Today's Small Beauties

Today's small beauties:

A long and peaceful bath with rose bath salts.

An extra helpful and lovely rail worker at the station.

Saying goodbye to my friend Merriel at her funeral. I thought that there would be more people there for her so I was extra glad that I went. And I discovered that she was once a semi-professional dancer and was offered a place in Peggy Spencer's dance troupe, who used to be on the telly in the 70s. She turned the offer down. It was lovely to find that out about her but I also appreciated the reminder to grab every opportunity life sends. The loveliest thing at the funeral was her grandson and his friends, who are in their late teens and so becoming young men. They were so sweetly supportive of one another and lovely to him when he cried about his gran. Bless our boys becoming men. They have good hearts and sweet souls.

The gnarled shapes of bare-branched winter oak trees against a suddenly blue sky. I stood for a while and traced their winding silhouettes for a while wondering what had led them to grow into such twisted beauty.

The joy of seeing my first catkins of the year ~ always so happymaking.

A train home coming just at the right moment.

Passing by Merriel's card shop, which was closed for her funeral today, and seeing that several people had left bunches of beautiful flowers and heartfelt notes for her, including a lovely bunch of white and red roses and another of tiny sweetly smelling narcissus. She would have been very touched.

Beautiful pale silver sunlight through the trees. I am constantly stunned by the light in the winter; so brief each day, and therefore so precious, but also so delicately exquisite.

Collecting an exciting parcel from the Post Office containing wonders from the US ~ a gift of winter pages; a diary and a book of days to weave my winter dreams in. Such gentle, lovingly created, peaceful beauty. Thank you to Lesley Austin at Wild Simplicity.

Feeling that today is the first day of the rest of my life ~ as every day, and every moment is, but today felt full of potential; my first day of re-engaging with the world after such a deep and magical midwinter, blank pages to write in, both in reality and metaphorically, plans to unhurriedly and naturally weave my life more deeply with Himself's in ways that grow with our hearts and the seasons, the poetry of being gently beginning to sing through the first days of the new year.

Lemon and ginger tea in a simple white tea cup.

My friend who never ever phones me first phoning me. People can be most surprising.

A happening in my local coffee shop which means that I will choose not to spend time there in future, which may not seem to be a beauty but it feels to be part of a movement of life to disengage me from this place where I am so rooted in and allow me to see further, and wilder, shores.

How funny Himself is; his humour, his intelligence, his deep love. He makes me smile every day.

Suddenly, after several years of inertia, finding the energy to have a proper sort out at home ~ many seemingly immoveable objects disposed of, leaving me feeling the shift inside and out.