Spent time (a lot) choosing, downloading, enabling, figuring out which apps it will work with (Google native apps are impenetrable, Apple iMessage is impenetrable). No I am not going to reveal my current favorite font by name. It is still available for free so I don’t want a rush on it which will entice the provider to begin charging a fee 🙂 No, the font you see in this text post is not it 😦 Stay tuned, the reveal will happen eventually 🙂

The hiker, solar browned, wind-chapped, and trudging to re-supply at Tuolumne Meadows, came upon a man seated near the trail. He had ¼-peck wood baskets placed around him with apples for sale.

He carefully chose one at a time, scrutinized it, then used a clean cloth to hand polish it to a radiant brilliance. He then looked at his reflection in the apple skin, either nodding approval and adding it to a basket with a ‘yes’ sign on it, or placing it in one of the ‘no’ baskets behind him.

The hiker politely began speaking: “What are you doing?”

The man replied: “I am polishing apples.”

“Why?”

“With each polished apple I sell, I believe that I am demonstrating gratitude for all that my spiritual practices have brought to me, and I consider the polished apple as a gift to the spiritual teacher within each of us.”

There is a moment in my personal life timeline when I chose to print in longhand rather than write in cursive. I have input into my synaptic way-back machine my request for the day when that happened. I can see the Nixie lights blinking, so eventually a glowing image of the day when I began longhand printing will appear, and I shall be able to describe it here. But not yet.

I know it was a very long time ago, and probably has something to do with my two early passions for professions. I wanted to be an electrical engineer, and I wanted to be an architect. Both of those professions need the practitioner to be able to write clearly, and I remember one of the live-in students at Taliesin West telling me that I must “have a good hand” if I wanted to intern there, which I did want to do.

Although I did not have the financial power to intern at Taliesin West, I was employed many times as a draftsman, and often got compliments on “my hand”. I believe that boosted my self-esteem quite a bit, and I am grateful that I have continued to practice what, for me, has become an art form. My children tell me that they love looking at things I have longhand printed, and they always know when a written item has been done by me because of my distinctive style.

I bring this up today because I am experiencing a strong push to get a memoir (the memoir is the genre of writing that I have chosen to pursue) written and published. I want to make my writing as powerful as possible, and so I shall write all my drafts using longhand printing to get my self on paper.

No matter what time zone I am in, I have discovered that my life attains a natural nurturing rhythm when I choose to take no external actions before noon. The time before noon is spent in personal preparation for the day in my home or where I happen to be on that day. Perhaps I shall have car window stickers made with the slogan “Not Before Noon”. Or perhaps I shall get a new visible tattoo of “Not Before Noon”, to encourage me to integrate the behavior into my RL. Namaste to all 🙂

What a delightful surprise for me as I approached my writing desk on this wonderfully silent and peaceful moment in time. Magical and unique sunbeams had highlighted perfectly my writer’s perch and made me feel especially welcome on this day. I am grateful. Namaste.