The Seasons Are Changing

Look here! Although it is still February, we are days away from some of the spring flowers starting to open. (In a way this is scary... it is warmer than it "should be" for this time of year.)

At the creek, the rocks are rimmed with crystals of ice.

I have found a place on Boulder Creek where I can start doing meditation every day. I have picked a beautiful spot with a large flat rock, sloping downward at the right angle and in the right direction, upon which to sit and a wonderful cascade of water in front of me. I have been accepted into a 100 day "virtual" meditation retreat under the supervision of a Soto Zen Meditation Master. This will be good! And I suspect it is going to help me focus and move forward in other parts of my life as well.

Ping Pong in the Night

Not as sulky as he looks - Tim the Cat doesn't like the flash on the camera.

I was in bed reading last night when I suddenly heard a dashing and rumbling plus a click, click, clicketty, clicketty, click, click, click. Tim the Cat was playing with one of his ping pong balls. I kept thinking that any minute he would get it stuck under some piece of furniture and the noise would be over but it kept going on and on. I finally realized he had somehow gotten a ping pong ball up, over, and INTO the bathtub.

I try to be considerate of my downstairs neighbor and I am sure a roudy game of ping pong ball, played by a thundering cat, in the bathtub, at 11 pm, is bound to be audible to someone trying to sleep downstairs so finally I got up and took the ping pong ball away from Tim. You should have seen his face peering over the rim of the tub. He looked both cute and forlorn at the same time.

I probably shouldn't talk about my cat so much, but I have to admit that he is one of my chief forms of live entertainment.

Stray Cat at Dawn

At 6:30 I was near my front door putting my shoes on when I heard an ever-so-gentle tap-tap on my front door. My hands stopped their movement of tying shoes. I thought "What in the world?" and was immediately conflicted about opening the door. Was it my downstairs neighbor for some reason? Was it someone bad who would hurt me? The soft tap-tap sounded again.

Gingerly, I opened the front door a crack and there, hanging on the screen, was a small cat. It had reached through the place on the edge of the screen that was loose and was gently pawing the curtain of clear red plastic hearts currently hanging on the door. The curtain of hearts was still gently swinging. The cat froze in place. I froze in place. And then the cat yanked its paw back through the screen, disengaged its claws, dropped to the porch and streaked off.

I stepped out onto the door mat. The cat halted at the top of the lower staircase and turned. It was so cold out, predawn, cold breeze in the darkness. I felt sorry for this cat out in the cold. "Kitty, Kitty, Kitty?" I called, wondering what in the world I would do if it came. It didn't. It delicately walked through the snow and sprayed my little pine tree and then returned to take one more good look at me from the top of the stairs before descending to the sidewalk and disappearing around the curve.

I went back into the house and shut the door. I looked down at Tim the cat, sitting in the center of the living room rug, remembering the time when he was a stray cat, so terribly skinny, and lost out in the cold. "Aren't you a lucky cat," I told him. "Is there a possibility of more breakfast?" he asked with his eyes.

As I drove out of the parking lot of the church later after meditation, two homeless men were standing behind the church in the lea out of the wind. I raised my hand to them as I passed and they raised their hands to me. One of them had his hands wrapped around a steaming paper cup of coffee.

Another of the long-time shops on Pearl Street had "Going Out Of Business" signs in its windows this morning.

Its cold in the world right now. Really cold. In the early morning, unexpected tapping on the door sounds like danger arriving at my house. I wish the recession would stay a story on television rather than standing as a "going out of business" sign in the windows of yet another familiar, neighborhood shop.

Smilebox Picture Show

Here are a few pictures I sent to my adopted neices and nephews of meditation in the morning, my weekend up in the mountains at the women's retreat, the Prayer Box I made at the retreat, and, of course Tim the Cat and his thoughts about my being gone a whole weekend!

Enjoy!

Make a Smilebox slideshow

Up in the Mountains Over the Weekend

I spent the weekend at First Congregation's annual women's retreat at the St. Malo conference Center in Allenspark, CO. It is just 10-15 minutes south of Rocky Mountain National Park. Ever since I first saw it I have loved the 'Chapel On The Rock' which graces the entrance to the center and which I could see, bathed in morning light, from the balcony of my room. What a magestic view!

Tim the Cat had to stay at home but he was well looked after by my twin neighbor girls across the street. They obviously spent some time playing with him (for which I am very grateful!) because his basket of ping pong balls and stuffed mice was pulled out into the center of the rug and there were balls and mice everywhere when I got home.

It is good to go on retreat now and again. I hadn't spent time laughing, crying, dancing, sharing and reflecting with other women for a long time and it was good!

Reaching one of my 100 goals in life!

When I was little my parents used to put my sister and I to bed before we were sleepy. What to do? I used to make up stories in the darkness to amuse myself. I thought, "When I grow up I am going to be a writer! I am going to publish books!" but when I shared this thought with my parents they strongly discouraged me from attempting to make my living in such a precarious way. So I became an English teacher instead... which lasted for all of one year... and now here I am a business skills trainer for small business owners. How did THAT happen?

Just today, though, I realized I made it. I DID become a published writer after all, even if I am self published and only my friends have found me (so far!) on the internet. I can't tell you how much pleasure I get from seeing these posts illustrated with photographs I have taken (mostly.)

I have often commented that I have waited for lifetimes for this generation where the tools of writing and publishing are positively at our fingertips! I am a very happy camper indeed!

World's Dirtiest Cat!

Timothy Ming, my good friend and companion, commented this morning, "I was never the one that thought being the cleanest cat in the world was a virtue. Remember that you were the one that wrote that title into the blog. I said, even that day, that I would take a dust bath as soon as I had the opportunity. You know I did!"

Good as his word, Tim the Cat DID have a dust bath yesterday... a fine day of brilliant Colorado sun and balmy temperatures. He came into the house absolutely brown on gray and I bribed him back outside where I took a spare hairbrush to him. My neighbor, Doug, was on his balcony maintaining his bicycle. A newly brushed cat will not last nearly as long as a newly cleaned and greased bicycle chain. In fact I hadn't made it back into the house before Doug burst into laughter and called me back.

There was Timothy Ming on his back in the warm dust, pleasurably wiggling back and forth. Even 24 hours hence, you can still pat him vigorously and see the dust fly!

Beginning Day for "My Life On West Pearl"

My Landscapes of Thought blog was originally intended to record my spiritual life and journey and to share writings, poems and quotes that touch my heart.

Almost immediately, however, it also began to contain portraits in words of my life here on West Pearl in Boulder. Over the weekend I realized I would feel more comfortable writing if I had separate places to journal about each of these things.

So welcome to my world on West Pearl! Here you will find entries written by my cat, Timothy Ming and a record of enounters with my wondrous neighbor, the Fox. Pictures of my neighborhood as it changes with the seasons. Stories from my life. Conversations I overhear at the tea shop. Things my friends have shared with me that are worth passing on.

These posts are "portraits" of life, drawn and painted in words. I hope you enjoy them.