My search for delight continues. I have already started to notice how I am finding what I seek — my delight muscles are strengthening. I have already begun to understand the communal power of sharing our delights as writers and humans who thirst for connection and justice. I have already started believing that nurturing delight and holding on to it with hands and an open heart will save us

I am not sure if I am finding delight the right way. I have started with huge things, broad concepts, and bright strokes that might remove delight from an approachable, embraceable, authentic place. I want to develop eyes that see the delight in life’s nooks and crannies. I trust that will happen over time.)

Thank you, 

Jeannine Ouellette and Ross Gay for the inspiration for the inspiration.

Delight 11 — The parable of turning water into wine

I am sitting in church, and that day’s scripture was the parable of the miracle of turning water into wine. Miracles are a delight. The ability to find miracles is a delight. All life is a miracle. From the tiniest act of kindness to the largest, earth-shattering feat of wonder, life is a miracle. We must live like our ever-loving life depends on it because it does. Turning water into wine, finding needles in haystacks, moving mountains one stone at a time — all miracles. Starting anything, deep conversation, serving others, building community — All miracles.

Delight 12 — Care Packages

Care packages are a delight. On MLK Day in 2009, as part of celebrating Barrack Obama’s inauguration, I participated in a National Day of Service. I moved from DC to Indiana to volunteer in Barrack Obama’s 2008 campaign and was invitedto assemble care packages for service people at RFK Stadium. We assembled care packages at long tables that reminded me of the tables used in my Fellowship Hall during dinners at my childhood church. Hundreds of tables. Hundreds of volunteers. A morning of service. At one point, Michelle, Malia, and Sasha Obama arrived and began assembling care packages with us. They stayed a long time. The girls were young, and seeing them right there alongside their mother was beautiful. I was not close enough to interact with them, but I was close enough to be profoundly moved and inspired. I will never forget their presence and their example.

Link to post on Substack

Delight 13 — Bird Smiles

Bird smiles are a delight. Something I have noticed is that birds always seem to be smiling. Whether hummingbirds enjoying a flower’s nectar, cardinals preening in the new-fallen snow, pelicans diving for dinner in crystal blue water, or geese flying south for the winter, they always seem to be smiling.

Link to post on Substack

Delight 14 — The Kindness of Strangers — Thanks, Nora McInerny

The kindness of strangers is a delight. The other day, I listened to Nora McInerny’s podcast, Terrible Thanks for Asking. She had asked people to tell stories of the kindness of strangers. She shared story after story in an all-out effort to connect us to kindness and hope. Each story was a delight. Love momentum built with each example of our better angels. Our inherent goodness made more sense as a light was shone.

Delight 15 — The things that are simply O/K — with more Thanks to Nora McInerny

The things that are simply O/K are a delight. Just as miracles are a delight, the things that are simply O/K are a delight. Let me explain. Everything does not have to be a fireworks and parades. Everything does not have to be an emergency. (Despite the fact that right now it feels like backing off the throttle means we are standing still and not confronting life’s pain.) The things that are simply O/K don’t stress me out. They are life’s ebb and flow, even keel, quiet amidst the noise. Simply O/K asks us to be honest with ourselves, listen from a place in our hearts, and pay attention to our internal bullshit detector. Simply O/K demands that we calm the chaos-seeking, reactionarily motivated, used-to-upsetness parts of ourselves. Honesty is a delight. Calm is a delight.

Delight 16 — The person with nothing to say — A Note to Sophia Efthimiatou

Thank you, Sophia. I want to be that person with nothing to say. I want to be that person whose receptivity muscles are Ironman level. That said, I have nothing to say except . . . There is a tension between having nothing to say and the need to sing your truth from the mountaintops once you find your truth and before you lose it again in the back and forth of life itself. Somewhere in having nothing to say is also the tension between playing small, diminished versions of ourselves and the performative hunger to feed attention and ego. The fact that I am writing this immediately after reading your piece annoys me. It bothers me that I did not digest it more before having something to say. I will have to think about that. Again, thank you for that food for thought.

Sophia’s original post, “Nothing to say”.

Delight 17 — Ph.D.s in Soil and Memory in Medievalist Horror Movies — Thank you, Emily Spinach

Emily Spinach’s original Substack Note

My response to this note: I love this note so much as someone who paid for a Ph.D. in wide-awakeness. Not the hate note part, but the fact you let your light shine. Keep shining as only you can.

Delight 18 — An economy of sticky tape and drinking straws — Thank you, Rachel Lawson

Crafty language that makes me smile is a delight. Language that makes me see things differently, feel alive, and maybe even change my mind. Language that has a certain taste and smell and feel. Language that dances between poetry and prose, almost flirting, almost gliding, almost twirling. Language that is so clear that meaning can be made like a diamond or an angel.

Delight 19 — Unflinching steadiness — Thank you, Ellen Livingston

Unflinching steadiness is a delight. Unflinching steadiness — and its twin, abounding curiosity — are delightful. I want to move between steadiness and curiosity, center and edge, light and dark. Flexibility and softness and fluidity are delightful. Building and creating and growing are delightful.

Delight 20 — Starting a New Life

I am on my way to start a new life. It is January of what I have declared “CLEAN SLATE ’98!” I am 27 and quit my dream job — teaching high school Drama — after failing “to work smarter, not harder” and setting the stage on fire during a performance of a stage adaptation of Ovid’s Metamorphosis. (There is a longer story about lights too close to an old fire-retardant curtain, Juno’s final speech, and a gym teacher who lost his mind.)

Read the post on Substack. Subscribe to the Wide-Awakeness Project.