Post #3314: The things that make up a life

(Photo: Seaweed on a foggy day.)

Yesterday, I stepped out for a walk in the deep fog and ran into my neighbour, who told me I’m the talk of the seniors’ centre at the moment. Why? Because I’m playing my fiddle at their monthly lunch this Thursday—an afternoon of live music followed by a soup social.

I agreed to this gig months ago, an easy yes to come and play half an hour of music and then share a meal with folks in my community. After that, I have to go on to our local trust committee meeting to make the case for the inclusion of a green burial cemetery in our community planning process. I took the day off work to do both of these things.

There is a lot going on here day-to-day. A friend is coming next week to stay for a period of songwriting residency, I’m taking weekly fiddle lessons for the first time since I was a kid, we are planning a spring party for the 80th birthday of my father-in-law. I’ve got board meetings and shows and craft socials all piling up over the next little while. And then there is work, with the intensity of knowing that I will wrap it all up before the year is out.

But I’ve also managed to book myself five or six days of silent retreat at a hermitage on another island in early March, and I’m giving myself the space for meditation every morning before the hum begins. Here is where I find the foundation for the things that make up my life, the footholds that show me the way forward.

It’s all very small in the face of the cataclysmic world state, but what else can we do right now but build our communities, our kindnesses and our resilience? All of this is preparation for whatever comings knocking on our doors next.