When I was growing up Saturday was a very big deal. My brothers and I arose at what seemed like the crack of dawn and we watched cartoons and kid programs while our mother slept late. Once she woke up and had her morning coffee it was time to begin our house cleaning tasks. We were all quite busy during the school week with lessons and activities so we generally let the house go to seed from Monday through Friday. We didn’t worry a great deal about mounds of clothes on the floor or dust covering the furniture. We knew that come Saturday we would get things back in tip top order. Continue reading “Happy Days at the Dime Store”
My grandfather was essentially an orphan. His mother died when he was only days old and his father left him in the care of an elderly lady that he called “Grandma.” When he was thirteen his adoptive mother died and he became a ward of the court under the guardianship of an uncle. Somehow in spite of growing up in a most unusual situation he became a great man whose integrity and love were legendary. My father-in-law was raised by an uncle and then later by a group of unmarried aunts. He too is an incredible man who has never had any problems adjusting to life and forming healthy relationships with people. Then there are my brothers and I who grew up in a single parent home plagued by sporadic poverty and mental illness. Somehow we all turned out to be just fine, actually even better than fine. What was the key to all us navigating through life without major problems? I suspect that it was just plain and simple love.
The annual frenzy known as March Madness is now over and a new national championship team wears the crown. The tournament comes by its frenetic name quite naturally because year after year virtually anything might happen as one college battles another. Unlike football that has become somewhat predictable and mostly the domain of universities with large amounts of money to spend, basketball is a sport that is still open to even small somewhat unknown schools. Whether public or private, it doesn’t seem to matter because as the minutes on the clock tick down nothing about the ending is ever certain. More than one Cinderella team has scored a victory in the final seconds making the game
I’m sitting in a waiting room at Methodist Hospital while Mike has some minor surgery. He tends to get cysts in his back that grow until they are pressing on nerves and they sometimes get infected opening the possibility of MRSA. He’s had a couple of the culprits removed over the years so it is a somewhat routine procedure but as we all know anything can happen whenever someone receives an anesthetic and goes under the knife. I suspect that we’ll be headed home in a few hours but I don’t take the process lightly given the seriousness of the pre-operative paperwork and preparation involved. 
On March 20, 2013 the United Nations celebrated the first ever International Day of Happiness, decreeing that every human on earth has the right to pursue happiness. Sadly there is no possible way to insure that all people actually have a shot at feeling joyful, even if for only a day, but it is a noble cause. Perhaps a bit more publicity for the event might have been in order. It was promoted so quietly that I actually missed it altogether, as I suspect many did. I luckily had a most pleasant day but I wonder how many souls were too busy attempting to survive in a sometimes quite threatening world to be able to pause for twenty four hours to enjoy life the way that the UN intended?
All It Takes Is A Little Love 