A Prayer

God, help me not to focus on what I've lost, but on what remains.

Happiness

Happiness is like a butterfly which,
when pursued, is always beyond
our grasp, but, if you will sit down
quietly, may alight upon you.

-Nathaniel Hawthorne

Peace

Peace does not
come from
knowing how you'll find
the answer,
or where to look for it,
or when it will come,
or what it will be.
Peace comes from
simply knowing
you will find
the answer.

Experience

"Experience: that most brutal of teachers. But you learn, my God do you learn."

CS Lewis

More Pics

Another picture of the Capital Building. It really is a beautiful structure.



This is Scott's favorite beer. It's another "leave it to a place like Wisconsin". In this case, leave it to a place like Wisconsin to have a beer called Spotted Cow. The same brewery, New Glarus, makes a beer I love. It's a Belgian red that's served in a wine glass. I have a bottle in my refrigerator, but is feels like a treasure so I'm saving it. For what? I don't know.




Ah, the house I love and miss so much in Columbus.

For She Who is Being Tried

What does she know who has not been tried?

The woman who has traveled lonely paths,

knows how to find her way.

She who has weathered losses

gains compassion.

Tested, she multiplies her resourcefulness.

She who has not been tried, what does she know?

She who has been surprised

abounds with vigilance.

Betrayed, she recognizes what is true.

Scarred, she finds her resilience.

Her illusions gone, she deepens.

O woman, you follow a spiral,

rounding and revisiting.

The furrow you plow

is your own life. Reach deep within

the soil you have loosened.

Draw forth its richness.

Be strengthened by the grace of your experience.

~mj abell

A Few More Madison Pictures

This photo is my car in a parking lot next to a big pile of snow that had been plowed. (IMHO, this amount of snow is really unnecessary.)

The photo below is the view out of the window at my apartment. It's a large field/park area. There are some people who bring their dogs out religiously every day to run in the field. It's actually enjoyable to watch the dogs running and playing and loving the snow. It just makes me miss my dogs so much.

The two dogs in this picture come out every day with their owner. They love playing fetch in the snow. They run so fast with tails wagging the whole time.

First Posted Pics From Madison

So, here I am on Saturday, January 9, 2010 in Madison, Wisconsin. Scott and I went downtown and walked around State Street for a while. It was super cold (somewhere around 4 degrees), but we bundled up and didn't mind the cold too much. It was very sunny and clear, so it was actually a pretty day. Scott took this photo of me on State Street with the Capital Building in the background.


Leave it to a place like Madison, Wisconsin to have a sidewalk sale like this...winter clothes, snow piled up in the background...



















The Capital Building in Madison is very pretty lit up at night.

"Personal and Professional Development" is Over-Rated

Seriously....

Personal and professional development is over-rated. Who and where are the people out there championing stability and satisfaction? Why are we made to feel like there is always something else we should be chasing?

After making a major (and misguided) decision for my "personal and professional development", I have such clarity. After making this fateful decision, I found the following poem (a little too late for me, but maybe helpful to someone else):

I am enough.

I have enough.
I love enough.
I risk enough.
I feel enough.
I get enough.
I handle enough.
I am loved enough.
I am healed enough.
I am ready enough.

I am enough.