Brady Street Beauty

I have two first-world problems right now. Well, two that I’m going to talk about now.

May 23rd first world problem list:

1. I’m a tad jealous of all the cute lamb and calf photos posted by northern England shepherd and writer James Rebanks.
2. I’m slightly sad that we are not in Edinburgh, Scotland and northern England today as we planned.

First World Problem One

It’s like this. In preparation for our trip to England, I read this fine book called The Shepherd’s Life by James Rebanks. (By the way, here is my Goodreads account where you can see all the books I’ve written and recently read.)

James Rebanks tells the story of how he dropped out of high school to help on the family farm. Later, he applied to Oxford University and got accepted. He went to school there for awhile, but after school he returned to the family farm. Isn’t that strange and exciting?

Anyway, I found him on Twitter. I don’t use that platform just a lot, but I have an account, so I follow him now. He posts, almost daily, photos of sheep and little lambs and stone fences and cows and calves. I look at his pictures and I think, what a great thing to have these awesome things to share with a nature-hungry world!

First World Problem Two

Marnell and I and my friend Sherilyn were planning to be in England this weekend. (Strictly speaking, we were going to be in Edinburgh, Scotland this morning and Sherilyn was going to take a quick hop over to Ireland.)

Missing a trip is not a huge life crisis. It’s not the Holocaust or a death or a small business failure or a typhoon and a COVID outbreak hitting a refugee camp at the same time like our friends in Bangladesh. It’s not even like the tornadoes or wildfires I’ve written about.

Still, since I tend to be a melancholy person even on a sunny day, I thought it might be wise to prepare a strategy for dealing with these items.

Current Strategy

1. Walk around neighborhood here on Brady Street.
2. Notice many beautiful things, amidst the graffiti and trash.
3. Be thankful for the scenery outside our own windows.

I haven’t found any twin lambs yet, but I have found a pair of geese and goslings, a black squirrel, a whole neighborhood full of dogs and wildflowers, a pink and red bike, and a man looking out of a second story window directly above me who said hello even though he knew I would never have seen him otherwise.

It’s odd, but after I started looking for beauty, I found it all around. Our Brady Street beauty is a brand all its own, but I love it!

P.S. Stay tuned for an update during the week next week on Voices of Survival podcast! I’ll be sharing more info, as well as the much-improved graphics done by friend Velinda of Laurel Street.