Linger in the beautiful
Untitled photo by Carli Jeen via Unsplash
“Meanwhile, let us have a sip of tea. The afternoon glow is brightening the bamboos, the fountains are bubbling with delight, the soughing of the pines is heard in our kettle. Let us dream of evanescence, and linger in the beautiful foolishness of things.”
— Okakura Kakuzō
Exactly five years ago tomorrow, I published the very first post of this blog. For the past few weeks I’ve wondered whether I should do anything to celebrate this milestone, and then I looked back at last year’s post on the exact four-year anniversary– I wasn’t even sure if I was back to writing blogs so soon after Jeff’s death– but I was here, writing about an everyday topic. However, there was no mention of it being the four-year mark. Probably I didn’t even think about it. I was still pretty numb then.
I decided Okakura’s quote was fitting for this five-year mark, because it captures so much of what I hoped to establish here from the very beginning. I wanted this blog to be a place where I, and hopefully others, would slow down and linger over whatever beauty or joy or solace we might be able to share here. The steam rising from that hot cup is a visual reminder of life’s evanescence and a source of warm, healing vapors to inhale in the midst of rapidly-chilling weather (or the remaining cool days of spring, if you live in the southern hemisphere).
Five years ago I didn’t envision I would still be here at this blog at all, let alone being here while missing some of the most important people of my life, and yet also giving thanks for so many others newly arrived, bringing me consolation and joy. Then, as now, I have no idea how much longer I will be here online, or here on this earth, but that’s okay. When we come close to understanding how very brief life is, even for those of us who may live a long time, it’s true that most of the things that seem important to us start to appear at least a little bit foolish. But how beautiful much of that foolishness is, while it is ours!
This post was first published seven years ago, and five years have become twelve. The original post, comments and photo are linked, along with two other related posts, below. These links to related posts, and their thumbnail photos, do not appear in the blog feed; they are only visible when viewing the individual posts by clicking on each one. I have no idea why, nor do I know how they choose the related posts. That’s just the way WordPress does things.
- Posted in: Uncategorized
- Tagged: anniversaries, brevity, commemoration, company, consolation, death, friends, future, joy, life, milestones, remembrance, tea
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