“Twenty years from now you will be more disappointed by the things you didn’t do than by the ones you did do. So throw off the bowlines. Sail away from the safe harbor. Catch the trade winds in your sails. Explore. Dream. Discover.”
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Finding Happiness: November’s Observation Writing
Through the Car Window, New Delhi
A child crouches barefoot beneath a concrete wall
beside the black asphalt, traffic and fumes.
She scoops up dirt with her bare hands, piles and pats it
into a pan, then dumps out the grains and begins again. There
under the freeway overpass the powdery music of dirt
whispers through the cracks of her fingers as she listens
and listens to the calm of its voice, holding it
like satin in the palm of her hand.
Through the Car Windo
Finding Happiness
Where do you notice happiness around you?
October observation
A Dog’s Life
The dogs in Venice prance across stone plazas, tails wagging,
toenails clicking as they toss their toys at the master’s feet
and wait for more play. Glossy fur shining, a dachshund
scuttles through a crowded alleyway, calmly wearing its leash.
On the boat a blond terrier boards, spies the legs of strangers
and snuggles up, waiting for pets. A Brillo-haired poodle
with perky ears turns the corner with his master, and trots
toward a window to sniff a potted plant while his master waits.
Dogs in Delhi do not prance or parade their glossy coats
and frilly hair. Unwashed, uncombed, they wander
wary-eyed and restless through streets and bramble patches
behind ruined temples. Into hard sand they scratch and dig
to make their beds. One grey-haired dog curls himself
onto a manhole lid littered with leaves, then rests its head
on the curb, unnoticed while strangers walk by. Sometimes
there are advantages to life on a leash.
Observation of an everyday activity that has an important impact:
Before Moving On
After working all day, we set out
down our driveway with the green arch
of trees reaching over the road. We pass through
redwoods, and glide under branches past
the narrow necklace of stream rolling down
banks of thick earth, then pull up to the main road
and stop. It’s a kind of ritual we go through
each time we come to the crossroad. I look back
up around the corner to the right, past the tall strands
of wild grass, trees and shrubs that have grown up there,
and are rarely trimmed back. I pause and peer
through the branches, twigs, and shadows, waiting
to see if a car, or bicyclist might come racing past.
And there we hesitate, like birds poised on
the edge of flight, lifting and cocking their heads
to gaze into the sky the moment before
raising their wings for the long trip south.
“Yes,” I might say, or, “Wait,” while a
slender-legged deer rounds the bend
and trots past. All our journeys, into town
or half way round the world hinge
on the trust inside those words.
