Illuminating the Winter

I think the best part of Christmas is the lights.

Because it reminds me about the verse in the book that talks about not keeping our light under a bushel basket.

With all that good news being shared,

the world is being illuminated

And with out those little shining lights...

it just isn't Christmas.

The Weapons of Mass Destruction

We all know books burn - yet we have the greater knowledge that books cannot be killed by fire. People die, but books never die. No man and no force can abolish memory... In this war, we know books are weapons."
Franklin D. Roosevelt

Quotable

Life isn't about waiting

for the storm to pass,

It's about learning to dance

in the rain.

Milestone

Six months ago I thought a father passing away was the worst day of a persons life. But what I've come to realize is, that it isn't.

In the days that followed my father's death, it's the unexpected ways that I am reminded of him that cause my tears. Military holidays, rope knots, pine scented saw dust, running saws and Cracker Barrel. There will be many more triggers, and the memories will strike sometimes like a trickle and sometimes like a tsunami.

I don't think it's bad. My heart still feels like it's free-falling when there's a question that I want to ask him and he isn't available. I am conscious of his total absence in waves. For days on end I'm keenly aware, and on other days I almost forget.

But I won't ever really forget. It will just sting a little less everyday until the emotional triggers get pulled or the unexpected memory surfaces. If I'm crying, it's not all bad either. It doesn't mean I'm depressed. It just means he still touches my heart and his love for me wasn't wasted.

Quotable

Most of us

don't have to be led into temptation;

we know the way.

~ Jeff Adams

Stealing Time Part Two

Yesterday I admitted to not being a good thief, listing several ways that time is stolen from me. As I thought about it more, I realized most of us live with one very real time thief in our own homes. Do you know what I'm getting ready to say? Brace yourself--the television. Percentage of households that possess at least one television: 99
Number of TV sets in the average U.S. household: 2.24
Percentage of U.S. homes with three or more TV sets: 66

If the average person watched TV a conservative two hours a day, that comes out to 14 hours a week. In one month, that's 56 hours. In twelve months it 672 hours, or 28 days. What could you do with 28 extra days in a year?

But according to A.C. Nielsen Co., the stats are actually worse than my conservative estimate, stating the the average American watches more than 4 hours of TV each day.

If you watch 3 hours a day, that's 21 hours a week, 84 hours a month, 1008 hours a year: 42 days.

4 hours a day, 28 hours a week, or 56 days a year.

Number of hours per day that TV is on in an average U.S. home: 6 hours, 47 minutes. At that rate, TV is stealing over 182 hours a month. One week of every month watching television and over 90 days for the year. What could be accomplished in that amount of time?
Books could be read and written. If the average TV watching American gave up one hour a day and worked out , it would dramatically change their health and relieve some of the health care costs.

Only 49 percent of Americans recognize they watch too much TV. What about you? How much time is your TV stealing??

Stealing Time

Can you steal time from twilight? I am not a very good thief. I have tried staying up all night, only to be forced to pay for it by sleeping through beautiful days. I’ve attempted to write or create through parts of the night. And I get away with it for awhile, but then, naps call to me until I fall into a chair and relinquish alertness for a coma. I may steal time—in a way—by multi tasking until it’s glaringly apparent that I am not good at either thing equally. I could steal your time…yeah, I could do that without even trying.
Instead, I’ll tell you all the ways time has been stolen from me. Like when I go shopping with my sister, which I am loathe to do for any reason. She has been known to take to identical pairs of shoes, and peruse their stitching, their eyelet configuration, the interior soles, the coloration of the leather and make comparisons for twenty minutes. When she can’t decide, she asks me, “Which pair do you like?” Honestly, by then, I don’t care. I’m less interested in nuances when I think precious daylight is a-wasting.
I’ve window shopped with a female relative who wanted more than her budget or mine could bear in a life time. She’s able to do this for hours. I’m bored after ten minutes.
I liked the way my dad shopped. He’d price something and think about it for days or weeks after. Maybe even save money for it. When he went to buy the item, he went in, picked it up, chose an unopened, undamaged box, paid and left. From the time we walked into the store until we stuffed the purchase in the car may have been ten minutes, and that was if we stood in line.
I could tell you about the people who dawdle in front of me below the speed limit. In our free country, they are free to travel at whatever speed they like. The only reason it irritates me is because they are wasting my time, stealing my time. Probably everyone has waited too long in a doctors or dentists office. Over the years, I’ve wised up enough to bring a book to read or a notebook to write in, so they can’t waste my time.
But stealing time? I already have too much to do in what had been allotted to me without taking it from people. My dad used to say, that whatever you steal will cost you three times the value. Since finding it to be true, it keeps me honest.

In the Beginning

Have I always loved beginnings? Sometimes not. Beginnings are fraught also with many unknowns, many hiddens. The beginning of a baby’s life, when every dream could still be realized, every hope fulfilled and the most amazing life any two parents could imagine seems possible. The beginning of a trip when it is full of unrealistic fantastical promise. The beginning of a book, like a new love interest before you get to know them: Both are perfect .
At the beginning of a new job I envied those already comfortable there, already in the flow, already taking their jobs for granted. In a new city, I envied those who made themselves right at home wherever they were making it look as though they had always been there, living their lives.
I don’t always despise beginnings. On the mornings that I was first to walk the beach, or only thought so because the ocean erased all traces of those who had gone before me, I felt like the only person in the world at the beginning of time.
I’m three years into a writing career and every time I pull out a new notebook or click on the new page in Word, I restart, begin again. Every story, every article every essay. Maybe it is the continuous supply of new beginnings that keeps me interested.
What are you beginning?

Haiku for Today

Father's Advice

You always said,

Anything is possible.

I want to live that.

Dream Endangerment

Can sacrificed dreams be revived? Or are they lost forever? Do you harbor at least one dream that you can't let go of? That has yet to become a reality?
I picture dreams as living things, needing fed, nurtured, sunshine and freedom of expression. I've seen folks give up their dreams to pursue harsh jobs, all in the name of providing for the family. Sisyphusian jobs that served their purpose but exacted a cost, draining color from hair and skin and leaving them ravaged seniors, bitter, dry and humorless. Their dreams were barely entertained much less realized.
I've witnessed some who held hands with their dreams, and found ways to nurture and sustain them. And still others who danced with their dreams and when the financial responsibility of parenthood no longer needed them, their dreams bloomed into a second career. The second part of their lives, just as fulfilling as the first.

It reminds me a little of that Japanese man who watered the seed everyday for years with no return on his investment. Then one day, the seed sprouts ten feet.

Considering everything begins with dreams, I find it surprising that we don't embrace them more widely, more often. I had people in my life who encouraged mine. I can't thank them enough. Dreamers inspire the rest of us. Dreamers beget dreamers. But dreamers need encouragers.

I think of dreams as an endangered species with so many hunters, so many shooters, thieves and killers of a good idea. The young dreamers of today are the movers and shakers of tomorrow. How are you involved with that movement? How do you encourage dreams? Are you living your dreams?