the beauty of an ordinary life
Here is the world. Beautiful and terrible things will happen. Don't be afraid.Frederick Buechner The bad news? The year ahead will be full of sadness, grief, disappointment, and struggle. Exactly like the year we're wrapping up today. And the year before that. And all the years before that. To be fair, the current state of … Continue reading Cloudy with a chance of …
Whether you're following along day by day or only intermittently, by now you've likely picked up on a recurring theme in the work of the December Sanity Journal, and that theme is close examination of the people in your life and how they make you feel (more on this, later in the post). You might … Continue reading On the 19th day, some grace (and a few more things).
Here's what I wrote, exactly one year ago: never, ever give up. I'd forgotten writing it, and re-reading it made me laugh. Because that's 2018 in a nutshell: the year of not giving up. Events of 2018 changed the course of my personal life in ways I'll never get over. But it pushed me to … Continue reading A few things: December 2018
Looking back over the past 12 months, the way December beckons that kind of review, one encounter stands out as perhaps the best thing to happen to me in this terrible, wonderful year. I was having lunch with a philanthropist friend, trying (badly) to make a case for funding the nonprofit agency where I've worked … Continue reading A few things: December 2017
Cheers, 2017; I'm watching you. And thanks to the folks at Hipstamatic for five years of happiness in picture-making.
My second favorite Eric Ries quote begins this way: "Zero invites imagination...." The context for the quote is the world of business, start-ups in particular. The idea, extrapolating a bit, is that imagination lives in a place without restraint, specific points of reference, judgment or relativism - all of those things being important, perhaps, at … Continue reading Four quotes and a (short) movie.
Once upon a time, near the shortest, darkest day of the year, when I was feeling very, very sorry for myself, I plopped down at my desk, set a timer for 30 minutes, and started writing down everything I could think of that had given me even a moment's happiness during the previous 11 1/2 … Continue reading 50 Happy Things for 2015: Bloggers Unite in Flood of Gratitude
I don't want to jinx things or tempt fate, but it's looking like I will make it through 2015 and into a new year. Which means it's about the time that I normally compile and share my 50 Happy Things list, the time-limited, year-in-review free-write that I started a couple of years ago to give … Continue reading On lemons, lessons, love.
jenny's lark 