windinthemaples | Resistance is Futile

mermaiden gave me these questions to answer. If you're of a mind to answer some of your own, comment below and I'll whip some up for you. :)

Tell me your perfect day, waking to sleeping. What would you do, who would you see, where would you go? Where would you be in life?

My perfect day is Yule day in the not-too-distant future. I wake up, well-rested, a couple hours before the rest of the household and use that delicious alone-time to check my email and have a quiet breakfast of toast and tea. Once my husband and child(ren) are awake, we're quick to get ready and out the door, where we drive to a food pantry I've had a hand in organizing and running. We spend the whole morning as a family, dispensing canned foods and hugs and heavy boxes of wrapped gifts to the clients. They are all extended family to us.

Daniel takes child(ren) to the park to play and take Solstice photographs while I stay behind to finish a great, inspirational book while soaking in a hot tub. I have plenty of time to reflect on the meaning of Yule and thoughts of what I want to accomplish in the next year. I have solitude in which to dress and annoint myself with a warm, spicy perfume that sings of the season.

We get back together at the house, that beautiful spacious house with all the windows and trees outside. Our friends and family, who live nearby, start arriving with vegan dishes for our Solstice potluck. Music is on the stereo and the whole place fills with the comforting sounds of dishes clinking, children laughing and drumming, and the smart crackle of a fire in the fireplace. We'll spend the afternoon feasting communally and working on cute little crafts with the children. We'll bake and cut spiced dough ornaments for the tree and create birdfeeders, hay stacks, and salt licks as offerings for the animals wintering outside. At some point, we'll all move outside, securely wrapped in warm blankets, for a ritual. I'll have the time to sing a chant and see the eyes of each person in that circle, all beloved friends and family, and plenty of time to soak in the energy of that moment. We'll finally break off on our own to meditate in the last minutes of darkness before sunrise. The children will be snug in bed and everyone will scatter to their own places, singly or in pairs or family units. In this perfect day, I'll find a spot to sit on the dunes at the edge of the sea, completely warm and cocooned in my blankets, and I will watch as the sky transforms from darkness to that glorious pink and gold of daybreak. I will sing to the Sun and feel joy and gratitude to my very bones.

I'm going to cheat and extend my perfect day to a day and a half.

After sunrise, I'll rejoin my friends and family indoors where we can be warm and safe as we join our sleeping children for a few hours of rest. We'll wake up to the smell of a late breakfast cooking and the sounds of caroling from the livelier folks in our group. We'll all open gifts, curled up under the tree with all its dear little handmade ornaments, and share, if we choose, sacred moments from our time alone the night before. The children will run around the house whooping and leaping, handmade capes tied around their shoulders, sharing their new gifts with each other. Everyone is invited to stay as long as they like, maybe even days of gentle community and celebration.

What one thing in this lifetime do you want to accomplish more than anything?
More than anything, I want to live a life of inspiring philanthropy and vision. I want to have the world be a better place because I lived in it, to have people feeling more positive about humanity, embodied life, and the goodness inherent in it all.

What bit of advice would you give your 15 year old self?
The teasing means nothing. After high school, those girls will lose their looks while you grow into yours and ten years later they'll all be befriending you on this wacky thing called Facebook. Hang on--this is certainly *not* the best time of your life.

If Graeme could only take one thing away from the years growing up, what would you want it to be?
Only one thing? Love fearlessly. If I get a few more things, I'd want him to understand the power of doing the right thing and the unshakeable depth of Daniel and I's love for him.

What part of your life do you think the Goddess is strongest in, reminds you of Her the most, resonates with Her?
Service to others. Any variety, this is when I feel most plugged-in to the Divine.

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I'd love to take some questions. :)

1. Where is one place in the world you feel compelled to see? Why do you think you feel that inner call for that place? Have you been there?

2. What is one anecdote from your childhood that you think best reflects the seeds of your personality?

3. What would your dream job be?

4. What song do you turn on when you need a good cry? Or, conversely, what song makes you happiest?

5. What is one thing about you that most people don't know?

I'd be happy to answer a few questions if you have any you'd like to ask me. :)

And I must say, I love your idea of a Yule celebration. Beautiful~

1. Congratulations! You've been promoted to librarian super-power. As part of your duties, you get to decide which books are required reading in public schools. What are a few titles on the list and why did you pick them? :)

2. Name five to ten famous people (fictional, historical, currently living, dead, undead, your choice!) that you'd like a chance to count among your circle of close friends.

3. What college course, if any, radically changed your worldview? Why?

4. Burgers and French fries and Cokes are available absolutely everywhere! What food items do you wish were available on every street corner? :)

5. What is one book you really loved as a child? Why?

That perfect day? It put me in happy tears. What a beautiful, joy-filled vision. I believe, whole-heartedly, that such a day will someday be. I know it. *so, so, so much love*

Resistance is Futile

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