It's to the Rooms We Hold Dear Thing

Dear America,

"How to be happy when you are miserable.  

Plant Japanese poppies 

with cornflowers and mignonette, 

and bed out the petunias 

among the sweet-peas

 so that they shall scent each other.  

See the sweet-peas coming up.  

Drink very good tea 

out of a thin Worcester cup 

of a colour between 

apricot and pink." 

Rumer Godden, writer
#301 "Nothing is worth more than this day." By Katharine and Ross Petras

this is my mom, if she were living in a verse.

and in this morning, as I think mom thoughts, and wishing I could just beam myself over to see her, to drink very good tea, in a dainty Worcester cup. in the living room that shelters and safeguards nearly sixty years of marriage and family and seasons, and thinking she would be most happy to know, that at the ripe old age of fifty-something-something, that her girl has finally come upon a worthy goal to take her places unknown:  writing four blogs in the next four days!  teehee

I know!  Crazy, right! it's a sizable mission, considering my pace has been a wee bit non-existent of late.  

but i just got to thinking, given this will be blog #997 if it ever gets to print, i will have only a few more to go to reach the number i have waited for, for so long; and likewise, given that this blog's divine birth -- it's very intention from the beginning -- has rested in the hearts and minds and arms of our country's founders, it just seems natural for this momentous occasion to coincide with Mother's Day.

Bearing in mind the labor of love that this process has become, the idea of actually coming to the intersection of ten years and one thousand blogs is a longitude and latitude that simply takes my breath away.  

I love this Rumer Godden quote, above; it fits quite nicely with another favorite of mine, "Bread and water can so easily be toast and tea."  --  anonymous.

Rumer seems like a woman i would have loved to have known.  In the bio, linked above, it mentions:

One of her favourite axioms came from an Indian proverb that says - "everyone is a house with four rooms, a physical, a mental, an emotional and a spiritual. Most of us tend to live in one room most of the time but unless we go into every room every day, even if only to keep it aired, we are not a complete person". She quotes this in her autobiography A House with Four Rooms.

and as I breathe in these words, on this rather atypical day in May -- with a light rain misting over the landscape outside my four walls, housing my four rooms,  I'm realizing that quite possibly, she, in accordance to the ancient Indian proverb, may have missed one;   considering the conversation we've been having here on the old G thing, what about the space we place for the fifth room, of the political realm?

and indeed, it is... just one more room to air out from time to time.

[and proving to be a perfect candidate for Marie Kondo every single day.... but i digress]

on this day, i love that a cup of tea can take me back to memories spanning my fifty-something years, to sitting across the room and seeing my mama in her favorite chair, drinking anything from a cup of jasmine tea to a Manhattan.  

in a sense, i can feel as if I'm living in the comfort of all four/five of my rooms, whenever in the company of her.

it's the same feeling i have when sitting in my corner window, under the shadow of a giant eucalyptus, watching the neighborhood come to life in the morning, drinking coffee. 

our rooms are defined by what we value, and expressed through our relationships; our rooms converge, and even overlap, by seasonal whims of life and times; but for the most part, our rooms are private, sacred to our own heart, our own mind, our own destiny, designed and divined by God.

...and right on cue and just as the day should have it-- my girl and i just finished a sweet conversation.  She often calls during her lunch time, my mid-morning...
....hanging up, my thoughts have spun into realizing my baby girl has her own rooms, and then some.  What an honor it is to be her mama.

Did she choose me? 
Did I choose mine? 

I would like to think it was a collaboration with God, as God awoke one day and decided to play in His Garden and...... Plant Japanese poppies 

with cornflowers and mignonette, 

and bed out the petunias 

among the sweet-peas

 so that they shall scent each other.  

See the sweet-peas coming up.  

Drink very good tea 

out of a thin Worcester cup 

of a colour between 

apricot and pink.

...and plant a consciousness within us all to know God
in relationship with the floor plan of our lives, our own rooms.

no four/five rooms are designed the same.

the thing is, i never know what the day will bring on this day in the life of an American Girl.

it's my diary and i can do what i want, say what i want, feel what i want -- and have! --  nearly a thousand times over.

America -- a mansion in many ways --  is a family-centered culture because family gives us a sense of security and wealth in ways unimaginable; a strong, healthy, loving, happy family is priceless, in terms of its possible return upon society.

to which, this day, i give my honor.

Make it a Good Day, G