Tag Archives: acceptance

Apr30

oubaitori.

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none of the flowering fruit trees in the ancient idiom 

are in this photo

 but some of my native plants are doing as they please

blooming and flourishing at their own rate

 

 “Oubaitori” comes from the kanji,  (Japanese characters), that symbolize four flowering trees: cherry blossom, plum, peach, and apricot. It’s an ancient idiom meaning that people, like the flowers on those trees, bloom and flourish at their own rate and in their own way. The overall takeaway: Don’t compare yourself to others, instead, celebrating your inherent uniqueness.

I’m on it.

 

Jun3

roll with it.

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pete the cat is our loyal sentinel who patiently keeps watch

welcoming in the new day.

 

 

—

‘each new day has a different shape to it. you just roll with it.’

-ben zobrist, american formerl MLB player

Jun14

abstract mess.

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 getting ready in the morning

i made a quick decision

to throw one light piece of laundry

down the stairs

rather than carry the extra three ounces

down seven stairs to my washing machine

tucked away in a little closet

such a brilliantly lazy choice

i instantly realized my mistake

when it caught on a piece of art

hanging along the stairway

ripping it off the wall

sending it reeling

into another wall

creating a divot

the art tile on the wood

cracking in two

the nail lost deep in the carpeting

went down the seven stairs

now easy

with three ounces less

than i would have had to carry

stepping over it all

walked into my kitchen

flipping on the light

 which answered me with a sudden ‘pop!’

a lightbulb had chosen that moment to blow out

i took in the spectacle of it all

sat down with a cup of coffee, a piece of chocolate, and a bit of music

another day had begun.

—

‘i think you have to let go of this idea that you can be precious about everything,

and let it be the abstract mess that it is.’

-ryan reynolds

Feb1

best way.

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“the best way to get along with people is not to expect them to be like you.”

-joyce meyer

 

 

—

art credit- L Józef Wilkoń – Leopanter

Jan5

time runs out.

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“It is easy to mourn the lives we aren’t living. Easy to wish we’d developed other talents, said yes to different offers. Easy to wish we’d worked harder, loved better, handled our finances more astutely, been more popular, stayed in the band, gone to Australia, said yes to the coffee or done more bloody yoga.

It takes no effort to miss the friends we didn’t make and the work we didn’t do the people we didn’t do and the people we didn’t marry and the children we didn’t have. It is not difficult to see yourself through the lens of other people, and to wish you were all the different kaleidoscopic versions of you they wanted you to be. It is easy to regret, and keep regretting, ad infinitum, until our time runs out.

But it is not lives we regret not living that are the real problem. It is the regret itself. It’s the regret that makes us shrivel and wither and feel like our own and other people’s worst enemy.

We can’t tell if any of those other versions would have been better or worse. Those lives are happening, it is true, but you are happening as well, and that is the happening we have to focus on.”

—

in memoriam of r.s. – you will be greatly missed and thanks for the music

—

credits:

text: Matt Haig – The Midnight Library, 2020.

art: Grant Haffner – Into the night, 1978

Oct27

like books.

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“we are like books.

most people see only our cover,

the minority read only the introduction,

many people believe the critics.

few will know the content.”

-emile zola

 

 

 

—

image credit: newton free library

 

Sep15

a really big family.

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“i have a really big family.”

 

—

“families don’t have to match. you don’t have to look like someone to love them.”

-leigh anne tuohy

Aug15

mistaken orders.

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the restaurant of mistaken orders employs waitstaff with dementia

and you can never be exactly sure what you will be getting.

below is a statement from the restaurant to potential patrons and to the world.

—

you may think it’s crazy,

a restaurant that can’t even get your order right,

all of our servers are people living with dementia,

they may, or may not, get your order right.

however, rest assured,

that even if your order is mistaken

everything on our menu is delicious and one of a kind.

this we guarantee.

“it’s okay if my order was wrong, it tastes so good anyway.”

we hope this feeling of openness and understanding

will spread across japan, and through the world.

—

We ask for your continued support of The Restaurant of Mistaken Orders in Tokyo, Japan.

Our mission is to spread dementia awareness and to make society a little bit more open-minded and relaxed.

 

—

“gratitude is when memory is stored in the heart and not in the mind.”

-lionel hampton

 

—

source credits: https://www.japan.go.jp/tomodachi/2019/winter2019/restaurant_of_mistaken_orders.html

   the government of japan

 

Aug12

so what.

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“sometimes people let the same problem make them miserable for years

when they could just say, so what.

that’s one of my favorite things to say. so what.”

-andy warhol

Aug8

pride.

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ann arbor pride fest 2023

—

so happy to live in a city that takes pride in all people and celebrates everyone. 

—

“festivals promote diversity, they bring neighbors into dialogue, they increase creativity,

they offer opportunities for civic pride, they improve our general psychological well-being.

in short, they make cities better places to live.”

-david binder