My gratitude was easier even though it was a tough week.
Politics is effecting me, making me so sad.
While we try to live in the present, we also look to the future,
as Chagdud Rinpoche once said, “with a little bit of hope.”
The hatred, the pulling apart of our basic rights,
and feeling a bit old to be fighting this when in fact
we are still working long hours to make a business run,
is making it hard to see the future with any type of upbeat dreaming.
I hope this shifts during the eclipse time.

*spoiler alert… this is not all happy happy silly silly.
it is more like life than that….*

Gratitude was easy, though.
Our insane cats kept us both laughing, even to the point of laughing
long after the fact seeing the visuals I witnessed this week!
*giggling now*
It started with my water cup lid going missing.
I have to have a lid on the water beside my bed or trust me,
small tongues will shortcut into my water glass instead of walking to their bowls.
*i love them, but they would go to my glass
after stretching their legs into the air to clean their tuchies!*
I looked everywhere, under the bed, in the b ed, and finally gave up.
Next day I found it in his toy stash!
*i could see him in my mind’s eye trotting this huge lid out in front of him like
an African lip plate, bat ears out to the side, big as ever!*

Grateful for the good news: Oregon intends to protect the ACA on their own…
despite what the feds do.  Thankful for people, color, work, and acts of forgiveness.
*especially the grace of forgiveness. 
true regret, contrition and forgiveness bond trust over time.*

Then back to the crazy cats again, as they stole dowels from Mitchell’s woodworking pile,
continued to hide Julie’s ice cream sticks everywhere, and then the funniest thing yet,
Yamantaka decided he loves pea pods.  Raw.
Begs for them and carries his everywhere.  Such a strange and funny cat!

The new moon and lunar eclipse fell (in the Vedic tradition) with Ganesha..
We did a Ganesha Puja and shared our intention for the next cycle.
We do this and use the lunar cycle to mark the time we share it.
I entered our intentions into my journal…
*a bit too personal and involves others to share*
I’ve also been listening to Ken Burns “Roosevelt” and caught this quote by Eleanor…
roughly.  I had to look it up… very timely for NOW.

When you write in a journal you really get to see the changing tides of day to day…
Up and down, sweet and sour, joy and sorrow.  It is a bit like riding on a swing.
Stubbed toe, unable to walk, scoring a sweet Coronado platform rocker
to reupholster for resale (or to keep, if we like),
horrid painting days one day then the next, a good day…  Round and round…

While looking at gratitude, it has been years since we’ve had a good burger.
I grew up with butcher’s and growers and ranchers and
was used to good meat from people who killed humanely.
*my mother tells the “horrid” story of her dad patting the animal
then shooting it, while she munched at In n’ Out, a factory burger…
at 95 I’m not going to change her to see he was being kind.*
I don’t like the current state of meat industry and we won’t eat it unless it meets our criteria… no hormones, no GMO, no feed lots, humanely raised and dispatched.
We’ve found good beef from a local rancher and again enjoy an occasional burger.
Mitchell piles his high with everything on it, a true West Coast burger!

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Hahnemühle Nostalgie Sketchbook, Pentalic HB woodless pencil,
liquid watercolors and inks in Pentel Aquash waterbrushes:
Platinum Cassis Black ink,  Platinum Citrus Black ink,
Noodler’s Lexington Grey Ink,  Super5 Frankfurt, and Super5 Dublin inks,
De Atramentis Document Brown ink, Robert Oster Jade ink,
Pilot Metropolitan with Platinum Cassis Black ink,
Lamy Al-Star with Platinum Citrus Black ink,
Lamy LX pen with De Atramentis Tobacco ink,
Pilot Preppy pen with Noodler’s Lexington Grey Ink,
Platinum Carbon pen with De Atramentis Document Brown ink,
Lamy Al-Star with De Atramentis Document Black ink,
Platinum Carbon Pen with Platinum Carbon ink waterproof cartridges,
Sennelier, Holbein, Primatek watercolors and Daniel Smith Watercolors.