Appreciate mothers and grandmothers who make Easter brunch while time remains, and smart, thoughtful friends.
Precious are those who will listen to you cry and offer to help. There's joy to be found in something as common as a receding cold and as much a miracle as good health and strong limbs. Put forth effort and maintain it all by running.
Movement breathes life. Take advantage, living in these United States, of the gift of freedom.
Prisoners kept in solitary confinement can't see the bright blue skies and light green trees, while the free man may soar over all that can be found. Watch the eagle rise outside.
On inclement days, novelists, poets and nonfiction writers of all kinds free souls and warm minds like summer sun. Indoors, in libraries with overflowing shelves, open freedom and touch its pages, treasure the gift of books.
Meliorists believe that by taking small, generous actions the world can be made better and share the philosophy in dense books.
Eschew despondency and dystopian fantasy. By embracing change and taking new actions, the future brings events to look forward to in time.
"The question is whether any civilization can wage relentless war on life without destroying itself, and without losing the right to be called civilized," wrote environmentalist Rachel Carson in 1962 taking her argument outside.
Give the gift of power to feminists and activists, a good doctor, people who call themselves friends
people who talk about whole, plant-based foods and nutrition, who campaign for: human rights, the Affordable Care Act, marriage equality, freedom.
Keep all of these heroes in close proximity, even social media counts, poet! And meet the future running.
A woman once toddled, doomed across the lawn for months, and felt only gratitude, concerned but unseeing, for this dogged movement. No one noticed she was no longer capable of running.
She had many beautiful recipes that were too difficult to prepare and overflowing shelves of unused cookbooks.
She became more radical and outspoken as she aged and exercised her freedom.
She could putter, dream, read, write, while spending her days at home. She had so much time
But so little. The health and happiness of the people she knew across continents faded. She attended the funerals of many friends.
Then, in the end, she traded fancy ingredients for simple ones and was grateful to look out upon her garden filled with peppermint and passionflowers and sit for a while outside.
"By acquiescing in an act that can cause such suffering to a living creature, who among us is not diminished as a human being?" wrote Rachel Carson in Silent Spring, the book that led to the Endangered Species Act and drew the nation's attention to the destruction taking place outside.
She was the kind of person who focused her blue mind and took long walks along the water and stopped to watch a river otter and paid attention to running
water of every kind. She would have liked In Watermelon Sugar by Richard Brautigan, perhaps, but she died from breast cancer, liver cancer and a heart attack in 1964, two years before it came out. Helpful friends
rallied around her. She never read this line, "Or you walked someplace. There were flowers all around. That is my name. Perhaps you stared into a river. There as something near you who loved you."; but she may have appreciated it. She placed great warranted faith in books.
She wrote down what she saw and told stories. She had little of it and carefully expended time.
She drew attention to the Earth's atmosphere, which humans depend upon for their freedom.
One man saw the United States as great poem expressing freedom.
Walt Whitman wrote Leaves of Grass in 1855 in joy of being outside
even in death, "I bequeath myself to the dirt to grow from the grass I love, If you want me again look for me under your boot-soles." he wrote. Imagine every breath taken in routine and rest as a gift of time.
Whether a man travels by boat, travels by air, travels by foot, or strolls in sympatico with a beloved companion his time falls short, always running.
To slow time, delve into transporting music, read poetry, examine murals and create urban art. Read a Gothic Western, The Hawkline Monster, Pretty Deadly, mythologies, comic books.
Remember: "We're a cause made up of converts; the doors of this movement are open to anyone whose heart and mind leads them inside," writes Wayne Pacelle of The Humane Society of the United States in The Bond: Our Kinship with Animals, Our Call to Defend Them. A good life ends surrounded by friends.
So, come together, join a book club, share a thumb drive, write handwritten letters, express care and concern for a multitude of friends.
Appreciate the gift of speech — “Do anything, but let it produce joy.” — of freedom.
On occasion light candles and incense and sip Vampire Cabernet from long stemmed glasses as indulgences for the unearned blessing of being born into these United States in this incarnation, but practice effective altruism for the next. Read: The Life You Can Save, The Most Good You Can Do, Doing Good Better — Start with these books.
Fight for the lives of happy ducks, lambs, chicks, hens, rabbits, turkey and sheep. The onset of spring blossoms like a spellbinding gift. Indulge a great variety of senses. Begin running outside.
Run over the water, along the waterfront. Watch the rising moon. Watch the lowering sunsets. Pace with the rain, everywhere running.
The gift writes, takes long walks, shows up, arrives anywhere safely, enjoys freedom and time.
Cherish the good opinion of mother, father and friends. Cherish mythologies and wilderness, planets, trees, trails, farmer's markets, Seattle, new flavors of chocolate, warm clothes, favorite meals, favorite places, and time spent outside.
Enjoy the freedom of a perfect day. Hit the ground running.
Enter a New Year filled with books and refreshed time.
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