Kindness

Little Cuter created a Kindness of Calendar for her graduating kindergartner.

Every day has a different activity, starting with June 1st:  Volunteer to do the dishes after a meal.

FlapJilly was faced with the detritus of baking and snacking and dinner.  She was unfazed.

It was a problem to be solved, an organizational dilemma that was right up her alley.  That which did not go into the machine was washed by competent hands in the sink.  

And Mama didn't have to do anything at all.

It's been a tough week for the grown-ups; kindness certainly helped.

No Words

I have all these thoughts. My head tends to explode as I follow them. I keep trying, but I have no way to make sense....

If part of being an ally is opening myself to the anguish......

FlapJilly loves her Facebook Messenger app because she and I can chat.... if Mama gives her the phone....on which she saw something that led them to a conversation about skin color and how some people think it makes a difference and the importance of standing up when people are mean because of skin color and my favorite little girl's face appeared over her mother's shoulder, nodding her agreement with a fierce and determined and certain mien as my daughter and I tried not to cry........

https://bensbells.org/

Ben's Bells organized a clean-up in Downtown Tucson on Saturday morning, after protest turned to destruction on Friday night, and the only thing more absurd than the oxymoron of Downtown Tucson is breaking the windows of the local businesses who support it .... and then I go off the deep end (Are there outside agitators in Tucson?)..... 

Not only do I have no words, I have no conclusions trying to be put into words..

I do know this.  In my darkest days, after I watched Gabby Giffords's head blow apart, senselessly, suddenly, 10' away from me...... I often found  myself sitting at a table in a corner of the Ben's Bells studio, painting coins 

for bells, 

as I wept, acknowledged but unmolested, doing good when I could think of nothing else to do.  

Beautiful Annie gifted me this one in the hospital while they buried my little friend.

 

It hangs beside the fireplace in our living room; I notice it every single day.  It speaks to me and smiles at me and today, perhaps it's giving me some guidance.....

I feel better having written this.  Thanks for helping me organize a thought.  

Kindness..........

It's not a bad place to start, I guess, but........