OOOOF.

I liken us to standing in a wind tunnel, our features blown back into flattened grimaces, hair streaming and for some of us, falling out. How to find solace while whatever we are standing in/on swirls around us politically and emotionally, far and wide?

I have experienced what I don’t wish on anyone, a time of lying awake — between surgeries, diagnosis, outcomes — and wondering what time is left. But importantly, how, if I was given it back, would I live my life. In the darkness I knew for certainty a few fundamentals:

I cannot change what is happening.

But I will remember this dark, deeply disturbing place and how I got myself out of it.

I made some decision, followed some roads, continue on the journey still staying healthy enough and always, always breathing.

But I feel this darkness again.

Sleepless this week I got up and read, coming across this passage from The Comfort of Crows, written by Margaret Renkl:

”The world is burning, and there is no time to put down the water buckets. For just an hour, put down the water buckets anyway. Take your cure from the bluebirds, who have no faith in the future but who build the future nevertheless, leaf by leaf, and straw by straw, shaping them into the roundness of the world.”

I am not a political or opinion blog, just a navigation tool, if it speaks to you. In the midst of it all, the shouting pundits, the heart breaking news, the inconceivable debates between friends and foes, how will you turn it off and make your future in the world — ensure your deep breaths?

Are you screaming, throwing things, building something, hugging, learning, speaking, sharing? All of this is ok. All of this builds your nest and will weather this world.

Please, tell me.

Eagle rising off Restoration Point, Bainbridge Island.