Seeing Things in a New Light

I'm on a mandatory slow down, but this enforcement has allowed me to notice and take in and experience things in a new light.   Rather than a stark fluorescent tube lighting up my room with a vibrating intensity, I am seeing things through a warm ambient lamp that floods my experiences with a gentle softness.

These things I have been enjoying:

Taking turns reading Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets with my daughter in bed.  While she reads (and with such expression!), I knit rows of her red scarf, and then we switch.

Sharing tea with my daughters.  They drink out of little Japanese cups with no handles and they put in just about as much sugar as tea.  And then they lap it up with little teaspoons, like kitty cats.  And I laugh.

Settling into a comfortable position in my bed or in a chair.  It never took so much adjusting before, but as I finesse and finagle and lift my immobile hips with my able hands to position them just right, I am grateful that I can do this, that it IS possible to find comfort, even if just for moments at a time.

Bracing this computer on my upright knees, propping my head up on pillows and an airplane neck cushion and summoning my spirit to help me write.  Hearing the tipple of keys as my hands stumble to catch up with my thoughts and pushing away my monkey mind, writing what comes to mind, not censoring, not judging.

The editing that comes later.  Reworking, refining, finding the beauty and excising the ugliness.  Shifting, changing, deleting.

Bringing my characters alive and feeling their pain in my very bones.  Crying while I write.  Or laughing.  But writing.  And listening to music that suits the mood of my writing.

Sharing my space with friends.  Allowing myself to be just who I am where I am now, and they fitting in to fit in my little shell for a little while.  The happy chatter, the sharing of tea and biscuits, the warm and grateful place we can bask in together for a while.

Puzzling how to move things from one place to another without being able to carry them.  Figuring out everything new and doing things differently.  Breaking my routine.

Even as I am able to speed up more, I find myself slowing down more often.  Why?  Because it helps me meet myself where I am; it helps me appreciate all the moments of lovely light that I find myself sitting in each day.