Trees – Page 52

Change

Change

Yesterday
Was
All
Saints’
Sunday

The afternoon came late with snow
Enough to cover the browns of fall
And cover most everything with the white of winter.

Change.
It is not enough that it’s change.
This one, many of us would have wished, would have waited a month or more.
Makes for a long winter, or so we say.

We don’t mind change, we just want to be in control. We want to choose what change comes our way and forms our futures becoming our past.

So what change would we choose?
The lists are endlessly wishful, and just about totally impossible.

So what to do with this change, this snow change.
It’s a little thing, really, snow in November.
It’s the cold, the cost for fuel which may become impossible.
And that is not just a little thing.

Which does not melt the snow or reduce the cost for fuel.

What can one do with such a change?
It’s simple.
By morning more snow floated loose from the clouds
Onto the brow-beaten ground that is as much home as anywhere;
It’s enough to ski on.
And it’s enough to make a great time preparing for the winter to come.

Snow.
For Saints all, it is an opportunity,
an opportunity to turn what many will complain about,
into a graceful chance to enjoy the wonders of creation.

Wonders are many, and the thankfulness one holds
For the little things,
Or the big things,
That make cold into a gift and wonder.

The canoe is stored for the winter; it’s too dangerous to canoe with water so close to freezing as one glides on the ripples, waves and fish spinning galore.

And the skis are ready.
Tomorrow will be the day to first cross country ski on the ground that God created and called good.

All will be well, all will be well, all manner of things will be well.

Start of a Sweet Month

1 November, All Saints Day
Start of a Sweet Month

It is a sweet month, November is, a month when winter is not set, though the sun sets early and rises late. The hard cold is not yet, and the water is still clear for canoeing.
A month to prepare, a month that is the end of the church year, a month when travelers are few and far between and solitude and peace are more easily found in old haunts and newly explored places.

Then on the first day of this sweet month, with temperatures already below zero often in October, the cold arrived over night at -7 with a low forecast of -4. In town it’s -3.
Halloween was a cold one again.
And November came in with just a skiff of snow.

Snow on the canoe.

A closer look at the obvious presence

Of a beaver, obvious because of the telltale tooth marks on the trees, as the beaver prepares for winter, setting the food of trees in storage next to the beaver house, not 50 meters distant downstream.

This, just a stone’s throw from the wake up view, is the outflow creek of the lake. The beaver have taken this creek, dammed and controlled it to keep the lake at high water marks and made a quiet pond, a home for them, and for us to canoe on just down the creek a bit, over a couch some fools left on the ice one winter past.

This the stillness of wonderful weather, quiet from the throngs, and distance from the noise of the city, but not out of reach of the military jet sonic booms as they reach out to distant sorties.

Here the soul, on All Souls Day, can live well.
Here the saint, on All Saints Day, can live well.
Here creation is good.
Money is scarce, fuel for transportation and electricity (generator made) is short, and propane for heat is dwindling.
Ah, a wood stove in a shelter on a trailer, which would provide dry heat, a system for heat that costs labour and chainsaw gas and oil, and truck gas to haul in the wood. But that’s a pipe dream.

Even so, here, whatever may come,

all is well, all is well, all manner of things are well.

Home, Sweet No-Home

Home Sweet No-Home
This Halloween

The autumn this year has been mixed as to whether we are going to experience a bit of summer finally or at least a taste of fall, or is the weather just going to quick-jump right into freezing temperatures and snow cover, but never enough to ski on.

Summer to Snow

Snow lays on the ground even before the leaves have all fallen.

Bare Brown

The snow is gone and the leaves with it.

Piles of Ugly

The trash shows again, that people thought it was their privilege simply to toss along the path into the woods.

There are high piles of ash dotting the edges of the campsite and the woods around, as if to carry and pile them around were to have cleaned up after oneself. Nails, broken metal rods, pallet plates, bricks, concrete blocks, half burned plastics, old cans, broken plastic you-name-its, and the most disturbing, an old quad lead-acid battery. (We got that back into the recycle system thanks to Primco Dene’s staff at the car wash and oil change business!)
The bad behaviour of humans should no longer surprise me, but it does. Good behaviour is always welcomed and I try to remember to thank people for it.

The real joy of being home, at no-home, are the views and light and water and sky.

Standing Together

Whether it’s the solid white-ish grey trunks of the poplar,

Cross Tops
Or the tops of leafless trees crossing the grey skies.

Leaning White

Or the white birch barely hanging in there on the shore.

Wedges of Reality

There simply is nothing like being able to canoe out on to the lake to see the afternoon sun playing with clouds and pure reflections making harmonious orchestration wedges of trees on the shores.

Beckoning Light

Until the sunsets behind the trees on the shore beckoning me to wander closer to the wonders of creation.

Ending Delight

Then the universe comes together in specular beauty as the water reflects in ripples my presence in the canoe in the reeds as the sun claims clouds on the horizon as its playing field.

For being homeless, this is a wonderful home, creation with a small wonderful place for me.

Where is your home?
Do you see beauty all around you?
Do you see creation as a gift?
Life, each day, each hour, each moment as time to marvel at all that is, bad and good, ugly and beautiful
In creation and creatures alike?

The View in Words

The View in Words
Wake orange on dark blue black water waving still in a hardly breeze.
No animal, then a neck or nose, a loon or a beaver?
A Sock under the water out a foot into the water, wool and warm and orphaned.
The wake joined by a second this closer and obviously a loon or duck maybe, and then the other moves and two new wakes colour the water.
The red spread of sun having set small in area with tinges of red reflected in water and clouds.

The muskrat’s footprints, and then a crow’s footprints. Clear water into the sand and reflecting amid the reeds bent in submission to the cold, doubled in their own reflection curved top and bottom breaking the water view, but still coloured by the setting sun.
The orange water catching the sunset not red but orange as if the sky were more beautiful than it is.

All these words

because I missed the sunset canoe ride and forgot my camera, even my cell phone, and must remember the view as it is, until another showed up with a camera and I borrowed it to record what I took note of in my mind as the view for tonight’s setting sun.

This is the sunset.

Tracks

The colours, the view, the sunset.

Words, as great as they are, are not as verbose as a photo.

Relief Canoeing Again

Relief! – Canoeing Again

I went to sleep again to the sound of loons.
And woke to moderate temperatures (9° C) and the sound of the wind.

Sun catches the tree tops

Before the sun disappeared into the bright light of day behind the clouds
I paddled in my canoe against the wind and waves
And found beauty right there:

Launch in foam and little waves that seemed large.

Keep paddling, even if everything is against you,
When the wind blows against you as you head out,
The trip back home is easy.

Peace is not the absence of discord,
But the presence of Christ in the inevitable discord.

Joy is not the lack of sorrow, dismay or despair,
JOY is the presence of God in all that life brings.

Of course the basics requirements for life are good to have as well:

Clean air,
Clean water,
Nutritious food,
Proper clothing,
Sufficient shelter,
Meaningful labour,
And
To be able to love and be loved.

And how many people of our current 7.7 billion on earth do not have the basic requirements of life?

Many, many, too many!

It is not for lack of the basics. There is plenty.
It is a matter of greed, hording and consuming beyond need, and turning a blind heart to those who need the basics, which are consumed by others as luxuries.

With thanks to God for the basics that I do have; and a prayer that the others will be mine before it is too late.

This time it was just a scare, until the response came back containing this:

After our discussion this morning I can clarify that the Alberta Environment and Parks has no issue with you camping on Public Land for the 14 day period and vacating for 72 hours as per the Public Lands Act and Public Land Administration and Regulation.

Which is exactly what I told the RCMP constables as they evicted me, an unjust and unnecessary eviction. Cost me more than a few days in court prep time, anxiety, and money to move the camper off in less than 14 days.

Who Is My Enemy – In the Canoe

Who Is My Enemy – In the Canoe?
An ode by a man under attack by so many lies, and so many liars and those who acquiesce to evil; an ode in the form of a prayer to God, with you listening in.

Beauty
There is great beauty in nature, in photography done well, in the soul of so many people when they are met with Grace. There is beauty in my life.
Is there beauty in your life?

‘My’ Canoe
I am able whenever the weather allows, to jump in a canoe and paddle a lake, to breath clear air and watch the sun rise and set, to watch loons dive away and beaver swim by, to watch the ducklings grow, to see the geese migrate south in their noisy, majestic “V’s”.

Everyone has something of a canoe, even if it must be only in your imagination. And it is precious. So

Don’t Fiddle,
Don’t Faddle,
Don’t Piddle
Just Paddle

Paddle in your canoe.

Who is my enemy when I can be in a canoe?
No one can be, for I am free.
Being free does not stop the attacks on me, nor does it fix the ruin I have been brought to by lies at all levels.
Being free does not put Evil to rest, but it gives me and many others life, life abundant.

Am I hurt as my sunset may be forced early upon me?
Yes, beyond anything I could imagine!
Am I going to let myself become angry?
Beyond what I cannot control, of course not. I do not allow myself to be that kind of a person.
Why would I allow this, this worst of treatment, so unjust, unethical, and downright mean … why would I allow this or anything else to change me into something like the people who do this to me?
Would I want to become a bully? Would I want to become indiscriminately mean and even cruel like the many people who have together taken every thing from me except a sleeping bag, a tent, a bicycle, and my clothes?
Would I choose to allow them to take my soul too?
Would I want to choose that the Gaslighting that my own family started and carried on without pause, and is now regularly repeated in so many ways by so many people … would I want the Gaslighting to have the intended effect on me?
Would I want to forget which are the truths, which the lies, about me?

Who am I,
that I can be in a canoe?

I am:
Kind
Gracious
Unconditionally loving
Forgiving
Slow to anger
Healthy focusing the energy of anger towards healthy changes
Honest
Clear about reality
Clear about what I have done and what I have not done
Tremendous with children, at a momentary meeting, as an acquaintance, as friend, as parent.
Sexually healthy, respectful, faithful,
Loyal
Respectful of all genders, colours, faiths
Healthy:
Mentally resilient and creative and as always uniquely equipped to help others, and remaining very healthy despite continuing efforts to Gaslight me.
Physically proactively providing for my health care needs and remaining very healthy despite all efforts to deny me my health.
I am a pacifist, a practical pacifist.
I am a sacramental mystic.
I am simultaneously a saint and a sinner.
I am a child of God, a saint in the eternal light of Christ.

This is who I am not:
I am not mean,
I am not crass, profane,
I am not hateful or begrudging
I am not vengeful
I am not quick to anger
I am not reckless with my health and my health care
I am not dishonest, I do not lie,
I am not confused about reality, projecting falsehoods on to others
I have not forgotten what I have done and what I have not done or confused what others falsely say with what actually happened, what I said, what I did, what I thought, what I strove for
I am not abusive to anyone, especially not children, I certainly am not perverse with children
I am not a sexual deviant, nor promiscuous, nor a misogynist nor a misandrist.
I am not disloyal, I do not betray anyone or any trust.
I am not ill, though this sustained attack on my person has landed me in emergency surgery.
I am not mentally ill, nor psychopathic nor psychologically disordered in any way.
To all and any who accuse me of being suicidal I say very clearly that I am immune.

To my enemies:
I ask the plethora of my enemies, is this, the person I am not, really who you want me to change to become, as if that would relieve you of your responsibilities for bullying, cruelty and lies?
Would you like that I succumb to the constant Gaslighting and become mentally ill, psychotic, disordered, or not resilient?
Would you like that I respond to accusations that I am going to kill myself that I say instead, “Ok, when and where and how?” [Now wouldn’t that be perverse, and wholly unnatural!]
I am not reckless with my physical health, nor passive about it, nor uninformed, nor un-engaged.

I am certainly not passive about anything that I can change for the better:
Rather I take to heart the prayer:
My I have the serenity to accept the things I cannot change,
The courage to change the things I can,
And the wisdom to know the difference.

I am not violent nor unrealistic about my part and place in life.
Instead I choose not to become vindictive, or even angry, because I would not want to be that kind of a person. I’ve sacrificed much in life to remain a pacifist, one who forgives instead of being vindictive.
Would you prefer or recommend that I become vindictive and destructive, violent and scheming?
I am not disconnected from my Creator and this Creation, in all aspects and dimensions I am able to participate in Creation I do.
Would you want that I become a one dimensional idiot?
I claim no goodness on my own merit, but all good I am is a gift from God. I accept full responsibility for all bad that I am, think, do and allow by inaction to happen. I can do this because I fully trust God’s forgiveness and blessings.
I am not a child of the Devil, Evil, or Decay.

Who do my enemies think they want me to become, when I can be in a canoe?
How is it that you wanted me to change?
You said you want to provide services to me, for me to choose to become more stable. You suggested that I move in with my wife from whom I am separated. I have told you and told you again, that my ex would then attack the few assets my wife holds onto by a threadbare string, and two more people would be out on the street, homeless like I am. And you thought that would be an improvement? You said yes that I should choose this!?!

What kind of an upside down world do my enemies think they can force on me?

How can I respond to the lies and terrible things done to me by so many people?
How can one respond to such cruelty, such destructive cruelty, against me and the children, against so many other men and children?

Cruelty comes in many forms. One is this Gaslighting, this telling me that somehow I am responsible for and able to change the fact that lies by so many at all levels in the Justice system have made me homeless, and that these lies have put the children at great risk.

Cruelty comes not only as commissions, but also as omissions.
It comes from people who stand by and do nothing to know the cruelty done.
It comes from people who close their eyes, ears, and mouths in the face of evil.
It comes from people who know full well what is done, especially people with authority, and they do nothing because it is risky to do anything in the face of evil.
“The world is in greater peril from those who tolerate or encourage evil than from those who actually commit it.” Albert Einstein

What am I to do?
I tell you, I bind sins, and continue to live with Grace.
I choose, as an ordained person, to continue as the gracious person I am, but to name these acts against me (and similar acts against so many other men and children) for what they are: they are evil.
I choose to ‘bind these sins’, those of commission and omission. God will judge those responsible. The judgment will be in the afterlife, but as God is not bound by time, the effects of that judgement begin already now.

Except I have forgiven my family, those I was asked to and did promise to love unconditionally, those who I have at great cost forgiven, and whom I continue to forgive. Because I know where their sins begin, and I trust that it is not in maliciousness, but in mental illness. But even if it is maliciousness, how can I not forgive and continue to forgive people who were so close and so powerfully loving and so life changing for me (both good change at first and then so terribly destructive against me, without reason from me)?

Having left this cruelty against me and others in God’s hands, I am free.
Free to respond with grace to the doers and those that acquiesce. It is not as if I have forgiven them (other than my family), but their evil will not define me, nor will it change me but for the better. I will work to stop this cruelty to men and children, as much as God makes me able.

Most of all, I will not forget Beauty, in all its aspects, in this world; the beauty of nature, of light reflected in photography, the beauty of hard work and physical health providing for oneself and for others, the beauty of words that inspire, and the beauty of love.

All of this is possible because God provides story upon story for us, through which we can know something of God as

God who loves unconditionally all people, God who wishes us all life, and life abundant.

Who can be my enemy when I am in the canoe, steeped in the beauty of God’s creation?
Only Evil is my enemy, and God has defeated Evil, it just does not know it. But I can live that it is defeated.

[Last minute addition:]

The RCMP will not though, just minutes ago they evicted me, so that homeless, with a borrowed trailer on Crown land, I now have no place to live except on the run from this borrowed patch to the next with my tent. In this random camping location I was there no more than 14 days at a time. I now have really no where to go that is even a bit safe. This sin is bound as well, for while I move out every 14 days and stay out for 72 hours, as per the requirements, there are frequently others who do not, who stay for months … and not the RCMP, nor any other authority, do anything to them, even though they are clearly living there setting up for the winter, clearly set up having spent months there. I abide by the regulations, and am evicted. Others who clearly do not abide by the rules are not evicted.

If this bothers you let them know.

This is how we deal with homeless people. We make it impossible for them.

God save us. God save me. God show me the beauty available now, still with my canoe, which now is no canoe at all. It is another nothing, taken from me. And yet I will find a way to live determined not by my enemies, but in Grace.

What about you?
Who is your enemy when you are in your canoe (wherever and whatever it means for you to be in your canoe)?
Where is beauty and grace for you?

Out for a Bit of Beauty

Out for a Bit of Beauty

Before the showers of the day a quick paddle around the lake at sunrise caught the goodness of light and life.

The colours against the sky reach from reeds to single tree.

The colours are not the greatest but it’s as good as it gets. Fall cool has hit and the leaves are turning, ready for the winter to come.

After a day of soft rain showers a walk through the freshly washed world worked wonders.

The road lined by birch sentinels keep watch though all atrocities still perpetually ruin plants and creatures alike.

The entrance after rain is less easily traversed, keeping undedicated traffic to a minimum.

The traffic is still high enough for stupidity to persist.
Can you find it?

Flowers colour the forest floor.
(OK, not quite flowers.)

The dreary evening light is obvious here.

And less here

Until one compares it the morning light before a day of raining gently.

How wonderful it is to live in the midst of such beauty,

and to live so well,

Despite loved ones become enemies by their choice lying and wreaking havoc in my life to try to ruin in.

Who has time or energy for revenge, though new enemies treat me as if I would somehow allow anger to ruin my life?

God will judge those who have participated, who have maltreated me, who have tried to contribute to my ruin. That judgement is more real and more profoundly problematic than any revenge I could seek.

As for me, I can choose again and again to forgive,
to bind and move on,
or ignore the work of evil against me or the stupidity that it masquerades as.

Live Peace.

Enjoy.

Breathe.

The wonders of fresh water astound and point to the goodness of the Creator.

Home-Bittersweet Home

I’ve been away for a while, missing the beauty of home.
One of the first things I did is put the canoe in the water just after sunset
And
Immerse myself in
the Colours
the Fresh Air
the Quiet
Of a pair of loons calling to each other.

Sunset drips colour into solitude.
These attributes reach well towards Plato’s ideals.

It took a while to get everything safely secured for the fall.
But with a warm fire burning, the stars in full view, and the air just cool enough to keep almost every bug at bay,
I settled in for a sleep in a bed custom made by me for this old body, firm for my arthritic back, a hip hole for the arthritic hip, raised for the GI that is so challenging and warm against even the deepest cold.
Waking before sunrise the stars were clear but the lake deep in fog so obvious even in the dark of night.
After a short walk I took this shot literally out the window, weathered grime and all on the window, with the fog back-dropping the trees, water and reeds.

View from a room.

Before the walk,
Before the sunrise,
Before breakfast,
I stepped out to the fresh quiet and put this together in a panorama.

Birch Frames, Water Fogged, Reeds Galore.

It’s good to be home.
It’s bittersweet to be home.
It’s part of the colour of life to be home having survived so many threats to my well-being and life.
If you pray, pray for me and mine; but pray most of all for all those whose lies brought my life to be threatened, and for those who threatened, directly or indirectly.
I cannot imagine what it is like to live, knowing one’s own lies, blatant and obvious, ignored as lies by others, any who have added their own lies to the perverse saga, bring such cruelty to another human being.
I cannot imagine what it is like to live, knowing that one’s own willful blindness invites and allows others to lie, blatantly and obviously, and then to bring threat upon another’s life.
That kind of winning is …
Well …
It’s not winning, it’s losing in the ultimate way, it is to lose one’s integrity and being. It is to sacrifice what cannot be regained or bought or undone. It is to sacrifice one’s own good, to bring rot on another human.
My life may have been, may still be under threat, very real and present.
But I still remember the actual events of history, the loving kindness given and received, the abuse and false accusations, the wondrous times of trust, the unpredictable outrages, the marvelous times of affection, the danger to myself and the ones given into my care, the delight for us all, the Gaslighting and perversions, the truth and my resilience,
My survival.
My yes’s and my no’s.
My clear response to attacks on my person: my insistence that reality be participated in and NO I was not going to kill myself as I was constantly accused I would.

Who in their right mind would say it is a crime to answer one’s spouse’s constant barrage of false accusations that one is going to kill oneself by saying that one is immune, one has been inoculated, the side effects of medicine no longer make the abuse beyond intolerable, though the abuse certainly continues. NO means NO.

And in this case NO is a clear statement of LIFE at it’s best. How could that be criminal? Or possibly create fear? Or be unnatural?

What’s unnatural is one’s spouse’s constant barrage of false accusations that one is going to kill oneself….

And this is home … where this does not stop.
And I stay, because this is where I am, if barely.
When, though, will it become as important to listen to a man say NO, as it is a woman say NO.
Today, I say YES, an amazing YES … this is the wonder of home.
Today, I say NO, NO, those who have done me evil will NOT determine my life. God will adequately deal with them, and I am thus able to remain gracious and kind.
Who would want, given the opportunity to leave all judgement and consequence to God … who would want to become vengeful after a life of forgiving and unconditional love?

Let’s see: on the one hand one would become Evil personified, one would consume life, one would rot from within, one would live in torment and in order to make it through each day one would have to live in denial.
Or one can by grace choose to be Goodness personified, and therein one gives life freely to so many around, one grows, matures, and blossoms as beauty within, one lives at peace with the universe, with others (even one’s enemies) and with God, and one can embrace truth, both the evil and the good of truth … and one can delight in things small and great.

How do you choose?

As for me and my household, we choose to serve the Lord, and to trust and live out amazing Grace.

For now it is Autumn begun,

Winter ahead.

Always then Spring!

It’s about TIME

The way to defeat evil is to live a good life.

A trip to friends brought us to a familiar, wonderful view out over the mountains.

Though our visiting took priority over getting high on the mountains until the sun was well up in the sky. The sunrise was less rise than rain fall. So we enjoyed the clear air clean of the wildfire smoke from the many BC fires. The clear mountain air.

A breath of fresh air as good as good friends: priceless.