Thoughts in a Garden (Reprise)

Perhaps optimism is a rosy interpretation of the facts -- or perhaps optimism is a factual interpretation of the rose.

I sit in my garden, gazing upon a beauty that cannot gaze upon itself, and I find sufficient purpose for my day.

Overnight it rained, and the wind shifted into the west, and this morning my garden is fresh in the sun, and its scent wafts through my window.  But if I sit in my garden, who will keep my appointment in town?  But if I keep my appointment in town, who will sit in my garden?

In every gardener there is a child who believes in The Seed Fairy.

I cultivate my garden, and my garden cultivates me.

It pleases me to take amateur photographs of my garden, and it pleases my garden to make my photographs look professional.

Why try to explain miracles to your kids when you can just have them plant a garden?

Words once heard:  "Many times Death has come for me, but finds me always in my beautiful garden, and leaves me there, I believe, as an excuse to return."

A child's garden is a triumph of hope over too much watering.

What is a gardener but a magician's assistant?

If you've never experienced the joy of accomplishing more than you can imagine, plant a garden.

As a gardener, I am among those who believe that much of the evidence of God's existence has been planted.

If you believe that God is everywhere, then you might well look for Him in a church, but if you wonder if God is anywhere, then you might better look for Him in a garden.

Afterthoughts #1

 A milestone in life is the day the challenge of discovering who you really are is replaced by the challenge of being the person someone thinks they married.

The most basic strategy is to get time on your side.  The most basic tactic is to sit and wait.

Evidence: a body of facts insufficient to prove anything you don't already believe.

Truth: whatever justifies your advantage in life.  If you have no advantage in life, then everything is a lie. 

Reality: a set of default perceptions for people with no imagination

Nothing unites people in a tighter bond than denying the same obvious truth.

The painter has this in common with the golfer -- that both know how hard it is to apply a proper stroke to a still object.

First Love

From somewhere there came a harmony

Of trumpets and strings and saxes, 

And the planet seemed to be standng still.

'Twas I spinning on my axis.

Parting Wisdom {That's All Folks)

"Fate is a fancy name we give to the absence of a plan."

 Nothing strains a relationship like revealing a secret that is past its "best-if-revealed-by" date.

A domestic spat is a saga of streaming episodes without, unfortunately, a "Skip Recap" button.

"Maybe you're not the best person you can be, but you have the best shot at it."


"Life is a continuing attempt to overcome the personal shortcomings that make us likable."

"You can break up a marriage and remain friends.  It's a harder thing to break up a friendship and remain married."

"If you never eat a ripe banana until you finish the overripe ones, you will spend your life eating overripe bananas."

"The problem with living happily ever after is that it means the story's over."

Reflections Before A Mirror

Who be this stranger in my glass

This ghost from yesterday,

Whose battle scars I carry still,

Whose debts I must repay,

Whose trinkets fill my attic space,

Whose idle thoughts my brain,

Whose sins reside upon my soul,

Will someone please explain

How came this mortal coil to be

My final residence,

This house forever haunted by

Its previous occupant(s)? 

More From The Miscellany Bucket

What makes the daily moral clash between mind and body so challenging is that the body actually has no morals. 

It is hard to change someone's mind who believes it in their head bone. 

The intangibles of life not only bring the greater happiness, they require less closet space.

It is often wise, before giving up on a relationship, to try one more degree of separation.

Perhaps worse than never realizing your dream is never enjoying your consolations.

One of life's harder calls is whether someone who understands you is ready to hear the rest.

We Stayed Together For The Kids

We stayed together for the kids,

Two kids we barely knew,

Who once upon a moonlit night

Back when the world was new,

Resolved to love forevermore 

And stay forever true.

 

Wait...Say That Again

If you can remember it without tears, it wasn't happiness.

Ever wonder what history would look like if we stopped trying to force everything into chronological order?

 

It is probably true that everything we were taught as a child would be thrown out of a court of law as leading the witness. 

If today the world were perfect, with what aching nostalgia would we look back on the Age of Possibility. 

If God is an illusion, then I have this question -- can you have an illusion without an Illusionist? 

You can't look at the night sky without wondering how this tiny enterprise called Planet Earth will ever justify its overhead.