Month: November 2020

Grateful Heart Monday

Welcome to another Grateful Heart Monday! Today’s gratitude is for the surprisingly good Halloween 2020 I had just over a week ago now.

October 31st always benchmarks the end of the warm season for me. It’s the last night I keep the ornamental ponds open and all the summer decorations and accent lighting out. It also of course is when trick-or-treaters come out, which is something my partner and I have come to enjoy by decorating to get in the spirit of the occasion ourselves. Unfortunately, many of the Halloween’s around here since I moved to Toledo have been exceptionally rainy and cold, thus putting a serious damper on the occasion. Add in this year’s COVID crisis and many parents having previously told me they weren’t allowing their kids to trick-or-treat this year, I had questioned whether to even decorate or not. Thankfully, I did, but even more thankfully, was when the weather did cooperate and allowed for far more kids to enjoy the evening. While last year, we had a tremendous number of treats left over, this year we just about ran out! In addition, we also were able to have a fire in our firepit in the driveway for the trick-or-treating hours, which helped to create a nice festive mood and keep us all warm too!

Beyond the pleasure of seeing the delight of parents and their kids in costumes, like this one homemade full-body dinosaur suit that was pretty darn amazing and another who had created their own wonder woman outfit, I was overly thankful especially for the many compliments I received for my work in the gardens and yard. This year I also lent a hand to helping others have nice yards for Halloween as well by cutting three different neighbor’s grasses earlier in the evening. I was thankful to have had such a burst of energy to do so in light of how my health has felt lately.

And while the day started with a nice breakfast at a local chain restaurant, First Watch, it ended with doing something I normally would have waited until the day after to do, that being the decoration take-down. But, in light of the weather calling for it to be in the 30’s with 40 mph winds the next day, we opted to do the holiday cleanup and the end of the season work once the trick-or-treating hours were over. On some level, it really was a major relief to be able to wake up the next day and not have that looming over me to do.

Oh, and I should also mention that after all was said and done with the cleanup, I honored my inner child and the occasion by eating a bunch of my favorite Halloween candy bars, Mounds and Almond Joy, while watching a scary tv series.

So, with another Halloween come and gone, I just wanted to express a little gratitude in this Grateful Heart Monday entry for this year’s October 31st having been one that left me with some very favorable memories.

Peace, love, light, and joy,
Andrew Arthur Dawson

Thought For The Day

Quote #1

“There is only one way to look at things until someone shows us how to look at them with different eyes.” (Pablo Picasso)

Quote #2

“No matter how inclusive we are working towards being, we can always do more. We can always do better.” (Victoria N. McGovern)

Quote #3

“Inclusion is not bringing people into what already exists. It is making a new space, a better space for everyone.” (George Dei)

Bonus Quote

“Inclusion requires the teacher to believe that all students have something important to offer in the classroom and that we really are better off learning together.” (Beth Foraker)

Peace, love, light, and joy,
Andrew Arthur Dawson

The Next Four Years…

By the time this article gets published on my blog, it will be four days past election day. As I write this, it’s exactly two days prior to that day, a day I’ve come to see holds paramount to all other interests for many in this country.

Quite honestly, this whole election has brought a stress upon my life that has made me feel so very distant from the vast majority, especially those closest to me. Case in point, a friend of mine recently got very angry with me when I said I hadn’t cast my ballot yet and didn’t even know if I wanted to. In the heat of that moment, they expressed some choice words and said they might have to re-evaluate being my friend if I didn’t do my civic duty. It was an extremely disheartening conversation and one that truly saddened me.

The idea of losing any friend based upon a stance I may or may not take on voting seems insane. But I often feel lately we’re living in insane times and acting in insane ways towards each other. It’s precisely why I feel like there will be no real winner in this election because at the core of all this insanity are people believing the problem is out there in our political leadership, when it’s in us, in the way we treat each other, like considering not being a friend if a person doesn’t vote.

Whether I voted or didn’t shouldn’t matter. What should matter is the amount of anger that seems to be building in so many for even the slightest of things like with my friend’s stance on voting. What good does getting angry do? Anger only begets anger and an angry individual will only remain angry long after this election is over, even if their candidate was elected, as it merely will be transferred onto something else to be angry at. And let’s not forget that all it takes to begin a war is for two individuals to be on opposing sides of some view and become seriously angry about it.

While I may be angry at some things in my life, chiefly my health, one thing I can say for sure that I haven’t been angry at or complained about during the majority of the past four years is the state of our country. That’s not because I’ve been in favor of this political administration, because, on the contrary, I haven’t, but nor have I really never been in favor of any political administration since I became an adult either. Honestly, I’ve just chosen to always focus my energy on other things that I feel more called to place my energy in, like treating those around me with unconditional love and respect, no matter what they stand for. In my humble opinion, that takes a lot more work than angrily lashing out at the current political administration.

My core goal in life has become one of inclusion, not exclusion, even when it may bruise my ego in doing so. That’s why for me, whether someone votes or doesn’t, won’t change my opinion of them. This is no different from the neutral stances I take with political affiliation, religion, sexuality, race, and countless other things that cause so many others to hate one another versus love one another these days. That hatred is the very thing that’s causing our country to be at the very tipping point it’s at right now and notably why people are worrying about things like civil war and mass violence.

So, what happens in the next four years, I don’t know. But truly, I want you all to know that I plan on doing my part to love each of you through it all, NO MATTER WHAT! Whether you voted or didn’t, whether you’re in favor of who gets elected or doesn’t, or whether you think of me as some 60’s hippie love child or someone you think buries his head in the sand, I chose to love and accept you, just as you are. I only hope you’ll do the same with me, because if we ever want to see peace achieved in our country, and the world for that matter, it will only come by accepting each other for our differences, rather than trying to create a society that’s only filled with what our mind thinks it should be filled with.

Peace, love, light, and joy,
Andrew Arthur Dawson