I could have sworn I'd written and posted this somewhere before, but various searches are turning up no sign of it, so I'll post it here.<\/p>\n
There were lots of fallen leaves on the ground today, which reminded me (somewhat roundaboutly) of two incidents. Both of these are true stories.<\/p>\n
First:<\/p>\n
Way back in March of 1998, I was driving along on the freeway when I encountered a tricky and unexpected situation. I don't remember what it was at this point, but I think it involved needing to get out of someone's way and having only a narrow gap in traffic to work with. But I navigated through it with grace and ease. I was so pleased with myself that I started singing a song that I learned from a Short Sisters tape; it includes the line \"To see when Way opens \/ takes a little gracefulness.\"<\/p>\n
I finished singing that line.<\/p>\n
And then I looked up . . . <\/p>\n
. . . and realized that I had missed my exit.<\/p>\n
I decided ruefully that I really ought to change those words to \". . . takes a little mindfulness.\"<\/p>\n
Second:<\/p>\n
Some years back, I disremember when exactly but the season was autumn, I attended a writing workshop meeting at Susan L's place in Menlo Park. I went into the house, and as we were sitting around chatting and waiting for the rest of the workshoppers to arrive, I wistfully thought to myself that it was too bad I wasn't out East around about then, because one of the few things I really miss about the east coast, other than friends, is the leaves turning brilliant red and other nifty colors.<\/p>\n
Then Mary Anne arrived. She came in looking cheerful and happy, and she handed me a huge gorgeous red leaf.<\/p>\n
I gaped at it.<\/p>\n
Finally, I sputtered something like, \"Where did you get this?\"<\/p>\n
She said, \"Oh, they're all over the sidewalk outside, right in front of the house.\"<\/p>\n
And at the end of the workshop, when I left the house, sure enough, there were big bright red leaves all over the sidewalk. I had been so busy pining for the red leaves out East that I had totally failed to notice the ones that were right there in front of me.<\/p>\n
It was practically a parable.<\/p>\n
I'll close my sermon for today with a quote from Jon Carroll from some years ago:<\/p>\n
\"Experience is useless without memory and mindfulness.\"<\/p>\n\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
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