Category: Grateful Heart Monday

Welcome to another chapter of Grateful Heart Monday, where gratitude remains the sole expression in my writing for the day, which for today is for having compassion for even the smallest of God’s creatures, even a tiny baby robin that fell from its nest the other day.

About a week ago, I was outside doing my typical morning chores when I noticed on the street across from me were three tiny objects that looked rather strange. I opted to stop what I was doing to go take a closer look and it’s then I discovered that a robin’s nest overhead in the tree there had shifted during the previous night’s windstorm causing all three babies to fall from it to the ground. Sadly, two of them had already died, but one was still flailing around and way too young to take care of itself. My heart wrenched as I looked down at the creature, mother nowhere in sight. Years ago, in my addiction days, I would have said “oh well” to something like this, just chalked it up as another one of those misfortunes of life and gone back to whatever I was doing prior. It’s sad to say but there was a time when I didn’t care about things like this and even did things like throw eggs from bird’s nests out of anger and rage in my life. Thankfully, I don’t carry that energy anymore. Now, I carry far more compassionate energy, especially with God’s creatures.

In light of that, watching that tiny bird flail around, so helpless in its first few weeks of life, my heart stirred greatly, so much so that I went and got my ladder, put on some gloves, and scooped that bird up. I then climbed all the way up to the very top rung where I realized I was glad I didn’t have any fear of heights, as looking down from that top step would probably have made one who does, feel some sense of vertigo. Anyway, I was just high enough to reach the nest and gently moved it back into a safe resting spot, making sure the hole the baby robins fell through was now protected. I placed the sole remaining survivor back into it and lastly said a blessing as I took the two babies that had passed on already and placed them in branches within the tree high up off the ground. After I was done with the task and the ladder put away, I wondered if that one survivor would make it. I wondered as well if it’s mother would be thankful or abandon it. Either way, I was filled with gratitude, gratitude for what 12 Step recovery has given me, which was a deeper connection to God and to my heart to care about things like this, something I never had before I ever did 12 Step recovery and lived in addictions instead.

Having an open heart today that feels compassion for things like tiny baby robins and other of God’s creatures means the world to me, because deep in addiction, the heart is often sealed shut, and life filled with nothing but anger and resentment. So, on this Grateful Heart Monday, I’m thankful to have compassion today for things like baby robins that fall from their nest, as I think that’s also symbolic of how God is with all of us, when we too fall from our nests in life like I once did with my former life of non-stop addiction…

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

Welcome to another Grateful Heart Monday, where gratitude remains the sole expression at the start of every week on TheTwelfthStep, which for today is for my sister Laura’s recent summer birthday trip to Toledo!

A few months ago, just prior to me turning 50, Laura asked me what I wanted as a gift for the big milestone that was coming up. My answer was the only one I truly wanted, which was for her to come visit me. Seeing any of my remaining family at any point is an absolute blessing in my life, and her recent trip to Toledo was no exception.

From the moment I picked her up, our weekend was filled with many things to be grateful for. Our first day together we went to downtown Detroit and saw the Van Gogh Immersion exhibit, something we both have wanted to see for some time, and it was such an amazing experience, especially for the visual and hearing senses. Dinner that night was at Mark Wahlberg’s restaurant, Wahlburgers, in Greektown, and dessert afterwards from Astoria Bakery, quite possibly one of the best bakeries I’ve ever been to.

Our second day began with breakfast at The Speedtrap Diner in Woodville, Ohio. This diner is one of my favorite out-of-the-way unique joints to go to locally for a meal where the walls and ceiling have so much to look at and where it honestly feels like I’ve travelled back in time to the 1950’s. Not too far from there is The Schedel Gardens, a beautiful botanical garden and arboretum situated alongside the bank of a small river in Elmore, Ohio. There, we spent the afternoon and it might just have been the most peaceful and unique gardens I’ve ever visited, where there are multiple places to relax, each with a different theme that makes it ultimately feel like you’ve travelled to several different parks in the world. Dinner that night was a homecooked meal that included a sausage and cheddar lasagna, tossed salad, and garlic bread, all prepared from scratch by my partner Chris. The evening ended with watching a moving romantic film titled “Finding You”, a movie I first discovered on Prime and later bought for re-watching at home because I liked it so much.

Our final day included a trip to one of my top ten restaurants, The Melting Pot, which is an amazing experience if you like fondue. There, we had three courses of it beginning with a cheddar-based one, then a meat, fish, and vegetables one in a Coq Au Vin broth, and finally one with a cookies and cream milk and dark chocolate concoction that had an incredible assortment of things to dip into including cream puffs, salted caramel cheesecake, brownies, macaroons, and much more. It was most definitely a huge caloric experience that’s for sure, which is probably good that we went and played a totally fun game of putt-putt in Garden City, Michigan at Garden City Mini Golf.

While all of the experiences I shared with my sister were things to be grateful for, what I have the greatest gratitude for from her trip here was simply all the time we shared together talking, reconnecting, and bonding further together, given all the years we once were more apart as brother and sister. I will most certainly treasure the memories from her visit for some time to come, and it’s most definitely something to dedicate today’s Grateful Heart Monday to!

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

Welcome to another Grateful Heart Monday, where gratitude always gets expressed to kick the week off, which for today is for something I’ve already written about ever so slightly in my last few articles but wanted to take the time to express more deeply, and that’s the recent summer trip I took to see my closest friend, Cedric.

It’s amazing to think that Cedric and I started our journey in this life together when I was only 25 years old, and he was 34. The amazing memories we now have over two and a half decades are endless and if there’s one thing we always seem to enjoy doing together it’s taking trips somewhere. This summer it was to York, Maine, where we spent four days enjoying a section of the country neither of us had ever spent any time there.

In addition to the enjoyment of swimming in the chilly waters there and hanging out on the oceanfront top-floor balcony listening to music, especially at dark, the highlights I’m most grateful for are for the entire day we got to play six games of mini-golf (Schooner Mini Golf, Raptor Falls Mini Golf, Wells Beach Mini Golf, and Wonder Mountain Mini Golf), the drives we took along the scenic Route 1 from Saco, Maine down to Portsmouth, NH, the restaurants we dined at (Three Sisters in Biddeford, Maine, Luigi’s West End Pizzeria in Portsmouth, New Hampshire, So Zap in Ogunquit, Maine, and The Kitchen in Portsmouth, New Hampshire), the daily Starbucks hangouts that were filled with lots of laughter, especially the one in downtown Portsmouth where a total stranger named Tim told us his entire life story in an hour, watching the entire new season of The Umbrella Academy on Netflix together late at night, having the best cookies ever from Crumbl Cookies in Newington, Rhode Island, visiting Nubble Lighthouse in York, Maine, which I think might just be the prettiest lighthouse I’ve ever seen, and taking a long walk into downtown York after the sun set for the evening.

Beyond our four-day visit to Maine, I wanted to also mention a few other things I was grateful for on this weeklong vacation. The first is for reconnecting with my dear friend Sean Slater who picked me up from the Providence airport and took me to dinner in North Kingstown to Wickford on the Water where we had the best fish tacos next to an inlet and then enjoyed some Starbucks afterwards in downtown Providence. The second is for reconnecting with my dear friend Debbie Coon who met us in Quincy, Massachusetts for an early dinner at Port 305 where we sat by the water and enjoyed coffee afterwards in Braintree at another Starbucks (Yes, I know, I have an addiction to Starbucks! LOL!). And lastly, for visiting Nobska Lighthouse on my final day of the trip where they were giving away free homemade ice cream (Yum!), for pizza afterwards at Marc Anthony’s in Onset with my recovery friend Nick L., and for him coordinating for me to do a 12 Step recovery lead at his home group, Buzzards Bay Monday night, to end the evening.

So yes, I have much to be grateful for on this Grateful Heart Monday’s recap of my recent trip back east and want to end by thanking Cedric for making it all possible and leaving me with plenty of lasting memories from another vacation in our decades long friendship.

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