Day 350 Naked Stretching

November 24, 2015

(If we live with an open and grateful attitude, every day will bring a gift. This is one of 365 gifts during the year I turned 70.)

I have only to look outside my back door to see bare tree branches stretching outward with a few tenacious leaves still clinging. What I notice is that even in their nakedness as winter approaches, the branches are beautiful as they insist on reaching upward. Maybe nature has been my life-long inspiration. I have always reached, knowing that the reaching is so important, even if the goal is never fulfilled. Life is always about the journey right now and the stretching of one’s spirit with possibilities in mind. 

Far away there in the sunshine are my highest aspirations. I may not reach them, but I can look up and see their beauty, believe in them, and try to follow where they lead.” ~ Louisa May Alcott

When I was teaching eighth graders, once I pulled a disruptive girl out in the hall so I could speak privately with her. Thinking I could re-direct her behavior toward a goal, I asked her, “How do you see yourself when you are 25?” I remember feeling sad at the empty look on her face as she shrugged her shoulders apathetically. Here was a young child who did not reach, did not understand how that action connects us with life.  Apathy begins a dying process, even at age 13. 

For a month after my first husband and I split up, I spent time looking inward and then reaching to a new place creatively. I took photos, wrote an article and submitted it to a major national photo magazine. It was accepted. Today I continue to reach.

My gift today is reaching.

 ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~­ 

Day 351: Parkway

You can find links to my other posts on this project here:
http://bjschupp.blogspot.com/2014/12/365-gifts.html

Day 69 – Naked Beauty

February 16, 2015

(This is part of a 365 project during my 70th year where I write and illustrate a blog on each day's gift.)

Predictions for this area are for up to 10 inches of snow overnight. I sit in my car on the Safeway parking lot, which is filled with people carrying plastic bags filled with toilet paper and rushing to their cars as the temperature falls into the low 20’s. Chill, gloom and monochrome surrounds me but beauty abounds even on a bleak day such as this one. When my eye focuses on a single tree, I see a balanced curve of reaching branches morphing into a lacy silhouette. This tree does not need color or adornments; it is striking in its nakedness.

Humans too are beautiful without culture’s accoutrements. Without regarding clothing, makeup, jobs, possessions, colors or awards, there is a simple beauty in our reaching which becomes a lacy network against our own bright backdrop of expectations. Like the tree, our reaching is a paradox of simplicity and intricacy entwined. Robert Browning wrote, “A man’s reach should exceed his grasp.” My tree's beauty exceeds expectations.

This tree overlooks a grocery store parking lot, surrounded by chill, cars and snow flurries. Shoppers with hands full of recent purchases get into their cars to head home while I step out to admire a bare beauty, a metaphorical arbor arching over the end of my day.

My gift today is a bare winter tree.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

> DAY 70 One, Two, Four

You can read my other posts on this project here:

http://bjschupp.blogspot.com/2014/12/365-gifts.html