Wow! I changed the calendar month, and the temperature dropped 20 degrees! Today when I woke up the sky was crystal blue, puff clouds floating along, and my first thought was appreciation of a beautiful morning. Then I realized, baby it is cold outside! Hot tea this morning, but not on the porch, inside at the dining room table listening to NPR Morning Edition. I put my National Park Service fleece on and for the fourth day in a row this week I walked to the library for the monthly volunteer meeting.
It is so comforting that there are these things that happen regularly and that I do - 1st Friday at 9 a.m. the library volunteer meeting!
Then off to the Katahdin Woods and Water Millinocket contact service station - aka the Millinocket visitors office! That is why I have my NPS fleece on, ready for my Volunteers in the Park (VIP) shift! Today is a very slow day at the office, but I get a little time to visit with Lynn from the Park service. Lynn is on "detail" at KWW and she will be leaving next week and going back to her regular job, I will miss her, and we already have a plan for us to visit each other!
While the visitors office was slow I had brought other "work" to do. I am working with others at the library on a regional volunteer program, and we are just getting started, it is good work, and after each meeting or conversation I have a spring in my step and increased energy as we move forward. These are all good things. I each day get to experience the benefits and goodness of volunteering. I know I am doing something that the community needs, and I am for sure getting so much back from what I do. I am in this "frontier" place, out in the woods, and there are so many political and institutional threats to our democracy that happen almost every moment of the day. I am trying to find my way on how I can honor my community in a way that respects diversity, that believes that everyone can contribute and that we all have value. Tricky business. Long held beliefs and biases. Fear and judgement. All here everyday, and I get to practice how to touch each person that I encounter in my days.
All of this is swirling within me, and most of all I am aware of how much I love the changing of the seasons. The eagerness and awareness that in a few days it will be warm again. The sun is beautiful and the angle of the sun makes painters flock to our part of the world. There is an incredible night sky which is coming earlier and earlier. We have (along with Northern Minnesota) one of the biggest "dark skies" east of the Mississippi. I am present here; with the weather, with my tasks, in my home.
And now I have just finished my Friday night ritual of News Hour. I have heard David Brooks and Mark Shields. I shed tears as I listened to a husband rely his story of his journey with his wife and her mental illness. And NOW it is time for the LYNX game. I am tuning in, yelling loudly and hoping for a big win home in St. Paul as I cheer the team on from my perch in Millinocket Maine!
It is so comforting that there are these things that happen regularly and that I do - 1st Friday at 9 a.m. the library volunteer meeting!
Then off to the Katahdin Woods and Water Millinocket contact service station - aka the Millinocket visitors office! That is why I have my NPS fleece on, ready for my Volunteers in the Park (VIP) shift! Today is a very slow day at the office, but I get a little time to visit with Lynn from the Park service. Lynn is on "detail" at KWW and she will be leaving next week and going back to her regular job, I will miss her, and we already have a plan for us to visit each other!
While the visitors office was slow I had brought other "work" to do. I am working with others at the library on a regional volunteer program, and we are just getting started, it is good work, and after each meeting or conversation I have a spring in my step and increased energy as we move forward. These are all good things. I each day get to experience the benefits and goodness of volunteering. I know I am doing something that the community needs, and I am for sure getting so much back from what I do. I am in this "frontier" place, out in the woods, and there are so many political and institutional threats to our democracy that happen almost every moment of the day. I am trying to find my way on how I can honor my community in a way that respects diversity, that believes that everyone can contribute and that we all have value. Tricky business. Long held beliefs and biases. Fear and judgement. All here everyday, and I get to practice how to touch each person that I encounter in my days.
All of this is swirling within me, and most of all I am aware of how much I love the changing of the seasons. The eagerness and awareness that in a few days it will be warm again. The sun is beautiful and the angle of the sun makes painters flock to our part of the world. There is an incredible night sky which is coming earlier and earlier. We have (along with Northern Minnesota) one of the biggest "dark skies" east of the Mississippi. I am present here; with the weather, with my tasks, in my home.
And now I have just finished my Friday night ritual of News Hour. I have heard David Brooks and Mark Shields. I shed tears as I listened to a husband rely his story of his journey with his wife and her mental illness. And NOW it is time for the LYNX game. I am tuning in, yelling loudly and hoping for a big win home in St. Paul as I cheer the team on from my perch in Millinocket Maine!
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