A Thought For Thursday

LETTERS TO MY CHILDREN

For those of you who've been following along, you'll recognize 'Sometimes You Need A Base Hit'.

For those of you who are new, first - WELCOME! Here's a bit of background:

When my grown daughter, Kaitlin, was a baby, I started to make notes of things I wanted to tell her when she got older. Part of me was afraid, if I died while she was still young, no one else would know to tell her these exact things. (ButIwasn'tneuroticoranything!) That note- taking process continued for fourteen years and then I began to write a series of short letters to both of my children, each letter containing one important message. When I had completed the series, I copyrighted and it was printed in three short books called "Sometimes You Need a Base Hit" (volumes 1-3). Remember, short letters for even shorter attention spans!

Dear Kaitlin and Casey,

The greatest single thing that you can share with anyone is your time !

Make no bones about it, time is arguably one of our most precious commodities. It is the one thing that no one seems to have quite enough of. That right there is one reason why it's such a great gift to give someone. Let’s face it, giving your time is truly giving of yourself. It confirms another person’s importance to you. Think about the Harry Chapin song, “Cats in the Cradle” - life can be brutal or empty when someone you love doesn’t MAKE the time to do things with you. Indirectly, this relates back to item #9 in this book concerning handmade gifts. They translate to time and thought honoring another person. Try not to lose sight of the concept.
Love, Mom

Dear Kaitlin and Casey,

“But” negates every single word said before it.

A harmless, little, three-letter word, you say? I hasten to argue that point with you! I implore you to listen to the everyday conversations around you. Every single time the speaker uses “but”, they are doing three things:

1. They are contradicting every word used in the sentence(s) preceding it.
2. They are offering you their true opinion on the subject to you with all the words that follow it.
3. Dollars to donuts, they are being negative and offering reasons why something CAN’T or WON’T work. (That negative “poison” I've told you about rears its ugly head all over the place).

Listen to others and learn. Try not to make the same mistakes yourself!
Love, Mom

Dear Kaitlin and Casey,

Be decisive!
Have an opinion! State a preference! Make a choice! Be clear! Nothing is more tiresome than someone who continually says: “I don’t care.” “It doesn’t matter to me!” “Whatever you want!”

First of all, no one likes a wishy-washy person. Second of all, if you continually leave it to other people to make the choice, you are actually burdening them with an unfair amount of responsibility. No one wants to choose for everyone else all the time, and, if you were to find someone who enjoys doing just that, I might suggest that you think long and hard about spending time in their company.
Love, Mom

Always looking forward, PJ

What's Up For Wednesday

Flickr Fever

Today's featured photographer is Clarissa Blum :

http://www.flickr.com/photos/blumequinephoto/

She captures a glimpse of the soul of each animal she photographs, and she photographs other well-composed and -framed shots in the process. I *heart* her work; she's one of those folks I wish I could shadow for a week, or a day, or even an hour.

Always looking forward, PJ

A Truth For Tuesday

My projects are specially chosen. They have to meet some fairly strict requirements:

• Naturally, they have to be of interest to me.
• Their targeted completion date has to be well into the future.
• I must be able to work on them from a reclining, but not flat, position, with tented knees.
• They must be something that I can put down and resume with ease because I don’t have a lot of up time on any given day.

Sounds a bit odd or restrictive I know, but I’m accommodating some physical limitations. I have a special, zippity-doo-dah recliner, with fabulous lumbar and head support, that I spend time in many days. It’s my Project Throne Zone. Most people have a Project Throne Zone, but everybody’s is a bit different.

One of my more interesting projects during the later part of 2009 has been editing someone else’s work. I’ve done scads of editing in my day – most of it either my own work, or things of a technical nature done by others. This latest work is a book with a conversational tone that must be maintained throughout. It’s a new experience for me because, as a writer, my voice is pretty clear, my style identifiable. This author has his own voice and I have to protect its presence with every keyboard stroke. I feel like I should pay him for the schooling with which he’s providing me. Okay, not really, but I’m growing and learning.

Lately, with all that’s been going on in my home, I’ve had to take a hiatus from my editing project. The writer has probably had moments of doubt as to whether I’d return to it or not. That gray mass of clouds that blanketed my world is beginning to lift and, if he’s reading this, I'd like him to know that… (she said with a smile, certain he IS reading this!)

Always looking forward, PJ

A Memory For Monday

I SMELL GARLIC!

Once upon a very long time ago, in a land far, far away from here, I was a weightlifter. I started working out with resistance training in 1980,when everyone else was in the "Let's Get Physical - Olivia Newton-John-1980's-aerobics kick-off." phase.

Some people rolled their eyes and some actually voiced concern that I'd wind up looking like THE HULK without the green skin. As if that is something to which Miss "Wears-Dresses-Everyday-Has-Fifty-Pairs-Of-Shoes-And-Waist length-Hair" would aspire. (People have always made me laugh.)

I tried the 'join the local gym' thing a couple of times, but I didn't want to have social hour, I wanted to exercise; I didn't want to keep their hours, I wanted to keep mine; and I sure as hell didn't want to wear makeup and do my hair before I worked out. Puleez!

Anyhoooo, owning exercise equipment quickly became having my own personal gym and, while I can no longer weight lift and have divested myself of most of my equipment, I still have a treadmill, recumbant bike, weight bench and ballet barre. It's used by other people, so it's not just gathering dust. And you haven't lived until you've watched Chef Stu sweep the gym floor all the while saying, "I coulda been a contenda!"over and over again.

All of that has just about nothing to do with this post, but it was lovely to share. :)

Okay, so just to keep things straight, we were at "Once upon a very long time ago".....I was in the gym, which was next to the kitchen, and Chef Stu was in the kitchen cooking with one of our mainstays, garlic. (We buy and use 5 pounds of garlic every 6 weeks.) It was pretty much business as usual.

By the time I came into the kitchen from the gym, Chef Stu had finished whatever he'd been working on and was nowhere to be found, yet the smell of garlic was everywhere. I made my way upstairs to the master suite and found the scent of garlic and Chef Stu. Here's how the conversation went:

me: Hi Honey, what were you cooking?

CS: Cooking? I haven't been cooking. How was your workout?

me: Just fine, thanks! But darn, if I don't smell garlic! Did you leave something out? Did something go bad?

CS: I don't smell a thing.

me: Your sense of smell has never been as acute as mine.

CS: Let me go check.

me (as I'm walking into and out of every room upstairs): I can smell it in here, and here and here. There's gotta be something.

CS (calling from downstairs): I got nothin' down here!

me: Whatever. I'm going to take a shower.

And, within seconds I found the source of the garlic smell - me! Took my shirt off and thought I was either in Gilroy, California, or Italy. I laughed all day long, just picturing myself walking all around the house, noting the scent of garlic everywhere I went, literally trying to solve a mystery! What a ditz!

On a personal note (can it get more personal than recounting stinking of garlic?): Today is the birthday of my beloved, Chef Stu, the man who saved me from what was, supports me through what is, and holds all the doors open for what will be. To say 'Happy Birthday' falls completely short of what I truly wish for him, but it's a good start. Here's to this birthday and many more to follow, VHG. You are, in all ways, divine. xo

Always looking forward, PJ

Sabbath Peace

"We are what he has made us, created in Christ Jesus for good works."   Ephesians 2:10

"One spring my wife and I planted gardenias. "We'll help," said our two young sons. We gave them trowels, and they began digging. Before we knew it, they were off playing with their toys, leaving a few shallow holes in the dirt. Of course we didn't mind. Actually, we were pleased by their effort.

But if I'd hired a landscaping firm to plant those gardenias, I'd have been upset. "You won't get paid until it's done right," I might have said. That thought reminded me of the difference between serving as a response to God's grace and love and serving in an attempt to earn these gifts of God with our works. It's the difference between the eager offerings that children give their parents and the anxious toil that workers may do for their employer.

Our position in our Father's house is secure. Even if our good works are mixed with the remnants of sin and the best we can do is dig shallow holes for the Almighty, God is pleased with our effort. When we look for salvation in God's grace and not in our own good deeds, we are free to offer joyful service. "

Marvin Lindsay (Virginia, USA)

Always looking forward, PJ

The Weekly Bleat

(Unrelated snippets of thought, odd questions, short rants, news items otherwise unworthy of print, comments, criticisms and harsh, radical statements in one blog post)

This week's bleats:

1. About 5 years ago, I found some small, Christmas-themed, tin pails and decided that I'd force paper white bulbs and bring them to all, yes all, of my neighbors. I'd never forced bulbs before and I'd never had paper whites either, but, like clockwork, the bulbs all began to bloom the week before Christmas and I made the rounds, delivering two to every home.

The act of giving was well received; appreciation of the paper whites, less so. Why? They stink to high heaven and, if the strong scent is not pleasing to your nose, it's like receiving a baby skunk....cute, but surprisingly pungent.  And no, I sure as heck did not keep any of those stinkin' things in my house!  ;)

2.  We had a foot of snow this past week; ordinarily we get a cumulative total of 6 - 8 inches ANNUALLY.  Small state is ill-equipped to manage the white stuff.  I find it almost comical, but that's because I don't HAVE 
TO go anywhere.

3.  This from my sister, Shirley:  Why do they call it stainless steel when it isn't....you know, stainless?
4.  Chef Stu and I decided to give a gift card to the girl who was Scotty's hospice aide and is currently Mom's hospice aide.  While he was out running errands, he stopped at our bank - where we are very, very good customers - and purchased one.  Do you want to know the annoying part?  There was a $2.50 charge for the card AND it has an expiration date!!!

Chef Stu, always polite, said to the girl, "If I go to subway and I buy a gift card, I get a free sandwich; if I go to Wawa and buy a gift card, I get a free cup of coffee; and if I go to my own bank where I'm a very, very good customer and buy a gift card, I pay them $2.50????????????????  I don't understand."

The point wasn't the $2.50, it was the business practice.  Nothing about it leaves you with a warm, fuzzy feeling.

5.  I'm getting a bit nervous about adopting the new rescue dog come early January.  With my schedule, I'm just afraid I will suck at training the dog AND caring for Mom.

6.  For the last handful of Christmases, we've gone from simple, to simpler, to simplest where the festivities are concerned.  A big, positive change has been the absence of gift giving since Stu retired.  One year we set a $25 limit, one year we wrote love letters, and this year we decided to do nothing.. It was absolutely blissful!

You get to a certain place in life where you have everything you need and you don't want any more random stuff.  We're there.  And, during the year, if we need something, we get it then.

7.  Did you hear or read in the news this past week that the general in charge of  the troops in Iraq wants to make pregnancy ( for both the impregnator and the impregnatee) an offense punishable by court marshall?  He has backed this up by saying, if he loses soldiers from active duty because they're pregnant, it leaves US troops fewer in number.  He needs everyone deployed to serve their full tour of duty..and I'm paraphrasing here.  I can see his point; HOWEVER, here's another instance where politics wants to have a say in a woman's reproductive freedom.  Historically, why has it been men who want to have control over what each woman does with her own uterus?  From where I sit, your uterus is YOURS, no one else's, and, if you're sticking your nose into someone else's uterus, you're way out of line.  But that's just me.

8.  Call me a dummy (you'd have to wait in line), but since I switched over to the updated version of blogger 'compose' options - which now includes the 'text strike through' option, I can no longer figure out how to do a spell check.  Does anyone know???

Always looking forward,  PJ

Some Silliness For Saturday

Washing Instructions

Always looking forward, PJ

Merry Christmas!

Have a blessed, happy and safe Christmas!

(art images from Etsy.com)

Always looking forward, PJ

A Thought For Thursday

It's Christmas Eve and I can't think of a better time to stop and reflect on this piece, first told by Dr. James Allen Francis at the First Baptist Church of Los Angeles in a sermon, "Arise, Sir Knight. It was delivered on July 11, 1926 to the National Baptist Young Peoples' Union and has often been erroneously attributed to anonymous authorship.

One Solitary Life

He was born in an obscure village, the son of a peasant woman.

He grew up in another village, where he worked in a carpenter's shop until he was thirty. Then for three years he became a wandering preacher.

He never wrote a book. He never held an office. He never had a family or owned a house. He didn't go to college.

He never visited a big city. He never travelled two hundred miles from the place where he was born. He did none of those things one usually associates with greatness.

He had no credentials but himself.

He was only thirty-three when the tide of public opinion turned against him. His friends ran away. He was turned over to his enemies and went through a mockery of a trial.

He was executed by the state. While he was dying, his executioners gambled for his clothing, the only property he had on earth. When he was dead he was laid in a borrowed grave through the pity of a friend.

Twenty centuries have come and gone, and today he is the central figure of the human race and the leader of mankind's progress.

All the armies that ever marched, all the navies that ever sailed, all the parliaments that ever sat, all the kings that ever reigned, put together, have not affected the life of man on this earth as much as that One Solitary Life.

Merry Christmas, Everyone!

Always looking forward, PJ

What's Up For Wednesday

You Write The Caption!



Don't be shy! We don't judge, we just want to 'get our silly on!'

Always looking forward, PJ

A Truth For Tuesday

IDEAS FOR A BETTER LIFE, PART FOUR (images from flickr.com)

1. Every day, find time to be alone.

2. Having problems? Talk to God on the spot. Try to nip small problems in the bud. You don't have to wait until bedtime to pray.

3. Make friends with people who know and love God.

4. Keep a notebook of favorite scriptures on hand.



5. Remember the shortest bridge between despair and hope is often a good, "Thank you, Jesus."

6. Laugh! And then laugh some more!

7. Take your work seriously, but not yourself.

Always looking forward, PJ