dark shadows

Come Come My Dears

/ roughwighting / 55 Comments

curtains, spring breezeFrom my window I observe the woman watching the birdfeeder, and I wonder if she is as strange as she seems.

“Come come, my dears, come come,” she croons, like a female Frank Sinatra. The birdfeeder is less than half-full or more than half empty, depending on your perspective, and has been for a week now, much to my dismay.

Oreo, the next-door neighbors’ black and white cat, caught one of the lustrous red cardinals in her mouth, mid-air, a week ago Monday, and the feeder has not been visited since. Continue reading →

Are YOU Successful?

/ roughwighting / 32 Comments

successFunny, how conflicted a person can feel about success.

And there’s the rub. What IS success, and what is not?

That is what I’m thinking at 5 a.m. as I take in a deep breath, smell the essence of my tropical green tea, look outside my window and glory in the darkness, the blinking lights of the town and the city beyond the bay.

success, morning moon, moon, dawn

This, this is my success.

Waking up at 5.

yoga, stretch, morningStretching and pulling and moving my muscles, yoga style, in bed before encouraging the whole lot of them – the cold feet, the sleepy leg muscles, the torso, the heavy head, to rise up from bed and start a new day.

This is success, starting a new day, every day, with freshness and vigor.

But sometimes I, and a lot of us (let’s be frank, it’s human nature to lie in bed in the middle of the night and …) ask the age-old question —  “why?”.

Why strain and strive for another day, for another “success,” whether it be writing or banking, running a business or running a marathon, selling sailboats or collecting stamps, lawyering or antiquing (and I’m just listing a few of the passions I know of friends and family).

Don’t we all stop once in a while and ask, “what the hell does it matter?”

That’s when we should stop and, well, just STOP, and ask ourselves, “what does matter?”

early morning, shadows and light

I sip my tea and watch the harsh blackness of the night begin to slowly, slowly become a softer dark, a black that silhouettes the hills, the dark floating islands, the deep mystery of the bay in front of me. A black that mystifies and entices. These dark shadows soon will be illuminated by the sun’s rays. Objects that are dark now, will soon glow pink and peach and glory in the day.

dawn, chapel, Old St. Hilary's, morning

Like me.

That’s what matters. I just want to glory in each day, stretch my body and my mind to wakefulness of the light, and the dark. Wakefulness of the laughter that surrounds me, and the sadness. Wakefulness to the aroma of steaming tea, and the soft strain of the classical music in my background.

morning, light, blue

Rosy dawn turns to a blue morning.

That’s what makes my day. I throw out the fear and insecurity of being a “success,” since it means nothing.

Instead, I promise to just stay in the moment, and ignore the rest.

success, morning, rainbow

Success!

Here’s to your success!