Feeling Grateful — Counting Blessings

Feeling Grateful — Counting Blessings

It’s been a good (and challenging) week and I’m feeling grateful for many things:

• Family dinners with our kids and their significant others. I’m feeling so grateful that both our daughters live in the Twin Cities area and we are able to spend time with them and our grandchildren frequently. It is hard for me to believe that my youngest child is now 30 years old. Where did the time go?

My youngest daughter and granddaughter

• A lovely cool week in Minneapolis with temperatures in the 60’s and 70’s. Although many are complaining about the cool weather, I love this kind of open-window weather and am grateful for this lovely respite from the summer heat of early June.

• The magic of antibiotics when you really need them. This week I developed an abscess on my nose that was not healing. I tried to tough it out because I didn’t want to take antibiotics but it was getting more and more painful. Reluctantly I sought medical help and was surprised to get an injection of antibiotics immediately along with a 10-day course of antibiotics and a topical antibiotic gel. I had no idea that something like an abscess on one’s nose could be serious. I’m now starting my third day of antibiotics and feeling like a human being again. The pain is almost gone and the swelling and redness are starting to recede. While I hate taking antibiotics because of how hard they are on my digestive system, I am so thankful that I have them when I need them.

• I am grateful that I have the luxury of having excellent health insurance and great healthcare available where I live. Not everyone is so lucky. I’m also aware that the senate is currently getting ready to vote on a bill that could make good healthcare inaccessible for far too many people. I hope that everyone will raise their voice against the proposed healthcare bill. (That’s it for politics today folks, I promise.)

• I am grateful for good people. A dear friend of mine agreed to adopt my brother’s cat after my brother was injured severely in a car accident and no longer able to care for the cat. She was not the most lovable cat in the world. In fact, she was fierce, fat, and had an attitude. She’s been with my friend and her husband for about 5 months and she’s becoming a different cat. I love to see how she’s blossoming in their care. Here’s to the cat whisperers of the world!

Recent photo of the cat taken by my friend. Doesn’t she look contented?

• Photo play. Although I haven’t felt like going out in the woods to make photographs yet, yesterday I picked up some fresh flowers and a couple of flowering plants. I’m playing with my new iPhone 7 plus camera as well as my Canon 5DIII. It brings me joy.

• I’ve begun working on my Wild Altars book of images from the north woods. I’ve picked the photographs I want to use and am working on the text of the book. To help me quiet the critical voices in my head I’m embracing advice from writer Anne Lamott and letting myself write a “shitty first draft.”

“Almost all good writing begins with terrible first efforts. You need to start somewhere. Start by getting something—anything—down on paper. What I’ve learned to do when I sit down to work on a shitty first draft is to quiet the voices in my head.” — Anne Lamott

Even during challenging times like the times we live in, there is always good and light in the world. It feels important to me that I celebrate and recognize the many blessings and ordinary miracles in my life.

When was the last time that you paused to count your blessings?

What are you feeling grateful for today?

May you walk in beauty.