Let me look at you 2020

We live in a world of contrasts, moving between shadows, in an unknown dance between light and dark, forming unseen patterns of intentions and inattentions.

For we cannot exist, only in the light, or only in the dark; the dance is constant, the patterns permanent, a combination of light and dark.

I think of times, of memories of goodness, and kindness, and humanity, and sometimes, they feel oddly heavy, for they are shrouded in a dark veil of events, exceedingly sad.

For even the most magical of tweezers cannot pluck away, only the good, the shiny, the golden, leaving to dust and decrepit, the unhappy, the wretched.

For in our life of contrasts, lie intertwined bonds, of happy and sad, of light and dark, they are but conjoined twins, they can never be only one.  

Let me look at you, 2020. You have been all that - with shadows scary, and hopes light and airy, I know I cannot remember one, whilst turning my back to the dark.

The yin and the yang of our existence, even when it frustrates, brings optimism and comfort; for even in the darkest times, there must come the light.

 ***

A year such as the one we have just had, begged for a pause and a little contemplation. I decided to jot down a few reflections that had flickered through my mind several times this year. Words flowed so swiftly, my typing could barely match their speed, as they hurtled through, in whatever quasi-poetry form they wished to ooze out in. 

Many many more thoughts remain whirling in my head about this incomparable year we have just had. As I am sure, they are swirling in yours. Truly, let me look at you, 2020!

  ***

 Ouroboros

This word, this haunting image, spirals through my mind all year. The tireless Ouroboros, the serpentine symbol of destruction and rebirth, the snake eating its own tail, destroying, recreating, reinventing.

The serpent is vicious, it destroys in haste. Pandemic, forest fires, lives on ventilators, burnout, lost jobs, businesses shuttered down, loneliness, deserted streets.

Yet, in its spiral, it remains a symbol of eternity and infinity and return. Of spirit, and survival and rebirth. Always returning, never stopping, never giving up.  

Let me look at you 2020, whilst terrifying and destroying, and bringing us to our knees, with humility and humanity, you bring strength, and faith to recreate, to reinvent, to not succumb and become dust.  

And even the thoughts of a menacing snake, cannot take away the circular of the ouroboros, of life, of continuity, of eternity, and a reminder, that we lay in a circle, this circle. Of destruction and rebirth.

  

Happy New Year!  

Okra and other scary monsters

 I rarely cook okra. There is a reason. However, reason at times, evades the mind.

I pick a bunch of ladies’ fingers or lady’s fingers (not sure which), as it is known in Indian English, from the grocery store. I wonder why I dread it so much. After all, I no longer gag while eating it. Ahem… if in a sentence, the word “gag”is strung so close to the vegetable… Enuff said, you say?

The day I decide to cook it, I must first tear myself away from my book – a retelling of Greek mythological events from the female mythical character’s viewpoint. As I cut the vegetable into neat, uniform, green circles, my thoughts remain immersed in the world of Gods and demons -murderous Medea, mystical Circe, enchantments and miracles, hexes and curses. I decide the vegetable name would fit well within Greek mythology - both the Marathi name, bhendi, and the English name, okra. Would it be a God, demon, nymph, monster, demi-god…my mind trails… I decide to move away from Greek allusions, but the spectacle in the pan before me tells me otherwise…

Just as in my book, the nymph Scylla is transformed into a scary monster, the crisp and clean green rings seem to mutate right before my eyes. Silky skeins emerge from their sides. Soon the skeins are ropes and they wickedly entangle the other okra pieces that refuse to emit the slime. Soon the poor innocents are entangled in their slimy grip and the evil energy of the slime seems to grow – in power and force and brutality… it takes on a life of its own…

I imagine it swelling and swaying, growing and moving, outside of the pan… the spell is cast and there is no return. Its slimy strings grow into long lengthy arms, snake-like arms, engulfing me, swallowing me up in its goopy gulp, and then move on to devour the dog, the sofa, members of my family upstairs, and finally the house.

Agreed, quarantine has been long and the imagination seems to be on steroids, but again, trauma by okra is very real. And it deserves its space and ink.

As I stand there, staring at it mindlessly, waiting for it to swallow me, I muster a little courage, a little determination… and a little lemon juice. Stop, right there, Okra! I’ll kill your goop with acid, my valiant inner Greek goddess arises to vanquish the monster.  I return from the fridge, armed with lemons, some dried coconut, and of course, as per my husband’s request, ground roasted peanuts. I add it all in, stir nervously, attempt to break the goop, and leave it to cook uncovered. I turn my gaze away, too scared to make eye contact with the monsters growing in the pan.

Slowly the slime is contained, the monsters lose their long slimy arms, the spell is destroyed, the hex is broken. The slimy monsters in the pan, give up, dry up and the green cut rings emerge victorious.

This is not a victory I had imagined would be mine. I had conceded defeat, yet moved through the motions, not with any particular hope. Or faith. There really had been no huge determination – mostly some revulsion, and a slow stench of impending defeat. And even if I continued to move through the motions, with no particular hope for success, it came. Slowly. Unexpectedly.

I wonder how many times, and how many things I go through with the same energy. And the same lack of faith. In myself. And in doing so, how often do I make the monsters bigger and stronger, giving them more powers than they may truly possess?  Slimy, Spiderman-skills, snake-like arms, multiple ferocious heads, and others, that a robust imagination conjures.

Yes, okra (and all you other monsters) - you have your powers, and yet, I have mine. Even when they may seem muted and muffled, in the wake of your spellbinding histrionics, even if, I am the one who make them out to be so mesmerizing and massive.

Next time, I hope I can turn and glance at, and have a little faith, in my own quiet strength and power, rather than the hypnotic alluring of the monsters before me… in the pan or outside.

And now that my head wears the laurels… it knows it is wise to keep an eye on the inner strength, and most importantly, it knows now… how to tame the okra.  

Sometimes things die… sometimes things change…

Sometimes things die. Sometimes they become something else. Sometimes, we are in a place where we witness it. Sometimes, we must live through it...

What do we do? Hold on like crazy to the old, or to the thought of the old, hoping fervently it won’t change? Perhaps… Or clutch on to it in our mind? Tight. Really tight. Eyes tightly shut, mind tightly closed, refusing to believe that anything can be different from the idea of what we hold? Of how things are, and will continue to be? Always…

Or do we wake up and face the reality and take stock of the change?

Who doesn’t love the metamorphosis of the drab caterpillar, transforming miraculously into a brilliant, scintillating butterfly? But what when we must watch the brilliant, scintillating butterfly turn into a drab worm?

Perhaps, that is 2020 for us.

Loss. Yes, the sense of loss has been imminent since the start of the pandemic. In small ways, in big ways - every person has a different story. And holding its hand, is grief. From the small, simple everyday things we take for granted, to all those big, wonderful plans.

But alongside, there has been a slowing down, and a solidarity, and a simplifying, and a renewed sense of what truly matters, and an ability to awaken to pleasures in the small joys, the little things, the simple enjoyments. Yes, 2020 you have been a mixed bag. You have taken away so much, you have taught us so much. 

These thoughts run through my head as we drive through the “ghost towns” in Eastern Oregon. 

Abandoned, derelict, they stand in shambles. But even while the decrepit walls crumble, they hold inside them stories. A history of an old, possibly glorious past. A past filled with hope, and possibility, of dreams, of riches and gold…

Gold was found in Sumpter, Canyon city, Granite, among other places during the gold rush of the late-1800s, and add to that, the Oregon trail and pioneers. As a result, several of these towns were booming, but were abandoned, once their industries were no longer prosperous, or when they failed to be part of a wider transportation plan.

Images of the wild wild west come to mind, and I imagine these dusty towns filled with prospectors and pioneers, speculators and traders, gold-miners and saloon owners…  

According to historians, about 256 such towns in Oregon became ghost towns. And just as they arose from the dust, they were eventually to be left in the dust…

Once again, I think of change, around us, so constant… Sometimes, it’s quiet and subtle, sometimes, it laps up up in big waves.

We drive further south into other remote, uninhabited parts of Oregon, all the way to the Alvord desert, which is now a crumpled and dried, alkaline river-bed.  

I look at the cracked and parched ground of the Alvord desert. It is hard to believe that this was once a lake, supposedly 100 miles long and 200 feet deep. What became of it? Of its power and force and form and energy?

And while my mind tries to recreate images of nature and a time bygone, I stop myself. I come back to the now and I pause, for I cannot but help wonder…

This beautiful desert in front of me – is it the butterfly or is it the caterpillar?

 

I wrote this before Oregon got engulfed in forest fires and smoke. It didn’t feel right to post this once the fires started and amidst news of burned-down homes. But I did want to share it, for really, the piece is about ghost towns, and perhaps change, and perhaps some of the ghosts we hold inside us… of our past, of that which we can’t let go, even when it’s long gone… and a new reality that is always emerging and standing before us, even when the ghosts lurk in the back…

For that is what recent histories and stories do… they make us notice things, and feel things… around us and sometimes, in a short instance, ever so fleetingly, inside us…

Alvord Desert: The desert sky

Nature marvels. It leaves us in awe. At times, all we can do is resign in its vastness and accept humility. Accept that we are insignificant in the limitlessness of its being. That we are powerless in the energy it exerts. That we are ignorant in light of the mysteries it holds. 

Standing under the stars in a desert reminds me of exactly that. Staring at a sky filled so choc-a-bloc with stars, I wonder if they have room to move.

An RV trip takes us to the middle of the Alvord desert in the Southeast of Oregon. I had often looked at that corner of Oregon with curiosity and Covid seems like the perfect time to explore remote, uninhabited parts of Oregon in a rented RV. Gears move swiftly in motion once I discover that it is possible to camp smack in the middle of the dessert as it is BLM (Bureau of Land Management)-managed land.

Our RV stands in the middle of the desert, in the middle of nowhere, without another soul for miles. We stand on the parched alkaline desert ground, with the Steens mountains on one side, and infinity on the other. A river once flowed here, and what now remains, is a large playa basin encrusted with salt mineral fissures. Silence engulfs us as we stand on the crumpled looking dry lake bed, and the world seems to slow down, just a little bit.

After dinner, we plant our chairs under the silence and the sparkle of the desert sky. The moon however, is rather bright as it is only a few days short of a full moon. We see the Milky Way, we see several planets and constellations that we normally cannot. We watch the International space station make it round.  We don’t need a flashlight as the stars and especially the moon is so bright and the parched yellowish cracked ground reflects it all.

I wonder how the desert sky would be on a new moon night.

I wake up around 4 a.m. to use the bathroom and happen to glance outside the window to remind myself of my surreal surroundings and current location. My jaw drops. The sky is a cluster of twinkling Christmas lights, crammed with stars. I step outside. The moon is gone and the stars are all out to play – every single one of them. Yes. The moon has gone to bed and the stars are dancing. They dance with a natural mirth and an ease of being and a knowingness of their place and power – they know who they are and what they can be – and all I can feel is awe, and perhaps a twinge of envy.     

My husband and daughter are sound asleep. I decide to wake them out of their deep slumber. We step out of the RV. It is 4 am. We do not need a flashlight. The stars shine bright and the earth holds the light.   We stand there mesmerized by it all. 

My daughter quips, “this is like a planetarium”. It certainly is. The Milky Way stretches out and sparkles with authority. My husband uses an App on his phone to identify constellations, and planets and galaxies. Yes, entire galaxies – visible to the naked eye. We marvel at the Andromeda galaxy and the Triangulum galaxy right in front of us.

I wonder what lies in these nebulous zones twinkling before my eyes. If that is an entire galaxy I am staring at, just how insignificant is the earth, and just how insignificant am I? I am not even a dot on my planet, and my planet is not even a dot in this immenseness before my eyes.

I want to learn astronomy, I want to know more about these stars and planets and the others that inhabit them. Surely, it can’t just be the 7.5 billion of us in this limitlessness glowing before me.

Yes. The sky is majestic. Nature is majestic. I am humbled by its grandness, its beauty, its power, its continuity, its never-ending, its never-stopping, its sheer force.

And even when I stand mesmerized in its awe, even when I feel humbled and tiny, I know that I am a part of it. That I am a part of this grandness, in my own, teeny, tiny, absolutely insignificant way. And we all are. And that we get to be a part of something so magnificent and beautiful is a beautiful thing. 

    Our "campsite" for the night

    Sunset over the Steens Mountains

    Puppy in the moonlight

    Sunrise over the playa

    More sunrise...

    Blogger silhouette whilst clicking pictures of the mountain :) 

    Sadly I do not have any pics of the night sky - will have to learn that skill :) 

Sourdough stories… rising together… sweet brioche

The brioches swell in the oven. From their dumpy, round, little mounded beginnings, they rise to perfection and bask in their golden sheen.  

I look at them. They look back at me, stuck together, in a warm, radiant daze.  I long to be one of them. Warm and golden, in a cozy snuggle. United. Together. In harmony with each other. Rising together.

I wonder how it must feel to be one of them. To sit so snug and safe with those around them. To be surrounded by each other, warm in the embrace of those closest.

I look at them. They look back at me, light and airy, trembly even, but confident of their space, owning their place. Together, yet each is independent and free.

I wonder how it must feel to be one of them. To grow, to selfishly thrive, without chiding oneself for taking up too much space, too many resources, causing discomfort to others, especially those closest. Secure in the knowledge, that each one is capable and safe and will rise – upwards.  

My mind travels to my thoughts from a few hours earlier. I gingerly place each carefully rounded ball, which until seconds ago, was a mass of gnarly stickiness. I see as much tray as I see dough, and each ball has space and air around it. I wonder if that space will get filled in. Will they swell and use up all the space the tray has to offer, or will they remain alone and separate, keeping a safe distance, even if that may keep them somewhat shriveled.

In my happy little world of sourdough and warm ovens, flour and yeast, every bit of space in the pan is used up. The balls swell and rub their non-existent shoulders with each other in cozy friendliness. Yet, each doughy circle takes care of itself. It grows and rises, keeping faith that the others will do so too. They rise together. They rise upwards.

I share my brioche stories with friends on a zoom call. Quarantine makes the world shrink, it brings friends from different times and places together. Friends, who humor my strangeness of perspective and gift me their listening.  A friend shares a quote. I pay it forward, by sharing it here:

Our deepest fear is not that we are inadequate. Our deepest fear is that we are powerful beyond measure. It is our light not our darkness, that most frightens us. We ask ourselves, “Who am I to be brilliant, gorgeous, talented and fabulous?” Actually, who are you not to be? You are a child of God. Your playing small doesn’t serve the world. There is nothing enlightened about shrinking so that other people won’t feel insecure around you. We are all meant to shine…

~ Marianne Williamson

Yes, there just may be enough space in the pan… and in the world, for each of us. For each of us to rise. No one needs to be punched down for the other to thrive. No one needs to rise faster and before the other – especially if we are headed to the same place – our journey may be easier if we support each other and rise together.

Everything that we see, everything that we experience, is painted in large strokes of perspectives of our life and our times, and events around us. That even when I peer in the oven, to watch the brioches bake, these are the things that travel my mind. And that my sweet brioches seem to be infused with so much that our world seems to want and our lives seem to crave…

We are the stories we hear…

The evidence of an interesting childhood follows us well into adulthood. Yes, the childhood scars on my knees, shins, elbows, wrists, forehead and other random places all bear witness to that active childhood. Slowly, the scars seem to fade away with age. And with it, memories of events of how each one came to be… 

I have stitches on my chin. From two separate incidents, if I remember right. One has something to do with falling off of a guava tree (I hope that guava was super sweet), but it’s the other one that I remember clearly. I am about six years old, standing on a swing, and swinging away, when I see my parents and decide to wave. I know…I know… always the smart one….

I fall on the gravel, straight on my chin. Miraculously, none of my limbs are broken, but I am in a pool of blood. My father picks me in his arms and rushes to the street outside the park, where an autorickshaw driver is standing by a street food cart, and eating something yummy.

When asked, if he is available, he shakes his head to say no, without looking up. But when he catches a glance of a blood-soaked me, without another word, scrunches his snack in a paper, leaps into the rickshaw, and pulls to start it. We are already inside the humming vehicle.

I have no memory of the hospital or doctors or ensuing procedures. What I remember, very distinctly, is my father narrating the kindness of this rickshawala. Several times. To several people. I remember his joy and gratitude (and possibly relief), as he narrates the story.  

Yes, we are the stories we hear. Although I do remember plenty from when I was as young as three, the “clearest” are those that I have heard narrated, either then, or later.

Some are fun, some make me shake my head. And of course, there are always the silly embarrassing ones, that I continue to hear even today… as do all of you, I’m sure.

You don’t remember her? She lives in Mumbai – you broke that big vase in her house, remember?

Great. Now I do. Very well. Thanks Mom.

Funny thing though, is that I’m still not sure I remember her. I remember mostly the proceedings of that day, after I break the vase… ahem…

Yes, our memories of events of our childhood are often a mélange of our own scattered memories as well as the events as recounted by the adults around us, colored by their impressions of those events.

And that brings me to now. To our bizarre and unusual today, where we have all been cast in a strange sci-fi film with an ending that is yet to be determined. 

In the future, how we remember the events of Covid19 will be different from how our children remember the events. But along with their own impressions, they will also carry our impressions that will be etched in their memories. That puts us as parents in an odd, subconscious place of power.
It asks for us to ground ourselves and see the world with its bad, as well as its good. To notice the kindness, the courage, the generosity that is prevalent, as much as is the panic.

Who will we be? And how will that affect how our kids remember the events of this pandemic?

I have been asked about the scar on my chin often. Each time, the guava tree story somehow fades in the background, and I mostly mention the swing incident. And each time, I remember the rickshaw driver who took one glance at me, covered in blood, scrunched his food in paper, jumped into the rickshaw and beckoned us in. It was an awful fall and I was probably in a lot of pain, but years later, what I remember is the riskshawala’s kindness… and that may be a gift my father left me…

What is your thing of beauty?

This thing of beauty I speak of, may be the most difficult thing I’ve ever tried to explain. I fear I may not get far, and my words may remain a spin of a thought, a whir of words… and confusion. But if I get across, it may be a thing of beauty, in itself.

It is that intrinsic thing inside of us. Inside each of us, completely unique to us. It’s what makes us strong, it’s what makes us flawed.

It’s that strange, intangible, incomprehensible thing that makes us who we are - it results in good, in keeping our state of grace, in rising to occasions; it causes us to shirk responsibilities, cause unhappiness to others, in failing to do what the world wants us to - it results in happiness, it results in frustration… the scenarios are many…

This thing of beauty may be unknown to us. Others may see it but often we may not. Even when it is the very force with which we may live our life.

It may be a superpower, it may be a flaw, it may be different things at different times, on different days...

To know it would be strength, to understand it, sheer magic. Even when it is easy to see it in others when we try... finding our own, may be elusive and slippery.

And even if we never come face to face with our own thing of beauty, it will always be that pivotal, unequivocal piece that makes us, us.

My words seem to move around in circles. Nothing concrete is being said - no examples to demonstrate. I am a storyteller who stops short of narrating the stories...

But in my head, are stories... stories lived and heard that exemplify the thing of beauty of its characters - a silvery gossamer thread – sometimes shining through the darkest of their flaws.

In my head, is a book of short stories and in each of these stories, are characters, who, even in the most trying of times and in the most flawed of states, retain their thing of beauty. Sometimes that thing of beauty is their undoing. The thing of beauty is often the reason for sadness and misfortune and unhappiness. Yet it rides and soars with a power. Either to the stars, or down to a deep earthly abyss.

Stories that I write with my heart - when I can’t sleep at night, or in a clear moment in the shower or whilst in the midst of something “important” when I should be paying more attention to the matter at hand, rather than listening to the stories in my head...

Stories written by my heart that may only stay there... Stories that may never touch paper…

I share this with you not to bring to light, the fact that there is yet another book of stories inside me that I may never have the will or energy to write...

I share the idea because these are strange times and we may need to search a little to find our silvery gossamer threads… our thing of beauty…

We may also need to be generous and notice the silvery gossamer somethings of those around us - those who we may be confined with...

For reveling in that beauty, we rise, and become human… and even in our most flawed actions, we retain the beauty…

And when we do... even if I may not have written a single page of that book, with our stories, we may be a compilation of my unwritten book...

 

Australia

A fire burns within

it can hold it in no more

It explodes with a fury

Of a pain it can hold no more

 

Of a pain it can hold no more

Of an injustice it can bear no more

Of hurts it can silently watch no more

Seeking revenge for fish at its core

 

Seeking revenge for fish at its core

Swimming with plastic in their guts

In its large forgiving embrace

It cannot hold us anymore

 

It cannot hold us anymore

As we turn the other way

As icy glaciers melt

And temperatures soar each day  

 

Will we be tormentor or protector

Seeking change through our actions

Or climate change denier

Helpless at hands of politicians

 

Nature is bigger than us

And needs to stay bigger than us

That’s the only way for it to be

For us to live in harmony


 

Reflections from a decade…

A decade is a long time… 10 years, 3650 days, 87,6000 hours to be precise… Why then does it seem to fly by in the blink of the eye? Why then does it seem to drag like eternity?

The start of last decade seems like yesterday; the start of the decade seems like eons ago.

It must be the progression… the single days, the hours and minutes connected to one another like a long necklace of beads, connecting us to our past, keeping us connected, even when we cannot always recognize the person at the other end of the chain.

I look at the person I was at the start of the decade. Waif-like, 78 pounds, with a chronic illness I was determined to shake off. Mother to an energetic four-year old, my energy was lacking, but my will-power was immense. With every effort at healing that failed, my determination only grew sturdier.

Staying strong for a long time is an unnatural way to be. It’s like a body builder walking around constantly with flexed muscles. The strength takes away the flexibility, softness and vulnerability, making it hard to return to. What will my starting point or resting point be the next decade? What will be the place I return to naturally? A strong, if even tough me? Or an open, if even vulnerable me?

There is an animal called as ushghur, a porcupine
If you hit it with a stick, it extends its quills
And gets bigger. The soul is a porcupine,
Made stronger by stick-beating

~ Rumi – Checkmate

A decade later, I no longer try to shake of illnesses. I still don’t like them and a new diagnosis puts a knot in my stomach, but I learn to live with it. Acceptance is a good thing, a wise thing they say, but does it take away optimism?

Yes. There is wisdom in acceptance and that can only lead to peace. But for this precious prize, is there a certain withering away of optimism, and zest, and a light and bright, sunny naivete? Are there losses we make for the sake of wisdom? Or is it simply a function of being ten years older?

Stripped of causes and plans
and things to strive for,
I have discovered everything
I could need or ask for
is right here—
in flawed abundance.
…
There is nothing to do
and nowhere to go.
Accepting this,
we can do everything
and go anywhere.

~ Mark Nepo - Accepting this

The decade has been harrowing, the decade has been fabulous. With lows so deep, and near-death experiences, I ought to be grateful for every day I have here…  

And I am. And yet I forget. And I get caught up in life’s worthless trivialities that won’t matter zit in the end.

I have been privileged. I have never lacked for medical and other resources. My husband and daughter have been there waiting to have fun with me, whenever I have had the juice to. My parents and in-laws have spent time with me and my young child, health professionals, alternate therapists, my naturopath, my family and friends, have all rooted for me.

Yet, I have felt terribly lonely. For no one could possibly understand what I was going through. For I wanted to protect others of what I was going through. Yet, I now realize I never was, not for a moment, alone. In hindsight, perhaps some of the decisions we made, may have caused pain and aching, rather than healing. But I was never alone. Even when I tried to shut others out. And I am humble and grateful for that.  

Friendship is a mirror to presence and a testament to forgiveness. Friendship not only helps us see ourselves through another’s eyes, but can be sustained over the years only with someone who has repeatedly forgiven us for our trespasses as we must find it in ourselves to forgive them in turn.

A friend knows our difficulties and shadows and remains in sight, a companion to our vulnerabilities more than our triumphs, when we are under the strange illusion we do not need them.

~ David Whyte - Friendship

Being at the bottom, has made me realize that very few things in life truly matter. Being at the bottom has thrown light on things that I simply do not want in my life. Being at the bottom has made me question the many things that I have senselessly supported, the many boundaries that I have not dared to put in place. I wish I could say that having figured it all out, I am now ready to lead a blissful existence. Far from it, I have scratched the surface of a wound that they told me not to. Yikes. The goop is oozing out… Oh well... There needs to be a project for the next decade, right?

When we are young, we have images in our head of how our life is going to look like, expectations even, of ourselves and others. Sometimes, it turns out to be very different from what we anticipated. But does that mean it lacks in beauty? Will that depend on which lens will we use to view it? The lens of our anticipated expectations. Or that of our current reality for what it may be.

Bring it on 2020 and the decade ahead… I will give you my best shot.
And when I can’t, I will simply kick up feet, and turn on the TV, and eat junk food, or nap… or perhaps make more healthful choices.
For acceptance has taught me, that there will always be tomorrow to get back on your feet.

Reflecting back on a decade is a scary and beautiful thing. It shines light on the glorious iridescent parts as well as the deep dark shadows of not too long ago… And these reflections result in some hazy and some crystal-clear realizations. And perhaps these realizations will be a guide to how I wish to live the next decade, or 10 years, 3650 days, 87,6000 hours to be precise…  

Happy New Year and Decade everyone!