Where am I…

Where am I, or "πού είμαι" as translated into Greek by Google, because, after all, this is the Stoa ;-) ...

A good cup of coffee first thing in the morning helps me appreciate how lucky I am. At least, I feel lucky. I’m healthy, enjoying a toasted bagel with cream cheese and a shot of espresso. Warm inside as the wind bends the branches outside. And, of course, there is my wife, sitting on the couch, next to me. Married for over 20 years, we grow old together in the gentle flow from youth to aged.

From another’s point of view, I may be suffering.

Where am I?

I’m not a believer in “live in the moment”. I’ve tried it, a few times, but was always drawn from the now by the suffering of others. I can’t control their suffering, but I still experience it. Perhaps there is too much mother in me. Is “mother” a Jungian archetype? Yes, according to several sources on the web.

Where am I?

I’m here, now, suffering the suffering of others. Compassion without suffering is hard. Suffering without compassion is harder. Still, there is comfort in the sway of the trees, the whistle of the pines.

Where am I?

Outside my window, I see the Blue Ridge Mountains. Not the mountains themselves, worn to rolling hills over the millions of years, but the ecosystem defined by the blending of people and the ancient ecology of the Appalachias. Mountain Laurel, rhododendrons, and azaleas crouch beneath the protection of oaks and maples. It’s spring, just a few weeks after the solstice, so I wake to light. Today is cloudy, and windy, and green.

That’s not to say that everything is good. For though I am grateful for the morning, my coffee, my bagel, I see the English ivy, creeping along the forest floor, up the trunks, into the canopy. We fight the kudzu, but have given up on the ivy. When I say “we” I mean my neighbors. I do my part. I go out twice a year and tug, pull, yank out the invading ivy that dares to cross the line that demarks my responsibility.

But nobody is caring for the common property, shared by all in the HOA (Home Owners Association). Ivy is everywhere in the commons. I should do my part and clear at least some of the commons. But there is poison ivy amongst those ivy. And I don’t want to get poison ivy. So I let the English ivy run rampant.

In the long term, I know the ivy will win, or the kudzu.

I’ve heard an urban legend that kudzu got its hold in North America because Jimmy Carter, then Governor of Georgia, planted the freeways with kudzu, to make more “green space”. Unable to make the leap from Africa for millions of years, kudzu was brought to America in the 1970’s.

That’s all wrong, at least, according to Wikipedia. Kudzu is from Asia, not Africa (no doubt a Freudian slip of the South). And it was introduced to America in 1876. To some, it’s part of the ecosystem now. I’ve heard another legend: goats love kudzu! If only the South liked goats! An elderly 7th-generation North Carolinian told me she wouldn’t touch goat cheese. “Smells too much like goats!”

I love goat cheese.

Where am I?

For now, today, this morning. I am writing in my journal with some 21 others, invited by Peter Limberg and the Internet Real Life sessions.
____________________
(1) IRL Journaling with Peter Limberg on April 15, 2025. 

Quote of the day: “It is more important that a proposition be interesting than it be true.” - Alfred Whitehead

Prompt of the day: What makes a good, memorial event in IRL or online? (Or just write about whatever is alive or bothersome for you today.)