The river is high. Moss covers the bare maples, upon the bark of which sprouts the new growth of ferns. Near the ferry crossing, perched high in the bright sun atop a dead cottonwood, are two bald eagles. Beside us, a towhee spins a few notes, as if trying to catch our attention, while a crested blue jay calls out, No! Look over here! Everything is right. Perfect. Such is […]
Something I wish I’d learned during my growing up years, and that had been stressed above all at home and in school, is the importance not of proving myself as an individual, but of embracing and cultivating my natural talents in a spirit of contribution and cooperation. Instead, I was caught up in the cult of individuality, wherein I mistakenly equated self-worth with accomplishment on the dead-end terms of a […]
I think of Joe, our cat, who, in the years before he died of old age in 2015, would sit in peace behind the house and look off into space as he listened to the birds and the squirrels making their rounds. Finally, after a very short illness, which of course was no illness at all, death took hold of him and shook him from head to tail, and wrung […]
I’m one of the crazy people who know — yes, know — peace is possible in my lifetime. I also know that the only time peace is possible is now. Something else I know: peace is not possible if I’m not at peace myself. The rest — is simple mathematics. ~ [ 2097 ]
A little time on hands and knees Is good for the spirit. World leaders, begin this way: Clean your bathrooms, Scrub your floors, Make bread for the poor; They may or may not love you, But this is what your life is for. ~ [ 2088 ]
In my seventy years I must also have walked twenty-three hundred miles or more. Of course not every step was taken in peace, for peace. If only they had been. Alas, many were wasted. But I’m learning. ~ [ 2076 ]
If you were to ask me what I really do, I wouldn’t know what to answer, except that it appears to be very little. I write decently, and say some decent things, but I’m probably at my best when I’m not writing, and even better when I’m not saying anything at all. Sometimes I think that if I were to remain silent long enough, the meaning of my lifetime of […]
A warm, steady rain. Sirens half a mile away. A common sound these days. Doctor, I have pain. It’s fading now. To rain. ~ [ 2074 ]
As I sit here watching the world go by, I remind myself that those who sign up to terrorize their fellow human beings suffer from a lifetime of anger, fear, loneliness, and trauma. In this way they’re like the wealthy, powerful bullies whose unconscionable bidding they do. Their outlook is beyond sad. Isolated as they are, seeking security and a sense of belonging in numbers, they epitomize the tragedy of […]
Our questions, problems, troubles are pebbles in a pond. Out of reach, yet they rest in the peace of a quiet mind. If we go in after them, up comes mud. ~ [ 2065 ]
William Michaelian 
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