A farmer was trying to get her geese to lay golden eggs. She played her flute, hoping to inspire them. She played and played. A few eggs plopped out but not one of them was golden.
“Did you have a good day?” the farmer’s husband asked her later that night.
“It wasn’t a good day for golden eggs,” the farmer said. “But it was a wonderful day for making music.”
Maybe we fall short of our most-desired goals. But we can still look at what’s right in our lives rather than what’s wrong. We can focus our attention on what we have accomplished rather than what we haven’t.
Today’s reminder: Use what we’ve got. Want what we already have.
I’m sure you’ve heard that story before but I made the flute-player a woman not a man just to stir things up a bit. Coming up soon: an interview with Lisa Barr, author of the novel, Fugitive Colors.
And I’m giving away a paperback copy of The Mom Who Took Off On Her Motorcycle on goodreads beginning July 3 so stay tuned!
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About dianabletter
Diana Bletter is the author of several books, including The Invisible Thread: A Portrait of Jewish American Women (with photographs by Lori Grinker), shortlisted for a National Jewish Book Award. Her novel, A Remarkable Kindness, (HarperCollins) was published in 2015. She is the First Prize Winner of Moment Magazine's 2019 Fiction Contest. Her work has appeared in The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, Commentary, tabletmag, Glamour, The Forward, The North American Review, Times of Israel, and is a reporter for Israel21C, and many other publications. She is author of Big Up Yourself: It's About Time You Like Being You and The Mom Who Took off On Her Motorcycle, a memoir of her 10,000-mile motorcycle trip to Alaska and back to New York. She lives in a small beach village in Western Galilee, Israel, with her husband and family. She is a member of the local hevra kadisha, the burial circle, and a Muslim-Jewish-Christian-Druze women's group in the nearby town of Akko. And, she likes snowboarding and climbing trees.
DIANA BLETTER 
Beautiful post; it shook me out of my reveries.
Thank you for writing! I hope it inspired you to make some beautiful music!
We all need occasional reminders, Diana. Especially me!
Thank you, Marilyn, for writing!
What a lovely example, Diana, and an inspiring nudge.
The photo is made to order, just how I picture the farmer…if she had a flute instead of a pitch fork.
Excellent post.
Thank you, Marylin. We got to keep doing our art, even if we don’t always lay golden eggs!