Skip to content

Love what you love

2011 June 6

Every morning I read the obituaries in my local paper. I like to hear the particular details of how a person is remembered.

He started tending cattle at 8. *  Her cinnamon rolls were the envy of all her friends  *  He skied down the mountain on homemade skis with an aspen pole brake.  (all from the Durango Herald).

Recently, I read an obituary that said: his family says his passions were cooking and collecting cast iron cookware. Oh, I thought, how lucky it is to have passions, to simply love what you love.

It’s like taking out an insurance policy against boredom, depression, restlessness.

Perhaps your house is messy and the breakfast dishes still haven’t been washed. Perhaps imperfection is the soundtrack to your life, to which you sing along laughing and unafraid. Perhaps it’s enough to spend the month of June watching pole beans split open, sticking out their green, dragon tongues.

Or to spy calendula blossoms flagging down honeybees and butterflies with circular parades of stamens.

It doesn’t matter what you love – honeybees, cast iron cookware, cobbling words together on your blog, the thrill of the opening notes of a concert, spotting antlers in the forest newly cast from an elk’s head. It only matters that you’re here, loving it.

The poet Mary Oliver says:

You do not have to be good.

You do not have to walk on your knees for a hundred miles through the desert repenting.

You only have to let the soft animal of your body love what it loves.

It is enough to love what you love; really, it is everything.

Photos: grape buds, hops vine, chive flower, potato, green bean, calendula, apples, tomatoes



43 Responses leave one →
  1. June 6, 2011

    This is beautiful, and just what I needed to read and feel.
    xx oo

  2. June 6, 2011

    thank you so much for this, rachel. just beautiful!

  3. June 6, 2011

    Thank you.

    xox

  4. Rachel permalink
    June 6, 2011

    This is just lovely… I will spend my day loving what I love!

  5. June 6, 2011

    Maybe, my favorite post ever. Truly, the best thing to read on this beautiful morning.

    Thank you.

  6. June 6, 2011

    ahhhhhh, food for the soul.. you made my day:<)))

  7. June 6, 2011

    Awesome post. I especially loved this part: It’s like taking out an insurance policy against boredom, depression, restlessness.

    Find your passion and LIVE it! What a great thought for today. I’m linking to this now. Thanks!

  8. June 6, 2011

    I once read a memorial service notice that said “Chocolate will be served.” I really sort of wanted to go.

  9. June 6, 2011

    Wow – a beautiful, thoughtful sentiment! I LOVE it! :) Thank you!

  10. June 6, 2011

    Because when we all come to end of our lives, it will be good to have loved. That makes a full life. I fill up when I’m loving.

  11. June 6, 2011

    yes yes yes! i love your baby apple photo.

  12. June 6, 2011

    As usual, gorgeous. And you yanked my favorite line from my favorite Mary Oliver poem. Such a lovely thing to read first thing in the morn!

  13. June 6, 2011

    Wonderful post for a Monday morning. You’re so right – to live with purpose, presently. I, too, love Obituaries. Have you read
    The Dead Beat: Lost Souls, Lucky Stiffs, and the Perverse Pleasure of Obituaries? I loved it.
    http://www.amazon.com/Dead-Beat-Perverse-Pleasures-Obituaries/dp/B001O9CF5O/ref=sr_1_2?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1307378156&sr=1-2

  14. June 6, 2011

    love the mary oliver bit. and the photos of your garden. but most especially, i love that you love reading the obits…so glad to know i’m not alone in this!

  15. June 6, 2011

    Lovely and inspiring, thanks!

  16. June 6, 2011

    thank you for these words and the reminder…

  17. June 6, 2011

    Rachel! So often I feel like we are on similar orbits. Like, you write something and I just nod and nod and smile and tear.

    I like this post a whole lot and will share.

    x

  18. Katie B. permalink
    June 6, 2011

    I give huge kudos to Ann Butler, who does the Herald’s obits, for putting in the extra effort to extract that added detail from family members. It’s not easy, always talking to people who have lost someone, but she cares so deeply about their stories, that they always end up grateful. (I’m grateful, too, having had to pinch hit for her and seen how delicate the job of writing obits is. A woman threatened to have my job because we, as a matter of policy, don’t use euphemisms such as “he went to be with the Lord our Savior” — we just say he died.)

    • 6512 and growing permalink
      June 6, 2011

      Katie,

      Thanks for this nugget of detail, just goes to show that for everything we love and value, there is often someone hard at work behind the scenes making it so.

      XO, Rachel

  19. June 6, 2011

    Beautiful post, Rachel. Have you read If You Lived Here, I’d Know Your Name by Heather Lende? This post made me think of her book {which I loved.}

  20. Melissa permalink
    June 6, 2011

    grateful for your words and these funny little connections that spring up all over the place . . .wonderful post. thank you!

    ps. at one year old, my girl weighs 22 lbs 10 oz. cannot believe it’s been a year!

  21. June 6, 2011

    Oh, pole beans *do* have dragon tongues, don’t they? Lovely post.

  22. TonjaB permalink
    June 6, 2011

    It is everything! Thank you (long time follower, first time poster)! My Dad passed away in 1992 and my Mom now has Alzheimer’s. I know what their loves were and mine are. They are entangled like the vines of pole beans forever! Thank you again!

    Tonja

  23. Ruth permalink
    June 7, 2011

    Oh, Rachel, thank you!

  24. June 7, 2011

    With gratitude to you.

  25. Christy permalink
    June 8, 2011

    Thank you for such beautiful words! And the “perhaps imperfection is the soundtreck…” part…just speaks to my soul. Yesterday, instead of doing the ten thousand household chores we have, My husband said “Let’s go canoeing!” And off we went. This morning, the cleaning fairies did not come during the night. But would I trade my sun-soaked day of fishing? Never.

  26. June 8, 2011

    I really needed this reminder today! Thanks for being great as usual, Rachel.

  27. June 8, 2011

    THIS is beauty. The words and the pictures. I love it.

  28. June 8, 2011

    LOVE this. So much truth in “loving what we love.” I love my sweet and simple life. It’s a gift. So are you. <3

  29. June 8, 2011

    LOVE.

  30. June 10, 2011

    It’s like taking out an insurance policy against boredom, depression, restlessness.

    wow. i loved this post, every part of it… and that quote by mary oliver? so perfect friend. thank you.

  31. Noelle permalink
    June 11, 2011

    This is amazing!! Totally great way to start every day!!!

  32. June 18, 2011

    this is gorgeous — as is life, and loving it.

    thank you!!

  33. February 11, 2013

    Very nicely done. Thanks. And thanks to Shawna for sending this link.

  34. December 20, 2013

    Thank you so much for this reflection. I have returned to this a few times already, and I felt that it was only right that after multiple viewings, I let you know how beautiful this is and how much it warms my heart.

  35. May 29, 2014

    Being a witness to *how* you love what you love is also pretty incredible. XO

  36. Cherilyn Haaland permalink
    November 2, 2014

    sublime… words and photos for which there is no need for words.
    i have admiringly read your bit in the local paper off and on for a few years. I have recently been pulled in to the world of blogs… but only five or so. yours is now my fave (of five). every time you remind yourself to appreciate something, so do I. every time you are hoping i will laugh, i do. child raising philosophy. Spot on. WILLINGNESS and LOVE WHAT YOU LOVE. beautiful. crazy! I am feeling like a groupie who might show up on your door step any day.

    i haven’t delved deep in to your blog history, YET. the rewarding, messy and fulfilling endeavors, willingness….. brilliant, and i love mine and I want all of yours. Lucky for you that you have cats. if you had dogs, i would insist on a dog and kid walk immediately.

Trackbacks and Pingbacks

  1. blog love and some quick photos « Mama the Reader
  2. Friday Favorites :: June 10, 2011 Edition | Two Frog Home
  3. Good Reads
  4. Link Love :: Summer Loving | ...infinitely learning...
  5. Homestead happenings: 4 kids, 2 dogs, 1 sheep, 1 bunny and a gazillion mosquitos « 6512 and growing
  6. DIY Kitchen: raw chocolate cake | 6512 and growing

Leave a Reply

Note: You can use basic XHTML in your comments. Your email address will never be published.

Subscribe to this comment feed via RSS

%d bloggers like this: