What do we expect to see?

Single bright green acorn on leaf mould

Wandering without an agenda, even for a few minutes, lets us notice what we might otherwise miss. A SINGLE ACORN One, just one when last year, there were multitudes, so many I couldn’t walk without crushing some. One, just one, not a deficit, but more rebalancing the scales of the years. Weighing out time. One, … Read more

It is time, said the friend

closeup of dewdrops on the last remaining purple foxglove flowers

I’ve been waiting for this day. I just didn’t know it. Until a friend reminded me. IT IS TIME Turn your gaze upon your soul, for it is time. Look past the shadows, look between the light; it has been waiting ­– waiting for you to step back from the endless undertakings, to take your … Read more

So, how do you know?

cluster of ripe and unripe blackberries

How do you know when the berries are ripe? Or when it’s time to cut the hay? And when do the fledglings know it’s time to leave the nest or the goslings leave the lake? Or the leaves start to turn, and the fungi push their fruiting bodies into the air?  It’s not a knowing … Read more

Being in the arc of time

slice of tree trunk showing different tree rings and moss on the bark

Yesterday, I was reminded that here in the valley, we do not have time. We can’t be rigidly bound to a to-do list if a tree is down and blocking the road. So even if I’d wanted to be elsewhere, I couldn’t get out until we’d cleared the debris and made the tree safe. And … Read more

There is time…

skyline with sunset cloud formations

Reflecting on the watershed of the year: There is a time for everything that matters, even if we think there isn’t. Because time is not linear, and neither are our choices so long as we don’t give them away. + Sue Heatherington Pause. See differently. Re-story 🌿

This moment in time

Blackberry flowers delicately caught in a shaft of sunlight

Is like no other. We have not had it before, and neither will we again. But to be fully present right now is to invest in what is to come. Even if we don’t see the outcome. Pause. See differently. Re-story 🌿

Pondering our perceptions of time and movement

pondering-our-perceptions-of-time-and-movement

We tend to think of movement as getting from A to B. Or of getting better, moving away from what was undesirable. Yet here in the valley, water and the unrooted more-than-humans are the only ones who display movement like this. Others demonstrate their aliveness by blossoming like the overnight eruption of white hawthorn flowers … Read more

Choosing your time well

choosing-your-time-well

There is mechanical time, valley time and your time. And especially in the transition zones, knowing which we are using is wise. Yesterday morning, by the time I’d walked from the valley floor to the sunlit path on the hillside, the dandelion ‘clocks’ were their usual fluffy selves. CHOOSING TIME If you want to see … Read more

Time to rediscover our place

time-to-rediscover-our-place

Like missing the beauty in the ordinary, does familiarity obscure the distinctive nature of place? Which is rather sad because we can only be here. Not elsewhere. At any one moment in time. So what is it about this place that is calling to us? And why does it matter? I’m reminded of Thomas Merton’s … Read more