hotel’s little library

This past weekend Mrs. Abstract and I stayed in Union Inn Hotel built in 1880 in Volcano, Amador County,CA.

The hotel has a small well library. I found a wonderful book, Home, written by Beth Powing.

“ It was November, our first autumn in the farm. The ground was frozen, there were white crystals in the black ice on the end and the sun traveled low across the sky.

We went into the woods to cut next year’s firewood.”

–Beth Powing, Home, Chronicle of a North Country Life

note: I’m sorry I’m slightly behind in my blog. I’m immersed in chess. I’m following the World Chess Championship in New York,N.Y between Magnus Carlsen, current world champion from Norway, who battles Sergei Karjakin, the challenger from Russia.

Reading

“Benedict considers reading such an important part of the meal, in fact,that he insists that the person doing the reading be a good reader, someone who would inspire rather than irritate the souls of the listeners. The reading was to be a artistic event, an instructive experience, a moment of meditation.”
-Sr. Joan Chittister, The Rule of Benedict

HAPPY THANKSGIVING

Gratitude is often forgotten and takes effort to express.

My gratitude to the Lord for all the blessings and to everyone.

 

Season in the vineyard

note:We toured Chalk Hill Vineyard and Winery in Healdsburg,CA. last week. We tasted wonderful wines.

Reading

“The poet is always our contemporary. Our being for the moment is centred and constricted, as in any violent shock of personal emotion. Afterwards, it is true, the sensation begins to spread in wider rings through our minds; remoter senses are reached; these begin to sound and to comment and we are aware of echoes and reflections. The intensity of poetry covers an immense range of emotion.”-Virginia Woolf, How Should One Read A Book

 

Living in the present

“As both a student of history and a man devoted to living in the present, I admit that I do not spend a lot of time imagining how things might otherwise have been. But I do like to think there is a difference between being resigned to a situation and reconciled to it.”-Amor Towles, A Gentleman in Moscow

note: A Gentleman in Moscow is the book I am currently reading and enjoying it immensely.

No limits

Dawn spreads its wings
brushing lilacs in bloom
a bee will fly across mountains
seeking the blossoms.

Pursuit of silence

“The doorways of the present moment are each guarded by an elaborately simple array of distractions that works in tandem with the prayer word.Together they open the doorways to the silent land.”-Martin Laird, INTO THE SILENT LAND

watching films

note: During the last 5 days Mrs. Abstract and I were immersed in the Napa Valley Film Festival. We had been watching several films everyday.We were lining up for the showing of Captain Fantastic,one of the films in the festival.

I was taking notes but I could not write any poetry.

snow