Share the Love

I bundled up this morning, hat, coat, hood, and mittens. A chance to get outside in the brisk air before the walking paths were too busy. The light mist and westerly wind kept even the winter-hardy dog walkers at home.

We are usually stuck in the struggle of everyday tasks, keeping up on what's happening on screen, following, liking, putting items to go back to in folders marked in red and on and on and on.

In these last few weeks however, we have been told to slow down our lives and our minds. We have been reminded that we have little control these days except in our own actions. Spending time alone is easier for some of us, we like distance to think. We lean towards the quiet and yet I have to wonder if on any other day, I might have missed this!

Share the Love

In the middle of the sidewalk, no branches to drop their moisture, I noticed this heart. I probably need not tell you how it put a smile on my face. An unexpected delight, perfectly formed where I could not miss it. Should not miss it.


I dare say that these reminders are for us to share the love that persists all around us. Although our patience may lag, our humour may stall, our sarcasm may escalate, our goals may slide, we are all capable of noticing.

When we see the goodness in others, let's recognize it.
When we witness the kindness in strangers, let's applaud it.
When we experience the magic, in whatever form it takes, let's share the love.

If we each notice, and then take the time to share, we will surely make each other smile. Because the magic I saw on the path this morning is everywhere. It just looks different to each of us.

Now, please notice the magic around you! Then Share the Love. (Tweet This)

We are tied to eachother like never before in spite of our distance. (Tweet This)


Be well,

Learning the Summer Time Sway

As I sit at this vantage point of experience I wonder where else my path will take me. When you reach a certain age we can not stare down the fact that time is marching on. And so is our Summer.

We can do our best to out-pace our peers in the swimming pool, or on the running path. We can continue to stand on our heads and bend in ways that even we ourselves could not have fathomed not long ago.

Summer Time Sway - Ethel circa 1915

But nevertheless, we look down on our scars, see white hairs appearing, lines defining the choices we've made written on our faces. In my mind I am young and oh-so wise but at the end of the day, sometimes I am tired.

I yearn for those days when I had insurmountable energy and could fill my calendar from early to late, grab a tea and a sandwich in the late afternoon and would never consider a nap. My body needs a snooze some days now, but somehow I never cultivated the skill to close my eyes and drop into the motion of doing nothing. Swaying unconcerned as if in a hammock on a warm summer's day.

Is this why we get a vacation? To consider, to stop, to just be. I've reached the half-way point of my summer break. I feel the tide pulling me back to the rest of my life. Torturing me with tasks undone, incomplete projects, scraps of paper with plans scattered on my desk.

I yell loudly in my inside voice. Leave me alone.

Let me listen to the birds chirping frantically while they find a lonely puddle, hear the distant hum of a lawn mower propelled by an adolescent chore list, and the familiar (although gratingly annoying) sound of an ice-cream truck coming up the hill to my home. Let me savour it all.

Life is still teaching me to sway.

Allow me to immerse in the second half of my vacation, as we should in the second half of our lives. Growing and learning, of course. But also basking, nodding, swaying in appreciation for what we have experienced and accumulated in our hearts with those who have graced our lives.

With special thanks to family and dear friends (over coffee, on a patio, by phone and via Skype) who have shared their precious summer time with me. You have enriched my life.

And now on to the second half.

Have you given yourself the gift of the Summer Time Sway? (Tweet This)

Learning the Summer Time Sway with what fills our hearts. (Tweet This)