Threads & Tethers

Everyone has their ways of processing the world around them and within them. One of mine is writing. The practice of putting words together on a page puts my life together a little better. It sharpens my attention, and makes more clear the lens through which I see the world.

Last spring I stopped writing on a daily basis, except for the occasional burst of creative energy or the expression of moral outrage. The absence of this practice has been noticeable. At least to me.

Writing acts as both a thread and a tether. It weaves together the callings of my heart with the steps of my feet, and keeps me in close connection to who and what matter most. Without this practice in place things begin to unravel, and there is a growing sense of being unhitched to that which keeps me grounded.

If ever we were in need of a thread and a tether it is now. Now is not the time to be at loose ends with ourselves.

Which means, there is only one choice to be made. At least for me.

Start writing again. And so I am.

What are your ways of processing the world?

What acts as both your thread and your tether?

Whatever it is, if you have set it down, now might be the time to pick it back up.

The Chase

Chasing squirrels is high on Gracie’s to-do list any day of the week. Because she can’t safely be off-leash out in our neck of the woods, that makes actually chasing one a moot point. If she tries, as she did yesterday, forgetting that she is tethered to an old stump, she will get caught up short in very short order.

The thing is, the squirrels don’t know she is on a leash.

This morning a tree squirrel who calls our property home was afraid to make a run for the woods, never realizing that freedom was his for the taking. Flitting from branch to branch he chattered constantly, trying to scold and scare her away. She circled the tree, jumped up on the trunk of the tree, and sat by the tree, but no matter how much Gracie wanted to chase that squirrel down, her leash wouldn’t let her do it.

Sometimes I want to put my thoughts on a leash. You know the ones. The ones that chatter and scold and scare us and just won’t shut up. What if we put them on a leash and tethered them to an old stump? And when those thought show up chattering and scolding and scaring, we remember that no matter how much those thoughts want to chase us down, the leash on which we’ve put them won’t allow it.

Pick a thought, put it on a leash, tether it to a stump, and head out into the woods where freedom is ours for the taking.