MaryAlice Musings and More

  I love the vistas that I get to enjoy every day.  Somewhere, and I do think it was in one of the car trips from Minnesota to Maine, I began to be more aware of what happened to me when I came upon an amazing vista.  What I experience when I drove around a curve and world opened up.   As my eyes took in the expansiveness it seemed that my heart opened up as well.  Those opening up, vista moments happened again and again.   My heart experienced great exercises in being big and wide open.   I knew throughout the time that my heart felt closed and needed to be protected that I would not lose that big wide open capacity. I held it with me inside my little home. I live in the town center of Patten,  I do not have an expansive vista from my house.  I have trees and in the winter there is more opening up of the big sky and the horizons beyond.  This "nestling in space" also soothes and comforts my heart.  It is the other of my expand...

Joy and Sense of Belonging It has been a long time, almost 18 months and  people have stopped asking when I would resume my blog.  I had no answer.  My emotions were frayed, my hope was diminishing, I felt unmoored.  There were times when a moment, an interaction, something I saw felt like the kind of story that I would muse about in this blog. I could not find a way to bring that moment back.   Slowly, slowly something has shifted.  The hardness that had been erected (or maybe just took root from an unconscious neglect) around my heart has softened.  The isolation that the pandemic tapped, but was not fully responsible for, has lessened, actually it has just gone away.   Once again, I can hold these musings.  Actually, they have been held.  The stories have been there, waiting.  Patiently waiting for me to pick them up and to share them with you.   This is what I learned and relearned about my musings: They are ...

  One year ago I was trying to sort out what was I going to do.  I had started my trip west and south at the beginning of the month.  Once again I was traveling across the country on a train. Boston to Chicago, Chicago to Winslow.  A couple of days in Chicago were the last time that I saw a play live (Goodman Theater) and the last time I heard live music (Jazz Club near north side).   Myah had just arrived back in Minnesota from Spain, just squeaking through before a total lockdown.   I was not supposed to fly back until Mid May. The conversations that we had with my friends were ones I never had before.  I remember asking out loud if I should just "stick it out here".  Cindy would be moving to her new home and I could help.  Karen and Jen were there and the Desert Oasis was another place where I would be welcomed.   We scoured the internet,  reached out to folks that I worked with in the beginning of the AIDS epidemi...

  Hug | Definition of Hug at Dictionary.com www.dictionary.com › browse › hug verb (used with object), hugged , hug ·ging. · to clasp tightly in the arms, especially with affection; embrace. · to cling firmly or fondly to; cherish: to hug an opinion. · to  ...     Within a month of moving to Patten, one of the pieces of information that had floated around in this very tiny town about me was, "she's a hugger".  And even in this cross of frontier and new england, I got some good hugging right back to me.   I think that as the years have gone by since my retirement, four years now, I have allowed myself to more of my unrestrained hugging self.  Hugs are great, and hugs do come into gradients of enjoyment: "too much", "too little" or "just right".   A just right hug, ummmm, I can feel it as I type.    Just to be clear, I am not talking about bad, inappropriate, abusive touching.  That is not a hug, ans as a child and growing girl I en...

  Well March 2, 2021 can go down in the memory book.  There is wind up here on ridge, and there have been big winds since I moved into my house in Patten, but yesterday topped them all. After an almost balmy start to the month, the arctic blast happened,  the winds blew, and I mean they blew hard and long.  I heard house and outside noises that I have never heard before.   The wind chill was -20+ something.  I was concerned about being able to attend my second session of Decolonizing in Conservation Communities by the Wabanaki Reach Program Tuesday morning.  Even though the winds were roaring and the temperature was continuing to drop we all got online, almost 50 of us zooming from 9 to Noon.   We spent most of yesterday talking and sharing about white privilege, micro agression and thinking about ways that conservation efforts of today follow a colonization history.   It is hard to sit in how the color of my skin has never rea...

  More snow today, like another 6+ inches.  Wet, heavy snow.  Good snow family making snow.  The temperature hovering just above/below freezing. It was mostly above and there may have been a little bit of freezing sleet, but it was mostly snow.  At times the snow was so heavy and the flakes so big I felt like I was inside the snow globe and the outside had all the snow!  This is all going to change,  with each hour for the rest of today and throughout the night the temperature is going to drop.  The winds are going to start to blow. By 9:00 a.m. tomorrow morning the wind chill is supposed to be -20 degrees.  Yep, -20 degrees.  The good news is this arctic blast is short lived. I do not have to leave my house until Thursday morning when I drive to Lincoln to get my second vaccine dose.  I went to the post office and the grocery today.   I am ready to once again be hunkered down.  The good news about the temperature dro...

 I have had the most pleasurable day,  it was one of those days that I could just find and go with my own rhythms.  I woke up early with sun streaming onto my bedroom window.  After a few moments watching the sunbeams I fell back to sleep.    I like that "fall back asleep" morning time.  I woke up and the sun was even brighter.  I came downstairs, made a pot of tea, listened to NPR and looked through the NY Times.  I decided to make my favorite winter porridge, wild rice, dried fruits and nuts, with a little maple syrup and whatever kind of milk you like.  This is my bowl of fruit and nuts that I will put in with the cooked wild rice.  This winter I have found a very easy way to cook my wild rice.  I put in even more water than you need,  cook the rice for about 45 minutes and drain off the excess water.  No measuring, no fuss and wonderful wild rice   I did not take a picture of my finished bowl, but it was...