Planting & Watering – Amanda Salisbury Books & Art

The tough make bone broth?

In Finding Water: The Art of Perseverance by Julia Cameron, the author says:

When we remember that we have a daily life, we begin to find our grounding….It is our job, faced with impending changes, to continue to husband the life that we have got.

She wrote of career changes, particularly good ones that can feel like very unstable ground. In my life today, this applies to the changing seasons.

We adopted a puppy. I’m embarking on new mediations for my anxiety and depression. My youngest will soon enter middle school, and my eldest has already gotten a small taste of high school, which begins shortly. My husband is still settling into a new job. Middling is constantly looking for the thing that makes him great.

This is the season I am living. It is not a bad season, but the change itself is anxiety-producing. I must persevere.

Remembering my daily life has been grounding. Laundry, dishes, and a home-cooked meal have a way of removing drama. It’s hard to be dramatic over a hot sink of dirty dishes. Or when holding a puppy. Or when simply reading a book.

For me, one thing is sure to reduce or eliminate drama swirling about my home: making bone broth. Maybe it is the husbandry of the thing. Maybe it’s the time and the slow alchemy of turning discarded bones into golden nourishment. Either way, I feel more centered with these jars awaiting the freezer. I feel more at home in my own life. Like the more things change, the harder I must work to remember the unchanging: my God, my love for my family, and dirty dishes.

This is how I plant and water my life. Small acts of husbandry and love repeated. Now have a puppy picture.

This is a dream box.

It’s self-stated purpose (or the purpose given it by its makers) is to hold your dreams forward in the world. I opened it today. The tiny stickie note slept unfaded, though the dream has long since faded. It was a dream I acted on in 2014.

Today I wrote a new little note with a new dream and it’s big. It’s ludicrous from where I sit this day. And then I recall this scripture:

Jabez prayed to the God of Israel, saying, “Oh that you would bless me and enlarge my border, and that your hand might be with me, and that you would keep me from harm so that it might not bring me pain!” And God granted what he asked. 1 Chronicles 4:10

I’m not Jabez. But I am seeking. More responsibility, for that is what enlarging one’s border means. He asked in a specific way and so am I. Not for a physical border but a career border.

I work toward my dream and toward my God. They do not have to be opposing works. There is no magic in the dream box. There is only clarity. A one-and-a-half-inch circle in which to breathe the dream of my heart. Clear concision is necessary.

The old stickie note went in the recycling. It was a real dream and I strove toward it, reaching it in degrees. But it is not THE dream. It was too small. Too concise. It outlived its usefulness.

Maybe it won’t take me five years to look in the box again.

Category: Planting & Watering

When the Going Gets Tough

Recycled Dreams