Green Island

This is where two rivers meet: McKenzie and Willamette. Sometimes I think we ask too much of nature. We go forest bathing and swimming in it; walking and running through it; drinking, huffing, and gobbling it down, all the time. It gives all that we need. How do we give back? I thought this while… Continue reading Green Island

2021 Pride

Today is the birthday of someone I used to love. She loved me too, she said a lot, almost daily. Until I told her I was gay. After that, she stopped talking to me. Well, once she spoke to me, cryptically, with sad eyes, and then walked away. That was in the late 1980s. I… Continue reading 2021 Pride

Summer

Summer can be a peak experience and that is why people like it. Summer feels generous. There is a bumper sticker that says “Be Love.” This is the season to be love. Fire is the element of summer. Fire is also spirit, the universal life force that supports matter and form. This is the time… Continue reading Summer

What’s your suchness?

I woke to two cats fighting inside my house. One of them was mine. This is part of the tension that holds the world together.  It was the suchness of the moment. Suchness is zen talk for the natural state of reality.  I am practicing using it in a sentence. How’s your suchness today?  What… Continue reading What’s your suchness?

Emotionally curious

I walked quickly by a chatty neighbor’s house but he popped out his door at the last moment- “hey Mary Ann!” I was caught and thought argh, no, not now, I’m busy. I stopped, backtracked, turned around to face him and noticed he had bruises and stitches on his face. He remembers nothing but being… Continue reading Emotionally curious