Possibilities . . .

We've recently moved.  We love our new (very old) house, and part of the fun of starting over is discovering all of the pieces of the picture that unfold with each new day.  I will admit, it being a house built in 1930, some of the surprises are not all together happy ones; but many of them are!  It's fun seeing little glimpses of the past or watching what comes up in the yard as different weather makes its way here.

This morning, as I headed out with Sadie for our walk, I loved seeing all of the fall blooms that emerged overnight.  I couldn't help but smile, wondering who planted the bush?  What were they going through at the time it was planted?  How long did they imagine it might bring smiles?  Etc., etc., etc.

If you've read this blog for any length of time at all, you know that my brain works like that.  I like wondering.  I like imagining.  And . . . well, I like flowers that bloom overnight without my help!

I was delighted by the blooms, I was.  As I walked, though,  I realized I was actually more delighted by something else - something not as beautiful, but more giving, I believe.  (I hope no former English teachers are reading this - I'm well aware there were some rule breaks in the former sentence.  That's the way I wanted, though.  So there.)

What delighted me most - what brought me the most hope - was the bountiful number of buds.  The bush is laden with buds too many to count.  That means flower after flower after flower, for days and days.  That means that as we begin to don our jackets and sweaters, we are promised the gifts of blooms and blooms.  I love that!

I spent the rest of my walk considering the gifts of possibilities.  I wondered how many I pass by and don't notice.  I wondered how many times I see the picture right in front of my face but fail to notice and wonder about the possibilities hanging all around.

What other possibilities are out there?  Are you missing any?

List 28 . . . Ten Reasons We Should All Be Square Dancing on a Regular Basis

Yep, you read that correctly.  I bet that's a post title you were not expecting, but I'm a fan.

Each summer when my family is at KANUGA we have a ball at the square dance.  After this summer's soirée, I've decided that I must set myself about figuring out a way to square dance more than once a year.  I'm going to require that of my life.  I'm not sure if I'll have to travel for this event or if I'll have to get schooled in square dance calling; but, alas, I need more square dancing in our lives.  You do, too.

I wish you could all learn to square dance from Uncle Ted White of THE WHITEWATER BLUEGRASS BAND.  They're fabulous musicians, and Uncle Ted can magically teach the dance to a couple hundred people, give the history and folklore behind it and actually have folks from 2 to 102 dancing at the same time.  He does all of that without ever raising his voice - it's a miracle.

Here are the ten reasons that we should all be square dancing on a regular basis:

1. Square dancing makes you smile, and that is always a good thing.
2. It works up a sweat; but it's okay, because everyone else is sweating, too.  No one is glistening.  
3. People who are square dancing together make eye contact.  Do we do that enough in everyday life?
4. When you are busy learning and participating in square dancing, you are RIGHT THERE,  in the moment.  There is no place for worrying or fretting.
5. Everybody can do it.  It doesn't matter how talented you are or how old you are or what language you speak.
6. Square dancing is a fun way to teach our children about days long gone.  In a dance, we are actually doing what our ancestors did, and even doing it to the same song!
7. Square dancing throws us out of our comfort zones, and that's when the good stuff happens in life.
8. At a square dance, every single person in the room touches every other person in the room . . . and they smile at each other!  
9. You don't sit in a chair, staring at a lecturer, to learn a new square dance.  You learn on the job.
10. Square dancing involves lots of hand-holding.  You might be connecting with your grandmother or a new friend or your soul-mate . . . but, rest assured, you'll have someone's hand to hold.  

Come on, friends DO SI DO . . . it's good for us all.

Watch out - Bipedalism is rampant . . . a vocabulary lesson.

George Willis Dean was my grandfather, my Papa, my mother's father.   I could probably publish an entire blog around only him.  There are many, many stories.  He was a huge presence to me, a big man who took up the whole room.  Funny how our feelings and perspectives shape what we actually see, I thought until I was about thirty that he was physically large.  It wasn't until a friend referred to Papa as a "cute little man" that I saw that he was actually rather small.  I remember that as one of the first times I realized how much what we 'feel' shapes what we 'see.'

Papa was incredibly intelligent, intensely loyal and wisely witty, though sometimes I'm not sure he meant to be.  I can remember whole conversations with him, conversations from when I was nine or ten and conversations from when I was a teenager and young adult.  I can remember his advice, I can actually hear him going on and on about his fear that all he believed in was free falling straight to the dogs - just about everything.

He fervently worked to preserve history, his past and others, he recited poetry that he had first memorized in his boyhood, he lamented that schools no longer taught penmanship, and I live in thanksgiving that he didn't live to see the world's relationships with social networks.  There would not have been enough thirty minute talks after Wheel of Fortune in his den in Douglas, Georgia to even begin to try to explain all of that!  He wouldn't understand.  He'd be sad.  I would agree with much of his anger and be a little unsettled about some of it.  That's how I was with so many things about Papa.

I think about him often, hear his voice, imagine what he'd say about my kids.  Lots of times when he comes to mind, I remember laughing.  He told great stories and we laughed a lot.  He could make us all feel like we were actually growing up in 1920 in Uvalda, Georgia!  He told stories about school, about his siblings and crazy tales of adventures from a time when things were a little different.  I loved those stories.

As I'm sure you understand at this point, Papa wasn't one who would be described as open-minded.  He knew what he knew, he thought what he thought, and he was solid in that.  He saw no need to change any of that and felt like the world and all of us in it were doing what we could to destroy what he loved best.  He shuttered about things that didn't bother me, he argued about politics with my mother, and he grunted through most of the CBS Nightly News.  


I laughed this morning, thinking about a time that my uncle really got him - a time Papa's wisdom didn't win out over his feelings about the world going to 'you know where' in a handbasket!  This is a good one, and I wish I had thought of it!  

My uncle, Papa's son, got up from the dining room table where we used to eat every meal, and walked over to look out the window.  He worked up his most disgusted voice, glanced off to the side of the yard, sighed and said, "Goodness, look at those bipedals walking down the road."

"Pathetic" Papa replied, "What is this world coming to?  Ayyyy me, me."  (Ayyyyy me, me was one of Papa's favorite phrases and he explained years ago that it meant that things just weren't good.)

Ha!  The laughs were grand and loud when my uncle explained that "bipedals" were beings who walked upright on two hind legs.  I can see his face now!

View a few precious bipedals and have a great day.