#NewThisDay Writing From My Photo Stream
Newbury Street
"The human heart is the first home of democracy. It is where we embrace our questions. Can we be equitable? Can we be generous? Can we listen with our whole beings, not just our minds, and offer our attention rather than our opinions? And do we have enough resolve in our heart to act courageously, without giving up — ever — trusting our fellow citizens to join with us in our determined pursuit of a living democracy?"
— Terry Tempest Williams in "Engagement”
Breakfast for Wave. I am the kind of grandmother who will make the egg over into the one he wants if I put ketchup on it and today is a day he does not want ketchup. Charlie and Brittany are happy to eat a scrambled egg with or without ketchup. I am listening to a new book on audible, even if I am still thinking so much about Navalny and his heroism and his sense of humor even in prison life which he knew he would never escape even as it got worse and worse for him. In his memoir, he never wavered in his convictions and principles. I think Navalny is a Christ-life figure in this willingness to die for his convictions––his believe in his human and political right to challenge Putin in an election and to call out Putin’s authoritarianism and the greed and profound dishonesty and hypocrisy of those running the country he was born into and would not leave, as well as his right to speak out against an unjust war against Ukraine. I was in church yesterday, at a mass being said for the death of a friend’s 98 year old mother, whom I didn’t know. It gave me an opportunity to think about Alexei every time I looked up at the larger-than-life size Christ on the cross. These thoughts were in my day, and not all of my day. I swam a mile for the first time in awhile. I talked with my cousin and determined that we will host the family holiday party here in December, which I’m looking forward to. We drove into the city for lunch a bit of window shopping on Newbury Street, and coffee at the Thinking Cup, which was delicious. A quiet Saturday in November. I am listening to A Walk in the Park, by Kevin Fedarko, in anticipation of the trip I am making to the Grand Canyon. I tried revising an older poem. Tomorrow I hope to write a new one.