The Plainness of Ordinary Revelation

Week 21

The Plainness of Ordinary Revelation

Tweets

      1.   Change of pace matters.

      2.   Change of venue matters.

      3.   There’s a time for drudgery, when the right thing doesn’t

            get done without endurance.

      4.   Most likely, distinguishing between endurance and

            willfulness is one of life’s most challenging perceptions.

      5.   When does the break come, the light shine through?

      6.   When someone who counts and measures the depths

            says “lighten up,” it’s probably time.

      7.   When will I learn that doing in the right way is waiting?

Core

Elbow on his desk,

running his fingers

through his hair,

he couldn’t get

to the bottom of it.

Then, walking to that

special shop to buy

a birthday card

for his sister,

it came to him

when the caterpillar

fell on his neck.

© 2012 Allan Cox, Allan Cox & Associates Inc. All Rights Reserved.

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Life in Firefly Village

Week 20

Life in Firefly Village

Tweets

      1.   Intriguing how community takes place and people 

            adhere to form.

      2.   I had a professor, a sociologist, who defined

            socialization as the process whereby a biological blob becomes a social slob.

      3.   Amazing, too, how simple good will gets things started in

            the right way.

      4.   Perhaps you can’t go home again, but you can savor

            what home gave you.

      5.   It was a slower time then, but life still requires we make

            the most of fallow time, when more happens than we

            think.

      6.   Me? I like to watch tall grass bend in the wind.

      7.   Have you seen any fireflies lately?

Curb

We, boys mostly,

sat on the curb

in our town

wherever we

met to play

ball in the streets.

Sometimes we sat

there with a

portable radio, listening

to some game that mattered.

The curb was

the starting place,

the spectator place,

the ending place,

when our time

in the street

was done,

when we might hear

someone’s mother call

her son to lunch or supper.

There were times,

too, after supper

when our dads would

join us, till it

began to get dark

and we’d sit on the curb,

laugh and tell stories,

and watch the fireflies.

© 2012 Allan Cox, Allan Cox & Associates Inc. All Rights Reserved.

______________________________________________________

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The imagination Hiding in Small Things

Week 19

The imagination Hiding in Small Things

Tweets

      1.   Carrying a book is one of life’s pleasant little rituals.

      2.   Let’s say you pull one out of a bookcase downstairs,

            then climb upstairs to sit and read in bed.

      3.   We become aware of these simple acts and what they

            mean to us when we’re interrupted from carrying them

            out.

      4.   Decades ago, a facilitator asked us to cross our arms,

            then reverse the way we always do it. It made us feel

            clumsy, ungainly. Try it.

      5.   What comes to mind is how much these little moves

            serve to hold us up, even comfort us.

      6.   Parsing ritual can be an exercise in imagination.

      7.   Imagination is always some kind of coming alive, a

            knowing participation.

Upheld

Have you noticed

how good it feels

to carry a book?

Just one, with it

held between your

palm and fingers

on one side and

your pressuring thumb

on the other.

Something good

will come from this,

or likely to.

Once, a grade-school teacher

asked me to bring the

dictionary from the school

library to our classroom

for a project—the

big one on the stand,

ten inches thick.

I cradled it in both

my arms and

imagined I was hoisting

a wheelbarrow full of coal,

delivering it

to our cold little house.

© 2012 Allan Cox, Allan Cox & Associates Inc. All Rights Reserved.

______________________________________________________

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When Time Rubs Against Your Knuckles

Week 18

When Time Rubs Against Your Knuckles

Tweets

      1.   Some things and people have to be left alone to thrive.

      2.   Many things I start, or have a hand in starting, should be
            left to others to finish.

      3.   Hands off means “no looking over another’s shoulder.”

      4.   Subordinates often want to be left alone, be independent,
            ply their own craft, so they can bring you a rainbow.

      5.   Rough going in team settings—surprising hardship, hidden
            roadblocks, bogging down, frayed nerves-- are the stuff of
            achievement.

      6.   Time spent, doubts abounding,, too late to turn back though
             all seems lost, then a stunning glimmer.

      7.   Genius pulled through a slit, reversing all fortune.

Abrasion

A seed is planted

and like a

watched pot

that doesn’t boil,

should be left alone

for awhile,

tended, perhaps,

and watered, but

not busied.

Grains that rub, that

slip through our grasp

and time itself

make way for

appearances we cherish

and exceed our

small hopes.

© 2012 Allan Cox, Allan Cox & Associates Inc. All Rights Reserved.

______________________________________________________

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