Views from Raven's Nest: Daily Reminder # 341

(Please scroll down for the Weekly Wordzzle Challenge.)

Lots of pictures again tonight. I still haven't done my wordzzles. Bad Raven. I just didn't quite feel like it. It's not that much fun when I'm playing alone as I have been lately. But I digress. I'm going to use a Neale Donald Walsh/God message today. This one is about letting go of violence and speaks to many levels, personal and global, I think. The subject has been on my mind with the killing of Bin Laden. Assassination is crude, but is it right not to kill someone who is not only responsible for the deaths of thousands and thousands of people around the world but bent on and plotting to kill thousands and thousands more? Assassination is crude but so are terrorism and mass murder. I do always pray for people like Bin Laden. It seems to me they are the people in this world who need our prayers most. How dark must your world and soul be to allow it to justify seducing children into blowing themselves up, to justify killing thousands, to preach hate in the name of god or to treat women like things... Yet humans are complex. Even the kindest among us carry darkness in our own hearts... The only way we will every find peace in this world is when we stop trying to kill the people who are wrapped in hate and violence and start trying to heal their lives so that killing will seem like a non-option to them. Anyway, here's what Neale and God have to say:

On this day of your life, dear friend,

I believe God wants you to know...

...that this is not a day for remembering

violence, but for memorializing your decision

to heal every wound that could cause it.

There is one question that no one will ask of

those who use violence to make their point:

What hurts you so bad that you feel

you have to hurt me in order to heal it?

This does not condone violence, but it can

help us to understand it -- and to understand

how to stop it. CwG says, "No one does anything

inappropriate, given their model of the world."

Embracing the wisdom in those eleven words

could change the course of human history.

Love, Your Friend....

and a whole bunch of photos from the back yard's largesse today..... First off... there weren't bees, but there was a bumble bee! What a joy to see even one! There might have been a second one too but at least I have proof here of one. He didn't seem as zippy as he might, but he was there, buzzing around the dandylions. I was thrilled. For those who don't know about it, bumble bees and honey bees are endangered right now. There's some kind of disease decimating their numbers. My Spring and summer yard used to be rich in bees. Last year I saw none. This year's one is a hopeful sign.

and a robin and sparrows, cardinals, blue jays, hummingbirds, chickadees, goldfinches. The tufted titmouse was around but I didn't get his picture today. I have a long way to go on getting good pictures of hummingbirds, but it's so cool to see them up close like this. Rambling. Sorry.

How funny is that little but and those feet?

Some things I'm grateful for today: (Items in red are pre-gratitude, a whisper in the ear of the creative forces of the Universe, to please give me stuff because I'll really appreciate and enjoy it and won't that make the Universe happy too?)