grateful

When I rise from the ocean of sleep, my eyes open with gratitude. Last year at this time we were all so fearful, wistful, hoping for a change, a way out of economic collapse. I did not let that fear climb into the driver's seat of my life nor tell me what to imagine, nor write the story of my year. Everywhere I saw light upon frozen snow, painting a softness, and glowing from the eyes of moths at my window, and shimmering cool dappled shadows beneath the tall trees. I gave my heart to the light, everyday.

My pottery has been a refuge this past year, a doorway into a land where something deep and precious waits to be born. And I've opened my kiln, curious to see who is there.

And so this year, I am most grateful for creativity and active imagining and dreaming and all the attributes that they tell you, in 3rd grade somewhere, you must outgrow in order to memorize endless useless lists of facts.

As my heart and soul have dreamed, so my life has become. Hope has been a winged bird this year. And for this, and the other gifts of grace given to me this year, I am grateful.