Many ways of being…

It’s been a bit of a week. Actually, it’s been a whole lot of a week!

The guys installing the solar stuff on the shiny new roof come and go kind of like teenagers, making planning much of anything a challenge. Blessedly, they are now convinced that we need some warning for dog herding time before forays to the attic. Luther doesn’t understand the whole pull-down stair situation. (And they don’t much understand Luther!)

One of my knees is – shall we say – crankier than usual. The advantage to this is that I’ve had more time for paint videos and my favorite one-virtual-foot-in-front-of-the-other kind of meeting.

A whole bunch of my inner puzzle pieces began re-arranging themselves this week. Then, on Thursday, my mental sketch of how my life is organized changed.

It’s kind of unusual for me to have pictures before words but that’s where I seem to be just now. Rather like the roots and trunk and branches of my inner tree all shifted jobs.

This is a bit unsettling, but not at all a bad thing because I can already tell things make more sense. (Thanks, Sam!)

Then, on Friday, I wandered off to an adventure known as a Salon in Zoom-land with some mostly new friends pondering Carl Jung and Gnostic traditions. More shifting of puzzle pieces! (Let’s just say I don’t recall most of this coming up in Seminary!)

Saturday turned out to be a delightful full-circle sort of adventure in which the painting pictured above found its home.

In September of 2019, back in the pre-pandemic days, I did a street fair/art market in the town where I live. Based on the notion that there’s no such thing as too many prayer dots, I set up an outline of a peace sign and a station for making dots.

It was great fun! I especially loved watching the kids go from, “I don’t know how” to “This is cool!” (I spent lots of time promising that they couldn’t possibly do it wrong.)

Then, last August, a candidate I was excited about won the primary for commissioner in DeKalb County’s super district six. (And, no, I don’t know why it’s different from the regular districts!) Anyway, there was no opponent for the general election so we had ourselves a new commissioner.

Somewhere along the way I promised him the painting for his office when he – you know – had one.

Today was the day! And, in case you wondered, we’re already brainstorming new community art projects. At least one of which would involve ladders. Gulp!

Here’s what you can’t see in the photo. Behind the peace sign, deep in the under layers, the Metta Prayer is hard at work. It says something pretty close to this, with a smidge of tradition mixing:

May all beings be peaceful. May all beings be happy. May all beings be safe and well. May all beings awaken to the light of their true nature. May all beings be free and free from suffering.

Amen. Amen. Selah.

“Oddly” enough, that’s pretty much the same picture my shifting puzzle pieces are making. Kind of like a promise to me and to the world.

ps… May all beings find their voices and be free to vote!

pss… And may this painting and these painters and Commissioner Terry be powerful peace in our world!