Once Upon A Time…

    Once upon a time, in a land not very far away there was a small town, nestled in brown rolling hills and oak trees, inhabited with mostly happy people who got along with each other and with neighboring cities.  Gardens were planted, golf was played, churches attended, businesses thrived, and many a feast was eaten; that is until the day of the great let down.  On that day the banks, money changers, manipulators, and Federal Regulators let everyone down: and so the Great Recession began.  Every town had lived through recessions in the past, but nothing had been seen in decades like the Great Recession.  Where once flowers had grown on the land between the lanes of traffic now stood people with cardboard signs asking for work or food.  Stores, restaurants and shops all over the land closed their doors, leaving many people without a way to care for their family.  When people could not pay their mortgage, the same banks from the great let down threw the people to the street.  Families cried, asking their leaders for help. 

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The Mighty Grape

There is a point on the two lane highway as you enter the Napa Valley where the horizon is filled with vineyards that stretch outward across the valley floor and then sweep upward as high as the hills will allow.   The only break in the perfectly aligned rows is an occasional family home, almost always two story and white, with a wide porch encircling the house, or clump of oaks majestically watching over the vines.  During summer the view becomes a sea of green, balanced by the alternating red lines of soil; but as autumn arrives a mosaic of red, yellow, and orange attack your senses in a vibrant mosaic of nature.  I see a small sign placed at the entrance to a dirt road leading to the white house that reads, “Drive slow – grapes at play.”  I think there is more truth to the sign than we know.

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she is more…A Mother’s Day Story

“Mom, where are my blue socks with the little pink hearts?” shouted Kallie from her upstairs room. 

Lynn (Mom) walked from the kitchen, where she was making breakfast, to the landing midway up the stairs, “They are in your top drawer on the right side, with all your other socks -same place that they have been for the last four years; and remember the rule of not shouting in the house?”

“Yes Mom, thank you.”  ‘You’ was drawn out in typical adolescence overkill.  Kallie was the middle child in this busy household.

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Sag Mir, Wo Die Blumen Sind?

This German folk tune, later sung by a host of musicians including Peter, Paul, and Mary, asks a very good question in its title; “Where have all the flowers gone?”   Throughout the song, the songwriter misplaces a multitude of people and things – I used to sing this song in my eighth grade German class.   Listening to the tune brought back a memory of the last time I “lost” my keys.  All of us have lost our keys, books, wallet or purse, only to find the missing artifact in some obvious place a few moments, or hours later.  We are amazed to think that we could have overlooked during our frantic search a set of keys sitting on the kitchen table.   Could the keys have become invisible for two hours, and then just reappeared?  Is there a wormhole to a distant universe in my kitchen?  Or maybe, when we lose, or temporarily misplace something, it is because we have forgotten where ‘it’ came from and how to find ‘it’ once it has become missing?

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Your Next Good Read

I had just finished reading a book, one of those political thrillers where one tough good guy overcomes a government of corruption (if it were only true), so I was searching for my next book to read.  I wanted a book with more action, but at the same time historically significant and spiritually/emotionally fulfilling.  I wanted my next good read to matter.  Most importantly, I wanted to learn something important.  Like many of us, I read the first sentence of the first chapter to get an idea of the story. Here is what I found.

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Filling the Glass

It appears to me that life, nature, and dice always arrive in polar opposite pairs; not always, but often enough. If I throw a pair of dice, I invariably get a six and a one. If I get a raise at work, the transmission in my car blows up, thus nullifying any potential extra money I may have planned on. Often the opposites are not equal in strength; a big positive is only partially offset by a minor negative, or vice versa – so equality in a specific event is not a given. This concept helps me understand the optimists and pessimists of this world; optimists believe life will be driven by more wining pairs than losers, and pessimists favor the opposite. However you view the world, your glass is rarely empty or completely full, it is somewhere in between. The trick to living a happy and fulfilling life then, is to manage the level in the glass.

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The First Step

The first thing that I noticed was his eyes; piercingly intense, visible even through the thick brown hair that was wet with sweat and had intermingled stains of red. Those eyes could have been wild with anger, or hate, we would have understood, but instead they were sincere, full of compassion and knowing. His eyes were kind – even today.

He was kneeling in thick dirt, dried mud from sweat and blood covered his hands to the elbow; his feet and calves were equally stained. The crowd roared with approval when the soldier raised the whip high to the sky. He yelled for the beaten man to “get up now.” Idiot. Didn’t he know that whipping a hurt man will not make him move any faster? I wanted to look away because he was my friend, my master, but I could not. The whip came down hard; his cry was muted by the force of the approving mob. He had been beaten, but he wasn’t beat. He moved his right foot slowly, dragging upward to a kneeling position. The cross was balanced on his right shoulder, with the cross member in front just past his knee and the end reaching ten feet behind. Weighing 200 pounds, it was a massive killing staff designed with only one purpose. The crowd continued screaming for more, hoping for another blow from the guard. But the guard was tired from a long night, so he rested, hoping for selfish reasons that the prisoner would stand up soon. 

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Unbroken Glass

Dreams are a fickle animal.  Not the dreams we have while sleeping, although the two can definitely be related, but the dreams we have for our future, or that of a spouse or child.  Dreams are the building blocks of the road that goes up; they’re the yellow bricks that lead to a sunset over a flower filled hill.  Dreams sustain hope, and draw our lips to smile when the circumstances that surround us would dictate otherwise.  A house, a new car, a college diploma, a promotion; these are common dreams, but so are peace, serenity, contentment, belonging, acceptance, and love.  The fulfillment of some dreams then can be seen and touched, being made of wood, stone and steel.  Other dreams are as ghosts, invisible to the eye, but real to the heart and mind.  Hard as a rock or light as air, dreams are a powerful creator of emotions, turning light into darkness, and back again as quickly as a thought.  The importance of having and holding a dream in the context of a full life cannot be overvalued, so then dreams must be carefully constructed and stored in a fortified space, protected from the harsh elements of today. 

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A Good Dog

Kaizer, our 100 pound lap-dog, can suck the negativity and anger right out of anyone, his enthusiasm for life fills a room when he enters it; as does his enormous head, long and lean body, and huge feet.  His tail can be compared to nuclear energy; it is meant for good, but when it’s near a coffee table where any breakables are on display – the incredible force of his nonstop, speed-of-light tail can only leave destruction and heartache behind.  He is one of two dogs whose home we share (note the implied ownership – they hold the mortgage and have never made a payment), and without them our home seems empty and too quiet.  Kaizer is a good dog (and Harley – so are you).

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