Why Not Be Beautiful?

We went back for a visit to the Ranch last week, and it was garishly gorgeous. It wowed me. I felt almost dizzy. Everything lined up...the luminous green hills, the shimmer of sea...we even glimpsed the tell-tale white splash of a whale breaching.  We dared to detour and drive a short distance up our old canyon, where we saw my oak saplings, the macadamia trees that skirt the fence, pregnant cows as big as ships and a few playful calves...everything so dear and familiar.

I was young there once, and I can't believe I lived more than thirty years in that place and thought any of it was normal, if indeed I ever did. (But you know? Looking back, I’m pretty sure I always recognized the wonder and implausibility of it. I think I lived a state of enchantment.)

And on a daily basis for all those years, we poured our hearts and souls into the place, working hard to steward and protect it and foster a sense of community. There is a spiritual component to it also, and that’s the part that's hard to talk about, but it was very real. There are layers and levels to knowing a place. There are secrets and ghosts, and something that was always there, unnamed, but deeply felt.

Anyway, we went back to the Ranch for a visit, and like a tempestuous, passionate lover, it covered me with kisses, filled me up with sky, and confirmed that we still belong to one another.

I guess we always will. 

Now I have become the punchy paramour of the sky, spellbound and ridiculous, but I’m enjoying these surprising new days of this new chapter in our lives. We have dubbed our house The Last Base. It’s largely unfurnished, but we have views of the mountains, and we’re close to town and friends, and as long as we’re together, I have no complaints. As Merwin said (and I’ve been reading a lot of his poems lately) “happiness has a shape made of air/it was never owned by anyone/it comes when it will in its own time”. Happiness has been dropping in on me a lot lately, and I appreciate its random appearances more than I ever did.

One afternoon, I went for a walk near the Mission. Singing emanated from the sanctuary, but it seemed to me the holiness was outside the doors: in the shifting hues of the mountains, the gnarled beseeching oak trees, the pastoral fields of green. I noticed a young woman walking on the dirt road just ahead of me…she was radiant and Rubenesque, wearing a white dress embroidered with bright flowers, her dark hair piled on her head in a thick braid, and she was simply being beautiful, enjoying her moment in the world. She smiled into the sunlight, becoming her own kind of beacon, and I thought, “Life goes by quickly. Why not be beautiful? Why not wear flowers? Why not be someone who shines a light?”

Lest you think I’ve become a shallow good times girl, I should add that my friends and I are working to put together an event of music and spoken word early in 2026, similar to one we organized last May in support of Democracy Forward. And this too is a way of being beautiful. We want to inspire a sense of hope and community. We will focus this time on the fact that there are people in our own neighborhoods who are hungry and afraid, and we’ll raise funds for the local food bank. But this gathering won’t be a litany of grievances; we will make room for light and joy, which fortify and sustain us.

In planning our program, we were particularly touched by the words of human rights activist Cleve Jones:

We come to this place this afternoon from many separate journeys. Our ancestors travelled different paths. But all our parents and grandparents and great grandparents and those before them - set their feet upon long and often difficult roads that converge here today, at this critical moment in the history of our nation and humankind.

But we do not despair, he adds, and we will not surrender. Every one of us has a role to play, and we can each bring some special skill or contribution.

So the themes of our gathering will be community, kindness, knowing what is right and acting accordingly, recognizing the many paths that brought us here, and honoring the bravery and ideals of those who came before us. We will remind ourselves and one another that we are a powerful and resilient community—and what is our country, after all, but a vast collection of communities? Our actions may be local, but from our local deeds, there is a ripple effect. The small, good things we do are cumulative, and our defiant hopes are contagious.  

Let us walk in beauty and light, carrying flowers, if we wish. Let us notice the holiness in the little moments within the ragtag days. Let us savor the unexpected tenderness that now and then arises, and contemplate the astonishing and unlikely fact that we are here together.

There has been too much leaving in the last few months. Now is about arriving.

“Would I love it this way if it could last?” asked Merwin. It doesn’t matter.