Tag: gratitude

Ours to Claim

March 30, 2023 by Cassandra Johnson

As I found myself doing my gratitude recognition and being prayerfully mindful of the simple things I have like my basic needs and even many desires, I realized what I can easily overlook. I usually recognize what is recent and constant but had to note, there is something more. There is another more grounded foundation for gratitude. This aspect can be irreplaceable. There is the appreciation for the multitude of experiences passed, places I got the honor of seeing, circles in which I moved, and people who accepted me in the most respectable, affectionate ways and then there are people to whom I had the pleasure of providing help, encouragement and support.

The memories of circumstances, events, past friends and current friends will always have their place. You and I cannot be robbed of these fortunes. There is an appreciation for experiences and circumstances I will always hold dear or from which I was able to recover and learn. We are all fashioned with a unique story. I am sure we can think of interesting people we have met, people that find us interesting, misfortune we have escaped or surpassed, and just simply being somewhere maybe especially fun or peaceful. The fact is no one can take away the moments you were able to live through and the personal way they made you feel. They will always have space and credit for being a part of your process. We get to be here and unlike new developments, there is an irreplaceable gratitude we can affix to the lives we have lived, to date.

Getting to experience the college student’s life was one stand out. Immediately following high school, I got to be the first in my immediate family to go away for this honor. I am lucky my parents and several of my teachers normalized this path for me. You get quite the momentum when people support your progress and or/ treat your path as given.

Being able to explore my cultural interests has been another spotlight. Volunteering freely here and in South America was a reminder of being in a brave and comfortable enough place to decide to uproot my life and provide some assistance for others. I can always appreciate the extended leap I took. Otherwise, I could have never counted so many international people among my friends.

Thanks to my parents, I also feel there is this work and study ethic forged inside my brothers and I, adding to our perseverance and endurance.  I cannot say all forms of striving are healthy or necessary (it can go left) but I am happy to see many instances were efforts equal purpose and achievement. The incredible influence that my parents, their parents and our ancestors have on us is something I can be grateful to hold within me, especially when I am down. Eventually, I get back to hope.

I am grateful no one can take away our experience. No one can take away all we got to do and see and who we got to meet. For better or worse, as I get older, I am remembering how I have survived and in what I have relished. I am remembering to have appreciation for moments passed. Different circumstances, different settings, different crowds. Remaining grateful for what comes now, I am pleased we get to have so many priceless gems tucked away.

buy me a hot chocolate

HERE TO THERE

MARCH 14, 2020 BY CASSANDRA JOHNSON

My heart is heavy with all the many lives, now lost to Coronavirus (COVID-19) in China and throughout the world. With my company’s new option, starting Monday, of being able to work from home for a week, I will do so accordingly. As someone who takes public transportation for quite some time to get there and back, I want to diminish the chance of being a harm to others or myself. Not everyone has options like I do, and I think people are commendable in all the various situations they are facing.

The gym has been a good healthy outlet for me to visit daily (save one alternating day). Working on my healthiness has done some work for my psyche in general and a nice bonus is that it is within walking distance. I also find it healthy to be able to be out and about and socialize in these continued smaller ways – being out – getting to the stores and the gym has been nice.

Ironically, I already imagine I will get more done working from home. I already know, per the chance we got to do so for about a month during our renovation. It has been quite the year already, well actually two years, I would say, starting with the flood that totaled most of my coworkers’ cars in the parking garage. We’ve had many ups and downs as a team.

Cuba. I coincidentally got a loving message from Dignora yesterday. I recalled her in my spontaneous audio suggestion on Wednesday as the first casa particular in which we stayed in 2016. She reached out to check on me and let me know they were okay. I think going through our tasks with extra special precautions is key. I think deeply even more of my fam in Ohio (where I grew up) and friends everywhere. I thought I had some gratitude before but I’m really appreciating life and how friendly and well-intentioned most people can be.

A lady asked me if I found any food as we were leaving the grocery store today😊. I said, “some” and asked her how she did? We’re lucky, in this particular store in DC, in Friendship Heights. I can’t speak to the whole DMV (DC, Maryland, Virginia area) but it wasn’t rough at the store just a little up the street. Even when the toilet paper section was starkly bare, next to a lot of other products, there was a considerable number of items left. You only had to reach further back than normal for what you would normally get or settle for brands or items, close enough to what you might desire. Also, there was plenty of food stocked in the perhaps not so healthy areas😊. Then, lo and behold, a smiling Safeway employee rolled out a skid of toilet paper next to the self-checkout line to which I was heading. Even then, people only gingerly started taking one 12 pack two-ply at a time. I don’t know what happens after I leave or what’s going to happen but did I ever really know? We’re just kind of very accustomed to life being a certain way – and that’s okay too. A journey is a journey even when we’re close to home.

Lots of love,
Cassandra

Another February

FEBRUARY 23, 2020 BY CASSANDRA JOHNSON

Becoming a free agent is going to be quite the trip, adding to some other personal parallel journeys.

Adding in gratefulness for all past and present paths, I’m ready – as far as I know.

All-nighters or rather, perhaps quasi all-nighters, here I come. It’s time to increase the work-at-home gigs and freestyle-freelance gigs on my way to even more of this volunteer travel life. I’m referring to this, personally, as my volunteer life challenge (keeping me ever closer to who I suspect myself to be).

At past and first glance, I thought about looking forward to what weekends are supposed to be and especially to those extended weekends and random PTO days, here and there. Then, I had a moment. Something different occurred to me, with the help of some hardworking YouTubers, writers and other creative people. Maybe I’d much rather capitalize on these times and power through, in an effort to have my future consist of what feels more like endless Saturdays, commencing and ending with volunteering, writing, translating, traveling, family, friends, discovery and soaking up forever suns and restful nights. Not a bad challenge that leads to that finish line.

I’m fortunate to have a birthday that ends in my favorite month, February. Reflecting on everything, every person I’ve met, knowledge of every ancestor paving the way and all my personal experiences, painful or dear – knowledge of what got me here is padding my steps.

I’ve worked hard before but for some different errant objectives. These were not regretful. Many were quite commendable, but rather for another time and another me not as ready as this one (probably even less developed for the me to come).

Being altogether better at meditating, resting up, working and chilling in between… I’m curiously excited about what and who I get to meet and of course, revisit. More to be shared. More to be seen.

Image Credits:
Images by geralt on Pixabay
Continue reading “Another February”

The Real

DECEMBER 6, 2019 BY CASSANDRA JOHNSON

Before my current travels, I left you with a taste of or rather a lot of my life in the desert of Peru. I shared heading a bit further to Arequipa and Cusco, and especially Machu Picchu. Well, back then, a younger me had decided before my 183-day stay was up, I needed to follow the best advice I knew on how to extend my time in Peru. I knew in order to continue or rather stay again; I would need to leave. I would need to leave the country and reenter it to reset my time. I had planned ahead, at least mentally and although it would cost me some bolivianos (as a US citizen), I knew Bolivia was my next abbreviated stop. I selected it for various reasons before I left the US for South America and for some additional ones once I was there.

People especially get to worrying about you when you’re away in a land foreign from the one you share with them and I imagine there was some relief knowing I was around new friends in various spots. Yet, still, there is a sense of imagining you alone, because truly you are apart from the foundation of the familiarity you shared with them and though you can feel complete on some days, this is also what can feed into your own homesickness and loneliness.

God rest my mother’s beautiful soul. She was no longer with us when I first ventured away from the States. This was only to Canada but knowing how much she worried about my father and each of my brothers, even for example, when I was two hours away at school or even when we were out longer than expected, this would have been a lot for her. Knowing her history, before I was here, I understood it to be linked to her childhood and losing her mother. My heart is warmed and twisted further still realizing that while we may mistakenly think dads not remembering the specifics of crushes, current best friend’s names, or who sits behind you in 5th period science means their nerves are made of more steel, this is not necessarily the truth. My dad was a traveler before my parents met and married, but I found him to be just as worried in his own way – at the same time excited for me – at the same time relieved when my feet were back on Washington DC soil followed by a visit to Ohio. I can’t help but miss all the unique things he would have to say to us in the most unique ways.

Actually, I have to now be perfectly honest with you. This post took a turn. I was ready to share how I entered La Paz, Bolivia. However, I’m holding space for my parents now… for our parents… a moment of recognition for hard work instilled in us, for compassion, for the ability to grow and for gratitude. I look forward to sharing again and I don’t even know what comes next (though I kinda think I do) but I’m happy to have a space to create and express and share and be thankful. Thank you.

Warm regards,

Always,

Cassandra Johnson

Misadventures Not Traveling (Technically)

AUGUST 28, 2019 BY CASSANDRA JOHNSON

Intriguing mishaps can meet you no matter the distance. These would be ones like those unfolding on my early morning metro commute one very early August morning. These would also be those hiccups that presumably seem to be mere circumstance, but sometimes, I wonder. I wonder if certain stumbling blocks are the signs and whispers (which I’m incidentally listening to for guidance) — are they signs of my own misdirection. Literally and figuratively. How about those obstacles? I happen to feel like I am at a crossroads so naturally I wonder. When I make one decision or change my mind, I wonder. Which step is next? Is something not seemingly working out because I need to go about it differently or do I need to not go about it all?

Mishaps also have a brilliant way of instilling gratitude. Gratitude could just be there on its own but there are times when I see it underscored by the knowledge of what the downside has been or could be. As simple as the experience of being caught out in a monstrous storm versus having a sunny day off from work.

It was just earlier this month – heading to work. I have become oddly accustomed to waking up much earlier to allow for the extra time it will take to get there. You see, there is customary maintenance underway on the metro and that means that the service for both the Blue Line and Yellow Line are interrupted a couple stops before I get to my regular stop. Consequently, there are free shuttle buses covering the gaps. This is when gratitude battles with agitation = Round 1. I am actually quite grateful for the inconvenience convenience. I remind myself.

I’ve taken this as an opportunity to engulf books – one of my pastimes which I’m pleased I’ve avidly gotten back to not neglecting (over the past several years).  Before getting to the shuttle, I take two trains and it’s no rush, because as I was mentioning I’ve decided to get up early to allow for trains possibly not showing up on time, breakdowns on buses, etc. This was the perfect day to be prepared for both.

The second train I transfer to took about 20 minutes longer to get to the shuttle bus destination because of a down circuit at another station. Once on the shuttle bus, driven by a friendly Ethiopian American gentleman, we journeyed what seemed steadily along. However, this was not the time to get comfortable. Not yet. Not the moment riders collapse away into their respective phones and other reading material. So, it seemed, the bus suddenly could not start back up once the bus driver stopped to open the door before crossing a railroad track (the obligatory traffic regulation).

I thought the two out-of-service buses eventually pulling up alongside him were going to rescue us from the highway. I thought this laughably but still fully imagining the possibility. Out of Service rotating on the bus signage where a number and destination usually was meant they weren’t currently running a route.

A couple of anxious passengers began standing and moving up front, towards the bus driver. They had to be thinking similarly. We had been sitting in silence for a considerable amount of time as the bus driver tried to restart the bus. Once, he powered down completely, the lights turned out briefly, but…nothing.

The two moving buses, however, mainly held up a few cars in the next lane, while one of the respective bus drivers did board our bus to see if she could help him. This also made complete sense, except for, they were oddly not communicating with us. She finally asked where we were headed. I found this oddly hilarious since we were not one or two random hitchhikers but rather a bus load of about 40 passengers headed to a couple of designated stops specifically designated by metro along a typical work route. She said she could get us to King Street. We were so thankful for her. (I thanked the first bus driver as we left him. He had gotten us as far as he could and now could get help without a bunch of anxious eyes on his back).

Our new driver immediately took us to a point that has recently become very familiar. This is where usually about 1% of the bus riders exit while most of us get off at the second shuttle stop, closest to our employment. (There are various shuttle buses available at other stations too, if one happens to be traveling beyond those other temporarily closed connecting stations).

This particular day, we assumed there would be a second stop to come. We were incorrect. She said she was not a certain type of bus and we all had to get out here. I write “certain” because I’m not sure exactly what distinction there was. She didn’t say “not a shuttle” so mystery still remains there.

I felt myself inwardly – maybe not so inwardly – smirking throughout these events. To work on limiting the anguish and knowing that I got up early for a reason, it became one of those times, I touched on in an earlier post, on which you will look back and laugh, but you actually find it so random that you find yourself laughing in the moment.

Getting off the bus, I made a quick turn on to King Street, knowing I would walk the rest of the way, At least we were in the vicinity and off the highway. People were standing outside now, hesitant and agitated before figuring out next steps. I thought to myself how they didn’t realize their fortune. I thought they have obviously never been dropped off by a local vehicle taking them in the wrong direction in Havana before. (future blog post to come😊).

Overall, life is now a far cry from dealing with car notes and car problems (though I have missed my middle-aged Ford on some grocery store and additional weekend errands). My recollection here is just the other side of some trouble with modern convenience but I also pause to say I am grateful for the high probability of on-time and quick service that gets me where I need and want to be. Since I gave up my car before heading to Peru the first time, I’m pretty fortunate to live in a large enough area with a good public transportation system. An added plus is living in such a walk-friendly space.

Universe just simply took a moment to say: Here’s a reminder of the importance of leaving an hour earlier during a partial metro shutdown😊

Also, here is the importance of temporary solutions, good systems being made better, a number of helpful people when it’s not always expected, and a fairly healthy portion of self-reliance.

Cassandra