PRACTICE RANDOM KINDNESS AND SENSELESS ACTS OF BEAUTY

PRACTICE RANDOM KINDNESS AND SENSELESS ACTS OF BEAUTY

Nov 13, 2021 | WORLD

Practice random kindness and senseless acts of beauty Anne Herbert’s popular precept has been expanded by Margaret Pavel into a powerful message for our era, and for all ages. Combined with Mayumi Oda’s watercolor art in the playful style of picture scrolls from 12th century Japan, offers delight and timeless wisdom.

I don’t know about you, but these days I really feel the need to re-share this sentence.

It is said that it was written on a restaurant’s paper placemat and I believe exactly that all the best inspirations are born more or less like this.

So I would like to write it wherever possible, but especially on the heart.

I would like to write keep calm and spread random kindness.

I hear and read too much hate.


I don’t care one side or the other, I don’t care above, below, sooner or later, because when hatred spreads, no one is right.

Yet we have a lot of history behind us, and we certainly do not lack examples.

‘Tis but thy name that is my enemy…
What’s in a name? That which we call a rose
By any other word would smell as sweet.

These are words that we all know practically by heart.

They are “ancient” words, but only because they were written in 1595 but sadly they could be from yesterday.

No one is born hating another person because of the color of his skin, or his background, or his religion, people must learn to hate, and if they can learn to hate, they can be taught to love, for love comes more naturally to the human heart than its opposite.. 

Another creepy example, you don’t even need to write about who these words are.

We remind them, let’s spread them.

If mine are too stupid, use those of The Great … precursor of the concept of spreading goodness:

We have developed speed, but we have shut ourselves in. Machinery that gives abundance has left us in want. Our knowledge has made us cynical. Our cleverness, hard and unkind. We think too much and feel too little. More than machinery we need humanity. More than cleverness we need kindness and gentleness. Without these qualities, life will be violent and all will be lost.

RICE FIELDS DON’T RISE FEELINGS

RICE FIELDS DON’T RISE FEELINGS

Nov 6, 2021 | ENVIRONMENT, ITALY

According to the annual report published by the National Rice Authority, Lomellina and Pavese are confirmed as the area with the greatest extension of rice paddies.

“The checkered sea” as my cousin used to say when we were children… yes, here we are quite far from the sea and therefore we are content to find beauty with alternative visions.

The checkered sea or rice paddies.

Paddy fields but no laughter.

Or, quoting neorealism, bitter rice since the conditions of livability, or should I say mortality, due to high rate of cancers, certainly do not allow smiles.

I don’t get tired of periodically reiterating the high danger of the poisons we live with, because the damage they cause to the body is terrible.

But as Charlie Chaplin taught us, a day without laughter is a day wasted.

So if the smile is still a little difficult, I would say to start at least with rice.

The most typical recipes of Lomellina, to stay on the subject of rice fields… mention among the first risotto with frogs … 

But I would “jump” directly to something else like the simple ris e lac: rice with milk or risotto with black-eyed peas.

Or, better still: why not take a longer jump outside the borders of Lomellina?

The caustic misanthrope proposed a tartare with Nero rice which to describe as delicious is few, and then she also told me about red rice!
I am a mess so on the first try I got the cooking time wrong but … you learn by making a mistake!
Thanks Lu!

Also on Paola’s blog: Primo non sprecare – First don’t waste, which I advise you not to miss, you will find a long series of recipes for cooking rice enriched with valuable advice, and they are one more interesting than the other!

I don’t know if I can choose, and you?

How about: can we dare a Keep Calm version?
Proposals are accepted!

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