Like a Pebble in the Puddle

 

               Like a Pebble in the Puddle

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My daughter and I were talking about a favorite author, Louise Penny, and about the village life she created. Dee Dee said, “I want to live in Three Pines.”

“I do too,” I responded.

The phone was quiet for a minute. A minute can be a long time. “Mom, I think you already live there.”

Another quiet minute. “You are right. I do.”

Back in 2018 I wrote a blurb or a blathering, depending on you point of view. Yesterday I pulled it up because my stubborn printer needed a test page. I chose it because it is short. I called the small piece “A Pebble”. I’ll give you part of it.

“I can’t change you. I can’t change much in this big bad world. But, I can make choices. When I choose hate and spite, superiority and greed, ignorance and fear, I add to the mess of my life. I might hurt you, but, ultimately, I hurt myself.”

I know we can change ourselves, our thinking. I believe, and this is just my belief so don’t hang on it, that to make changes we need help, all kinds of help, some with skin on it and some without. If I want to change, the helper will pop up in front of me. Of course, sometimes, often, I misidentify the helper.  

I continue my piece from 2018, which had been triggered by an event I no longer recall, “As much as I am able, I choose to treat you, and me, with dignity, with respect, with compassion, with acceptance. Like a pebble dropped in a puddle, my choice reverberates, touches you. I cannot control your response, only my choices. It’s not much. I hope it matters.”

In 1978, ’79 and ’80 I lived in Chicago. Those years culminated the lowest point of my life. There, in my little upstairs writing room, I learned to find the mountains I sorely missed. I began to learn to change my mind, my choices, my life. I had good help.

Back to Louise Penny. It is a coincidence that yesterday I finished re-reading one of her books. From the afterward, I quote Louise, “Three Pines is a state of mind. When we choose tolerance over hate. Kindness over cruelty. Goodness over bullying. (Or over being bullied, my words.) When we choose to be hopeful, not cynical. Then we live in Three Pines.

“I don’t always make those choices, but I do know when I’m in the wilderness, and when I’m in the bistro. I know where I want to be, and I know how to get there.” End quote.

Me too, Louise, me too. I don’t always make those choices but I know how to get there. I know how to live at the ocean or in the mountains or on the plains and be at home each place. I’ve learned to love where I am. Home is not about geography.

Three Pines or Etzatlan or Havre, Montana, any home, is at the end of a two-way street. I give you what I can and I take in what you give me, all while making choices as thoughtfully as I am able. Like a pebble dropped in a puddle, my choice reverberates, touches you. Your choices touch me. We dance. We dance alone. We dance together. I hope it matters.

Sondra Ashton

HWC: Looking out my back door

September 25, 2025

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