Cohousing-L Mailing List: Re: Let Us Give Thanks By Max Coots - (Joani and Neil's reading)

[Ann Zabaldo (zabaldo]

Thank  you Neil.  Especially poignant this year as Joani is one of  “… those 
friends now gone … but who fed us in their times that we might have life 
thereafter.”

Miss you, Joani.

Best --

Ann Zabaldo
Takoma Village Cohousing
Washington, DC
Principal, Cohousing Collaborative, LLC
Falls Church, VA
202.546.4654

As long as you have two or fewer … your ducks are always in a row.  The Covert 
Comic



> On Nov 20, 2017, at 6:31 PM, Neil Planchon <neil [at] swansway.com> wrote:
> 
> For many many years Joani and I read Let Us Give Thanks By Max Coots at 
> Swan's Market Cohousing thanksgiving gatherings.  This year, instead of 
> Joani, her daughter Amika read it with me with the assistance of another 
> neighbor.  And this year, with open and tender heart, as I’ve done before, I 
> am sharing the reading with you all!  Here you are:
> 
> Let Us Give Thanks By Max Coots
> -=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-
> 
> Let us give thanks for a bounty of people:
> 
> For children who are our second planting, and, though they grow like weeds 
> and the wind too soon blows them away, may they forgive us our cultivation 
> and fondly remember where their roots are.
> 
> Let us give thanks:
> 
> For generous friends…with hearts as big as hubbards and smiles as bright as 
> their blossoms;
> 
> For feisty friends as tart as apples;
> 
> For continuous friends, who, like scallions and cucumbers, keep reminding us 
> we had them;
> 
> For crotchety friends, as sour as rhubarb and as indestructible;
> 
> For handsome friends, who are as gorgeous as eggplants and as elegant as a 
> row of corn — and the others — as plain as potatoes, and so good for you.
> For funny friends, who are as silly as brussels sprouts and as amusing as 
> Jerusalem artichokes, and serious friends as complex as cauliflowers and as 
> intricate as onions;
> 
> For friends as unpretentious as cabbages, as subtle as summer squash, as 
> persistent as parsley, as delightful as dill, as endless as zucchini, and who 
> — like parsnips — can be counted on to see you through the long winter;
> 
> For old friends, nodding like sunflowers in the evening-time, and young 
> friends coming on as fast as radishes;
> 
> For loving friends, who wind around us like tendrils, and hold us despite our 
> blights, wilts, and witherings;
> 
> And finally, for those friends now gone, like gardens past, that have been 
> harvested — but who fed us in their times that we might have life thereafter;
> 
> For all these we give thanks.
> 
> Source: the late Rev. Max Coots, who was Minister Emeritus of the Unitarian 
> Universalist Church in Canton, New York. His passion for gardening yielded 
> this beloved and much used meditation.
> 
> -=-=-
> 
> 
> May you be well and may you have a marvelous Thanksgiving!
> Neil (and Joani in spirit) 
> Swan's Market Cohousing, Oakland CA
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