Taking A Walk #14
Still walking with Ross Gay
Early this year, I took writing class with
. We wrote a weekly short essay inspired by ’s Book of Delights. We were encouraged to find and write about a delight every day, as Gay had done in writing his book.I have learned a few things while finding and writing about delight. I am reminded of the time in my past when I have kept gratitude lists. I am grounded in the importance of breath and presence. My paying attention muscles, my hope bones, my vision horizon, my imagination machination all work together to make finding delight happen like breath, when I let it.
The month of June I am walking through a few delights I have noticed and remembered this year.
I'm on my way to start a new life
My search for steel and delight
It is January of what I have declared "CLEAN SLATE '98!" I am 27. I quit my dream job — teaching high school Drama — after failing "to work smarter, not harder" and setting the stage on fire during a performance of a stage adaptation of Ovid's Metamorphosis. (There is a longer story about lights too close to an old fire-retardant curtain, Juno's final speech, and a gym teacher who lost his mind, but I digress.)
Batman and My Foot Surgeon's Shoes
Thoughts on having the power we seek
Today, I am admiring the fancy leather shoes on my foot surgeon's feet. Fancy leather shoes are a delight. If I was smarter about shoes I would probably know if they are Armani, Dolce & Gabbana, or Prada. I try not to stare at them during my appointment. They are a comforting brown like milk chocolate, elegantly soft like the bathrobe at the Michelin-rated hotel we stayed at in Dublin this summer, the one with High Tea and a breathtaking art collection. His Batman socks — revealed when he leans back to answer my questions after having leaned forward and listened intently to my situation — soothe my frazzled-surgery-anticipating-anxious nerves.
The Delight of Golden Joinery
To our brokenness and our beauty
My childhood bedroom walls were adorned with beautiful china plates carefully curated by the women in my family — my mother, grandmother, and great-grandmother. Kittens, butterflies, and flowers, mainly, watched over my comings and goings well into my adulthood. Gradually, several broke during moves and time and my need to keep them with me as I grew up. In their gifting and their breaking, they are a delight. In their gifting and their breaking, they tell a story. They tell the story of profound love and growth. They tell a story of cherish and change. They tell a story of beauty and brokenness. The plates have been beside me my entire life. They are beside me today on my office bookshelf.