Quotes

Savor the Present

December 28, 2018


“One of the most important things I've learned during the last fifteen years is how to enjoy and savor the present. When I am writing, I am inside the sound and meaning of the words, playing with them, curling them around each other. When I am eating, I luxuriate in the taste and texture of every bite. When I am alone, I listen to and communicate with the silence within me and the noises and messages of the world around me.

“And when I am with people, I am really with them.”
—Rita Golden Gelman, Tales of a Female Nomad


Family

This and That

September 24, 2012

It’s fall! Can you tell? Our weather still says summer, but that didn't stop us from a this-and-that weekend, here at the Johnson household. My husband and I puttered about the house and yard, together and apart—a relaxing and satisfying way to spend Saturday and Sunday.


Some of the things we did:

I began putting out fall decorations, with this little set of votive candles I just bought. Everything else is in the attic…time to send someone up there to bring the boxes down.


We cleaned our potting bench. My husband has taken up vegetable gardening, so we now share the bench which I had let get into quite a state:



Better:


I cleaned and refilled the bird bath and squirrel bird feeders:

Ick
Much better
Come and get it!

I found a little friend keeping the orchids bug free:



Scout enjoyed the warmth of the sun:


We admired growing things:

Baby basils
Dendrobium Salaya Candy

There was also a little laundry, a little horse time, a little online puttering (Pinterest, A Bowl Full of Lemons, Blacksburg Belle and more), a little vacuuming, some sports on TV and, of course, some reading.

I'm at my happiest when I'm savoring these little moments, small accomplishments and simple pleasures. I’m grateful I had the time to slow down and enjoy them.

What did you do this weekend?

Learning

Seize the Day

January 25, 2012


“Life is not about enduring, it's about rejoicing; it's not about tolerating, it's about embracing. There is always something beautiful to be found in the mundane, something powerful to be learned in the trials, something joyous to experience in the interruptions to routine. Savor these moments! Seize the day!”
—Kerri Miles Dowd (Washington State high school teacher and good friend!)

Happiness

Riding the Waves

December 07, 2011

Photo courtesy Mirko Harnisch
“Happiness, like everything else in this rhythmic realm, comes and goes in waves, and it’s good to savor it when the wave rises and, when the wave recedes, understand that another wave will come. Sometimes you ride the wave; sometimes you ride out the trough. A wave’s height is measured by its depth, anyway.”
—Carl Safina, The View From Lazy Point

Habits

What Did You Savor Today?

August 31, 2011


“The pleasure of doing a thing in the same way at the same time every day, and savoring it, should be noted.”
–Arnold Bennett

Savor

Start Savoring Summer

July 06, 2011

Shish kebab on the grill
“At the end of summer we ask ourselves how many long afternoons and evenings did we savor? Or we should. How many seasonal pleasures did we seek and luxuriate in? How many summer tastes were not only indulged but encouraged?”
Sarah Ban Breathnach, Romancing the Ordinary

What are your favorite sensual summer pleasures?

Accomplishments

“To Take Delight”

May 06, 2011

I finished a large (for me) writing project late on Wednesday, and when I shared that information with a friend the next day, she said in an email, “That must feel good to have those articles done and delivered! Hope you're taking time to savor that feeling.”

Uh, not really.

What I did instead was rush right into the next things on my to-do list. Because other areas of my life had been neglected while I concentrated on my deadline, instead of taking the time to feel good about what I’d just done, I felt I had to leap into action and get those areas back in line. Instead of focusing on what I'd done, I focused on what was left undone. It wasn't until after I read and thought about what my friend wrote that I began to allow myself to savor a feeling of accomplishment.

To savor is to take delight in something. Accomplishing something you set out to do, like meeting a challenging deadline, is something to savor. I write frequently about slowing down and appreciating what we have—probably because these are lessons I’m still learning. These concepts are important to me. Perhaps through reading and writing about them, I’ll finally learn the lessons for good. Or maybe those lessons don’t get learned “for good”—rather, each time I revisit them, I explore some new nuance or facet of the concept. I think I do a pretty decent job of appreciating the good things in my life...maybe it's now time for me to learn to take delight in my own accomplishments.

Maybe you can help me with this process. How do you savor your accomplishments and the good things in your life? Whatever you do, I hope you have much to savor this weekend.

Something to savor