#365Gratitude Day 225:Let's Be Forward, Shall We?

Yesterday I was updating the apps on my phone, and ended up deleting a movie I had on it, to make room for all the downloads.  

I had two movies on there, and the one I kept is one of my favorites, an animated Disney film called Meet The Robinsons .

The movie is about a young orphan and brilliant inventor, Lewis, who becomes obsessed with finding his birth mother, and through wacky misadventures winds up visiting the future. 

The central theme of the movie is mindfulness, to weather misfortunes and mistakes, learn from them, and keep moving forward.  

Sometimes you just run right out of plans

 It's a lesson that the film's villain, the Bowler Hat Guy not only doesn't take to heart, he can't even perceive it.  At a few key points in the film he's so obsessed with the past that he literally cannot see what is happening around him. 

Eventually though, through pluck, determination, a smattering of good luck and some Disney magic, Lewis is triumphant and things work out. 

I love  this movie. I watched a good chunk of it yesterday, and finished it this morning lying in bed.  

It's got me so cheery just now. And as always, I find it so relevant to what I've got going on in my own life. I've got an ambitious side project going on, I'm just finishing up something at my day job, and have a lot on my plate.  Plus, my family life is exciting and challenging, with my new relationship with Squee having all sorts of amazing ripple effects on my other poly relationships, as well as all the surprises, benefits, and burdens of just having moved somewhere new. 

I'm so glad I stumbled across this favorite movie of mine again, and feel its message so strongly today.  

#365Gratitude Day 224: Sleep on it

I'm numbering these again. 

Why?

Because I've been sleeping on it.

It takes time to see when you need to make a change in your life.  I stopped   numbering because it felt like it was turning a mindful practice into an onerous obligation. I gave myself permission to miss days, to not be all OCD about it, whatever. 

I thought that ditching the numbers would be great. It was for a while. But it also let me get sloppy about the practice of my gratitude. 

So, right now, I'm changing that.  Yesterday I worked late, and for whatever reason had a not-so-great night's sleep. 

When I got up this morning, my girlcat Yin knew I had.  She normally sleeps with me anyhow, but after getting up for breakfast, she came back to cuddle up with me.  

"Let's take it easy, Mako."

I rested for a while, petting her, and letting her nuzzle up to me. Getting affection from your cat is one of life's great little pleasures. After about 45 minutes of it, I was ready to get up and get on with my day.  

One of the things that came out of our little impromptu cuddle session was my realization of another paradigm for marking my gratitude.  It's like cataloging something special each day.  It's a reverie, something that happens each day, labeled and numbered not from obligation, but fondness.  

I blog to hang on to my practice of being in the moment. 

Thanks, Yin.  

#365Gratitude:Free Chillbo

Sometimes you luck out. ​

A while ago I brought in our old Keurig coffee podthing (sure it's a word) to work. ​

​This was after Missy got us a new one because the old one stopped working. 

Then it mysteriously started working again. Nobody needs TWO Keurigs. That's like needing two belly buttons. Nobody needs two of those either. I easily can accomplish all the belly button related things I do each day with my one belly button. ​

​So I brought it into the office and left it in the kitchen, for anyone to use. (The Keurig, not my belly button. I figured people would bring their own belly buttons. Besides, hygiene!)

My coworkers are lovely people who drink a LOT of coffee. So, they broke it, for good this time.

​But that's okay. Because the management at my company are super nice folks, and they got me an Amazon gift card to make it up to me. 

The hammock, not the woman in the floppy hat

​I used it to get two of these:

That's a sort of inflatable hammock called a CHILLBO BAGGINS.  ​I think they're neat.  There are a lot of different brands of these, but I had to go with the Chillbo, because after my extensive research, I found that this particular brand has the funniest name. 

And I got two of them. For nothing.  

Actually, when I really look at it, it wasn't for nothing. I kind of paid in mindfulness.  

Instead of being grumpy when the second Keurig purchase turned out to be needless, I decided to bring it in, sure for my own convenience, but also to do a nice thing for other folks, because why not do a nice thing when it's easy to do so? 

That's the essence of how karma works. It's not a tally board sort of thing. The word karma is actually Sanskrit for "action".  It's the ripples you make in the pond by throwing a stone. Good action tends to make more good action. 

I'm planning to give one of the two Chillbos I got to a friend as a present. Because it'll be nice, and why not be nice? 

#365Gratitude:Lubble, Frubble, Squee and no Trouble

So this past weekend was a really, really big deal for me, and for Missy, too.

My girlfriend Squee came to visit us.

 I took off time Friday and Monday for her visit.  Missy and I did a fair amount of prep work to be ready.  We bought a bed for the guest room, put it together, realized we had it wrong, fixed it, realized we bought the wrong bed frame, returned it, put it together, and then collapsed in a sweaty, satisfied heap.

Missy agonized for days over finding good nightstands to put in there, and ended up rigging up some ersatz ones with plastic drawers, and a sheet or two.  (This was a total thoughtful surprise for me by the way - I love her so much.)  We just moved, and all the furniture money we had available really went towards the bed, so that was a lovely solution.

Squee told me that it was all amazing, but we didn't need to trouble ourselves, because the most important things she was coming to see weren't things at all, they were people - me, Missy, and my sister-in-law.  

There's this funny word that gets thrown around in polyamorous circles, frubble.  Frubble is (to quote Urban Dictionary [I know, but don't judge me, in this case it's great]) "Total joy over someone else's happiness."  In the case of polyamory, it's when you're happy that your partner is happy.

See? Cuddling!

We were positively dipped in frubble the whole visit.  Missy was thrilled for me.  Then Squee gave Missy and MB these amazing duct-tape wallets her daughter had made for them, and I was happy for them.  And we all spent time, and everyone was happy for everyone else and for themselves too.  There was a whole lot of cuddling on couches.

That's my wife, and my girlfriend, and if you look really closely, me sitting behind them (See my arm?)

We were family-building, forging all our individual feelings for one another into something greater than the sum of its parts.  I commented to Missy that frubble wasn't quite what I was feeling, because this joy I was feeling wasn't just someone else's happiness, it affected me, too.

She suggested a new word "lubble."  Maybe that's "total joy over the happiness of people you love, that makes you all love one another more"?  I don't know, it's a work in progress.

MORE CUDDLING?  Yep.

We spent amazing quality time together.  We hunted for Pikachu near our house.  We wandered around small charming towns near our house.  We ate Waffle House hash browns.  We felt love, connection, and closeness.

I am so blessed.

#365Gratitude:Getting the band back together

I'm very, very fond of my girlfriend Squee, and my friend Moliére.  We did the Littles Express event as a power-trio (with awesome help from many friends) two years ago.  Life stuff happened, and our little trio broke up for a while, which made us all very sad.

But we've got the band back together, as it were.  This morning I had a nice little Skype call with them both to show them something cool I'm working on, and just spend time.

It felt good, damn good.