them.

Coffee for a chance-met catching up

Hot tea for an intimate coze

Soda pop beside the town square’s fountain

For friendly nattering

This has turned out to be a low-key weekend, so far. The highlight of Saturday was a telephone call from my sister, who lives in New England. Not heard from for quite a time because of aversion by both parties to initiating telephone calls … and writing letters, also, I expect. Our mother used to call each of us quite frequently until the last two or three years of her life.  My sister and I have visited several times in recent years. She is still able to travel. I am not, due to fragrance sensitivities and low blood oxygen levels. Her visit in May included a day trip to a state park familiar to our family.

rainbow sky

a letter from your home to mine

rainfall in the desert

Neighbors across the back fence are “babysitting” two huskies for relatives, this week and next, and our two dogs have taken exception to theirs. Just when the dog belonging to our new neighbor to the south seems to be calming down a bit when our Scampers start barking at him/her, we again hear canine barks, screams and howling. I bring the Scampers inside and get some chores out of the way.

cups and dishes piled high and nearly dry

hot soup in paper bowls

If we were enjoying a cup of coffee (tea, hot soup, water) together, tonight, I would tell you that I have, for many decades, used random drawings (coins, cards, page-sentence-word numbers, photographs, &c,) as starting points for writing, meditation, focus and such. For the past five years or so, I have been using, among other resources, elemental blessings tiles from Sharon Shinn’s “Elemental Blessings” series. I added a couple of sets of the (?) 45 tiles to the first, since the characters in the books seem usually to select tiles (in the books, coins) at random from a container that contains multiple sets. Three is the most typical number of blessings drawn. After midnight, I drew three blessings tiles for the new week: Surprise, Surprise, and Hope.

afternoon clouds

shadows across the garden

bees humming lullabies

That set me to thinking about what might surprise me, since I’ve been quite glum (I must quit reading news…even off the Reuters web site, where they seem to pretty much stick to facts), this past month or so. Hope is a great blessing in any life, I expect, and it’s a shocker to me, realizing that my feeling hopeful would surprise me. I normally am a cheerful optimist.

I also am, or try to be, a realist. Feelings, mood, attitude–I think that those are responses to life, not states of being. Not dictated by the world around me, but my answer to those external events, both present and anticipated.

What dictates the structure of my life? What are my expectations? What will I accept or reject or clandestinely counter by living my  life in my own way?

Thank you for joining me, this weekend! I have enjoyed our visit, but I must get to sleep, now. There is a limit to how far I can stretch the benefits of a two-hour evening nap. And the last of the laundry is out of the dryer, so I have no more excuse for the random lights and noises in an otherwise sleeping household.

Much love,

Lizl

Thank you to Allison of the Eclectic Alli blog for hosting Weekend Coffee Share. The InLinkz link can be found on her Coffee Share post for this weekend: A time to reflect…