ATC - March 14 - Joy Gives Us Wings!

Last year I was taking an amazing Art Soul Journaling Class from TrueNorthArts and one of the exercises was to choose A Word for the New Year (rather than a whole list of New Years Resolutions which you are not going to keep anyway).
So Last Year I chose the word: Journeys and it was, both inner and outer.

This year, after a rather horrific November in which I saw my friends, one after another, go through emotional meltdowns and upheavals which so totally overwhelmed and exhausted me that I simply had to put my foot down and declare....
'Enough!'
'I will allow only those who bring JOY across my threshold to enter my home.
If you can't do that, stay home until you can.'

So my word for 2010 is JOY.

You can imagine my surprise and yes Joy! when I saw Ms D's ATC for this Sunday.
It is an all time favourite photo of mine, taken by Mr Bear of me, standing on top of the ArchDruid's Barrow, looking across to the village of Long Compton in the UK.
It was February of 1999 and I am about to hear about the amazing Brighid for the first time and start a Journey of Discovery and Adventure that will take a decade to accomplish.
You can now understand how this simple ATC packs quite a few joyous memories for me.

Having had that experience, what then does Joy mean to me now that I have settled here on the Island?
This is my response.The joyful delight of my 2nd Annual Seedy Saturday in which I scored not only 2 varieties of Heritage beans (Blue Jay Bush Bean and Crimson Flower Fava Bean) but..
shhhhhhhhhhh...
you have to tiptoe by the fridge, you don't want to wake them...
a wee paper bag full of ....
MASON BEES!Yes! I was able to purchase the last bag of those wrinkled little bug like cocoons and we hurried home and stuck them in the fridge so they wouldn't wake up too early before I got their home ready.
I am so hoping that they will like their new condo which we have stuck on a pole in a southward sunny spot and that they will find loads of flowers to pollinate.

Blessings to all those Seed Savers and Bee Keepers out there, who keep those species going!
Shanti