I'll get a female cat and "Annoushka" to my heart's content

My first alarm clock (of four, in case you were wondering) will go off in exactly 3 hours and 31 minutes. I may or may not wake up to it (or the three that will follow). Not only is the stifling heat in a house with a broken-down air conditioner a bit too much to fall asleep to, I also stayed up much too late reading a frilly, teenage-girly book about an exiled Russian countess hiding as a servant in England. Of course, there is the inevitable falling in love with a handsome man. What can I say? My taste in reading never quite "grew up." I will always find children's and young adult books much more interesting than grown up books. This one was full of wonderful bits of Russian: dousha...mylienkaya...Annoushka. I loved it. In fact, I am now possessed by an overwhelming desire to name a daughter of mine Anna, just so I can call her Annoushka. Although, I think that in revealing this, I just condemned myself to a life of daughter-less spinsterhood. So be it. I'll get a female cat and Annoushka to my heart's content.

I've recently begun pondering the paths we take in life

More precisely, I ponder my path, how it has not led where I, or those around me, previously hoped and expected. I consider the reasons for that, and most days I conclude that it must be three parts the result of my own disastrous decision-making and one part providence. I find I don't want to alter my long-held plans for who and where I would be in my adult life. But I also find I must do so, although living in a different set of life plans, a different path, feels very much like donning an article of clothing that just doesn't fit quite right. I remind myself that while the path I've come down and the path ahead may be steeper and slower and generally less comfortable than others, it is still my path. Mine alone. And I am learning to trust that someday, perhaps when my years are very, very ripe, I will wake up to find that all of the pieces will have slid neatly into place and that I am exactly where I need to be.

"One may not reach the dawn save by the path of the night."
~Kahlil Gibran

Into the night

I said to the man who stood at the gate of the year
'Give me a light that I may tread safely into the unknown.'

And he replied, 'Go into the darkness and put your hand into the hand of God
That shall be to you better than light and safer than a known way!'

So I went forth and finding the Hand of God
Trod gladly into the night
He led me towards the hills
And the breaking of day in the lone east.

So heart be still!
What need our human life to know
If God hath comprehension?

In all the dizzy strife of things
Both high and low,
God hideth his intention.

~ Minnie Haskins

Happy handprints

In the country,
in the gutter,
hidden by weeds.

I never would have seen it if I had been the driver.

But I was not the driver,
and I did see it,
and this bit of silliness made me pretty happy.

So I'm passing the happiness on to you. :)

the french, again

excerpt from the french on life and love, a charming little book i bought while thrifting in kc last year. i recently considered re-thrifting it so someone else could enjoy it, but decided to go the way of the selfish with it. i really do love the quirky illustrations that accompany some of the quotations. there just aren't enough of them.