Terrapin Station

Random FF: At the Beach

Karla says at RevGals:

Hello Pals~~
Random Friday Five is back!

1. If you could sneak away anywhere this weekend, right now, all expenses paid,
where would you go and what would you do?

To the beach in Florida where I grew up going. I'd stay in my cousins' little house next door to my grandparents' (which has been sold) - my grandfather's sister and her husband were the original owner of this little green cottage. I would go barefoot on the hand-poured concrete floors and read and walk on the beach and rock in a rocking chair. Fish a little. Look at birds. Go get seafood from Posey's.

Wow, I could be packed for this in 10 minutes. Can I go? Can I?

2. What is for lunch today? (one of the very first FF I ever played asked this.) Probably a big green salad and some steamed edamame. Maybe some ratatouille (eating up the leftovers).

3. Along that first-FF-I-ever-played theme, what are you wearing today? Jeans, black shoes, and a tie-dye type top in green and white.

4. Along the Today Theme, what are you doing today? Working! Exercising my Spanish muscles.

5. Along the random theme, what is your favorite scent, and why? The beach. :) I have scent warmers at home with Yankee Candles' "Sun and Sand" in them. I suspect that Coppertone plays a large part in the formula...

Have fun playing! Link to your blog, play in the comments, or play on Facebook!
Love and joy to you~~

Writing to God: the Mockingbird

Rachel says:

Today's prompt begins with verse 6 of the familiar Psalm 139 (NRSV): "Such knowledge is too wonderful for me; it is so high that I cannot attain it." The psalmist's use of "high" here indicates "expansive, beyond reach" . . . but what inspiration and insight might we find today if we literally gaze at high places, at nearby mountains, for example, or at the sky? Look up today. Let the high places catch your eye and your imagination. Be full of wonder as you pick up your pen to pray.

 

The mockingbird sits to sing

on the topmost branch of the tree outside my window

It's three stories and a bit

as high as she can go!

Every day she sings songs she's learned from others

Around the neighborhood she goes,

Celebrating and praising in many many languages

Listen to the mockingbird! O, ye birds of other hues

Praise the Lord with your songs!

 

 

Friday Five: Vital Connections

Sally says at RevGals:  OK I'll admit it, right now I am exhausted, there is so much going on and so much to do that I fell like I am running around in small circles, add to that the fact that there is so much that I'd like to do ....

What I need to do is give myself permission (make myself) to stop and to refocus, to breath the air and smell the roses to get perspective and to rest in God's presence, and sometimes that can be hard to achieve but I know that the harder it gets, the more essential it becomes. Somewhere deep inside I hear the Spirit whispering to my soul:

Live in me, make your home in me just as I do in you. In the same way that a branch can't bear grapes by itself, but only by being joined to the vine, you can't bear fruit unless you are joined to me... (John 15: 4)

So I want to ask you:

1. How do you intentionally make a vital daily connection with God? What roots you and gives you life?  I go out in the morning to pick up the newspaper, and I face the sunrise, and I say good morning to God and give thanks for yesterday, today, and tomorrow...pray for the things that are on my heart at that time.  Ask that I might be God's person in the world today. 

2.  Do you have a favourite space/ place that you go to?  outdoors and birds are the constants.  I love to go outside, usually in my yard, or often I stop at a pond in a local park on my way home from Jazzercise and listen to birds.  The Cornell Red Tail Hawk cam has been fascinating me lately.    One of my favorite birds and it's such a gift to get to see them up close this way.  I've found a whole world of bird webcams through this site, but this is still my favorite.  It's a good meditation place for me.  

Watch live streaming video from cornellhawks at livestream.com

 

3. Is there a particular passage, phrase or prayer that brings you immediately into God's presence?  When I was a little girl, this was often used as the opening sentence as  Morning Prayer  began: "The Lord is in his holy Temple; Let all the earth keep silence before him."  (from Habbakuk).  And to me, that means, settle in; it's time to pray; God is in God's house and so am I."  Conveniently, I now experience God as anywhere that I am.  

(The Lord was definitely a Him when I was a girl.)

4. Music- essential ingredient or distraction- discuss

When I'm trying to pray and listen, music doesn't work.  Often when I'm working, it doesn't either.  But sometimes when I am working, it is a blessing.  It might be sacred music; yesterday I listened to about an hour of Bach cantatas on Spotify.  I'm also very fond of Pandora's Yaz channel. 

5. Silence and solitude or engagement with like minded others?  I really prefer to be on my own when it comes to refreshing. 

Bonus, a poem, piece of inspirational prose or music that speaks to you of that vital connection...

To Live in the Mercy of God

By Denise Levertov

To lie back under the tallest

oldest trees. How far the stems

rise, rise

               before ribs of shelter

                                           open!

To live in the mercy of God. The complete

sentence too adequate, has no give.

Awe, not comfort. Stone, elbows of

stony wood beneath lenient

moss bed.

And awe suddenly

passing beyond itself. Becomes

a form of comfort.

                      Becomes the steady

air you glide on, arms

stretched like the wings of flying foxes.

To hear the multiple silence

of trees, the rainy

forest depths of their listening.

To float, upheld,

                as salt water

                would hold you,

                                        once you dared

To live in the mercy of God.

To feel vibrate the enraptured

waterfall flinging itself

unabating down and down

                              to clenched fists of rock.

Swiftness of plunge,

hour after year after century,

                                                   O or Ah

uninterrupted, voice

many-stranded.

                              To breathe

spray. The smoke of it.

                              Arcs

of steelwhite foam, glissades

of fugitive jade barely perceptible. Such passion—

rage or joy?

                              Thus, not mild, not temperate,

God’s love for the world. Vast

flood of mercy

                      flung on resistance.

Denise Levertov, “To Live in the Mercy of God” from Sands from the Well. Copyright © 1996 by Denise Levertov. Reprinted with the permission of New Directions Publishing Corporation.

Reproduced from poetryfoundation.org

Listen to the Mockingbird

This morning I had meaningful conversation with 2 squirrels in my front yard.  I told them I had squirrel syringes; they retracted their heads and did not return.

When I reached campus, the mockingbirds were singing. 

 

The Texas state bird, by the way.

Repellent

Saw an ad on TV just now for the Bell and Howell Solar Animal Repeller. Here's a link to the site. I think it's disgusting.

I understand not wanting animals to tear up your trash or dig in your garden, but hey, here's an idea: don't go live where they live and expect them to stay away from that stuff. Go live in a concrete canyon if that's how you feel about animals, ok? Or, secure your trash so there's not a problem.

Sorry if I sound a little loony on this subject, but really. The birds and squirrels who share our living space are one of my great delights. I'm not always thrilled when birds, raccoons, or possums go down our chimney, but then, we've been saying for years that we need to cover that up. So really, our bad there.

If you had this gizmo, you'd have no birds in your trees, no squirrels in them either, no bats in your belfry. (Bats eat mosquitoes, did you know?)

It's true that the other day I came in my driveway to see 2 turkey buzzards sitting on the roof of my house, and I parked and ran straight out into the front yard (by that time there were three, sitting on the ground) and hollered at them, "GET GONE!" a la my Memamma. And Boudreaux chased them madly, barking. I don't have to be thrilled with all the animals that come to my house. But I give them a sporting chance...(Boudreaux can't catch anything). They are beautiful, flying. Just a little repellent, sitting on my roof. I do have a superstition or two.

National Bird Day

Reprinted from the Daily Devotion of The Cathedral of Hope, Dallas: 

Scripture
I know all the birds of the mountains
And every wild creature is in my care.  Psalm 50.1

A Word of Hope
Many of the national days of remembrance we honor are rather obscure and even unknown to most people, but today, National Bird Day, is an occasion that coincides beautifully with the last day of the Christmastide Season. The evening of this day is also called 12th Night, the last of the twelve days of Christmas, the eve of the Epiphany, and medieval British traditions appointed two birds to symbolize both this day and the January 6 arrival of the Magi.

The wren, a small and humble grey brown bird, is the symbol of the departed old year and the bright, red breasted robin is the symbol of the new hope, the coming of the influential, and we are to assume, colorful magi who arrived in Bethlehem to worship and adore the Christ Child on behalf of the entire gentile world. The robin’s migration also ushered in the bright light of the world as the long dark days of winter were grinding to a close. Medieval Christians were familiar, too, with the old legend of the robin’s red breast being God’s reward for its stalwartly fanning the embers of the stable’s fire all night in order to provide warmth for the Christ Child.
Birds, from the partridge to the seven swans comprised half of all the gifts my true love gave to me on the 12 Days of Christmas, but their importance as symbols trace back to the teachings of Jesus, who obviously had great respect and much knowledge of our avian friends. His birds of the air stories featured ravens, sparrows, roosters, doves, pigeons and he even compared himself to a mother hen: “Jerusalem, Jerusalem!...I have often wanted to gather your people, as a hen gathers her chicks under her wings.” Luke 13.34.

Prayer
May I use this Twelfth Night as a good time of the year to remember and honor all the wrens and robins of my own life, and respect them as Jesus did, as quiet memories of the past and vibrant hopes for the future.

Devotion Author:
Dan Peeler
Minister for Children and Families, COH

*****

Birds and squirrels are one of my very greatest joys.  When I went with Ken to his specialist visit last week, on the third floor of a very brick-y medical building, a wonderful singing sounded right out the window of the room.  The nurse said, "Oh, that's our cardinal."  Apparently this male cardinal comes day after day and sings there...it's not an openable window, so he's not getting any food from the gig...he just comes and sings there because he likes it.  Were we the lucky ducks or what?  Click here to hear what we enjoyed.  Thank you, little brother. 

Over the holiday, some new concrete sidewalk was poured on my path from car to work.  I was tickled beyond measure to see that, although it had been carefully blocked from human traffic by big orange barrels and yellow tape, the set concrete is full of squirrel tracks.  There's a lot of student-made art on our campus, and I'm so pleased to see our squirrels getting into that action.  I'll get a picture soon.  Fabulous!

Birds

God is always showing me things with birds.  Funny, that. 

Or maybe it's that when I take time to watch the birds, is when God can get through to me.

This morning I was driving to church thinking about change - how in some ways I am ready for a change, while in some ways I have lately had quite enough change for the next year or so, thanks!

And I looked out over Lake Lewisville, and all these birds were swirling around.  Ducks, stopping off in a migration pattern, I think. 

And God said:  Change is always coming.  It's just a matter of whether you are paying attention.