When my daughter was tiny I used to nap when she did since neither of us slept much at night. Our next door neighbour got a puppy and would put him out in the back yard on a lead at about the same time as we napped. He would bark the whole time. It was making me furious. I was exhausted and really needed the sleep. I'd asked the dog's owner several times to put him out at our off-nap times, but she didn't do it. 

I was at my wits ends. I was so tired I was quite sure that a solid month of sleep and food and nothing else wouldn't be enough to regain any version of feeling awake and whole. Then I remembered a story about a violet, who, when stepped on responded by leaving a beautiful scent on the bottom of that person's foot. I was feeling pretty stepped on. I thought about how I too could be a violet. I made our neighbour a card using a wee footprint from my daughter as a picture on the front. She loved babies, including mine, and so I also included a photo of her. I wrote something like: I don't know when your birthday is, but please enjoy this card for today and all days, birthday or not. Then I signed it from my daughter and her mom. Then we walked over and put it in her mailbox.

The dog was never out at our nap times again.
​

Gravity
 
It is a privilege to learn something
and a responsibility to know it.
 
Knowing comes with weight
            over time
a gravitas of substance
that is held in the field
like lovely stone
            sure
            solid
            present
 
Maybe that’s why it’s called
the cloud of UNknowing.
 
Unknowing
            floats.
 
It’s beautiful too as it
            murmurs
            into and out of shape
mysteriously aloft in
liminal space ‘midst pulls
            of gravity.
 
Not yet knowledge
unknowing is held in silent trust
not yet able to be shared
and still without heft.
 
Not knowing
insubstantiates itself,
until,
it knows.
 
Then with speed and certainty
knowing drops to earth,
plants itself in a body
            of wisdom
is held gently mute
until it’s time
to share it
with those
privileged to learn.
 
originally written April 12, 2015