If I were to stitch together a quilt for the last six years – a quilt built of quotes that have helped me survive – it would be a quilt of many colors – a quilt with a lilt – a quilt of words that poets have built. There’d be Newcomer and Oliver, Jesus, Beagle, and Pinney, Osman and Adams and Vonnegut and Eddy, Gandhi, Anne Frank, Goodall, and Tutu, Mandela, MLK, Jr., Gorman, and Angelou. Thích Nhất Hạnh’s words would be on it, and Michelle Obama’s, too. Mr. Rogers would be there, and Winnie the Pooh, and L’Engle, F.H. Burnett, Seuss, and Rick Steves, and in the background there’d be patterns of bright autumn leaves. Autumn brings beauty and autumn brings loss. But “Anytime you learn, you gain,” said the stellar Bob Ross. -Karen Molenaar Terrell
we walk a “silent” walk together – the rule is no talking – and we come to stand in a field near a creek, listening to the birds in the trees no word passes between us as we stand still one minute two minutes three four and then without a word we smile and turn back to our start and I think I could live in those four minutes in my heart forever -Karen Molenaar Terrell
There’s a land of magic Where magpies sing morning harmonies And at night stars sparkle serenely Above silhouettes Of trees topped with palm fronds And long-beaked Ibis birds casually browse In parking lots packed with cars That have steering wheels on the right
“Am I done now?” I ask. Half-hoping yes. Half-hoping no. “I’ve taught my students, raised fine sons until they were grown, written my books, taken my photos, lived through the highs, and survived the lows. I’ve climbed enough mountains and seen my share of rainbows. So am I done now?” I ask. “I want to know.”
And Love answers: “There’s no end to Me and so there’s no end to you. You’re where you’ll always be – in Love unchanging, always new. You will never be done reflecting Love’s love – whether you’re in the valley below or flying in clouds above. So don’t worry about what’s next. You’re where you need to be now – enjoy these moments you have here – beyond the when or what or how.” -Karen Molenaar Terrell
I wake up at four in the morning and find my son has just messaged me from Australia. I reply and let him know I’m up. He is at the end of the day, and I am at the start of the same day. I ask him if he has any tips for me from the future. And suddenly time disappears. The space between us disappears. And there is just Love everywherenow, connecting me to him, and connecting me to the universe. We message back-and-forth for 15 minutes – text-chatting and text-laughing together. And then it’s time for me to go back to bed, and my son thanks me for “dropping in.”
-Karen Molenaar Terrell
“I climb with joy, the heights of Mind To soar o’er time and space; I yet shall know as I am known And see Thee face to face Till time and space and fear are naught My quest shall never cease Thy presence ever goes with me And Thou dost give me peace.” – V.H., Christian Science Hymnal #136
It is three in the morning and the cats sit next to my chair looking up at me with unblinking eyes and I know what they are thinking: “Feed me!”
For a moment they break and chase each other – scampering across the floor. And then they are back in position, looking up at me with unblinking eyes. -Karen Molenaar Terrell
I pass her first in the pet food aisle. Her expression is serious – like she is considering important things – and my expression is probably serious, too. Pet food is serious business. Next I pass her by the milk. I think we smile at each other that time. Then I come upon her in produce – and this time we full-on grin at each other.
I have to choose between two checkout lines and finally settled on lane #3 – behind a fellow boomer wearing a friendly smile and a baseball cap with the name of a golf course emblazoned on it. He grins and quips that any line behind him is going to end up being the slow one – and I assure him that if this line ends up being slow, it’s entirely me to blame. I am a slow-lane magnet. But, I tell him, I am retired, so I’m in no hurry. It’s all good.
Just as he gets to the front of the line, he turns to me and says – his face totally serious – “Oh! I forgot something in the farthest corner of the store! Is it okay if I go back and get it?”
I start laughing. I know what he’s up to. “Go for it!” I say. And he starts laughing, too, then. Then he says he has a good one-liner for me. He says, “What do a flat tire and a bad attitude have in common? They both have to be changed if you want to get anywhere.”
“That’s a good one!” I say.
The cashier rings him up and he turns to me and wishes me a good day before he leaves. He has already given me a good day.
After I pay for my groceries, I go to the in-store Starbucks to get myself a mocha. And, after paying for my mocha, when I turn around to go wait in the pick-up line, who should I see standing behind me but the woman I’ve been running into all over the store? We both start laughing like we’re old friends – and maybe we are by this point – and I say, “I’ve been following you all over this store!” And she nods her head, in happy acknowlegement.
A truck tailgates me and passes me going more than 60 in a curvy, no-pass 40 mph zone that has small businesses and homes on either side. I get on the freeway and a car zips around me and then pulls in front of me in the slow lane, goes past the car in the fast lane and then cuts in front of the car – so close he almost hits the front fender and the driver of the other car has to tap the brakes.
And I decide to just give up. I decide to have a crappy day. The world, I decide, is full of thoughtless, impatient, selfish people, and I’m suddenly too weary and worn to fight it anymore.
I exit in Mount Vernon and park in front of the CS Reading Room. Go inside and buy some “Quarterlies” and then walk down to the Skagit Valley Food Co-op at the other end of downtown. As I approach the door, this man going into the co-op opens the door wide for me – a big smile on his face – and asks, “Going this way?” I smile back and thank him.
I go to the other end of the store and pluck out some ginger chews from the candy rack. Then I see the Mother Earth News on the magazine rack. I pull it out and turn to the back page – knowing I’ll find one of my photos there. And there it is! I have to share this tiny moment of glory with someone. The cashier in the lane in front of me isn’t working with any customers at the moment and so I say, “Look! Here’s my photo!” And she grins a big grin and says, “No way! You took this picture?!” And we chat for a bit about how to get your pictures in Mother Earth News and I encourage her to submit her photos.
I go to the front of the store to pay for my ginger chews and the woman in front of me says, “You go ahead of me – you’ve just got that one thing.” What a nice thing to do!
I walk down to the Ristretto coffee shop for a mocha. The barista is really cheery and friendly. She asks me my name. And I often use that as an opportunity to make some quip about my name, but this time my pause is genuine. I really do not want to admit my name is “Karen.” But I finally choke it out and both the baristas and the customer next to me smile these kind smiles at me and assure me that my name might be “Karen” – but I am not a “Karen.” I give the barista a 30% tip – she’ll probably never know what she’s given me this morning.
As I’m sipping my mocha and writing this post on my cellphone, a thirty-something man goes up to the counter and starts regaling the baristas with a story that has everyone laughing. I find myself being pulled into his joy. As he leaves with his coffee, he glances over at me and grins – including me in his circle, and I grin back.
I leave Mount Vernon and decide to go to La Conner to pay my broadband bill. On the way I stop at Christianson’s Nursery to, literally, smell the roses. A begonia plant with pink flowers calls to me from its place on a table and I pluck it up and head for the checkout. The checkout man is so fun – his hair keeps falling into his eyes and he keeps blowing it out of his face, and pushing it back with his hands. He laughs and says, “It has a mind of its own.” I tell him I can relate – my own hair is always going rogue on me.
Now I drive into La Conner to pay my Astound bill – I’m hoping that Jolyne will be there – I always enjoy connecting with her every month. She makes me smile.
After I pay my bill and have a nice chat with Jolyne, I head for the La Conner boardwalk for a walk. On my way I come upon a young family enjoying the day together – there’s a boy of about nine, astride the mechanical horse in front of the “curiosities” shop, a young girl, a father, and a mother with gorgeous gold extensions to her black hair, braided down her back. The family is beautiful. They stop at the ice cream shop where there’s a photo stand-in of ice cream cones – it looks like the father wants to take a picture of his family there. I ask him if he’d like me to take a photo of all of them at the stand-in – and he’s happy to let me do that. The family arranges itself around the stand-in and I snap a couple of quick photos and hand the phone back to the father to see if what I took will work. He smiles and says, “We never get photos of all of us together. This is great!”
I’m so happy I got to do that for them.
I continue on my walk – enjoying the reflections in the Swinomish Channel. I wave to the person sitting at the back of a motorboat going past., and get a wave in return. I end up at the Calico Cupboard bakery, of course. This was always my plan. As I’m waiting in line to buy an apple cinnamon roll, I hear a woman talking to the hostess about the friends she hasn’t seen in twenty years, and file that away in my “interesting people” file in my head.
Cinnamon roll successfully purchased, I head for the door and see the woman who was meeting her old friends, talking to another woman – who I assume is one of these friends. Of course, I’ve got to know more. “So you haven’t seen each other in twenty years?” I ask. And the women laugh and explain that they’d met in a Bible study years ago, and one of the women had moved to Arizona and the other woman had moved, too, and this is the first time they’d seen each other in two decades! One of them lives in the Bow area now – where I live! – and I find out that one of her old friends from high school lives just down the street from me!
Isn’t life great?
I pass a man sitting on a bench, and point to my cinnamon roll box. “I bet this thing weighs five pounds,” I say. And he laughs and says, “Yeah, they make ’em big there!”
I pass the apartments where my parents used to live, and wave to the balcony where Mom always waved to me. I smile at the memory.
And then I’m back in my car and headed home with my cinnamon roll.
Another great walk this morning in Bellingham – I always find the smiles I need there, and the joy.
My first smile came when I was waiting to cross the street from Fairhaven Green to the path to Boulevard Park. A man in a delivery truck was trying to back up across 10th Street and onto Mill Ave. I stood back so he didn’t need to worry about me crossing the street, and could do what he needed to do. I could tell he was working really hard to navigate his truck backwards through the crosswalk, and when he got to the other side of the crosswalk and was finally able to stop and go forward, I saw him let out one of those “Whew!” sighs. I could relate to his human-ness in that moment and started grinning in human camaraderie. He happened to look over at me and saw me smiling. He smiled a big smile back and waved. That wave totally made my day.
I started down the path and saw a squirrel busily gathering his morning meal – nuts probably. He stayed still long enough for me to get some quick pictures, and then scampered off with his loot.
As I neared the ramp to Taylor Dock, I spotted a bunny hopping this way and then that way and then back the first way and, finally, stopping in the middle of the street. There was a youngish man on the other side of the bunny, watching its antics, a grin on his face. When the bunny finally hopped off into the bushes, the man and I made eye contact and smiled at each other. “Talk about a funny bunny,” he said, laughing. And then we both continued on our separate journeys. But I love those quick moments when we share an experience like that with someone else, and connect briefly.
Down at Boulevard Park I saw a crow showing off his morning snack – a crab leg maybe? – and soon three or four other crows showed up to try to snatch it from him. Crows crack me up.
I really needed my morning walk today. I needed the smiles.
Adventures of the Madcap Christian Scientist 