Radical Joy Revealed
September 13, 2017
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Radical Joy Revealed is a weekly message of inspiration about finding and making beauty in wounded places. We hope you'll enjoy these doorways into places that are both familiar and surprising, and we welcome your suggestions, stories, and photos. Click here to subscribe. 

Playing the piano in flooded Houston
Aric Harding plays the piano in his flooded Houston home.
Photo from a video by CNN.
Aric Harding returned to his Friendswood, Texas home, south of Houston, the other day to pick up some stuffed animals to comfort his children, who were staying at a shelter. While he was there, he took note of his piano, its legs deep underwater, and he felt compelled to sit down and play. "I decided to take a moment and play and take it all in," he said in an interview with CNN. 

This story is moving in many respects. First-Aric Harding returned to his home not for practical household supplies but for the stuffed animal friends that would cheer up his children.

Second, when he saw his waterlogged piano, he felt compelled to play. How extraordinary! He didn't rush out of his home as fast as he could, thinking there were more important things to do in that moment than make music. He didn't just see his piano and mourn its present and its even more dubious future state. He sat down and played. He played music as a way both to remove himself a bit from reality and to sink more deeply into it. As the water lapped at the piano and his own legs, he made beauty in his damaged house in his damaged city.

You can watch the video Mr. Harding made here.

To discover other stories of inspiring people, stories, photos, and ideas, subscribe to
 
Upcoming Events from Radical Joy for Hard Times:

October 14
Raise a Glass to the Catskills
Join New Yorkers in raising a glass of pure NYC water to the people and rivers upstate who steward the reservoirs.

October 21, 2:45 PM
Bioneers Conference, San Rafael, CA
A workshop with Polly Howells and Trebbe Johnson, at the annual groundbreaking national conference, about how to ask for guidance from the natural world and absorb the answers you get.

November 17-19
Rowe Center, Rowe, MA
Trebbe Johnson's workshop on how spending time in and making beauty for wounded places can bring clarity, compassion, and healing for our own inner wounds as well. 

 
It's easy to make beauty anywhere! Here's how!

New from Radical Joy for Hard Times founder
Trebbe Johnson: a book filled with ideas for creating simple, imaginative, collaborative gifts of beauty for hurt places in nature and in your community! 
   
To order click here.
Radical Joy for Hard Times is a global community of people dedicated to finding and making beauty in wounded places. Reconnecting with these places, sharing our stories of loss, and making acts of beauty there, we transform the land, reconnect people and the places that nourish them, and empower ourselves to make a difference in the way we live on Earth. 
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Each week Radical Joy Revealed comes to you free of charge with inspiring stories and suggestions for living with endangered places in creative, life-affirming ways. It takes thought, imagination, and a sense of timing to uncover and write the stories, choose just the right images to accompany them, and prepare them for distribution, and we could use your financial help. Please show your support of Radical Joy Revealed by making a tax-deductible donation to our non-profit organization.

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