Tag Archives: Love

1219. The search for meaningful origins for familiar or strange words is far older than the modern understanding of linguistic evolution and the relationships of languages. ~Wikipedia

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Where words come from is a fascinating subject, full of folklore and historical lessons. Often, popular tales of a word’s origin arise. Sometimes these are true; more often they are not. While it can be disappointing when a neat little tale turns out to be untrue, almost invariably the true origin is just as interesting. ~Wordorigins.org

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As my level of tolerance for this heat and lack of rain approached critical mass today, I attempted to take my mind off the misery by going to see what was on Pinterest. I came across an image of some words that have come into usage, and although I rather liked them I questioned their validity. So as the mercury rose higher on the thermometer and my grip on sanity loosened another notch or two, I researched them and then created some words of my own. Ex-English teachers can do that, can’t they?! At least, my blood is not boiling now, and I’ve chuckled enough to bring myself back in off the ledge, as it were. So here goes with some etymology, urban and homegrown. And yes, I will concede that the last one of my own making is quite lame!

nyctophile-a person loves or has a preference for night, darkness; pluviophile-a person who loves rain and/or finds comfort or joy or peace of mind during rainy days; selenophile-a person who loves the moon; ceraunophile-a person who loves lightning and thunder; thermophile-an organism that thrives at high temperatures

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antithermophile-an organism(person) that withers in high temperatures; floraphile-a person who loves flowers; aesthetistophile-a person who loves beauty; faunaphile-a person who loves animals; personaphile-a person who loves people; sunnycoolaphile-a person who likes bright days with a nip in the air

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The unfolding of your(God’s) words gives light; it gives understanding to the simple. ~Psalm 119:130  ✝

**All images via Pinterest

1218. Flowers do not indulge in sentiment. They indulge in passion… Octave Mirbeau

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Surely the flowers of a hundred springs
Are simply the souls of beautiful things!

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The poppies aflame with gold and red
Were the kisses of lovers in days that are fled.

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The purple pansies with dew-drops pearled
Were the rainbow dreams of a youngling world.

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The lily, white as a star apart,
Was the first pure prayer of a virgin heart.

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The daisies that dance and twinkle so
Were the laughter of children in long ago.

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The sweetness of all true friendship yet
Lives in the breath of the mignonette.

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To the white narcissus there must belong
The very delight of a maiden’s song.

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And the rose, all flowers of the earth above,
Was a perfect, rapturous thought of love.

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Oh! surely the blossoms of all the springs
Must be the souls of beautiful things.
~Lucy Maud Montgomery

My beloved is to me a cluster of henna blossoms from the vineyards of En Gedi. ~Song of Songs 1:14  ✝

**All images via Pinterest; collage by Natalie

1217. There is nothing better than adversity. Every defeat, every heartbreak, every loss, contains its own seed, its own lesson on how to improve. ~Malcolm X

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At last, you will not be remembered for
roaming the earth as a non-entity,
but by every word, and every miracle,
and every love, and every seed that ever came
from the innermost part of your heart.
~Michael Bassey Johnson

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Every day I read blog post after blog post filled with litanies of “somebody done me wrong” songs, and I know that pain and loss are real and deep, unwarranted and regrettable, heartbreaking and devastating. And although I can’t walk that proverbial mile in the shoes of these bloggers, they need to know that we’ve all been there and done that. But ya know, there comes a time when one must let the past go and move on. My guess is if I handed any of them a burning hot potato that I’d just taken out of the oven, they would put the darn thing down before it did any serious damage to their hand. And so why is it that any of them or us hold on to toxic, past suffering, letting it “burn” us over and over again, day in and day out! Why do we give hateful, hurtful people that kind of power over our lives? Isn’t it like dragging dead bodies around with us wherever we go-weighty, stinking, rotting corpses with no life left in them? Why do we do that? Is it because we think nothing good or anyone loving will ever come along again? Oh my gosh, if nature were like that, life on planet earth would have ended eons ago. Like everything else God created we are full of seeds and possibilities, but the seeds must first be sown and then nurtured before the possibilities become evident, not unlike those minuscule green shoots that push up from the darkness of the soil to the light. And that sowing process can’t be done by whining and wallowing around in the stench of those carcasses we’re hanging on to. It can only be done when disappointments and heartbreaks are finally thrown onto a compost heap to become fodder for new growth and the seeds are thrown out to germinate! And no, it’s not that I’ve lived a sheltered, privileged life devoid of heartache that I can say these things for I’ve known bitter loss; I live with chronic pain; I’ve dealt with defeat; and I’ve experienced utter despair; but I’ve also known enough of joy and happiness and miracles not to let that which has tried to break me define who and what I am and/or steal another millisecond of what life is left in these old bones. Walking away is a choice; letting go is a choice; setting ourselves free from harmful people and things is a choice, and only we can make those choices. So grieve a while, sing your sad songs, write your sad stories and poems, and then pick yourself up, dust your fanny off from the fall, stand bravely tall, and declare to life and the world that you cannot, will not be subdued or diminished by others or the past. Then walk away with songs of hope in your words, and never, ever look back.

He(the Lord) heals the brokenhearted and binds up their wounds. ~Psalm 147:3  ✝

**Images via Pinterest; text box added to altered and edited images I created; collage by Natalie too

1210. If grief can be a doorway to love, then let us all weep for the world we are breaking apart so we can love it back to wholeness again. ~Robin Wall Kimmerer

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Gratitude bestows reverence, allowing us
to encounter everyday epiphanies, those
transcendent moments of awe that change
forever how we experience life and the world.
~John Milton

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When despair for the world grows in me
and I wake in the night at the least sound
in fear of what my life and my children’s lives may be,
I go and lie down where the wood drake
rests in his beauty on the water, and the great heron feeds.
I come into the peace of wild things
who do not tax their lives with forethought
of grief. I come into the presence of still water.
And I feel above me the day-blind stars
waiting with their light. For a time
I rest in the grace of the world, and am free.
~Wendell Berry

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He (the Lord) maketh me lie down in green pastures: he leadeth me beside the still waters. ~Psalm 23: 1-2  ✝

**Images of wood drakes and great herons via Pinterest; collages created by Natalie

1198. When you arise in the morning, think of what a privilege it is to be alive-to breathe, to think, to enjoy, to love. ~Marcus Aurelius

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Every morning, when we wake up,
we have twenty-four brand new hours to live.
What a precious gift!
We have the capacity to live in a way
that these twenty-four hours will bring
peace, joy, and happiness to ourselves and others.
~Thich Nhat Hanh

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Hello, sun in my face.
Hello, you who made the morning
and spread it over the fields
and into the faces of the tulips
and the nodding morning glories,
and into the windows of, even,
the miserable and the crotchety –
best preacher that ever was,
dear star, that just happens
to be where you are in the universe
to keep us from ever-darkness,
to ease us with warm touching,
to hold us in the great hands of light –
good morning, good morning, good morning.
Watch, now, how I start the day
in happiness, in kindness.
~Mary Oliver

The path of the righteous is like the morning sun, shining ever brighter till the full light of day. ~Proverbs 4:18  ✝

**Morning glory in my yard

1195. Of the good in you I can speak, but not of the evil. For what is evil but good tortured by its own hunger and thirst? ~Kahlil Gibran

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The whole course of human history
may depend on a change of heart
in one solitary and even humble individual –
for it is in the solitary mind and soul of
the individual that the battle between
good and evil is waged and
ultimately won or lost.
~M. Scott Peck

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At the end of each day in the Creation story in Genesis it says: “God saw that it was good.” And then after the 6th day it says: “God saw all that he had made, and it was very good.” We are made in the image of God and so “at the heart of who we are is the love and wisdom of God.” “The divine likeness within us may be hidden or forgotten. It may be in terrible bondage by wrongdoing but the image of God remains at the heart of who we are, even though we may live at what seems an infinite distance from it.” (J. Philip Newell, THE BOOK OF CREATION) Why else would we blush or feel guilty about something we have done wrong? Unless of course something within us discloses its own goodness and disapproval of evil. We are witnessing on the world’s stage, horrific acts of evil that bombard us every day because of constant media coverage. Sadly many are fearful and losing heart. What we need to realize is that on any and all of those days, somewhere in the world man’s ability to be a mirror of God’s goodness is visible as well, but it’s is not researched or reported. Why? Money, money, money!

“The garden of God in which we have been created has not been destroyed. Nor has it been abandoned. We may live in a state of exile from in, but God forever dwells in that place and seeks our company. The Book of Genesis describes God as ‘walking in the garden at the time of the evening breeze’ and calling out ‘Where are you?’ The garden says, Eriugena, is our ‘human nature that was made in the image of God.’ God, he says, still walks in the garden of our souls searching for us…’” (J. Philip Newell, THE BOOK OF CREATION)

And the Lord God said, “The man has now become like one of us, knowing good and evil…” ~Excerpt from Genesis 3:22  ✝

For the love of money is a root of all kinds of evil. ~Excerpt from 1 Timothy 7:10  ✝

**Image via Facebook

1194. We could never have loved the earth so well if we had had no childhood in it. ~George Eliot

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There is a garden in every childhood,
an enchanted place where colors are
brighter, the air is softer, and the morning
more fragrant than ever again.
~Elizabeth Lawrence

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If you love a flower, don’t pick it.
Because if you pick it, it dies and
ceases to be what you love.
So just let it be…
Love is not about possession.
Love is about appreciation.
~Osho

As a child and an adult, I’m overcome with wonder when I smell a flower, like this lily. They are so very beautiful and fragrant, and I’m also fascinated by their stamen and anthers. Just look at the amazing red anthers on this one. Is it any wonder pollinators are attracted to them? My youngest grandson is one of those beautifully innocent children who is filled with curiosity. And as we worked in the garden one day last summer, he was quite taken with these anthers and I explained that they were food for pollinators. Afterwards I turned to get a tool out of my bucket, and when I swiveled back around, he had red all over his little mouth. Stunned, I asked if he’d eaten some of the pollen, and he said yes. As I reeled from the possibility that I might have killed my grandson or at least let him become very sick, I asked him why in the world he would have eaten the pollen. He said, “Well Mompy, I figured if it doesn’t kill the bees and such, it won’t kill me.” Before I took him in to wipe off his mouth, I decided to phone my daughter who just laughed and said, “That’s my Joe.” As it turns out he was okay and did not get a bellyache, but we had a long talk about not putting things in our mouths without first being very sure that the substances are not toxic to humans.

The one who gets wisdom loves life; the one who cherishes understanding will soon prosper. ~Proverbs 19:8  ✝

**Image found on Pixabay

1193. Imprinted on our heart is the exact moment we fell in love with the beach. ~Judith Frenette

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What we remember from
childhood we remember forever —
permanent images, stamped,
inked, imprinted, eternally seen.
~Edited excerpt
from Cynthia Ozick

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Oh, the golden age of the barefoot time,
While life was a fairy tale sung in rhyme,
When phantoms grim of a future day
Were hid in the mists of the far away…
Off for a swim on an afternoon,—
The moments—why would they fly so soon!
The rosy skies of our barefoot days.
~Excerpted lines from a poem
by Adelbert Farrington Caldwell

On the far left in the collage above are my great uncle and I on the beach in Southern California. He was one of my most favorite people on the planet, and before my Daddy came home from the War, he frequently took me the half a block down to the shores of the beautiful blue Pacific. Even after daddy got home and until we moved to Texas, the beach remained a cherished part of my daily reality. Sadly the photo of uncle and me is so faded now that you can’t even make out the water anymore. So I added the other pictures in the collage that I found on Pinterest to show what my earliest memories of the beach look like. Although my photo has faded, the imprint of those images in my mind’s eye is still brilliantly vivid so much so that 7 decades later I’ve never forgotten the people and places of my childhood. They are treasures that I horde and keep safe in my heart because I know that childlike faith, along with childlike love, are an open road to God’s heart.

And he said: “Truly I tell you, unless you change and become like little children, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven.” ~Matthew 18:3 ✝

1191. Seasons of the heart…

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Grief can be the garden of compassion.
If you keep your heart open through everything,
your pain can become your greatest ally
in your life’s search for love and wisdom.
~Rumi

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Your pain is the breaking of the shell that encloses
your understanding.
Even as the stone of the fruit must break, that its
heart may stand in the sun, so must you know pain.
And could you keep your heart in wonder at the daily miracles of your life, your pain would not seem
less wondrous than your joy;
And you would accept the seasons of your heart,
even as you have always accepted the seasons that
pass over your fields.
And you would watch with serenity through the
winters of your grief.
Much of your pain is self-chosen.
It is the bitter potion by which the physician within
you heals your sick self.
Therefore trust the physician, and drink his remedy
in silence and tranquillity:
For his hand, though heavy and hard, is guided by
the tender hand of the Unseen,
And the cup he brings, though it burn your lips, has
been fashioned of the clay which the Potter has
moistened with His own sacred tears.
~Kahlil Gibran

Then I would still have this consolation–my joy in unrelenting pain–that I had not denied the words of the Holy One.~Job 6:10   ✝️

1185. We can only be said to be alive in those moments when our hearts are conscious of our treasures. ~Thornton Wilder

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Today is not just another day, it is the one day that is given to you today. It is a gift, the only gift of a day that you have right now. And so the only appropriate response is gratefulness. If you do nothing else but to cultivate that response, to the great gift that this unique day is, and if you learn to respond as if it were the first day of your life and the very last day, then you will have spent this day very well.

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Begin by opening your eyes and be surprised that you have eyes you can open, the incredible array of colors that is constantly offered to us for pure enjoyment. Look at the sky; we so rarely look at the sky, so rarely note how different it is from moment to moment with clouds coming and going. We just think of the weather, but we don’t think of all the different nuances of weather. We just think of good weather and bad weather. This day, right now, this unique weather, maybe a kind that may never come in that form again. The formation of clouds in the sky may never be the same than it is right now, open your eyes and look at that.

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Look at the faces of people that you meet. Each one has an incredible story behind their face, a story that you could never fully fathom not only their own story but the story of their ancestors. We all go back so far. And in this present moment, this day, all the people you meet, all that life from generations and so many all over the world, flows together and meets you here like life giving water if you only open your heart and drink. Open your heart to the incredible gifts that civilization gives to you. You flip a switch and there is electric light. You turn a faucet and there is warm water and cold water and drinkable water. It is a gift that millions and millions of people will never experience. ~Br. David Steindl-Rast, Benedictine Monk

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Give thanks to the Lord, for he is good; His love endures forever. 1 Chronicles 16:34  ✝

**Images via Pinterest except for middle one that I took at the bottom; collages by Natalie