The Year is Complete!

Please feel free to look back through the 365 days of 2010 sunrises, but "a year of getting up to meet the day" is officially completed. There will be no more new posts.

PLEASE JOIN ME FOR MORE SUNRISE POSTS AT THE SUNRISE BLOGGER, WHERE YOU WILL FIND SUNRISE PHOTOS AND REFLECTIONS FROM ME AND FROM CONTRIBUTORS AROUND THE GLOBE.


Thank you so much for visiting.
A one year blog project in which I share a process of transitions: emptying of the nest, reacquainting with my rusty intellect, plowing onward with my first full length book, entering the second half of my first century, and generally reflecting on life.

(see Dec. 29th, 2009 entry for further explanation)

Thursday, January 21, 2010

reflections on a winter's day

sunrise:  7:05
In case you can't read the icy thermometer, it's about 15 degrees this morning, and so breathtakingly lovely that I was mesmerized. Had to drag myself inside to get my daughter to school and myself to exercise class.

There are a lot of things in my mind today.  First, here's a link to a New York Times article my oldest daughter sent me as a follow up to my post on MLK Jr.'s birthday. Very thought provoking stuff.

Reports of a powerful aftershock in Haiti were on the front page today.  The horrors and agonies of that small island are...impossible to fully conceive.  We can send money and goods and prayers; we can ache for them.  Then what?  Try to overlook the small things in our own lives, perhaps, and make the world a better place every day, in any tiny way that we can.


In lighter news, I read about the importance of standing up and moving around as often as we can.  Easier said than done for a lot of occupations, but not impossible.  I particularly liked this remark:  "Don't just send your colleague an email.  Walk over and talk to him.  Standing up."

That brings me to another sequence of thoughts that have been circulating in my mind.  History will have to sort out all of the profound changes that electronic communications are having on the world.  I am a newbie blogger, and a big fan of the forum for such a free and rapid exchange of ideas.

I am particularly happy about the connections I have been able to sustain with friends and cousins whom I rarely get to see.  One in particular, a multi-year blogger and my blog mentor, had this to say about blogs:
"...although I go through stale periods from time to time I keep it going for a bunch of reasons.  First, once you have readers you really do not want to lose them.  They become part of your connection to the world, a whole base of partial one-dimensional friends that think they know you at some level (and they do).  I have had beers with a fair number of them over the years, and in a few cases made actual friends..."

he goes on:
"I was never particularly creative -- colorblind, tone deaf, and lacking in motor skills, the arts were not for me.  But then blogging software came along - it is like an instrument invented for me.  It unleashed a heretofore undetected creativity...."

How could anyone argue against that kind of a testimonial?  On the other hand, we are all sitting down too much, and forgetting to connect with real people (she writes at her computer, alone).
So many things, taken too far, lead to ill health and negative repercussions.  As in so much of life - it's a question of balance.  Everything in moderation, including moderation, my father likes to quote from Lost Horizon

Make connections by computer, but don't forget real, physical, visual human contact.

And by the way -- don't forget physical, visual contact with that world outside as well, on our feet, standing up, in the snow.




8 comments:

  1. Looks like a lovely day in beautful Bangor. Why don't you practice what you preach and plan a trip to ski with me and my kids at Le Massif the last weekend of March...or just come to our house...the house you've NEVER seen. If not, I am liable to show up AGAIN at your place sometime soon and send your guiltometer through the roof.

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  2. Can you tell that I still haven't figured out how this ridiculous comment section works?

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  3. Here via the blogcousin. A couple comments... having passed the same empty nest, trying to reconnect with a self long gone dormant, blogging is a Godsend! My computer connections have allowed me to meet and know so many people, all to the good. But a surprising side effect is that I've developed a richer network of friends "on the ground" as well. Blog on. Those photos are grand indeed!

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  4. Thank you. And I love, "Blog on." Maybe a new mantra for me.

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  5. Thanks. I've always loved winter scenes. I do feel a bit chillier though.

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  6. Love these pictures. What camera are you using? We have no snow left. I walk most mornings by the beach, but it looks amazing when it's colder and we have ice floes

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  7. Thanks! The camera is nothing fancy - just a rather clunky Nikon digital, several years old. But it does the job.

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