Listening...

Like I wrote yesterday, I needed to do some thinking (and last-minute consulting--thanks, Jane!) before deciding on my 2017 blog theme. I like the idea of continuing to push for a post per day, especially if I could somehow, I don't know, be a better person when it was all done? (Lofty goal!) I think it worked a bit last year. I don't feel like a worse person, at least. So I'll give it another go.

My theme for this year will be "listening"--every day I'll post about something interesting/surprising that I heard (or overheard) that day. It doesn't have to be the "best" or even necessarily good, though I do like focusing on the positive. And, until I get a couple of weeks of posts under my feet, I think I'll keep the category broad (including podcasts and music). But I do want to focus on words (not just sounds).

I like the idea of just listening more and being mindful of other people's words. I do that for a living (more or less), but most of those are the words of people I have never met--writers and such. This year is looking like it's going to be a rough one in some ways, so listening--really listening--can't hurt.

Here we go...

1 January 2017: I spent a lot of time yesterday thinking about what I would post if I did end up going with "listening" as a theme. Unfortunately, by the time I started thinking about it, I couldn't remember the exact specifics of anything I had heard earlier that day. I spent a lovely and charming morning with Jane and her family, which included comfortable words of kindness and love, but--as happens so often with ordinary kindness and love--they dropped out of my head, leaving only the feeling and not the specific words.

Later that day, re-watching Call the Midwife for the millionth time, I heard one of my favorite bits of writing from that show, a pretty close encapsulation of what I want my blog to do, in part:

“Sometimes, there's a brightness and a richness in the moment. A ripeness that simply says, ‘Taste this’ and calls us to partake without fear or any thought of punishment. It is the fruit of our experience and, in its heart, it bares the seed of all our hopes. Take the joy, take all it gives. Life is sweet and it is ours. As is our right to love and relish every moment.”

I had heard it before, but so loved hearing it again. So we'll make that snippet of my beloved show the first "listening" entry of the year.