Inspirational Stories

When I was quite young, my father had one of the first telephones in our neighborhood. I remember well the polished old case fastened to the wall. The shiny receiver hung on the side of the box. I was too little to reach the telephone, but used to listen with fascination when my mother used to talk to it. Then I discovered that somewhere inside the wonderful device lived an amazing person - her name was "Information Please" and there was nothing she did not know. "Information Please" could supply anybody's number and the correct time.

My first personal experience with this genie-in the-bottle came one day while my mother was visiting a neighbor. Amusing myself at the tool bench in the basement, I whacked my finger with a hammer. The pain was terrible, but there didn't seem to be any reason in crying because there was no one home to give sympathy. I walked around the house sucking my throbbing finger, finally arriving at the stairway.

The telephone! Quickly, I ran for the foot stool in the parlor and dragged it to the landing. Climbing up, I unhooked the receiver in the parlor and held it to my ear. "Information Please," I said into the mouthpiece just above my head. A click or two and a small clear voice spoke into my ear:

"I hurt my finger," I wailed into the phone. The tears came readily enough now that I had an audience.

"Can you open your icebox?" she asked. I said I could. "Then chip off a little piece of ice and hold it to your finger," said the voice.

After that, I called "Information Please" for everything. I asked her for help with my geography and she told me where Philadelphia was. She helped me with my math. She told me my pet chipmunk, that I had caught in the park just he day before, would eat fruit and nuts.

Then, there was the time Petey, our pet canary died. I called "Information Please" and told her the sad story. She listened, then said the usual things grown-ups say to soothe a child. But I was unconsoled. I asked her, "Why is it that birds should sing so beautifully and bring joy to all families, only to end up as a heap of feathers on the bottom of a cage?"

She must have sensed my deep concern, for she said quietly, "Paul, always remember that there are other worlds to sing in." Somehow I felt better.

All this took place in a small town in the Pacific Northwest. When I was 9 years old, we moved across the country to Boston. I missed my friend very much. "Information Please" belonged in that old wooden box back home, and I somehow never thought of trying the tall, shiny new phone that sat on the table in the hall.

As I grew into my teens, the memories of those childhood conversations never really left me. Often, in moments of doubt and perplexity I would recall the serene sense of security I had then. I appreciated now how patient, understanding, and kind she was to have spent her time on a little boy. A few years later, on my way west to college, my plane put down in Seattle. I had about half an hour or so between planes. I spent 15 minutes or so on the phone with my sister, who lived there now. Then without thinking what I was doing, I dialed my hometown operator and said, "Information, Please." Miraculously, I heard the small, clear voice I knew so well, "Information."

I hadn't planned this but I heard myself saying, "Could you please tell me how to spell fix?" There was a long pause. Then came the soft spoken answer, "I guess your finger must have healed by now." I laughed. "So it's really still you," I said. "I wonder if you have any idea how much you meant to me during that time."

"I wonder", she said, "if you know how much your calls meant to me. I never had any children, and I used to look forward to your calls."

I told her how often I had thought of her over the years and I asked if I could call her again when I came back to visit my sister.

Three months later I was back in Seattle. A different voice answered "Information."

"I'm sorry to have to tell you this, she said. Sally had been working part-time the last few years because she was sick. She died five weeks ago." Before I could hang up she said, "Wait a minute. Did you say your name was Paul?"

"Well, Sally left a message for you. She wrote it down in case you called.
Let me read it to you." The note said, "Tell him I still say there are other worlds to sing in. He'll know what I mean."

This is Rex Barker, reminding you to be thankful for all of the little things in your life.

At a fundraising dinner for a school that serves learning disabled children, the father of one of the students delivered a speech that would never be forgotten by all who attended. After extolling the school and its dedicated staff, he offered a question. "When not interfered with by outside influences, everything nature does is done with perfection. Yet my son, Shay, cannot learn things as other children do. He cannot understand things as other children do. Where is the natural order of things in my son"?

The father continued. "I believe that when a child like Shay, who is physically and mentally handicapped comes into the world, an opportunity to realize true human nature presents itself, and it comes in the way other people treat that child."

Shay and his father had walked past a park where some boys Shay knew were playing baseball. Shay asked, "Do you think they'll let me play"? Shay's father knew that most of the boys would not want someone like Shay on their team, but the father also understood that if his son were allowed to play, it would give him a much needed sense of belonging and some confidence to be accepted by others in spite of his handicaps.

Shay's father approached one of the boys on the field and asked (not expecting much) if Shay could play. The boy looked around for guidance and said, "We're losing by six runs and the game is in the eighth inning. I guess he can be on our team and we'll try to put him in to bat in the ninth inning."

Shay struggled over to the team's bench and, with a broad smile, put on a team shirt. His father watched with a small tear in his eye and warmth in his heart. The boys saw the father's joy at his son being accepted. In the bottom of the eighth inning, Shay's team scored a few runs, but was still behind by three. In the top of the ninth inning, Shay put on a glove and played in the right field. Even though no hits came his way, he was obviously ecstatic just to be in the game and on the field, grinning from ear to ear as his father waved to him from the stands. In the bottom of the ninth inning, Shay's team scored again. Now, with two outs and the bases loaded, the potential winning run was on base and Shay was scheduled to be next at bat.

At this juncture, do they let Shay bat and give away their chance to win the game? Surprisingly, Shay was given the bat. Everyone knew that a hit was all but impossible, because Shay didn't even know how to hold the bat properly, much less connect with the ball.

However, as Shay stepped up to the plate, the pitcher, recognizing that the other team was putting winning aside for this moment in Shay's life, moved in a few steps to lob the ball in softly so Shay could at least make contact The first pitch came and Shay swung clumsily and missed. The pitcher again took a few steps forward to toss the ball softly toward Shay. As the pitch came in, Shay swung at the ball and hit a slow ground ball right back to the pitcher.

The game would now be over. The pitcher picked up the soft grounder and could have easily thrown the ball to the first baseman. Shay would have been out and that would have been the end of the game.

Instead, the pitcher threw the ball right over the first baseman's head, out of reach of all team mates. Everyone from the stands and both teams started yelling, "Shay, run to first! Run to first!" Never in his life had Shay ever run that far, but he made it to first base. He scampered down the baseline, wide-eyed and startled.

Everyone yelled, "Run to second, run to second!" Catching his breath, Shay awkwardly ran toward second, gleaming and struggling to make it to the base. By the time Shay rounded second base, the right fielder had the ball. He was the smallest guy on their team who now had his first chance to be the hero for his team. He could have thrown the ball to the second baseman for the tag, but he understood the pitcher's intentions, so he, too, intentionally threw the ball high and far over the third baseman's head. Shay ran toward third base deliriously as the runners ahead of him circled the bases toward home.

Shay reached third base, because the opposing shortstop ran to help him by turning him in the direction of third base, and shouted, "Run to third! Shay, run to third!"

As Shay rounded third, the boys from both teams, and the spectators, were on their feet screaming, "Shay, run home! Run home!" Shay ran to home, stepped on the plate, and was cheered as the hero who hit the grand slam and won the game for his team.

"That day," said the father softly with tears now rolling down his face, "the boys from both teams helped bring a piece of true love and humanity into this world."

Shay didn't make it to another summer. He died that winter, having never forgotten being the hero and making his father so happy, and coming home and seeing his mother tearfully embrace her little hero of the day!

Ah, There You Are
by
Joseph Mazzella

I misplaced my joy this morning. I woke up to find it missing like a set of lost keys. I started looking for it everywhere. I looked for it in the morning paper. It wasn’t there. I looked for it in my books. It wasn’t there. I looked for it in some music. It wasn’t there. I looked for it while I ate breakfast, got the kids ready for school, and headed out the door this morning, but I couldn’t find it anywhere.

When I finally got back home I decided to take a walk. I thought that if I couldn’t find my joy then at least I could get some exercise. The last leaves of Autumn were thickly covering the ground. I walked for awhile on this beautiful, crunchy carpet and breathed in the fresh, cool air. It was so peaceful and wonderful. After walking for a bit I stopped and smiled. I suddenly knew where to look. I glanced down and saw my joy peeking up at me from deep inside my soul. It had been sitting there right next to my love and God’s love, just waiting for me to find it. "Ah, there you are," I said. Then I laughed at myself for not knowing where to look all along.

It is amazing how we so often look for joy in every single place except the only place where it can truly be found, within ourselves. We are like a person running around searching for the glasses that are perched on the top of his head. We need to stop the search. We need to look deep into our souls and see the joy that has been sitting there all along. It isn’t hidden and it isn’t hard to find. It is there shining brightly right next to God’s love and our love. It is just waiting for us to smile down and say, "Ah, there you are."

Reach down and grab that joy today. Choose it, rejoice in it, and live in it. Take it along with your love and God’s love and share it with the world. And if you ever misplace it again, remember where to look for it first.

I sat next to the bed of an old man, a friend for over twenty years, and held his hand. Hal was dying. We both knew these next few days would be his last.

We spent time reminiscing about his long and fruitful career as a church pastor. We talked about old friends. We chatted about his family. And I listened as he offered sage wisdom and advice to a member of a "younger generation."

At a lull in the conversation, Hal seemed to carefully consider what he was about to say next. Then he squeezed my hand, gazed intently into my eyes and whispered, just loud enough for me to hear, "Nothing is more important than relationships."

I knew that this was somehow near the pinnacle of his life's learnings. As he considered all of his experiences -- personal, professional, spiritual and family, this one ultimate observation surfaced above the rest: "Nothing is more important than relationships."

"Don't get overly caught up in your career," he seemed to be saying to me. "Likewise, don't use people in order to achieve your goals, then throw them away. No project, no program, no task should be pursued at the expense of friends and family. Remember," I heard him saying, as clearly as if he were speaking the words, "that in the end, only your relationships will truly matter. Tend them well."

Writer Og Mandino puts it this way: "Beginning today," he said, "treat everyone you meet as if he or she were going to be dead by midnight. Extend to them all the care, kindness, and understanding you can muster, and do so with no thought of any reward. Your life will never be the same again."
At the end of a long life, my friend Hal would have agreed.

Customer: "Well, after much consideration, I've decided to install LOVE. Can you guide me through the process?"

Customer: "Well, I'm not very technical, but I think I'm ready to install now. What do I do first?"

CS Rep. : "The first step is to open your HEART. Have you located your HEART ma'am?"

Customer: "Yes I have, but there are several other programs running right now. Is it okay to install while they are running?"

Customer: "Let's see, I have PAST-HURT.EXE, LOW ESTEEM.EXE, GRUDGE.EXE, and RESENTMENT.COM running right now."

CS Rep. : "No problem. LOVE will gradually erase PAST-HURT.EXE from your current operating system. It may remain in your permanent memory, but it will no longer disrupt other programs. LOVE will eventually overwrite LOW-ESTEEM.EXE with a module of its own called HIGH-ESTEEM.EXE. However, you have to completely turn off GRUDGE.EXE and RESENTMENT.COM. Those programs prevent LOVE from being properly installed. Can you turn those off ma'am?"

CS Rep. : "My pleasure. Go to your Start menu and invoke FORGIVENESS.EXE. Do this as many times as necessary until GRUDGE.EXE and RESENTMENT.COM have been completely erased."

Customer: "Okay, done. LOVE has started installing itself automatically. Is that normal?"

Cs Rep. : "Yes. You should receive a message that says it will reinstall for the life of your HEART. Do you see that message?"

Cs Rep. : "Yes, but remember that you have only the base program. You need to begin connecting to other HEARTS in order to get the upgrades."

Customer: "It says "ERROR 412 - PROGRAM NOT RUN ON INTERNAL COMPONENTS. What does that mean?"

Cs Rep. : "Don't worry ma'am, that's a common problem. It means that the LOVE program is set up to run on external HEARTS but has not yet been run on your HEART. It is one of those complicated programming things, but in nontechnical terms it means you have to "LOVE" your own machine before it can "LOVE" others."

Cs Rep. : "You're welcome. Click on the following files and then copy them to the "MYHEART" directory: FORGIVE-SELF.DOC, REALIZE-WORTH.TXT, and ACKNOWLEDGE-LIMITATIONS.DOC. The system will overwrite any conflicting files and begin patching any faulty programming. Also, you need to delete VERBOSE-SELF-CRITIC.EXE from all directories, and then empty your recycle bin afterwards to make sure it is completely and permanently gone erased."

Customer: "Got it. Hey! My HEART is filling up with new files. SMILE.MPG is playing on my monitor right now and it shows that PEACE.EXE, and CONTENTMENT.COM are copying themselves all over my HEART. Is this normal?"

Cs Rep. : "Sometimes. For others it takes a while, but eventually everything gets downloaded at the proper time. So, LOVE is installed and running. You should be able to handle it from here. One more thing before I go."

Cs Rep. : "LOVE is freeware. Be sure to give it and its various modules to everybody you meet. They will share it with other people and then return some similarly sacred modules back to you."

Cs Rep. : " You may call me the Divine Cardiologist, also known as The Great Physician, but most call me God. Many people feel all they need is an annual checkup to stay heart-healthy, but the Manufacturer suggests a schedule of daily maintenance for maximum efficiency. Put another way, keep in touch.

Moral: If f you want to have love in your life, you have to know how to install the right programs.

LABOR OF LOVE

Too many people think they have nothing to offer. The can't build a
house, teach a math course, repair an automobile or paint a beautiful
picture! They feel they are less valuable than others.

One man applied for a job as a handyman. The prospective employer
asked, "Can you do carpentry?" The man answered in the negative.

"How about bricklaying?" Again the man answered, "No."

The employer asked, "Well, what about electrical work?"

The man said "No, I don't know anything about that, either."

Finally the employer said, "Well, tell me then what is handy about
you?"

The man replied, "I live just around the corner."

His greatest ability was his availability. But beyond your
availability, you may have more to offer than you think. For WHO you
are is often more important than WHAT you do. Let me explain.

Millions of tourists have visited Taj Mahal in India. Some say that
stepping through the vast sandstone gate is like immersing oneself in
a photo. The Taj Mahal glistens in the light of dawn, glowing like a
sculpted ember.

It was built by an emperor of India for his beloved wife, whom he
called Taj Mahal. She died in childbirth, and as she departed, the
story goes, she asked him to build her something beautiful and to
visit the site each year on their anniversary and light a candle.

Millions of precious and semiprecious stones adorn the walls. Lapis,
jade, quartz, amber, emeralds and onyx, among others, are set into
the white marble. Marvelously detailed arrangements of these polished
and shaped stones form garlands of flowers, both timeless and
exquisite. One can only imagine gnarled fingers lifting blocks of
white marble, shaping and polishing the blocks until they were as
smooth as an infant's tummy.

The Taj Mahal was designed to reflect the different moods of the day,
and as the sun rises, the mausoleum whitens, almost as though
daylight were bleaching it. The white marble wondrously reflects the
light around it, seemingly changing colors throughout the day.

Built as a labor of love, it is truly one of the great wonders of the
world. Your life, too, can become a labor of love.

The Taj Mahal is made of many of earth's finest materials. Similarly,
your life can also be built of the finest of qualities: character,
commitment, devotion, integrity and honor.

The Taj Mahal is adorned with jewels. Likewise, your life can bear
fruits of love, joy, peace, kindness, hope and more.

You may have more to offer than you realize. Perhaps what you
generously give away is your own beautiful life. And that is the best
gift of all.

If we want to fill our heads with the doom and gloom society seems to thrive on, all we need to do is turn on the local news at night.

To make that quantum leap toward personal happiness and success in life, sometimes we just need to do what so many people seem to be talking about lately: clean house and take personal inventory of the people we associate with most.

One of my favorite quotes of all time is, Avoid the ugly people. Mind you, when I say ugly, it has nothing to do with physical appearance.

The comment illustrates that to best achieve our goals and wants in life, we should surround ourselves with other like- minded people to support us on our journey. In other words, we need to clean house of our own ugly people who, for some strange reason, we feel the need to hold onto.

Maybe you'll relate to a personal example from my own life. On the surface, Mark (not his real name) was a pretty nice guy. I thought of him as my personal anchor, someone who kept me grounded and helped me stay on focus and direction.

But every time I'd venture out into something new, Mark would put his ugly hat on. Rather than becoming a voice of reason or attempting to illuminate both sides of a given situation, he'd only tell me about the horrors of such an idea and how crazy it was for me to even think that way.

He made it clear that without him, I'd float off into despair. (I mean, could you imagine me, of all people, wanting to write a book, start my own company, or dive into the volatile and unstable real estate market?)

Sounds funny now, huh? The moral of this story is that I allowed Mark to set my limitations. I forgot that people only have as much power over us as we give them.

In retrospect, Mark was correct: He was my anchor after all, because I allowed him to hold me back from sailing toward prosperity earlier in my life when I first wanted to take that leap.

Until I grew strong enough to cut the tie and move forward on my own, I allowed myself to be restrained by his idea of what success should be.

Remember, only you know what you're capable of, so if you're going to choose to live up to someone's expectations, shouldn't they be your own?

With that said, here's my challenge. Take a moment to reflect on any ugly people who may be taking up space in your head (rent free), and gently let them go. You deserve better. In fact, you deserve the best. Never, ever let another person hold you back from your dreams.

Now, don't do what I say, do what I did. Roll up your sleeves and set yourself free as well. Anchors away!

Good Fruits or Sour Grapes?
by
Joseph J. Mazzella

I have noticed something recently. I am not as angry as I used to be. I am not as grouchy either. I don’t complain nearly as much as I used to. I am not as worried or afraid as I once was. I can’t think of anyone or anything that I really hate either. Now I don’t think it is because I have mellowed with age. Quite frankly, I am not that old yet. Besides I know people a lot older than me who are a lot grouchier. I also know people a lot younger than me who are already way more mellow than I will ever be. Maybe it is that I just don’t have as much room for those things inside me anymore. When life squeezes you what is on the inside comes out. If you are full of sour grapes, then you will give the world vinegar. If you are full of good fruits, then you will give the world orange juice. Maybe my good fruits are finally ripening while my sour grapes are dying on the vine. Maybe I am finally gardening my soul the way that God wants me to.

One thing I do know, however, is that the more you fill your heart, soul, and mind with love and thankfulness, the less room there is for anything else. The more you love God, yourself, and others the less room there is for anger and hate. The more you thank God for your life and every good thing in it, the less room there is for fear and worry. The more good fruits you plant and care for, the less room there is for sour grapes in the garden of your life.

May you always fill your heart, soul, and mind with wonderful love and glorious gratitude then. May you always feel God’s perfect love hugging your heart and uplifting your soul. May you always be so full of the good fruits of love, joy, and thankfulness that not a single sour grape can be squeezed out of you. Remember, you are the gardener and your life is the harvest. Plant well, water often, and always invite others to the feast.

A store owner was tacking a sign above his door that read “Puppies For Sale.” Signs like that have a way of attracting small children, and sure enough, a little boy appeared under the store owner’s sign.

The little boy reached in his pocket and pulled out some change. “I have $2.37,” he said. “Can I please look at them”?

The store owner smiled and whistled and out of the kennel came Lady, who ran down the aisle of his store followed by five teeny tiny balls of fur. One puppy was lagging considerable behind. Immediately, the little boy singled out the lagging limping puppy and said, “What’s wrong with that little dog”?

The store owner explained that the veterinarian had examined the little puppy and had discovered it didn’t have a hip socket. It would always limp. It would always be lame. The little boy became excited. “That’s the little puppy that I want to buy.”

The store owner said, “No, you don’t want to buy that little dog. If you really want him, I’ll just give him to you.”

The little boy got quite upset. He looked straight into the store owner’s eyes, pointing his finger and said, “I don’t want you to give him to me. That little dog is worth every bit as much as all the other dogs and I’ll pay full price. In fact, I’ll give you $2.37 now, and 50 cents a month until I have him paid for.

The store owner countered, “You really don’t want to buy this little dog. He is never going to be able to jump and play with you like the other puppies.”

To this, the little boy reached down and rolled up his pant leg to reveal a badly twisted, crippled left leg supported by a big metal brace. He looked up at the store owner and softly replied, “Well, I don’t run so well myself, and the little puppy will need someone who understands!”

One of the most inspiring quotes I ever heard regarding perseverance was by Brian Tracy. He said:

"The difference between successful people and unsuccessful people is that successful people fail many more times than unsuccessful people."

I personally experienced the wisdom of that understanding right after my first book was published. Like many authors, I envisioned hundreds of bookstore customers lining up for me to benevolently sign copies for them.

I was living in Atlanta at the time and arranged my first signing at The Phoenix and Dragon -- the largest spiritual/inspirational bookstore in the city. The store was celebrating its 15th anniversary and had authors scheduled to appear throughout the three-day event. I was scheduled Sunday at 5pm -- the last day and time slot of the celebration.

Brimming with anticipation, I was put into a private signing room in the beautiful store, and for the next hour and a half, had little more to do than to read my own book, and wonder for what purpose in the world I had felt so driven to spend four years writing it.

Despite a nice sign placed outside the room exhibiting images of both me and my book, The 9 Insights of the Wealthy Soul" not a single customer entered the room. As each minute passed, I became increasingly anxious.

Do they not like the title? I wondered. Do they not like the book cover? Do they not like what 'I' look like?

After 90 minutes of this torture, I was absolutely distraught. For the four years writing the book, I had felt a sense of mission and purpose like never before in my life. Had God just been fooling with me?

Working a full 8-9 hour day in my holistic clinic, I had lived on a strict regimen during the four years of getting into bed by 9:30pm, so I could quiet my mind and feel a sense of surrender before turning out the lights at 11. I would sleep with that silent potentiality, so I could wake up at 5:30 in the morning and have two pristine hours of writing before heading into my clinic.

Before I ever began each session writing, I would close my eyes for 10 minutes and end my meditation whispering, "God, please grant me the words to touch just one person's life."

I truly was inspired, and despite my ascetic lifestyle, I knew that's what I had to do to maintain the grace in my words with which I wanted my readers to eventually be touched.

Now, sitting there alone at my first book-signing, I wondered if my entire life wasn't just a big joke. I watched the minutes agonizingly tick by on a clock on the wall. At 6:25pm -- just before the store's closing -- defeated, I began to get myself ready to leave.

At that moment, just when I couldn't feel any worse, a middle-aged couple walked in the room. Trying to regain my composure, I managed to hide my emotions and introduced myself. The moment I shook their hands, I felt something shift inside me. I began to give them a summary of my book:

Wealthy Soul and it's a story of a WWII pilot, my dad, and the lessons he was giving me in wealth accumulation while he was facing a terminal illness. And each lesson in the story becomes much deeper lessons about life and death, and finding the greatest spiritual meaning anytime we are facing our greatest adversities."

Both the man and the woman's eyes were now glued on me. I felt a tingle go up my spine. There was something different about the way they were looking at me that I couldn't quite identify. But I didn't know what else to say. However, additional words were unnecessary.

The couple turned to each other, and the husband nodded solemnly to his wife. She then told me, "I think we'll get the book." My heart began to pound. But instinctively, despite the impulse to jump in the air, click my heels and wring their hands to thank them for being my first readers ever and saving my life, I realized the woman was trying to say something else.

"The reason we're buying it," she said hesitantly, "is because our son committed suicide two years ago." She took my hand. "Maybe your story will help us get over it."

In that moment, I knew if I never sold another copy of the book, my four years of writing it had served its purpose. My prayer to God of asking for the words to touch just one person's life had already been answered.

Although I would have many more challenging years until my book caught on and saw substantial distribution, this couple's story was all the motivation I needed at that point to keep me moving ahead.

Thanks to them, I would come to the realization that the greatest of lives are made all in the same way:

Once when I was a teenager, my father and I were standing in line to buy tickets for the circus. Finally, there was only one family between us and the ticket counter. This family made a big impression on me. There were eight children, all probably under the age of 12. You could tell they didn't have a lot of money. Their clothes were not expensive, but they were clean.

The children were well-behaved, all of them standing in line, two-by- two behind their parents, holding hands. They were excitedly jabbering about the clowns, elephants and other acts they would see that night. One could sense they had never been to the circus before. It promised to be a highlight of their young lives.

The father and mother were at the head of the pack standing proud as could be. The mother was holding her husband's hand, looking up at him as if to say, "You're my knight in shining armor." He was smiling and basking in pride, looking at her as if to reply, "You got that right."

The ticket lady asked the father how many tickets he wanted. He proudly responded, "Please let me buy eight children's tickets and two adult tickets so I can take my family to the circus." The ticket lady quoted the price. The man's wife let go of his hand, her head dropped, the man's lip began to quiver. The father leaned a little closer and asked, "How much did you say?"

The ticket lady again quoted the price. The man didn't have enough money. How was he supposed to turn and tell his eight kids that he didn't have enough money to take them to the circus?

Seeing what was going on, my dad put his hand into his pocket, pulled out a $20 bill and dropped it on the ground. (We were not wealthy in any sense of the word!) My father reached down, picked up the bill, tapped the man on the shoulder and said, "Excuse me, sir, this fell out of your pocket."

The man knew what was going on. He wasn't begging for a handout but certainly appreciated the help in a desperate, heartbreaking, embarrassing situation. He looked straight into my dad's eyes, took my dad's hand in both of his, squeezed tightly onto the $20 bill, and with his lip quivering and a tear streaming down his cheek, he replied, "Thank you, thank you, sir. This really means a lot to me and my family."

My father and I went back to our car and drove home. We didn't go to the circus that night, but we didn't go without.

“Hey, ‘Bones,’ ” my brother, Parker, asked me, "what are you going to be for Halloween"? The elementary school party started at 7:00 PM. The winner of the prize for the most original costume got two free tickets for the Sunday matinee. Parker was dressed and ready to go. I watched him parade in front of the mirror in his pirate costume. He's so handsome, I thought. All the girls in the fifth and sixth grades were madly in love with him. I'd spent the afternoon defending myself from his rubber dagger.

"That's dumb," he said. "You hardly need a costume. You're already a perfect scarecrow!" I was used to these observations. Furthermore, he spoke the truth. At twelve, I was already six feet tall and weighed eighty-nine pounds. Tack on red hair and freckles and it added up to one thing: I was a scarecrow.

School days were charged with searing taunts. "Down in front." "How's the weather up there"? "Are those skis or shoes"? It was hard to smile back, and even harder to make friends.

I tried plastering my hair down flat on the top of my head and prying the heels off my shoes. I took scalding hot baths, hoping I'd shrink. In bed at night, I put my feet against the footboard, hands against the headboard and pushed, hoping to press myself back together. Nothing worked. So I saved nickels and dimes in a cider jug to pay the future surgeon who would find fame in Ripley's Believe It or Not by cutting six inches of bone from the legs of the tallest girl in the world and making her the same height as everybody else.

"When I grow up," I told Parker, as he brandished his cutlass in front of the mirror, "I'm going to live on an island where there's no one to stare." My brother raised his eye patch and looked at me hard.

Alone, I listened to the cheerless night and pictured the costumes my classmates had bought. I had tried on a few, too, but nothing fit. I could picture my classmates in their costumes, having a wonderful time. As I wandered about the house, I remembered happier days, before Mommy and Daddy were separated. When Daddy lived with us, he always made me feel loved and wanted. Seeing him now for short visits wasn't the same. The more I brooded, the more my self-pity grew.

Then I spotted a broomstick standing in the kitchen corner. Maybe I could make a costume, I thought. Outside, a sheet and pillowcase billowed on the clothesline. I could be a witch or a ghost. Then my gaze fell on the back of the cellar door. My father's old plaid work shirt, faded overalls, jacket and cap were hanging right where he had left them.

"I could be a hobo," I murmured as I buried my face in the dusty clothes. But Parker's taunt kept coming back at me. "You're a scarecrow." As much as I hated to admit it, he was right. Well then, a scarecrow was what I'd be. The closer I got to the school, the louder the cheers and clapping became, and the more my fears grew. What if they laughed at me? Worse still, what if they didn't do anything? Hiding behind the tool shed next to the gym, I pulled everything out of the pillowcase and started to dress. Because I was so tall, I could peek through the high window and see everybody taking turns on the stage in quest of the coveted prize. Ghosts, princesses, monsters, cowboys, soldiers and brides. They were all there, clad in store-bought costumes, fragile dreams for one night. My teeth were chattering. Would they clap for me? Would they whistle and cheer? My stomach ached from anticipation.

I'll run home, I decided. No one would know I had been there. But Parker came on stage and glanced at the window. It was too late. He had seen me. If I left now, he'd call me chicken. I watched him bow to the audience and listened to the squeals from the girls as he leaped on chairs and tables and parried with his sword. Next, a small gorilla climbed on top of a ladder and ate a banana. Lincoln gave a brief address. Cleopatra danced with a rubber snake in her hands, and a soldier marched and twirled his gun. Only Tarzan remained.

Maneuvering carefully through the entrance, I went in, held my breath and prayed. Please, God, don't let me make a fool of myself. The applause was so loud for the king of the jungle when he gave his call and swung on a curtain rope that no one seemed to notice me walk slowly to the center of the stage. A pillowcase covered my head. With arms outstretched and hands clutching the broomstick inserted through the sleeves of an old plaid shirt, I wore a felt hat and faded overalls stuffed with straw. The room was suddenly still.

Nobody clapped. Nobody cheered. The only sound I heard was the hammering of my own heart. I'm going to die, I thought, right here in front of everybody. The world was tilting, and my ears were ringing when the hood slid down my nose, just enough so I could peer through the eyeholes. And that's when I saw my classmates for the first time, as they really were. Petite blonde fairies with golden wands and steel braces on their teeth. A baseball hero with a bat and mitt-and bottle-thick eyeglasses. A boxer with fighting gloves, sitting in a wheelchair. Someone asked, "Hey, who is that"? "Parker's sister!" They looked at one another, surprise brightening their faces. Clapping and cheering filled the room.

The principal came up on stage. "The first prize for the most original costume goes to..." I never heard my name, only Parker, fear in his voice, saying, "I'll hold those tickets for her. She can't let go of that broomstick or her shirt will fall off." Later, classmates came over to talk with me. "How'd you ever get such a good idea"? "Parker," I said. "Where did you get the costume"? "My daddy." And in that single moment, I recaptured a memory that had almost slipped away. I was sitting on Daddy's lap and I heard him say, "I love you, sweetheart, just the way God made you." I felt his fingers riffling my hair, and I smiled inside, glad that God had made me a scarecrow.

I left the party early, but not before Nancy had said, "You'll come over to my house sometime, won't you"? and Elaine had confided, "I get goosebumps every time Mr. Allen is our substitute teacher. Don't you"? I didn't want to stay and dance. The boys' heads came only to the middle of my chest. But on my way home, I decided that Parker was right. A deserted island would be pretty awful. I waited up for Parker that night. I wanted to hear about the fun I'd missed. "Did you dance a lot"? I asked. "Sort of," he said. "If you think it's any fun for a fifth grade guy to dance with a bunch of puny third and fourth graders!" He kicked at the fringe on the rug and started up the stairs.

"It's going to be a double feature. One's The Wizard of Oz. Ray Bolger plays a scarecrow."

"And the other is The Sea Hawk," I said. "Can you believe it? Errol Flynn plays a pirate!"

One day I was lying on the bed, reading, when my mother came into the room. She held out a vase--a rather ugly vase. She asked, 'Would you like to have this vase?' I replied quickly, 'No, I don't want it.'
"As she turned to walk away, I picked up something that said to me, 'Wait a minute, don't shut this off yet.' So I asked, 'Where did you get it?'

"She said, 'Oh, I got it when I filled an order.' Filled an order? I thought--no communication here. So I asked, 'What do you mean, filled an order?'

'Well,' she said, 'when I was a little girl, the Smith Company mailed catalogs to people. I would take the catalog around the neighborhood, and I'd get people to order from it. When I filled an order and sent it in, they gave me a prize. One time, I got a porch swing for my family.'

"Now you have to understand, that my mother is 81 years old. She is one of six children in a family that her father deserted when she was quite young. Money was real hard to come by. My grandmother managed to keep the family together through the years, although I don't know how. For my mother to win a luxury like a porch swing was a significant accomplishment. Although she no longer had the swing, she had the vase--a vase full of meaning--which she offered to me. Instantly I said, 'Mom, I want the vase.' Now it sits in a prominent place in my living room. It symbolizes a precious meaning which my mother and I share.

nless we are all sensitive to the others and look for the inner meaning, we may end up missing out on many important things in life.

We convince ourselves that life will be better after we get married, have a baby, then another. Then, we are frustrated that the kids aren't old enough and we'll be more content when they are. After that we're frustrated that we have teenagers to deal with. We will certainly be happy when they are out of that stage. We tell ourselves that our life will be complete when our spouse gets his or her act together, when we get a nicer car, are able to go on a nice vacation, when we retire. The truth is, there's no better time to be happy than right now. If not now, when?

Your life will always be filled with challenges. It's best to admit this to yourself and decide to be happy anyway. One of my favorite quotes comes from Alfred D Souza. He said, "For a long time it had seemed to me that life was about to begin - REAL LIFE. But there was always some obstacle in the way, something to be gotten through first, some unfinished business, time still to be served, a debt to be paid. Then, life would begin. At last it dawned on me that these obstacles were my life."

This perspective has helped me to see that there is no way to happiness. Happiness is the way.

So, treasure every moment that you have. And treasure it more because you shared it with someone special, special enough to spend your time with... and remember that time waits for no one.

Stop waiting until you finish school, until you go back to school, until you lose ten pounds, until you gain ten pounds, until you have kids, until your kids leave the house, until you start work, until you retire, until you get married, until you get divorced, until Friday night, until Sunday morning, until you get a new car or home, until your car or home is paid off, until spring, until summer, until fall, until winter, until you are off welfare, until the first or fifteenth, until your song comes on, until you've had a drink, until you've sobered up, until you die -- to decide that there is no better time than right now to be happy.

I had a very special teacher in high school many years ago whose husband unexpectedly died of a heart attack. About a week after his death, she shared some of her insight with a classroom of students. As the late afternoon sunlight came streaming in through the classroom windows and the class was nearly over, she moved a few things aside on the edge of her desk and sat down there.

With a gentle look of reflection on her face, she paused and said, "Before class is over, I would like to share with all of you a thought that is unrelated to class, but which I feel is very important. Each of us is put here on earth to learn, share, love, appreciate and give of ourselves...and none of us knows when this fantastic experience will end. It can be taken away at any moment. Perhaps this is God's way of telling us that we must make the most out of every single day."

Her eyes beginning to water, she went on, "So I would like you all to make me a promise... from now on, on your way to school, or on your way home, find something beautiful to notice. It doesn't have to be something you see -- it could be a scent -- perhaps of freshly baked bread wafting out of someone's house, or it could be the sound of the breeze slightly rustling the leaves in the trees, or the way the morning light catches one autumn leaf as it falls gently to the ground. Please, look for these things, and cherish them. For, although it may sound trite to some, these things are the "stuff" of life. The little things we are put here on earth to enjoy. The things we often take for granted. We must make it important to notice them, for at any time... it can all be taken away."

The class was completely quiet. We all picked up our books and filed out of the room silently. That afternoon, I noticed more things on my way home from school than I had that whole semester.

Every once in a while, I think of that teacher and remember what an impression she made on all of us, and I try to appreciate all of those things that sometimes we all overlook.

Take notice of something special you see on your lunch hour today. Go barefoot. Or walk on the beach at sunset. Stop off on the way home tonight to get a double-dip ice cream cone. For as we get older, it is not the things we did that we often regret, but the things we didn't do.

Not too long ago I had "one of those days." I was feeling pressure from a writing deadline. I had company arriving in a couple days and the toilet was clogged.

I went to the bank, and the trainee teller processing my deposit had to start over three times. I swung by the supermarket to pick up a few things and the lines were serpentine. By the time I got home, I was frazzled and sweaty and in a hurry to get something on the table for dinner.

Deciding on Mushroom Soup, I grabbed a can opener, cranked open the can, then remembered I had forgotten to buy milk at the store. Nix the soup idea. Setting the can aside, I went to plan B, which was leftover baked beans. I grabbed a Tupperware from the fridge, popped the seal, took a look and groaned.

My husband isn't a picky eater, but even he won't eat baked beans that look like caterpillars. Really frustrated, now, I decided on a menu that promised to be as foolproof as it is nutrition-free: hot dogs and potato chips.

Retrieving a brand new bag of chips from the cupboard, I grabbed the cellophane and gave a hearty pull. The bag didn't open. With a loud pop, the cellophane suddenly gave way, ripping wide from top to bottom. Chips flew sky high. I was left holding the bag, and it was empty. It was the final straw. I let out a blood curdling scream. "I can't take it anymore!!!"

My husband heard my unorthodox cry for help. Within minutes he was standing at the doorway to the kitchen, where he surveyed the damage: an opened can of soup, melting groceries, moldy baked beans, and one quivering wife standing ankle deep in potato chips. My husband did the most helpful thing he could think of at the moment. He took a flying leap, landing flat-footed in the pile of chips. And then he began to stomp and dance and twirl, grinding those chips into my linoleum in the process! I stared. I fumed. Pretty soon I was working to stifle a smile. Eventually I had to laugh.

And finally I decided to join him. I, too, took a leap onto the chips. And then I danced. Now I'll be the first to admit that my husband's response wasn't the one I was looking for. But the truth is, it was exactly what I needed. I didn't need a cleanup crew as much as I needed an attitude adjustment, and the laughter from that rather funky moment provided just that.

Now I have a question for you, and it's simply this: Has God ever stomped on your chips? I know that, in my life, there have been plenty of times when I've gotten myself into frustrating situations and I've cried out for help, all the while hoping God would show up with a celestial broom and clean up the mess I've made of things.

What often happens instead is that God dances on my chips, answering my prayer in a completely different manner than I had expected, but in the manner that is best for me after all. Sometimes I can see right away that God's response was the best one after all. Sometimes I have to wait weeks or months before I begin to understand how and why God answered a particular prayer the way He did. There are even some situations that, years later, I'm still trying to understand. I figure God will fill me in sooner or later, either this side of Heaven or beyond.

Do I trust Him? Even when he's answering my prayers in a way that is completely different from my expectations? Even when he's dancing and stomping instead of sweeping and mopping? Can I embrace what He's offering? Can I let His joy adjust my attitude? Am I going to stand on the sidelines and sulk, or am I willing to learn the steps of the dance He's dancing' with my needs in mind?

I'll be honest with you: Sometimes I sulk. Sometimes I dance. I'm working on doing more of the latter than the former. I guess the older I get the more I realize that He really does know what He's doing. He loves me and I can trust Him. Even when the chips are down.

THE WOLVES WITHIN

An old Grandfather said to his grandson, who came to him
with anger at a friend who had done him an injustice.
"Let me tell you a story..."

"I too, at times, have felt great hate for those who have taken so much, with no sorrow for what they do. But hate wears you down, and does not hurt your enemy. It's like taking poison and wishing your enemy would die. I have struggled with these feelings many times."

"It is as if there are two wolves inside me; one is good and does no harm. He lives in harmony with all around him and does not take offense when no offense was intended. He will only fight when it is right to do so, and in the right way."

"But ... the other wolf ... ah! The littlest thing will send him into a fit of temper. He fights everyone, all of the time, for no reason. He cannot think because his anger and hate are so great. It is helpless anger, for his anger will change nothing."

"Sometimes it is hard to live with these two wolves inside me, for both of them try to dominate my spirit."

The boy looked intently into his Grandfather's eyes and asked, "Which one wins, Grandfather ?"

She jumped up as soon as she saw the surgeon come out of the operating room. She said, "How is my little boy? Is he going to be all right? When can I see him"?

The surgeon said, "I'm sorry. We did all we could, but your boy didn't make it."

Sally said, "Why do little children get cancer? Doesn't God care any more? Where were you, God, when my son needed you"?

The surgeon asked, "Would you like some time alone with your son? One of the nurses will be out in a few minutes, before he's transported to the university."

Sally asked the nurse to stay with her while she said goodbye to son. She ran her fingers lovingly through his thick red curly hair. "Would you like a lock of his hair"? the nurse asked.

Sally nodded yes. The nurse cut a lock of the boy's hair, put it in a plastic bag and handed it to Sally.

The mother said, "It was Jimmy's idea to donate his body to the university for study. He said it might help somebody else. "I said no at first, but Jimmy said, 'Mom, I won't be using it after I die. Maybe it will help some other little boy spend one more day with his Mom.' She went on, "My Jimmy had a heart of gold. Always thinking of someone else. Always wanting to help others if he could."

Sally walked out of Children's Mercy Hospital for the last time, after spending most of the last six months there. She put the bag with Jimmy's belongings on the seat beside her in the car.

The drive home was difficult. It was even harder to enter the empty house. She carried Jimmy's belongings, and the plastic bag with the lock of his hair, to her son's room.

She started placing the model cars and other personal things back in his room exactly where he had always kept them. She lay down across his bed and, hugging his pillow, cried herself to sleep.

It was around midnight when Sally awoke. Laying beside her on the bed was a folded letter. The letter said:

"Dear Mom, I know you're going to miss me, but don't think that I will ever forget you, or stop loving you, just because I'm not around to say "I Love You." I will always love you, Mom. Even more with each day. Someday we will see each other again. Until then, if you want to adopt a little boy so you won't be so lonely, that's okay with me. He can have my room and old stuff to play with. But, if you decide to get a girl instead, she probably wouldn't like the same things us boys do. You'll have to buy her dolls and stuff girls like, you know. Don't be sad thinking about me.

This really is a neat place. Grandma and Grandpa met me as soon as I got here and showed me around some, but it will take a long time to see everything. The angels are so cool. I love to watch them fly. And, you know what? Jesus doesn't look like any of his pictures. Yet, when I saw Him, I knew it was Him. Jesus himself took me to see God! And guess what, Mom! I got to sit on God's knee and talk to Him, like I was somebody important. That's when I told Him that I wanted to write you a letter, to tell you goodbye and everything. But I already knew that wasn't allowed. Well, you know what Mom? God handed me some paper and His own personal pen to write you this letter. I think Gabriel is the name of the angel who is going to drop this letter off to you.

God said for me to give you the answer to one of the questions you asked Him: 'Where was He when I needed him'? "God said He was in the same place with me, as when His son Jesus was on the cross. He was right there, as He always is with all His children. Oh, by the way, Mom, no one else can see what I've written except you. To everyone else, this is just a blank piece of paper.

Isn't that cool? I have to give God His pen back now. He needs it to write some more names in the Book of Life. Tonight I get to sit at the table with Jesus for supper. I'm sure the food will be great.

Oh, I almost forgot to tell you. I don't hurt anymore. The cancer is all gone. I'm glad, because I couldn't stand that pain anymore and God couldn't stand to see me hurt so much either. That's when He sent The Angel of Mercy to come get me. The Angel said I was a Special Delivery! How about that?!

One of my fondest memories as a child is going by the river and sitting idly on the bank.

There I would enjoy the peace and quiet, watch the water rush downstream, and listen to the chirps of birds and the rustling of leaves in the trees. I would also watch the bamboo trees bend under pressure from the wind and watch them return gracefully to their upright or original position after the wind had died down.

When I think about the bamboo tree's ability to bounce back or return to it's original position, the word resilience comes to mind. When used in reference to a person this word means the ability to readily recover from shock, depression or any other situation that stretches the limits of a person's emotions.

Have you ever felt like you are about to snap? Have you ever felt like you are at your breaking point?

During the experience you probably felt a mix of emotions that threatened your health. You felt emotionally drained, mentally exhausted and you most likely endured unpleasant physical symptoms.

Life is a mixture of good times and bad times, happy moments and unhappy moments. The next time you are experiencing one of those bad times or unhappy moments that take you close to your breaking point, bend but don't break. Try your best not to let the situation get the best of you.

A measure of hope will take you through the unpleasant ordeal. With hope for a better tomorrow or a better situation, things may not be as bad as they seem to be. The unpleasant ordeal may be easier to deal with if the end result is worth having.

If the going gets tough and you are at your breaking point, show resilience. Like the bamboo tree, bend, but don't break.

A message every adult should read, because children are watching you and doing as you do, not as you say.

When you thought I wasn't looking, I saw you hang my first painting on the refrigerator and I immediately wanted to paint another one. When you thought I wasn't looking I saw you feed a stray cat, and I learned that it was good to be kind to animals.

When you thought I wasn't looking, I saw you make my favorite cake for me and I learned that the little things can be the special things in life. When you thought I wasn't looking I heard you say a prayer, and I knew there is a God I could always talk to and I learned to trust in God.

When you thought I wasn't looking, I saw you make a meal and take it to a friend who was sick, and I learned that we all have to help take care of each other. When you thought I wasn't looking, I saw you give of your time and money to help people who had nothing and I learned that those who have something should give to those who don't.

When you thought I wasn't looking, I saw you take care of our house and everyone in it and I learned we have to take care of what we are given. When you thought I wasn't looking, I saw how you handled your responsibilities, even when you didn't feel good and I learned that I would have to be responsible when I grow up.

When you thought I wasn't looking, I saw tears come from your eyes and I learned that sometimes things hurt, but it's alright to cry. When you thought I wasn't looking, I saw that you cared and I wanted to be everything that I could be.

When you thought I wasn't looking, I learned most of life's lessons that I need to know to be a good and productive person when I grow up.

When you thought I wasn't looking, I looked at you and wanted to say, 'Thanks for all the things I saw when you thought I wasn't looking.' Each of us (parent, grandparent, aunt, uncle, teacher or friend) influences the life of a child. How will you touch the life of someone today?

Everything you do matters, whether someone sees it, doesn’t see it, or secretly sees it.

The year was 1964. The place was Chicago. A man I worked with had acquired a couple of all-leather, NFL regulation, 1963 Chicago Bears inscribed footballs and was selling them at a real good price. My first son was on the way. I bought the football. I had my son's "coming home from the hospital" gift, and it was something truly special.

Several years later, young Tom was rummaging around in the garage as only a five or six-year-old can rummage, when he came across the all-leather, NFL regulation, 1963 Chicago Bears inscribed football. He asked if he could play with it. With as much logic as I felt he could understand, I explained to him that he was still a bit too young to play carefully with such a special ball. We had the same conversation several more times in the next few months, and soon the requests faded away.

The next fall, after watching a football game on television, Tom asked, "Dad, remember that football you have in the garage? Can I use it to play with the guys now"?

Eyes rolling up in my head, I replied, "Tom, you don't understand. You don't just go out and casually throw around an all-leather, NFL regulation, 1963 Chicago Bears inscribed football. I told you before. It's special."

Eventually Tom stopped asking altogether. But he did remember, and a few years later, he told his younger brother, Dave, about the all-leather, NFL regulation, 1963 Chicago Bears inscribed football that was special and kept somewhere in the garage. Dave came to me one day and asked if he could take that special football and throw it around for awhile. It seemed like I'd been through this before, but I patiently explained, once again, that you don't just go out and throw around an all-leather, NFL regulation, 1963 Chicago Bears inscribed football.

I stood alone in the garage. The boys had long since moved away from home, and suddenly, I realized that the football had never been so special at all. Children playing with it when it was their time to play is what would have made it special. I had blown those precious, present moments that can never be reclaimed, and I had saved a football. For what?

I took the football across the street and gave it to a family with young kids. A couple of hours later, I looked out the window. They were throwing, catching, kicking and letting skid across the cement, my all-leather, NFL regulation, 1963 Chicago Bears inscribed football.

Once there was an emperor in the Far East who was growing old and knew it was coming time to choose his successor. Instead of choosing one of his assistants or one of his own children, he decided to do something different.

He called all the young people in the kingdom together one day. He said, "It has come time for me to step down and to choose the next emperor. I have decided to choose one of you." All were shocked. He continued. "I am going to give each one of you a seed today. I want you to go home, plant the seed, water it and come back here one year from today with what you have grown from this one seed. I will then judge the plants, and the one I choose will be the next emperor of the kingdom!"

There was one boy named Ling who was there that day and he, like the others, received a seed. He went home and excitedly told his mother the whole story. She helped him get a pot and some planting soil, and he planted the seed and watered it carefully. Every day he would water it and watch to see if it had grown.

After about three weeks, some of the other youths began to talk about their seeds and the plants that were beginning to grow. Ling kept going home and checking his seed, but nothing ever grew. Three weeks, four weeks, five weeks went by. Still nothing. He felt like a failure. Six months went by, still nothing. He just knew he had killed his seed. Everyone else had trees and tall plants, but he had nothing.

A year finally went by and all the youths of the kingdom brought their plants to the emperor for inspection, and after nudging by his mother, Ling brought his as well. When Ling arrived, he was amazed at the variety of plants grown by all the other youths. They were beautiful, in all shapes and sizes. Ling put his empty pot on the floor and many of the other kinds laughed at him. A few felt sorry for him and just said, "Hey nice try." When the emperor arrived, he surveyed the room and greeted the young people. Ling just tried to hide in the back. "My, what great plants, trees and flowers you have grown," said the emperor. "Today, one of you will be appointed the next emperor!"

All of a sudden, the emperor spotted Ling at the back of the room with his empty pot. He ordered his guards to bring him to the front. Ling was terrified. When Ling got to the front, the Emperor asked his name. "My name is Ling," he replied. All the kids were laughing and making fun of him. The emperor asked everyone to quiet down, and then announced to the crowd, "Behold your new emperor! His name is Ling!" Ling couldn't believe it. Ling couldn't even grow his seed. How could he be the new emperor?

Then the emperor said, "One year ago today, I gave everyone here a single seed. I told you to take the seed, plant it, water it, and bring it back to me today. But I gave you all boiled seeds which would not grow. All of you, except Ling, have brought me trees and plants and flowers. When you found that the seed would not grown, you substituted another seed for the one I gave you. Ling was the only one with the courage and honesty to bring me a pot with my seed in it. Therefore, he is the one who will be the new emperor!"

In September 1960, I woke up one morning with six hungry babies and just 75 cents in my pocket. Their father was gone. The boys ranged from three months to seven years; their sister was two. Their Dad had never been much more than a presence they feared.

Whenever they heard his tires crunch on the gravel driveway, they would scramble to hide under their beds.

Now that he had decided to leave, there would be no more beatings, but no food either.

If there was a welfare system in effect in southern Indiana at that time, I certainly knew nothing about it. I scrubbed the kids until they looked brand new and then put on my best homemade dress, loaded them into the rusty old 51 Chevy and drove off to find a job.

The seven of us went to every factory, store and restaurant in our small town. No luck.

The kids stayed crammed into the car and tried to be quiet while I tried to convince whomever would listen that I was willing to learn or do anything. I had to have a job.

Still no luck. The last place we went to, just a few miles out of town, was an old Root Beer Barrel drive-in that had been converted to a truck stop. It was called the Big Wheel.

An old lady named Granny owned the place and she peeked out of the window from time to time at all those kids. She needed someone on the graveyard shift, 11 at night until seven in the morning. She paid 65 cents an hour, and I could start that night. I raced home and called the teenager down the street that babysat for people. I bargained with her to come and sleep on my sofa for a dollar a night. She could arrive with her pajamas on and the kids would already be asleep. This seemed like a good arrangement to her, so we made a deal.

That night when the little ones and I knelt to say our prayers, we all thanked God for finding Mommy a job. And so I started at the Big Wheel.

When I got home in the mornings, I woke the babysitter up and sent her home with one dollar of my tip money, which was fully half of what I averaged every night. As the weeks went by, heating bills added a strain to my meager wage.

The tires on the old Chevy had the consistency of penny balloons and began to leak. I had to fill them with air on the way to work and again every morning before I could go home.

One bleak fall morning, I dragged myself to the car to go home and found four tires in the back seat. New tires! There was no note, no nothing, just those beautiful brand new tires. Had angels taken up residence in Indiana? I wondered.

I made a deal with the local service station. In exchange for his mounting the new tires, I would clean up his office. I remember it took me a lot longer to scrub his floor than it did for him to do the tires, but it got done.

I was now working six nights instead of five and it still wasn't enough. Christmas was coming and I knew there would be no money for toys for the kids.

I found a can of red paint and started repairing and painting some old toys. I then hid them in the basement so there would be something for Santa to deliver on Christmas morning. Clothes were a worry too. I was sewing patches on top of patches on the boys' pants and soon they would be too far gone to repair.

On Christmas Eve, the usual customers were drinking coffee in the Big Wheel. These were the truckers. Les, Frank, Jim and a state trooper named Joe.

A few musicians were hanging around after a gig at the Legion and were dropping nickels in the pinball machine. The regulars all just sat around and talked through the wee hours of the morning and then left to get home before the sun came up.

When it was time for me to go home at seven o'clock on Christmas morning, to my amazement, my old battered Chevy was filled full to the top with boxes of all shapes and sizes. I quickly opened the driver's side door, crawled inside and kneeled in the front facing the back seat.

Reaching back, I pulled off the lid of the top box. Inside was whole case of little blue jeans, sizes two to 10! I looked inside another box. It was full of shirts to go with the jeans. Then I peeked inside some of the other boxes. There was candy and nuts and bananas and bags of groceries. There was an enormous ham for baking, and canned vegetables and potatoes. There was pudding and Jell-O and cookies, pie filling and flour. There was a whole bag of laundry supplies and cleaning items. And there were five toy trucks and one beautiful little doll.

As I drove back through empty streets as the sun slowly rose on the most amazing Christmas Day of my life, I was sobbing with gratitude. And I will never forget the joy on the faces of my little ones that precious morning.

Yes, there were angels in Indiana that long ago December. And they all hung out at the Big Wheel truck stop.

Some years ago, on a hot summer day in south Florida , a little boy decided to go for a swim in the old swimming hole behind his house. In a hurry to dive into the cool water, he ran out the back door, leaving behind shoes, socks, and shirt as he went.

He flew into the water, not realizing that as he swam toward the middle of the lake, an alligator was swimming toward the shore.

His father working in the yard saw the two as they got closer and closer together. In utter fear, he ran toward the water, yelling to his son as loudly as he could.

Hearing his voice, the little boy became alarmed and made a U-turn to swim to his father. It was too late. Just as he reached his father, the alligator reached him. From the dock, the father grabbed his little boy by the arms just as the alligator snatched his legs. That began an incredible tug-of-war between the two. The alligator was much stronger than the father, but the father was much too passionate to let go. A farmer happened to drive by, heard his screams, raced from his truck, took aim and shot the alligator.

Remarkably, after weeks and weeks in the hospital, the little boy survived. His legs were extremely scarred by the vicious attack of the animal. And, on his arms, were deep scratches where his father's fingernails dug into his flesh in his effort to hang on to the son he loved.

The newspaper reporter who interviewed the boy after the trauma, asked if he would show him his scars. The boy lifted his pant legs. And then, with obvious pride, he said to the reporter, "But look at my arms. I have great scars on my arms, too. I have them because my Dad wouldn't let go."

You and I can identify with that little boy. We have scars, too. No, not from an alligator, but the scars of a painful past. Some of those scars are unsightly and have caused us deep regret. But, some wounds, my friend, are because God has refused to let go. In the midst of your struggle, He's been there holding on to you.

The Scripture teaches that God loves you. You are a child of God. He wants to protect you and provide for you in every way But sometimes we foolishly wade into dangerous situations, not knowing what lies ahead. The swimming hole of life is filled with peril - and we forget that the enemy is waiting to attack. That's when the tug-of-war begins - and if you have the scars of His love on your arms, be very, very grateful. He did not and will not ever let you go.

Please pass this on to those you love. God has blessed you, so that you can be a blessing to others. You just never know w here a person is in his/her life and what they are going through.

Never judge another persons scars, because you don't know how they got them. Also, it is so important that we are not selfish, to receive the blessings of these messages, without forwarding them to someone else.

Right now, someone needs to know that God loves them, and you love them, too- enough to not let them go.

How many of us at one time or another have wished that those fairy tales were true and that we could somehow find a magic lamp with a genie in it? How many of us have wished that we could have those three wishes that would change our lives? How many of us have wished that we could finally get all that money and all that stuff, so that we could finally be happy? I hate to say it, but I was one of those genie wishers for a long time myself. I finally realized, however, that I didn’t need a genie in a lamp because I already had an angel in my mind.

That angel had always been there trying to get my attention and show me the truth about life and love, but for a long time I was too busy wishing for a genie to hear him. I was waiting to get all of that stuff so that I could finally be happy. One glorious day, though, I finally heard what my angel had been whispering all those years. "More stuff isn’t going to make you happy. Being happy is going to make you happy." It was then that I realized that I wasn’t just taking the long way to joy, I was also taking the wrong way to joy.

We don’t need a genie in a lamp to bring us joy. We don’t need three magic wishes to bring us happiness. All we need to do is listen to the angel in our minds. That angel is telling us everyday just how much God loves us and wants us to be happy. That angel is telling us everyday that we can choose love, joy, and oneness with God, as well. That angel is telling us everyday that we are here to do God’s will by sharing that love and joy with the world.

Shove the genie back in the lamp then. God didn’t bring you here to sit around waiting for your world to get better. God brought you here to make the world better yourself. Share your love, joy, talent, and energy with the world. Create your own happiness everyday with what you think, feel, and do. Listen to that angel in your mind and become an angel in your own life.

The delicious aroma of something cooking permeated the hallway as I climbed up the steps to my grandmother's apartment.

I couldn't wait to step inside because I knew something wonderful was always waiting for me, a special dish or a special treat.

I would watch her as she cooked and I thought that some day I too would be as good a cook as my grandmother.

Her eyes lit up as she lovingly placed a dish in front of me. I was the worst picky eater to ever "grace" a table. Only at my Grandmother's table would I eat everything in sight. I especially loved her pot roast.

"Grandma, tell me how you make everything so delicious? Some day I want to be the best cook there ever was, just like you."

"Sweetheart," she would say, "I do not have any particular recipes, nothing is written down. I use a little bit of this and a little bit of that."

My heart sank. How was I going to become the "best cook ever" if I did not have an exact recipe? So to remedy the situation, I watched with a careful eye and memorized everything she did.

When she would shop for her ingredients (no big supermarkets back then), I insisted on going. I watched and listened as she spoke with the butcher. Everything had to be perfect. She would say, "The best cut of meat and remove any visible fat as this is for my granddaughter." Or in the open market, she would again say, "Nothing looks good today. Go inside and get me the freshest vegetables you have."

I enjoyed being with her and I learned so much. I wished the days would not move on but sad to say, they did.

The years went by, my grandmother passed away and I was left with some beautiful memories of all the times we shared together. She taught me how to cook, to shop, what to look for in a cut of meat and how to get the best bargains. My education in the art of cooking, taught by my grandmother, was priceless.

Did I become as good cook as my grandmother? My pot roast is almost as good, which brings to mind a very funny story.

When my family and I lived in Queens, almost every Wednesday my in-laws would come for dinner. My father-in-law worked half a day and would meet us at my house. They too, especially enjoyed my pot roast.

Speaking directly to his mom he said, "Why can't you make a pot roast as good as my wife does?"

She answered him by saying, "I don't have to. Marsha makes a pot roast that we all enjoy so let's leave it at that."

Several weeks passed and one day while speaking to my mother-in-law we devised a devilish scheme.

"I am going to cook a pot roast at home, take it to your house and not tell anyone where and by whom it was cooked," she said to me. I agreed. Even my father-in-law knew nothing of our scheme.

The day arrived and everything went off without a hitch. We even removed the pot roast from her pan and placed it into one of mine.

After dinner my husband again recited to his mom, "I cannot believe that in all the years I lived in your house, you never learned how to cook. Why can't you make a pot roast as good as my wife does?"

"Michael, I have to tell you something. Your mother made the pot roast and brought it over."

When he was told about the plan we pulled off, he couldn't believe it! The look on his face was one of amazement. I can still see it to this day!

Over the years, my children and friends have requested several of my dishes. One dish is always asked for over and over -- pot roast and potatoes. I have accommodated this request on many occasions. I love to cook and enjoy watching and hearing the ooh's and ah's as they begin eating.

A few years ago, I submitted my pot roast recipe as a "one-pot meal" in a contest. I had to actually put the recipe to paper even though none existed. I was just ecstatic when I received a check for a small sum and a copy of the cookbook in which it was published.

As I held the book and check in my hand, I started to cry uncontrollably. I wanted my grandmother to know that she was the best cook and teacher there ever was. I'd like to think she knows.

We all share special moments with people we love, whether it's with a parent, family member, teacher or friend. These moments cannot be duplicated. I cherish every moment I spent with my grandmother. She was a very wise and precious person.

Marhsa says, "Thank you Heartwarmers for allowing me to share some of my memories. I am no longer employed as a paralegal due to a serious injury. I live in East Meadow, New York, have two wonderful daughters and a precious and delicious grand daughter. I also want to thank the many readers who have taken the time to comment about the stories I have written."

From one pumpkin to another!!!!!!!

A woman was asked by a coworker, "What is it like to be a Christian?"

The coworker replied, "It is like being a pumpkin." God picks you from the patch, brings you in, and washes all the dirt off of you. Then He cuts off the top and scoops out all the yucky stuff.

He removes the seeds of doubt, hate, and greed. Then He carves you a new smiling face and puts His light inside of you to shine for all the world to see."

I liked this enough to send it to all the pumpkins in my patch.

I stepped into my hotel room to a pleasant surprise. Lots of room surrounded an inviting king size bed, flanked by overstuffed armchairs that rested against sliding glass doors that opened onto a private patio. A small dining table sat next to a kitchenette with a separate sink, refrigerator and coffee machine. "Wow," I thought to myself. "Nice place."

I love hotels, from the Holiday Inn Express to the Ritz-Carlton and everything in between. I love to enter a clean room, hang my clothes and gaze out the window, walk out in the morning knowing that each afternoon when I return, someone else will have made the bed. I like in-room dining and the way they greet you so professionally. "Nice to have you with us again, Mr. Goldsborough." Very cool.

The problem is that unless Alison travels with me, I never sleep well in hotels. I miss my family. Even though Linus and Camille, at ages four and almost two, find a way to interrupt even the best night's sleep at home, I'd still rather be with them. I'll take Linus clamoring over me at five AM or a kick in the chin from Camille over the finest linens and a chocolate on my pillow. When I'm on the road, I yearn for my loved ones.

I'm deeply troubled by the number of parents who wake up too late with the realization: "My children grew up too fast. In the hustle-bustle of career and corporate rat race, I missed their childhood." What they fail to say, but too often inwardly, think causes me even more pain and I barely even know them. "This applies to couples as well. They're so in a hurry to get who-knows-where, a destination seldom defined. Relationships turn into co-habitations, romance into convenience. Very disturbing.

A hundred years from now, no one will remember the size of your bank account, the car you drove or the square footage of your house. The world might differ greatly however, based on your impact in the life of a small child. Your life will most certainly improve, if you pay attention to your significant other, make the choice to put her or him first. Your example will benefit the rest of us. Our world cries out for role models and heroes of every day living. What could you do today to let your loved ones know how much they mean to you? What will you do tomorrow? And the next day?

Think of one specific action that you can take, and take it. Then think of another one and take that, too. Challenge yourself to find new ways to express your appreciation and love on a daily basis. It will pay off ten-fold at home.

On those slightly stressful days when the grass looks a little greener and you feel like maybe you need a break, remember this: Room service will never kiss you goodnight!

Amanda's story urges us to be privy to the horrible consequences that can occur when we judge our children harshly, rather than helping them discover who they are and what they have to contribute to the world. I hope you will open your heart to it and reflect upon how it is applicable to your relationship with your children.

17 year old Lily Sanders was dead. No one was blamed, not a word was whispered, but everyone knew who was at fault for Lily taking her own life. That’s right. Lily committed suicide on the 6th of June, and found beside her body lay her last words, written on a simple scrap of notebook paper:

I am not wrong. I am not evil. I am not the devil.
I am not mistaken, confused, or crazy, either.
My name is Lily.
I am a strong, but sensitive person. I am kind. I am capable.
But I am also a lesbian.
This is the part of me that can only be seen by you, the part of me which is ripped to pieces and analyzed by you, all of you.
The world cannot accept me for who I am.
How can I possibly accept who I am?
I will rid the world of one more burden and take my life tonight.
My name is Lily.
Freedom awaits me.

The day was filled with silence. Everyone in the community felt the tension, the unbearable weight, and fought it with the only weapon at their disposal. Most of them felt sad. All of them felt guilty. And all wondered what it must have been like for Lily Sanders to live here, and why it was so bad that she thought she had to die. Josh Monteith was one of the guilty ones. He had gone to school with Lily. They had been mutual friends since grade school. That was, until he found out that she was gay. He ridiculed her, vandalized her car, and one night he and a couple of friends cornered and threatened her. Now he could only sit alone in his room, wondering why. Why was she so different? Lily was beautiful; it was no secret that she could have any boy she wanted. It just didn’t make any sense. Why did he put her through such hell? Because she was beautiful? Because she was a “tease” for not dating men? Josh found the old-age useless excuses popping into his head: she was weird, she was wrong, she didn’t belong here and then the big kicker: everyone else was, I thought it was okay. Okay to harass someone day and night? Okay to threaten someone? Okay to drive someone to their death? No. Josh looked out his window and stared at the setting sun, wishing Lily knew how sorry he was now. Now, when it was far too late.~

Across town looking out at that same sunset was Ms. Silvia Coppins, who stayed at the school late that afternoon to mark papers. Mechanically she marked for spelling and grammatical errors, only half aware of what she was truly doing. Her mind drifted, and then finally rested on that strange and disturbing topic of Lily Sanders. Lily had been an excellent student, always at the top of the class and well-liked by teachers. Ms. Coppins could clearly recall the afternoon about six months ago when she heard the students whisper that Lily was gay. At first she dismissed it as idle gossip. Kids are always saying absurd things about one another. Her mind changed when later that week the class humiliated Lily by openly laughing at her during a presentation. Lily stood in front of her classmates and grew redder and redder, unable to move or defend herself, making her the perfect target for this brutal onslaught of degradation. Ms. Coppins could also remember her response to this horribly demeaning and embarrassing display: she froze, unable to act. She couldn’t react the way she should have by calming the class and talking things over with Lily. Instead she found that she couldn’t even look at Lily anymore. Was it this attitude that had forced her to take her own life? Of course it was. Next time, Ms. Coppins promised to herself, I will do something. I will make a difference. Before it’s too late.

She sat in a rocking chair, moving back and forth, back and forth, while the room filled with an orange glow from the dying sun. In her hand was a kid-sized pair of baby-blue knitted mittens, bright against the black of her dress. The room was silent except for the insistent creaking of the rocking chair, so quiet that she could hear every breath she took, every beat of her heart, a painful reminder that she was here and her daughter was not. The silence grew as shadows overtook the small room but the woman never moved despite the tears running freely down her face. Only when the sun had finally slipped out to beyond the sky did she speak. “Good-bye, Lily. I am so sorry, my little girl.”

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Each year, I am hired to go to Washington, DC with the eighth grade class from Clinton, WI where I grew up, to videotape their trip. I greatly enjoy visiting our nation's capitol, and each year, I take some special memories back with me. This fall's trip was especially memorable.

On the last night of our trip, we stopped at the Iwo Jima memorial. This memorial is the largest bronze statue in the world and depicts one of the most famous photographs in history; that of the six brave soldiers raising the American flag at the top of a rocky hill on the island of Iwo Jima, Japan during WW II.

Over one hundred students and chaperones piled off the buses and headed toward the memorial. I noticed a solitary figure at the base of the statue, and as I got closer he asked, "Where are you guys from"?

I told him that we were from Wisconsin. "Hey, I'm a cheese head, too! Come gather around, cheese heads, and I will tell you a story."

James Bradley just happened to be in Washington, DC to speak at the memorial the following day. He was there that night to say goodnight to his dad, who has since passed away. He was just about to leave when he saw the buses pull up. I videotaped him as he spoke to us, and received his permission to share what he said from my videotape. It is one thing to tour the incredible monuments filled with history in Washington, D.C., but it is quite another to get the kind of insight we received that night. When all had gathered around, he reverently began to speak. (Here are his words from that night).

"My name is James Bradley and I'm from Antigo, Wisconsin. My dad is on that statue, and I just wrote a book called "Flags of Our Fathers," which is number five on the New York Times Best Seller list right now. It is the story of the six boys you see behind me."

"Six boys raised the flag. The first guy putting the pole in the ground is Harlon Block. Harlon was an all-state football player. He enlisted in the Marine Corps with all the senior members of his football team. They were off to play another type of game. A game called 'war,' but it didn't turn out to be a game."

"Harlon, at the age of 21, died with his intestines in his hands. I don't say that to gross you out; I say that, because there are people who stand in front of this statue and talk about the glory of war. You guys need to know that most of the boys in Iwo Jima were 17, 18, and 19 years old."

(He pointed to the statue). "You see this next guy? That's Rene Gagnon from New Hampshire. If you took Rene's helmet off at the moment this photo was taken and looked in the webbing of that helmet, you would find a photograph. A photograph of his girlfriend. Rene put that in there for protection, because he was scared. He was 18 years old. Boys won the battle of Iwo Jima, boys, not old men."

"The next guy here, the third guy in this tableau, was Sergeant Mike Strank. Mike is my hero. He was the hero of all these guys. They called him the "old man," because he was so old. He was already 24. When Mike would motivate his boys in training camp, he didn't say, 'Let's go kill some Japanese' or 'Let's die for our country.' He knew he was talking to little boys. Instead he would say, 'You do what I say, and I'll get you home to your mothers.'"

"The last guy on this side of the statue is Ira Hayes, a Pima Indian from Arizona. Ira Hayes walked off Iwo Jima. He went into the White House with my dad. President Truman told him, 'You're a hero.' He told reporters, 'How can I feel like a hero when 250 of my buddies hit the island with me and only 27 of us walked off alive'? So, you take your class at school. Two-hundred and fifty of you spending a year together, having fun, doing everything together. Then all 250 of you hit the beach, but only 27 of your classmates walk off alive. That was Ira Hayes. He had images of horror in his mind. Ira Hayes died dead drunk, face down at the age of 32, ten years after this picture was taken."

"The next guy, going around the statue, is Franklin Sousley from Hilltop, Kentucky. A fun-lovin' hillbilly boy. His best friend, who is now 70, told me, 'Yeah, you know, we took two cows up on the porch of the Hilltop General Store. Then we strung wire across the stairs so the cows couldn't get down. Then we fed them Epsom salts. Those cows crapped all night.' Yes, he was a fun-lovin' hillbilly boy. Franklin died on Iwo Jima at the age of 19. When the telegram came to tell his mother that he was dead, it went to the Hilltop General Store.

A barefoot boy ran that telegram up to his mother's farm. The neighbors could hear her scream all night and into the morning. The neighbors lived a quarter of a mile away."

"The next guy, as we continue to go around the statue, is my dad, John Bradley from Antigo, Wisconsin, where I was raised. My dad lived until 1994, but he would never give interviews. When Walter Cronkite's producers, or the New York Times would call, we were trained as little kids to say, 'No, I'm sorry, sir, my dad's not here. He is in Canada fishing. No, there is no phone there, sir. No, we don't know when he is coming back.' My dad never fished or even went to Canada. Usually, he was sitting there right at the table eating his Campbell's soup. But we had to tell the press that he was out fishing. He didn't want to talk to the press."

"You see, my dad didn't see himself as a hero. Everyone thinks these guys are heroes, 'cause they are in a photo and on a monument. My dad knew better. He was a medic. John Bradley from Wisconsin was a caregiver. In Iwo Jima he probably held over 200 boys as they died. And when boys died in Iwo Jima, they writhed and screamed in pain."

"When I was a little boy, my third grade teacher told me that my dad was a hero. When I went home and told my dad that, he looked at me and said, 'I want you always to remember that the heroes of Iwo Jima are the guys who did not come back. Did not come back.'"

"So, that's the story about six nice young boys. Three died on Iwo Jima, and three came back as national heroes. Overall, 7,000 boys died on Iwo Jima in the worst battle in the history of the Marine Corps. My voice is giving out, so I will end here. Thank you for your time."

Suddenly, the monument wasn't just a big old piece of metal with a flag sticking out of the top. It came to life before our eyes with the heartfelt words of a son who did indeed have a father who was a hero. Maybe not a hero for the reasons most people would believe, but a hero nonetheless.

I was going to work a few weeks ago and my route took me past the weathered hulk of the now-abandoned Freezer Queen plant on the lakefront.

I spent a lot of time in that building back when life was so much simpler than it was today and I started thinking about those better times than these."

My beloved Uncle Iggy died long before the recent news that the warehouse he managed and doted over for much of his professional life was being shut down for major health violations, but I know that not even heaven can diminish the impact.

While a lot of Western New Yorkers remember my uncle as golf pro at South Shore Country Club, he actually earned his living managing the Merchants Refrigeration plant that morphed into Freezer Queen back in the 70s.

Few years in my life held the promise that 1964 presented. I had just graduated from high school and had earned a basketball scholarship to the University at Buffalo. I was looking forward to the new challenges the college would provide.

But I had to earn some money, so it was off to Merchants to work for Uncle Iggy in the rail cars and the tractor-trailers, unloading everything from washing machines to 100 pound sacks of flour to sides of beef.

Halfway through the summer, I got a respite from the backbreaking labor of the stevedore. Merchants had secured a contract from Southland Foods to package frozen beans for shipment to stores. My uncle told me to round up kids from South Buffalo to carry out that mission.

The youthful work force I assembled included Mike Kull, who would later go to the Final Four with St. Bonaventure, and Paul Fitzpatrick, a gridiron standout at the University of Maryland and a legend as Timon High's football coach. The others were also jocks at my alma mater. My job was to supervise this eclectic and eccentric group of kids who were only a year or so younger than I.

I've seen a lot of television sitcoms in my life that aren't half as funny as what went on at Merchants Refrigeration that summer. But the work got done, Southland got their truckloads of "French Cut Whole Beans" and the kids got paid.

Everything was copacetic. We got a rare visit from Uncle Iggy one morning and with him was an altar boy-looking kid. This newcomer already looked out of place among our gang of wits and half-wits. My uncle told me he'd be with us for the rest of the summer and left him in my charge.

This wasn't going to be good. Canisius was a Jesuit high school. Our high school was a Franciscan school. Canisius and Timon were like cobras and mongeese.

One of the features of our corner of the massive warehouse was the freezer, where produce was kept.

As a Crusader instead of a Tiger, the new guy would need to be initiated. I told him that he had to go into the freezer and count the boxes of beans. He would never actually complete the job as there were scores of racks, full of hundreds of packages of beans. I thought we'd leave the new guy in there for a few minutes and let him out to shiver for the rest of the day.

I had just closed the freezer door when a signal bell rang, indicating my uncle wanted to see me. I headed down to his office and was told to grab a fork-lift and unload a truck. It took about ten minutes to send the truck on its way and about then my scruffy band of bean packers were making their way to the lunchroom for their coffee break. I started counting heads and found I was one short.

Oh My God, I thought, he's still in there! I raced up the stairs and yanked open the door to see the young guy, shaking uncontrollably but still counting bean boxes.

"OK kid, great job!" I told him, yanking him back into warmer air. "You are now officially a 'green bean packer'."

Though his face was fairly frozen, I think I saw the kid smile. At least I hope I did.

I hope Iggy is smiling too, as I tell that story. I'm pretty sure this is the first time he's hearing it.

As it turned out, being locked in freezer was probably a great start for a kid we see every Sunday on NBC's Meet the Press.

The baby is teething, the children are fighting, and my husband just called and said to eat dinner without him. Okay, one of these days you'll shout, "Why don't you grow up and act your age?"

Or, "You guys get outside and find yourself something to do and don't slam the door."

You'll straighten up their bedrooms all neat and tidy with bumper stickers discarded, bed-spread tucked and smoothed, toys all displayed on the shelves, hangers in the closets, animals caged, and you'll say out loud, "Now I want you to stay this way!"

Then you'll prepare a perfect dinner with a salad that hasn't been picked to death, a cake with no finger traces through the frosting, and you'll say, "Now there's a meal for company."

And you'll say, "I want complete privacy on the phone! No dancing around, no pantomimes, no demolition crews! Silence! Do you hear me?"

No more plastic tablecloths stained with spaghetti, no more anxious nights under a vaporizer tent, no more dandelion bouquets, no more iron-on patches, no more wet-knotted shoe strings, no more tight boots, or rubber bands on pony tails.

Now, imagine your lipstick with a point. No baby sitter on New Year's Eve. Washing clothes only once a week. No PTA meetings, no car pools, no blaring radios, having your own roll of tape, no more Christmas presents made out of toothpicks and paste, no more wet-oatmeal kisses, no tooth fairy, no giggles in the dark, no knees to Band-aid.

They tell the story of a mountain climber who, desperate to conquer the Aconcagua, initiated his climb after years of preparation. But he wanted the glory to himself. Therefore, he went up alone. He started climbing and it was becoming later, and later. He did not prepare for camping, but decided to keep on going.

Soon it got dark. Night fell with heaviness at a very high altitude. Visibility was zero. Everything was black. There was no moon, and the stars were covered by clouds.

As he was climbing a ridge at about 100 meters from the top, he slipped and fell. Falling rapidly, he could only see blotches of darkness that passed. He felt a terrible sensation of being sucked in by gravity. He kept falling and in those anguishing moments, good and bad memories passed through his mind. He thought certainly he would die.

But then, he felt a jolt that almost tore him in half. Yes! Like any good mountain climber, he had staked himself with a long rope tied to his waist. In those moments of stillness, suspended in the air, he had no other choice but to shout, "Help me, God. Help me!"

There was another moment of silence and stillness. The man just held tighter to the rope. The rescue team says that the next day they found a frozen mountain climber hanging strongly to a rope, two feet off the ground.

"To be interested in the changing seasons is a happier state of mind than to be hopelessly in love with spring."

In today's world, office jobs and supermarkets have made it possible to work and provide for ourselves and our families regardless of nature's cycles. While most of us no longer depend directly on nature's seasons for our livelihood, our bodies' clocks still know deep down that a change of season means a change in us too. If we don't acknowledge this, we may feel out of sync, as though we have lost our natural rhythm. These days, autumn is more likely to bring thoughts of going back to school than harvesting, but in both cases, the chill in the air tells us it's time to move inside and prepare for the future.

We can consciously celebrate the change of season and shift our own energy by setting some time aside to make the same changes we see in nature. We can change colors like the falling leaves and wilting blooms by putting away our bright summer colors and filling our wardrobes and living areas with warm golds, reds, and browns. While plants concentrate their energy deep in their roots and seeds, we can retreat to quieter, indoor pursuits, nurturing the seeds of new endeavors, which need quiet concentration to grow. We can stoke our inner fires with our favorite coffee, tea, cider, or cocoa while savoring the rich, hot comfort foods that the season brings in an array of fall colors: potatoes, apple pies, pumpkin, squash, and corn. As animals begin growing their winter coats and preparing their dens for hibernation, we can dust off our favorite sweaters and jackets and bring blankets out of storage, creating coziness with throw rugs and heavier drapes. We can also light candles or fireplaces to bring a remnant of summer's fiery glow indoors.

By making a conscious celebration of the change, we usher in the new season in a way that allows us to go with the flow, not fight against it. We sync ourselves up with the rhythm of nature and the universe and let it carry us forward, nurturing us as we prepare for our future.

"Every man has his own courage, and is betrayed because he seeks in himself the courage of other persons."

A bright and shining vision has value only when you have the courage to follow it.

Pay attention to what others have to say, without becoming a slave to their opinions of you.

Consider differing and diverse perspectives, while keeping the substance of your most deeply held values intact.

Choose to intentionally make that effort, to maintain that focus, and all the rest will more readily fall into place.

Though the world may seem to be against you at times, keep in mind that you are working to make that world a better place.

Start to show some progress, and others will soon be buying into your vision.

Remember who you are, where you've come from and the real value of what you have to offer. Then step forward, with renewed courage and commitment, and make it real.

Back in 1995, when I went to England for the first time, I caught up with a girl I used to do a course with in Canberra. We didn't know each other that well at the time, but we'd become friends and stayed in touch. She moved to England about a year before me and was working as a nanny in Windsor.

This was in the days before most people had email addresses. When she heard I was coming over to England, she sent me her phone number in a letter and told me to give her a call when I arrived.

So that's what I did, and we spent a nice day together wandering around Windsor. I'd planned to travel around Europe for six months after that, and told her I'd contact her again when I got back.

Six months later, I tried to call her at the same phone number, and spoke to the lady who'd employed my friend as a nanny. She told me my friend didn't live there anymore, and she didn't have any contact details for her.

"Oh, well," I thought, "she knows my parents address and I'm sure we'll meet again some time in the future. Maybe when we're both back in Australia."

Just as I was about to hang up, the lady told me her husband was calling out something to her. I waited a few moments, and she came back with my friend's news phone number, which her husband had given to her. Apparently she didn't know he had it. She gave me the number and we said goodbye.

I didn't know it at the time, but the fact that her husband had overheard the conversation and interrupted was to change the entire course of my life.

Earlier on the same day, I'd tried to book a ticket home to Australia. I'd planned to spend six months living in London, but had a few bad experiences looking for jobs and places to live. It was pretty clear to me I'd be working long hours in boring employment while living in virtual poverty. London is a very expensive place and not much fun if you're at the bottom of the pile.

It was just before Christmas, and I'd been told all the flights were booked out until mid-February. I wanted to go earlier than that, but had pretty much resigned myself to the fact that I'd be stuck in Europe for a couple more months. I still had some money in the bank, so it wasn't that big a deal - I figured I'd just do a bit more travelling.

So I called my friend, now that I had the number, and went out to visit her in Windsor the next day. It turned out she'd moved into a guest house for young people. She told me there was a spare room, and I should come and live there for a bit - as it was much cheaper than London and there were lots of jobs.

So that's what I did. I ended up staying for two years.

That's where I met my wife and got my first big break in information technology. I wasn't even intending to work in that field and would probably be in a different area now if it wasn't for that. I'd certainly be married to a different person, or maybe not even married at all.

Almost all the most important parts of my current life stem from those two years in Windsor. And if I hadn't been given my friend's new phone number by her ex-employer's husband, I would never have ended up living there.

If things had turned out differently during that phone-call, for example the husband being out of earshot, I'd certainly be living a very different life now.

It always amazes me, looking back, how turning points like this are reached. How seemingly inconsequential events can have a huge impact on outcomes.

Of course this happens in nature, financial markets, and politics as well. It's popularly known at the "butterfly effect", where a butterfly flapping its wings in one place can cause a tornado in others. The more you look at the world, the more you notice how small things can make a big difference.

This is the main reason why most important outcomes are extremely unpredictable. Things almost always turn out differently from what anyone expects, because seemingly meaningless events can drastically impact entire systems.

Because of that, I think people who talk about setting long-term life-plans - and writing down where you want to be in ten years to the finest level of detail - are just silly.

All sorts of things about your life, and the environment you live in, will change in unpredictable ways over any period of time. Challenges and opportunities that you never expected will present themselves. To rigidly stick to some kind of life-plan under such circumstances is just asking for trouble.

Instead, you should prepare yourself to meet challenges and take advantage of opportunities, however they may present themselves. Success in life is about being adaptable, and having the resources to allow you to do that.

Expect the unexpected, and prepare for it the best you can.

His name is John. He has wild hair, wears a T-shirt with holes in it, jeans and no shoes. This was literally his wardrobe for his entire four years of college. He is brilliant. Kinda esoteric and very, very bright. He became a Christian while attending college.

Across the street from the campus is a well-dressed, very conservative church. They want to develop a ministry to the students, but are not sure how to go about it. One day John decides to go there. He walks in with no shoes, jeans, his T-shirt, and wild hair. The service has already started and so John starts down the aisle looking for a seat. The church is completely packed and he can't find a seat. By now people are looking a bit uncomfortable, but no one says anything. John gets closer and closer and closer to the pulpit and when he realizes there are no seats, he just squats down right on the carpet. (Although perfectly acceptable behavior at a college fellowship, trust me, this had never happened in this church before!) By now the people are really uptight, and the tension in the air is thick.

About this time, the minister realizes that from way at the back of the church, a deacon is slowly making his way toward John. Now the deacon is in his eighties, has silver-gray hair, a three-piece suit, and a pocket watch. A godly man, very elegant, very dignified, very courtly. He walks with a cane and as he starts walking toward this boy, everyone is saying to themselves, "You can't blame him for what he's going to do. How can you expect a man of his age and of his background to understand some college kid on the floor?"

It takes a long time for the man to reach the boy. The church is utterly silent except for the clicking of the man's cane. All eyes are focused on him. You can't even hear anyone breathing. The people are thinking, "The minister can't even preach the sermon until the deacon does what he has to do." And now they see this elderly man drop his cane on the floor. With great difficulty he lowers himself and sits down next to John and worships with him so he won't be alone. Everyone chokes up with emotion. When the minister gains control he says, "What I'm about to preach, you will never remember. What you have just seen, you will never forget."

The park bench was deserted as I sat down to read Beneath the long, straggly branches of an old willow tree. Disillusioned by life with good reason to frown, For the world was intent on dragging me down. And if that weren't enough to ruin my day, A young boy out of breath approached me, all tired from play. He stood right before me with his head tilted down And said with great excitement, "Look what I found!" In his hand was a flower, and what a pitiful sight, With its petals all worn, not enough rain or too little light. Wanting him to take his dead flower and go off to play, I faked a small smile and then shifted away. But instead of retreating he sat next to my side And placed the flower to his nose and declared with overacted surprise,

"It sure smells pretty and it's beautiful, too. That's why I picked it; here, it's for you." The weed before me was dying or dead. Not vibrant of colors, orange, yellow or red. But I knew I must take it, or he might never leave. So I reached for the flower, and replied, "Just what I need." But instead of him placing the flower in my hand, He held it mid-air without reason or plan. It was then that I noticed for the very first time That weed-toting boy could not see: he was blind. I heard my voice quiver, tears shone like the sun As I thanked him for picking the very best one. You're welcome," he smiled, and then ran off to play, Unaware of the impact he'd had on my day. I sat there and wondered how he managed to see A self-pitying woman beneath an old willow tree. How did he know of my self-indulged plight?

Through the eyes of a blind child, at last I could see The problem was not with the world; the problem was me. And for all of those times I myself had been blind, I vowed to see the beauty in life, and appreciate every second that's mine.

And then I held that wilted flower up to my nose And breathed in the fragrance of a beautiful rose And smiled as I watched that young boy, another weed in his hand

Do you find that every time you think about making a change in your life you sabotage yourself by thinking it is unlikely that you'll be able to do it? Do all the negative, self-limiting thoughts come to the forefront and stop you in your tracks? You must learn to change these self-imposed limitations that are preventing you from reaching your potential. Then you can transform your life and achieve your dreams.

An unlikelihood CAN become a possibility, which can lead to a probability, if you use the power of PERHAPS. You can use this simple word to change your negative beliefs into possibilities; and that is the first step toward changing them into probabilities.

Remember when you were a kid and you asked your parents if you could have something? If their answer was "No, you can't," you knew there wasn't much chance you'd get it. But, if their answer was, "Perhaps, we'll see," it usually meant you'd be able to convince them.

The word PERHAPS left the door open to negotiation; it meant there was a POSSIBILITY that you'd get what you'd asked for. All you had to do was be persistent from that point on and you would probably get what you wanted. There's POWER in the word PERHAPS.

Let's say, for example, you have a belief that you can't do math. Either you did poorly in the subject when you were in school (internal belief from past experience) or someone told you that you were not good in math (external belief). What would happen if you simply changed "I can't do math" to "PERHAPS I can do math"? The word PERHAPS opens up the belief to other possibilities. It allows for some action to be taken that could result in a change in the belief. "PERHAPS I can do math if I . . ."

- get a tutor
- take a class
- study harder
- concentrate more
- buy some math software
- work with numbers more often
- read a math textbook

Instead of just giving in to a negative belief, you are open to taking some ACTION that will help you change the belief. "I CAN'T do math" can become "PERHAPS I can do math if I take some action" and then become "I CAN probably do math".

Likewise, "I WON'T make money with an online business" becomes "PERHAPS I can make money with an online business if I start one and work at it" to "I CAN probably make money with an online business." Do you see how changing that one word will change the whole feeling of the belief?

Use the word PERHAPS to change your negative beliefs to possibilities that invite ACTION and, ultimately, to positive beliefs and probabilities.

Think about the potential outcome for your changed beliefs. Changing your negative beliefs is the first step in the transformation process that will really make a difference in your life. What are your possibilities?

Anita Foley of http://www.wealth-happens.com publishes Wealth Happens Ezine. Self-help success techniques often bring temporary change, but they don't work over the long haul! Change is not the answer! Transformation makes your life complete. Learn how: "http://www.themastercourse.com/ref.cgi?id=anidon

A few months ago I attended a seminar. One of the speakers began his presentation with what I initially considered a very confrontational remark. He paused very dramatically and bellowed… "What lies do you keep telling yourself?" Although the room fell deafly silent, we all knew that his question truly touched a nerve. That question has echoed in the hollows of my mind ever since.

"You're calling me a liar?" "All the lies?" "How much time do you have?" "That's not a lie, that's the truth!" The responses that were firing up to that question were racing through my mind at the speed of light.

In Life We Can Have Results or Reasons. If you are not getting the results you want, your reasons are the lies that you keep telling yourself. You can try to argue with that statement but its kind of like wrestling with the wind, it will keep you real busy but you really won't get anywhere. Lies create the idea that we are powerless to make things any different than the way they are.

I hate to admit it but we are all liars. We love our reasons and will go to extreme lengths to hold onto them. After all, our reasons are our stories, which define us. Those experiences "made us who we are today!" It's just the way things are……..

Results or reasons. Which do you have more of? If you answered reasons, its time to analyze the lies. I speak from experience. I spent the first thirty years of my life studying what I should believe in. Studied all the great reasons. Read all the great philosophers, not once did anybody ask me….."What is it that you want to experience with all these ideas?" So I got a little top heavy on reasons and a little short on results.

The problem with having so many reasons is that eventually these reasons create a logic of limitations. They are like a virus that creates "a story" that runs in the background of your minds hard drive. Whenever we see something that we want to create, the first thing we bump into is these beliefs (reasons) that have shaped our experience thus far. And so the battle ensues. Possibilities vs. Limitations.
The Grudge Match.
Its like a counterproductive stealth message has been implanted in your mind, "You never seem to really win at anything, so don't expect much here!" This message brought to you by your sponsor, "limiting lives is what we do!"

We all search for meaning in life. However sometimes life is meaningless. It just "is." The critical moments that shape our lives are when we define our experience and declare…."what this means is (fill in the blank)." If the statement that we make at this crucial moment, in filling in the blank, even mildly disempowers us, we empower the logic of limitations to control our perspective from that moment forward.

Oprah Winfrey was fired from one of her first jobs as a television reporter and told that "She wasn't fit for TV." How do you think she defined that moment? After his first performance on the Grand Ole Opry, Elvis Presley was banned from returning and told, "You ain't going nowhere son!" At that crucial moment do you think the King of Rock created a message of possibility or limitation?

Life just is. Sometimes when we look for meaning we might want to remember that.

Have you ever been fired, rejected, heartbroken, mistreated, insulted? How did you define the moment? I only ask, because that agreement has shaped your reality. Be Careful What You Agree With! The Results Can Be Lethal.

Listen carefully and you'll hear those reasons whispering their logic of limitations! It's no big deal if you hear the "stories" from time to time. The question is what are you going to do about it?

Mark Twain once commented that "life does not consist, mainly or even largely of facts or happenings. It consists mainly of the stream of thought forever flowing through ones head." Our REASONS create our definitions and create the energy of our life. Change our definitions and you change your experience. Change your meanings you alter your destiny. Life does not give us what we want. Life gives us whatever we expect. Life just is. The meaning that we attach to the events of our life defines our experience and creates the thoughts that allow us to create abundance or limitation.

When I was a kid I absolutely loved to read the cartoons and comics in the back of the newspaper. They made me laugh with glee. Now those cartoons were essentially a picture being defined by a clever or witty caption. One day I got the bright idea that I was going to change the captions on those cartoons and see if I could make them funnier. Isn't life the same way? Your pictures are your experiences. Your captions are your beliefs. Do you have the courage to change your own captions? It's your life after all. The only limitation we possess is the idea that there are limitations. Did you write your own captions or did you allow someone else to write them for you?

We all have a huge investment in what we have come to know. However, sometimes what we know has nothing to do with what we need to know to be successful. Sometimes what we know has nothing to do with what we need to know to be happy! To change all of that you need to locate your limiting beliefs and say goodbye to them. Change the captions of your life. Reasons or Results.

Marilyn Voss Savant writes a weekly column for Parade magazine. She is acclaimed as the person with the highest IQ on record. When she was asked by one of her readers about life, she responded with ""Feeling is what you get for thinking the way you do!" True poetry. To that I would simply add, be careful what you agree with it'll mess up your focus.

Consider this for a second: How many beliefs were you born with? How many beliefs do you have today? Along the way you have acquired a lot of baggage that is weighing you down. The problem most of us run into is that we believe in things that are "just not so", but we lead our lives in alignment with those lousy definitions and experiences to make them "so." It might be BELIEF-ECTOMY time.

One of the central tenets of the personal development movement is that we become whatever we focus upon most. Fifty years ago Earl Nightingale published his bestseller "The Strangest Secret" and made us realize that our focus creates our destiny. Web poet, adventurer and philosopher Mike Dooley of www.tut.com has eloquently modernized and improved upon this statement when he states, "Thoughts Become Things. Choose the Good Ones!" Most people don't get what they really want because their focus is fuzzy at best. Do you really know what you are focused on? Before you answer that question too quickly recognize that your focus has been responsible for creating your life up until this point. Your agreements shape your reality…. so be careful what you agree with.

So what is it that you really want? My advice is simple. Be Careful What You Agree With and Then Focus, Focus, Refocus and Refocus some more. And when you think you are through focusing, focus again. You wouldn't drive to your destination fixated on the rear view mirror! Reasons or Results. Be Realistic: Create A Miracle!

Harald Anderson is the co-founder of Art Inspires a leading online gallery of motivational and inspirational posters, prints. "When Art Inspires, Dreams Become Realities. His goal in life is to become the kind of person that his dog already thinks he is. http://www.artinspires.com

Enjoy the Ride
by
Joseph Mazzella

When I was a boy I used to love to go bike riding. There was a Summer 4-H camp full of paved roadways across the road from my home. During the Spring and Fall, this camp was mainly empty and the roadways were clear for me and my bike. I would ride my old, banana-seat, foot-brake bicycle for hours. The camp grounds had a lot of steep hills that were tough to get up. Often I would have to climb off and push my bike up them. The downhill rides, however, made it all worthwhile. I felt like I was flying, and I barely had to pedal at all. It was pure fun, pure delight, pure joy, and pure happiness. I laughed all the way with the wind in my face, my heart in my throat, and my soul in Heaven.
Choosing love, joy, and oneness with God each day often reminds me of those childhood bike rides. It can take a bit of work to get going at first. You can even feel like you are pushing your bike up a steep hill full of problems, work, and worldly concerns. Once you get going, however, you find that the ride becomes easier and easier. Soon you feel like you are flying along without even having to pedal at all. Soon you feel wind blowing in your face, joy filling up your heart, and love radiating from your soul. You find yourself laughing more, smiling more, and singing more. You find yourself sharing more, giving more, and helping more. You find yourself loving others, spreading joy, and living the way that God meant for you to live. You find yourself realizing that God is love, that life is joy, and that we are all God's children.

If you choose, then each day of your life can become a fantastic ride of love and joy that takes you a little further along the road to Heaven. The longer you ride, too, the less steep the hills will become. The longer you ride the faster and smoother you will go. The longer you ride the more you will feel God pedaling right along beside you and smiling all the way. Enjoy the ride.

I have always found it amazing how other people's words can have such impact on our lives...

We tend to want to be optimistic, in such a world full of negativity, but sometimes it is difficult to have the "glass half full" feeling, especially when you just feel like putting your head to the ground and wallowing in self pity.

However, every now and again, there is someone, perhaps that guardian angel, who appears at just the right time, to help you see things in another perspective.

I had gotten up on the wrong side of the bed, having feelings of sadness and depression. Perhaps this time it was the weather, the Monday blues, or problems of the past that I tend to let resurface occasionally when I get in my "therapy didn't help me" mood. Whatever it was, I was feeling down.

I went to work, where I answer phones for a paper supply company. Things can be quite fast paced and challenging on a daily basis. It was 8am, and before I could sit down at my desk, the phone rang. Regardless of how I was feeling, I answered with a cheery tone.

On the other end, a raging customer screamed, cursed and ranted at me. I let her get it out, for what felt like five minutes, although what I really wanted to do was hang up. There was no reason I deserved that kind of treatment, that was for sure. I told her she should speak to a manager, as I knew there was nothing I could say to calm her or make her feel better. Eventually, the manager resolved it and the whole episode was over.

Yet, it was still in my head, and I heard those harsh words over and over. I became even more depressed, a victim of this crazy lady's rampage. I was upset, and it showed.

At that moment, another employee who witnessed all of this came over to me. He put his arm around me and said, "You will live a good life if you don't weaken," and then he walked away.

I felt a release in such a way that truly brought strength to my entire body, and the negative and depressed feelings began to fade.

How true they were and how they can be applied to so many different aspects of life. I did not want to be weak, especially about something I had no control over nor deserved. I did not want to be weak about anything in my life, past, present, or future.

I am a cancer survivor and I certainly know what it is like to have strength, so why weaken now, just because of one bad morning? I put it all into perspective, as it was reconfirmed to me that it is best to let things go before they threaten to weaken you and your spirit.

I told myself that life is good, and no matter what, I will stand proud and strong the way I know how.

I ended up having a good day after my angel, whom I needed so desperately at that moment, spoke those ten small words to me. Those words will help guide me through the rest of my life.

I am sure there will be more bad and depressing days, as well as moments of weakness. That is inevitable. But after what I learned, I do believe I won't ever weaken so easily again, because life is good.

I have life and I am strong, and from now on, I will forever see the glass as half full.

There was a woman who had been diagnosed with a terminal illness and was given 3 months to live. As she began getting her things 'in order,' she called her pastor and asked for him to come to her house to discuss certain aspects of her final wishes. She told him which songs she wanted sung at the service, what scriptures she wanted read, and what dress she wanted to be buried in. She also requested to be buried with her favorite Bible in her left hand. Everything was in order and as the pastor was preparing to leave, the woman suddenly remembered one final request that was very important to her. "Please Pastor, just one more thing," she said excitedly. "Sure, what is it?" came the pastor's reply. "This is very important to me," the woman continued, "I want to be buried holding a fork in my right hand." The pastor gazed at the woman, at a loss for words.

"That surprises you, doesn't it?" the woman asked. The pastor replied, "Well to be quite honest, I am puzzled by the request".

The woman explained. "You see, Pastor, in all my years of attending church socials and potluck dinners, I remember that when the dishes were being cleared after the main course, someone would inevitably lean over to me and say, 'Keep your fork.' It was my favorite part of the meal because I knew that something better was coming, like velvety chocolate cake or deep dish apple pie. Something wonderful to end the meal!"

The pastor listened intently and a smile came upon his face. The woman continued, "So, I just want people to see me there with a fork in my hand and I want them to wonder, 'What's with the fork?' Then I want you to tell them: "Keep your Fork...the best is yet to come."

The pastor's eyes welled up with tears of joy as he hugged the woman good-bye. He knew that this would be one of the last times that he would see her before her death. But he also knew that the woman had a better grasp of Heaven than he did.

She knew and trusted that the best was yet to come. At the funeral, every one that walked by the woman's casket saw her wearing a beautiful dress with her favorite Bible held in her left hand and a fork held in her right hand.

Over and over the pastor heard people ask the question, "Why is she holding a fork?" and his smile began to get larger and brighter each time. During his message, the pastor told the people about the conversation that he had with the woman shortly before she died. He explained the fork and what it symbolized to her. The Pastor told everyone how he could not stop thinking about the fork and how he hoped that they would not be able to stop thinking about it either.

So the next time you reach for your fork, let it remind you, oh so gently, that the best is yet to come.

All my life, I've had this recurring dream that causes me to wake up feeling strange. In it, I am a little girl again, rushing about, trying to get ready for school.

"Hurry, Gin, you'll be late for school," my mother calls to me. I am hurrying, Mom! Where's my lunch? What did I do with my books"?

Deep inside I know where the dream comes from and what it means. It is God's way of reminding me of some unfinished business in my life.

I loved everything about school, even though the school I attended in Springfield, Ohio, in the 1920s was very strict. I loved books, teachers, even tests and homework. Most of all, I longed to someday march down the aisle to the strains of "Pomp and Circumstance." To me, that song was even more beautiful than "Here Comes the Bride."

The Great Depression hit the hardest at large, poor families like ours. With seven children, Mom and Dad had no money for things like fine school clothes. Every morning, I cut out strips of cardboard to stuff inside my shoes to cover the holes in the soles. There was no money for musical instruments or sports uniforms or after school treats. We sang to ourselves, played jacks or duck-on-the-rock, and munched on onions as we did homework.

These hardships I accepted. As long as I could go to school, I didn't mind too much how I looked or what I lacked.

What happened next was harder to accept. My brother Paul died of an infection after he accidentally stabbed himself in the eye with a fork. Then my father contracted tuberculosis and died. My sister, Margaret, caught the same disease, and soon she was gone, too.

The shock of these losses gave me an ulcer, and I fell behind in my schoolwork. Meanwhile, my widowed mother tried to keep going on the five dollars a week she made cleaning houses. Her face became a mask of despair.

One day I said to her, "Mom, I'm going to quit school and get a job to help out."

At fifteen, I dropped out of my beloved school and went to work in a bakery. My hope of walking down the aisle to "Pomp and Circumstance" was dead, or so I thought.

In 1940, I married Ed, a machinist, and we began our family. Then Ed decided to become a preacher, so we moved to Cincinnati where he could attend the Cincinnati Bible Seminary. With the coming of children went the dream of schooling, forever.

Even so, I was determined that my children would have the education I had missed. I made sure the house was filled with books and magazines. I helped them with their homework and urged them to study hard. It paid off. All our six children eventually got some college training, and one of them is a college professor.

But Linda, our last child, had health problems. Juvenile arthritis in her hands and knees made it impossible for her to function in the typical classroom. Furthermore, the medications gave her cramps, stomach trouble and migraine headaches.

Teachers and principals were not always sympathetic. I lived in dread of the phone calls from school. "Mom, I'm coming home."

Now Linda was nineteen, and still she did not have her high school diploma. She was repeating my own experience.

I prayed about this problem, and when we moved to Sturgis, Michigan, in 1979, I began to see an answer. I drove to the local high school to check it out. On the bulletin board, I spotted an announcement about evening courses.

That's the answer, I said to myself. Linda always feels better in the evening, so I'll just sign her up for night school.

Linda was busy filling out enrollment forms when the registrar looked at me with brown, persuasive eyes and said, "Mrs. Schantz, why don't you come back to school"?

But he persisted, and before I knew what I had done, I was enrolled for classes in English and crafts. "This is only an experiment," I warned him, but he just smiled.

To my surprise, both Linda and I thrived in evening school. I went back again the next semester, and my grades steadily improved.

It was exciting, going to school again, but it was no game. Sitting in a class full of kids was awkward, but most of them were respectful and encouraging. During the day, I still had loads of housework to do and grandchildren to care for. Sometimes, I stayed up until two in the morning, adding columns of numbers for bookkeeping class. When the numbers didn't seem to work out, my eyes would cloud with tears and I would berate myself. Why am I so dumb?

But when I was down, Linda encouraged me. "Mom, you can't quit now!" And when she was down, I encouraged her. Together we would see this through.

At last, graduation was near, and the registrar called me into his office. I entered, trembling, afraid I had done something wrong.

He smiled and motioned for me to have a seat. "Mrs. Schantz," he began, You have done very well in school."

"As a matter of fact," he went on, "your classmates have voted unanimously for you to be class orator."

He smiled again and handed me a piece of paper. "And here is a little reward for all your hard work."

I looked at the paper. It was a college scholarship for $3,000. "Thank you" was all I could think to say, and I said it over and over.

The night of graduation, I was terrified. Two hundred people were sitting out there, and public speaking was a brand new experience for me. My mouth wrinkled as if I had been eating persimmons. My heart skipped beats, and I wanted to flee, but I couldn't! After all, my own children were sitting in that audience. I couldn't be a coward in front of them.

Then, when I heard the first strains of "Pomp and Circumstance," my fears dissolved in a flood of delight. I am graduating! And so is Linda!

Somehow I got through the speech. I was startled by the applause, the first I ever remember receiving in my life.

Afterwards, roses arrived from my brothers and sisters throughout the midwest. My husband gave me silk roses, "so they will not fade."

The local media showed up with cameras and recorders and lots of questions. There were tears and hugs and congratulations. I was proud of Linda, and a little afraid that I might have unintentionally stolen some of the attention that she deserved for her victory, but she seemed as proud as anyone of our dual success.

But sometimes, I sit down and put on the tape of my graduation speech. I hear myself say to the audience, "Don't ever underestimate your dreams in life. Anything can happen if you believe. Not a childish, magical belief. It means hard work, but never doubt that you can do it, with God's help."

And then, I remember the recurring dream: "Hurry, Gin, you'll be late for school," and my eyes cloud over when I think of my mother.

Yes, Mom, I was late for school, but it was all the sweeter for waiting. I only wish you and Dad could have been there to see your daughter and granddaughter in all their pomp and circumstance.

A Gift of Love

"Can I see my baby?" the happy new mother asked. When the bundle was nestled in her arms and she moved the fold of cloth to look upon his tiny face, she gasped. The doctor turned quickly and looked out the tall hospital window. The baby had been born without ears. Time proved that the baby's hearing was perfect. It was only his appearance that was marred.

When he rushed home from school one day and flung himself into his mother's arms, she sighed, knowing that his life was to be a succession of heartbreaks.

He blurted out the tragedy. "A boy, a big boy...called me a freak." He grew up, handsome for his misfortune. A favorite with his fellow students, he might have been class president, but for that. He developed a gift, a talent for literature and music. "But you might mingle with other young people," his mother reproved him, but felt a kindness in her heart.

The boy's father had a session with the family physician. Could nothing be done? "I believe I could graft on a pair of outer ears, if they could be procured" the doctor decided. So the search began for a person who would make such a sacrifice for a young man. Two years went by. Then, "You are going to the hospital, son. Mother and I have someone who will donate the ears you need. But it's a secret" said the father.

The operation was a brilliant success, and a new person emerged. His talents blossomed into genius, and school and college became a series of triumphs. Later he married and entered the diplomatic service. "But I must know!" He urged his father. "Who gave so much for me? I could never do enough for him."

"I do not believe you could," said the father, "but the agreement was that you are not to know...not yet." The years kept their profound secret, but the day did come . . . one of the darkest days that ever pass through a son. He stood with his father over his mother's casket. Slowly, tenderly, the father stretched forth a hand and raised the thick, reddish-brown hair to reveal that the mother had no outer ears.

"Mother said she was glad she never let her hair be cut," he whispered gently, "and nobody ever thought mother less beautiful, did they?"

Real love lies not in what is done and known,
but in what that is done but not known.

My mother had been in a deep sleep for three days, taking in no food at all, and a minimum of forced liquid. A "Do Not Resuscitate" sign hung over her bed. Every time I looked at the sign, I shuddered. The finality of the words chilled me, even though the heat in her bedroom was way too high.

She was 88 years old and had reached the end of a long illness. She was still in her own apartment, but I had arranged for round-the-clock nursing care for her; I did not leave her side during those three days.

On the fourth morning, a Sunday, I called my husband and asked him to pick me up and drive me home (some forty minutes from my mother's apartment) so that I could get clean clothes. I had been wearing the same pair of jeans and blouse for four days, having had no idea when I arrived that the end was so near.

As we drove home that Sunday, my husband and I decided that before we went back to my mother's apartment, we would stop at the funeral home to make arrangements. The doctor had said that she would not last more than a few days at most, and the previous evening, the visiting nurse agreed with his prognosis. We felt it would be better to make the funeral arrangements while we were still relatively calm, rather than after the emotional trauma of death had set in.

I also wanted to stop at the grocery store so there would be some food in the refrigerator for the nurses and myself.

Once at my house, I quickly showered and dressed, then threw a few clothes into a shopping bag. We got back into the car. Suddenly, I told my husband that I had changed my mind about stopping off at the funeral home. And I did not want to take time to buy groceries, either. Something inside me told me that we had to get back to my mother in a hurry-before it was too late.

I rang the bell in the lobby and the daytime nurse, Callie, buzzed me in. After the elevator ride up to the 22nd floor, I saw Callie at the end of the hall, a look of amazement on her face. "It's some kind of miracle!" she exclaimed. "Your mother's eyes are open!"

Hurrying into my mother's bedroom, I was shocked to see that her eyes were open. She was propped up in the rented hospital bed, staring straight ahead. At first, I thought she was dead, and my heart started racing. But then she shifted her gaze and looked straight at me. She had a puzzled, questioning look on her face, as if to ask, "Where am I?" Or, perhaps, "Where am I going?" Then a grimace passed over her face-a grimace that I have replayed in my mind over and over again. Was it a grimace of physical pain? Of fear? Of sadness? I think by then, she felt no more pain, so it must have been a combination of fear and sadness-deep sadness at leaving, and fear of the unknown. She needed the comfort of being in my arms when she began her journey.

I held her frail body gently, and spoke to her softly, telling her how much I loved her. And then I could feel, and see, that she was gone.

"Only a few minutes," she said. "When I heard you ring the bell downstairs, I said to your mother, 'There's your daughter. Now you just hold on there. Don't you die before she gets here.' And she did hold on. She waited for you."

Thinking about the fact that something told me not to stop for anything on the way back to my mother's apartment, but to hurry as fast as I could; thinking about the fact that my mother opened her eyes when I rang the bell, and kept them open until I got there, so that I was able to say goodbye to her, I suspect that Callie was right. It was some kind of miracle. It was the Hand of Fate.

Are you still digging up things that are over and done? Do you keep chasing after "bones of contention"? Holding grudges is not going to help you move forward to happiness. Being an "emotional paleontologist" will result in a handful of useless bones. Not much use, because no museum will pay you the big bucks they pay for dinosaur bones. Give up the grudges. Stop digging around for those bones of contention. Let the dino-diggers worry about paleontology. Your concern is to look ahead, to move forward, to build your own happiness and that of those around you. Here are some helpful words on this subject by Rev. Bennett Wayne Dean:

Many of you may be familiar with the song “Digging Up Bones” sung by Randy Travis. It was quite popular in the late eighties, as I recall, and gets continued exposure on the radio and in old Matlock reruns. What’s Randy Travis singing about? He’s sitting all alone “digging up bones.” Doesn’t sound like he’s having much fun does it? “Exhuming things that’s better left alone.” Sounds like a depressing evening. “Resurrecting memories of a love that’s dead and gone.” Well, haven’t we all done the same thing more than once — probably many, many times? Oh, we may not have done exactly the same thing — sitting alone at home “digging up bones”, but we’ve all been guilty of “digging up bones” — of “exhuming things that’s better left alone.” Be honest, now. We’ve all done it.

A man comes home after having an unusually hard day at work and the first thing he hears from his wife is, “You went off and left your dirty cereal dish on the table this morning. I’m sick and tired of picking up after you!” And what does the man say? “Well, when I got up I had to pour out a half-full glass of curdled milk you left on the coffee table and didn’t take care of after you finished watching David Letterman last night. And there was one of those biting flies buzzing around it.” To which the lady responds, “Well, if I hadn’t been distracted by having go and turn off the porch light that you forgot, I would have remembered to take care of the milk.” And then he says, “Well, two weeks ago I got home from working the graveyard shift and every light in the house was on — and you were still asleep! The children were late for school.” Before this lively discussion reaches its unpleasant ending, the entire problem has been blamed on a visit by Aunt Bessie in 1978 and the shaggy dog that the husband had when the couple first got married — depending upon which one of the participants you asked, of course. Sound familiar?

What has just happened here? This couple was “digging up bones.” They were “exhuming things that’s better left alone.” The fact that the children were late for school two weeks ago didn’t have anything to do with the dirty cereal bowl being left on the table. And the fact that Buster the dog shed hair all over the new carpet in the late sixties didn’t make Aunt Bessie stay an extra two weeks in ‘78. No, the couple just started “digging up bones.” We all do it. We shouldn’t, but we do.

Or, how about this. A child comes home from school with his report card and Mom says, “How could you have made a “C” in math. Both your sisters made “A’s” when they were in Miss Matthew’s class. If you don’t start working harder, you’ll make another “D” like you did in the second grade. I told your father then you shouldn’t be playing t-ball, but he wouldn’t listen.” The child replies, “But Mom, that was 8 years ago." To which Mom says, “It’s the same thing starting all over. You are just not taking any responsibility anymore. Monday, I asked you to stop at the store on your way home and pick up a loaf of bread and you forgot. Now this report card. When your father gets home, I think we better discuss taking you out of that band you’re in — if you can’t do any better than this.” What has Mom done? That’s right. Mom’s digging up bones.

I’m reminded of a story I read about a young boy who had grown up in a rural setting a hundred years ago. Most of the year this young boy had drifted carelessly along, not putting much effort in his school work. But in midwinter some kind words from his teacher roused him to take a new start and he became a different boy and begin making up for past faults in his work. At the final examination he passed with a high grade to the great joy and pride of his mother and father.

At year end the parents were present for the graduation ceremony to the next grade. But the copy-books used during the year were all laid out on a table for the visitors to look at; and the boy remembered that his copy-book, well done in its latter pages, had been a dreary mass of blots and bad work before. He watched his mother as she began looking over those books and his heart was sick at the disappointment she was about to feel when she saw the poor work he had done in the past. But to the boy’s great surprise, she seemed quite pleased with what she saw and called his father to look with her. Afterward the young boy rushed over to the table and found that his teacher had thoughtfully and thoroughly torn out all those bad, blotted pages and made his copybooks begin from the point where he had started to do better.

How many times have we said — or if we haven’t actually said it, we’ve thought it — “Well I can forgive him, but I sure can’t forget what he’s done.” And what do most of us do? That’s right! We start “digging up bones.” We start “exhuming things that’s better left alone.” The person who we feel has wronged us isn’t present to hear our “digging”, but we, like the man in Randy’s Travis’ song, will sit alone at home or in some bar “digging up bones.”

On the other hand, there's AGAPE LOVE — a form of love which is both unconditional and volitional. That is, it is non-discriminating with no preconditions and is something that one CHOOSES to do. This type of humanitarian kindness is what we should, ideally, strive to show to all of our fellow men and women all of the time — regardless of what they have, or have not done to us ... for us ... with us ... or without us — rather than “digging up bones” when someone falls short of PERFECTION.

~Excepted from an article by
Reverend Bennett Wayne Dean Sr., Alabama, 1997

An older couple lay in bed one morning, having just awakened from a good night's sleep. He tenderly took her hand, but she pulled back responding, "Don't touch me."

Her confused husband said, "What are you talking about? We're both lying here in bed together and talking to one another.

It is good to be able to laugh when we can, and especially about daily aches and pains or normal problems. But sometimes our difficulties and losses are so staggering we wonder how long we can cope. Lingering and chronic illness, loss of someone we love and overwhelming worry can devastate us. All of us have known almost unbearable pain and hardships. Heart-breaking times. We might think we will never again wake up feeling good.

A wise obstetrician at a university teaching hospital once made a comment about suffering. Someone asked the doctor what advice he offered to his students, future doctors and nurses, when caring for mothers who gave birth to stillborn infants.

The doctor paused for a moment in thought. Then he said this: "I tell them that they need two eyes. One eye is not enough; they need two eyes. With one eye they have to check the I.V.; and with the other eye they have to weep. That's what I tell them," he said. "I tell them that they need two eyes."

He knows the secret of hard times: we need two eyes. One for seeing, the other for weeping. And we need two hands. One for holding on, the other for reaching out.

I don't know all there is to know about suffering. But I do know the way to survive it. Two eyes; two hands. That's how we get through this life best.

On July 22nd, I was in route to Washington , DC for a business trip. It was all so very ordinary, until we landed in Denver for a plane change. As I collected my belongings from the overhead bin, an announcement was made for Mr. Lloyd Glenn to see the United Customer Service Representative immediately. I thought nothing of it until I reached the door to leave the plane and I heard a gentleman asking every male if he were Mr. Glenn. At this point, I knew something was wrong and my heart sunk.

When I got off the plane, a solemn faced young man came toward me and said, "Mr. Glenn, there is an emergency at your home. I do not know what the emergency is, or who is involved, but I will take you to the phone so you can call the hospital." My heart was now pounding, but the will to be calm took over. Woodenly, I followed this stranger to the distant telephone where I called the number he gave me for the Mission Hospital. My call was put through to the trauma center where I learned that my three-year-old son had been trapped underneath the automatic garage door for several minutes, and that when my wife had found him, he was dead. CPR had been performed by a neighbor, who is a doctor, and the paramedics had continued the treatment as Brian was transported to the hospital.

By the time of my call, Brian was revived and they believed he would live, but they did not know how much damage had been done to his brain, nor to his heart. They explained that the door had completely closed on his little sternum right over his heart. He had been severely crushed. After speaking with the medical staff, my wife sounded worried but not hysterical, and I took comfort in her calmness.

The return flight seemed to last forever, but finally I arrived at the hospital six hours after the garage door had come down. When I walked into the intensive care unit, nothing could have prepared me to see my little son laying so still on a great big bed with tubes and monitors everywhere. He was on a respirator. I glanced at my wife who stood and tried to give me a reassuring smile. It all seemed like a terrible dream. I was filled in with the details and given a guarded prognosis. Brian was going to live, and the preliminary tests indicated that his heart was okay. Two miracles in and of themselves. But only time would tell if his brain received any damage.

Throughout the seemingly endless hours, my wife was calm. She felt that Brian would eventually be all right. I hung on to her words and faith like a lifeline. All that night and the next day, Brian remained unconscious. It seemed like forever since I had left for my business trip the day before.

Finally, at two o'clock that afternoon, our son regained consciousness and sat up uttering the most beautiful words I have ever heard spoken. He said, "Daddy hold me" and he reached for me with his little arms.

By the next day, he was pronounced as having no neurological or physical deficits, and the story of his miraculous survival spread throughout the hospital. You cannot imagine. We took Brian home and we felt a unique reverence for the life and love of our Heavenly Father that comes to those who brush death so closely.

In the days that followed, there was a special spirit about our home. Our two older children were much closer to their little brother. My wife and I were much closer to each other, and all of us were very close as a whole family. Life took on a less stressful pace. Perspective seemed to be more focused, and balance much easier to gain and maintain. We felt deeply blessed. Our gratitude was truly profound.

Almost a month later to the day of the accident, Brian awoke from his afternoon nap and said, "Sit down Mommy. I have something to tell you." At this time in his life, Brian usually spoke in small phrases, so to say a large sentence surprised my wife. She sat down with him on his bed, and he began his sacred and remarkable story.

"Do you remember when I got stuck under the garage door? Well, it was so heavy and it hurt really bad. I called to you, but you couldn't hear me. I started to cry, but then it hurt too bad. And then the birdies came."

"Yes," he replied. "The birdies made a whooshing sound and flew into the garage. They took care of me."

"Yes," he said. "One of the birdies came and got you. She came to tell you I got stuck under the door."

A sweet reverent feeling filled the room. The spirit was so strong and yet lighter than air. My wife realized that a three-year-old had no concept of death and spirits, so he was referring to the beings who came to him from beyond as "birdies," because they were up in the air like birds that fly.

Brian answered, "They were so beautiful. They were dressed in white, all white. Some of them had green and white. But some of them had on just white."

Brian answered. "The baby laying on the garage floor." He went on, "You came out and opened the garage door and ran to the baby. You told the baby to stay and not leave."

My wife nearly collapsed upon hearing this, for she had indeed gone and knelt beside Brian's body and seeing his crushed chest whispered, "Don't leave us Brian, please stay if you can." As she listened to Brian telling her the words she had spoken, she realized that the spirit had left His body and was looking down from above on this little lifeless form.

"We went on a trip," he said. "Far, far away." He grew agitated trying to say the things he didn't seem to have the words for. My wife tried to calm and comfort him, and let him know it would be okay. He struggled with wanting to tell something that obviously was very important to him, but finding the words was difficult.

"And there are lots and lots of birdies." My wife was stunned. Into her mind, the sweet comforting spirit enveloped her more soundly, but with an urgency she had never before known. Brian went on to tell her that the "birdies" had told him that he had to come back and tell everyone about the "birdies." He said they brought him back to the house and that a big fire truck and an ambulance were there. A man was bringing the baby out on a white bed and he tried to tell the man that the baby would be okay. The story went on for an hour.

He taught us that "birdies" were always with us, but we don't see them because we look with our eyes and we don't hear them because we listen with our ears. But they are always there, you can only see them in here (he put his hand over his heart). They whisper the things to help us to do what is right, because they love us so much. Brian continued, stating, "I have a plan, Mommy. You have a plan. Daddy has a plan. Everyone has a plan. We must all live our plan and keep our promises. The birdies help us to do that, because they love us so much."

In the weeks that followed, he often came to us and told all, or part of it, again and again. Always the story remained the same. The details were never changed or out of order. A few times he added further bits of information and clarified the message he had already delivered. It never ceased to amaze us how he could tell such detail and speak beyond his ability when he talked about his birdies.

Everywhere he went, he told strangers about the "birdies." Surprisingly, no one ever looked at him strangely when he did this. Rather, they always got a softened look on their face and smiled. Needless to say, we have not been the same ever since that day, and I pray we never will be.

Georgia, a friend of my wife's, was recently divorced and trying to raise her two sons when the Gulf War broke out. She heard about soldiers in the service who had no family and needed pen pals. Letters addressed to "Any Soldier" were distributed by commanding officers who noticed any soldiers getting little or no mail. Georgia wrote to 25 such soldiers almost daily, most of them men.

Keeping up with 25 pen pals on a daily basis almost consumed Georgia's time and talents. She sent poems, little stories, and words of hope and encouragement. When there were time constraints, she would write one letter and copy it for everyone. Greetings were sent whenever she knew about a special event, like a birthday.

One day, Georgia received a letter from a soldier that was depressed and discouraged. She pondered as to how she could help lift his spirits. It was then that she noticed that at work there were paper clips of various colors. Georgia took one of the yellow paper clips and photo copied it in the palm of her hand. She sent this picture with the paper clip with the following message: "This yellow paper clip that you see in my hand represents a hug that I am sending to you. You can carry this paper clip in a pocket or anywhere, and whenever you feel down, you can just touch and hold it and know that somebody cares about you, and would give you a hug if she were there." Georgia sent a copy of this picture along with a paper clip and the message to each of her other correspondents. After the war ended, Georgia received one of the pictures of her hand holding the yellow paper clip, and on the back were over 150 signatures of people that had been given her "hug."

During the years, Georgia named other paper clips. Pink came to mean a kiss, green was for good luck, and so on. Years later, Georgia was giving a class as part of a seminar for positive thinking. She shared with the members of the class her paper clip symbolism, and made a bracelet of multicolored paper clips for each of them. One of the women exclaimed, "So you're the one!" The class member told Georgia that she was visiting her brother and needed something to hold papers together. She had noticed a yellow paper clip on the refrigerator held there with a magnet. She borrowed the paper clip for her papers. When the brother saw it, he grabbed it and scolded her, and told her never to touch the yellow paper clip again. Now she knew why.

No one will never know how far her message has spread, nor how many lives have been touched by a simple yellow paper clip

This is Rex Barker reminding you that kind deeds have a will of their own, You never know how far an act of kindness can go. It can stimulate others and literally change history. So lets start changing a bit of history, one act at a time.

When notices were posted on the bulletin board at school announcing auditions for the twirling squad, I thought I might have a chance.

I had very little money to purchase a baton and when I visited the local music store, I almost fainted. The price was $8.50 for a

weighted baton. I bought lunch three times a week and thought that if I took a sandwich from home, I could save enough money to eventually buy the baton so I squirreled away the money. Along with some birthday money I had saved, I was finally able to buy the baton.

My hands were shaking the day I purchased the baton. Mr. Oliver, the owner of the music store, already knew me and smiled many times when I came in to "try out" the baton.

"It's easier to twirl with a weighted baton because it is evenly balanced," he said.

He told me, "It takes a while to get the knack for twirling and longer to learn the routines. Good luck." he said as I was leaving the store. I was delirious with joy!

My friend Joan offered to show me the basics. She would start off by showing me the proper way to twirl the baton so that I could make the squad. There were figure 8's, butterflies and simple twirling routines. After several sessions, Joan told me, "You are now good enough to make the squad."

On the day of the auditions my favorite music teacher, Mr. Milella, was in charge. When my turn came, my palms were moist and all I could think about was holding on to the baton. I did whatever was asked of me and I was told I would be notified of the results. Through the grapevine, I heard that I made the squad. Words could not describe how happy I was! I owed my success to Joan. We celebrated at the candy store with a chocolate malt.

But it was on my way home from a practice session that something would happen to turn my world upside down.

My best friend, June, and I walked home together whenever we could. It was on one of our walks home from school that we saw a bunch of "undesirables." They were tough acting, wore leather jackets, smoked, and were older than we were. I was very uncomfortable in their presence.

Out of the blue, one of them grabbed my baton and said, "Bet I= can break that thing over my knee." I just looked at him and said, "No you can't."

He laughed. I was a little scared and before I knew what was happening, he cracked it over his knee and I was left with a bent and misshapen baton. I just stood there for a few moments shouting at him. I yelled, "That baton cost a lot of money and you are going to pay for it."

Several years passed and I never forgot the boy who had broken my baton. I promised revenge if I ever saw him again. I had to buy a cheap version of my baton so that I could stay in the twirling squad. When someone left the squad, she gave me her old baton to keep because it was the same type that had been broken.

One evening after dinner, my mom told me about a newly hired woman at her office. This woman had a son in the Army who was stationed in Maryland. My mom "volunteered" my letter writing ability. After a while she convinced me that I should drop him a line as he was lonely. I said I would if she obtained his picture.

Well, lo and behold, who do you think the face in the picture belonged to? Yes, it was the boy who broke my baton years earlier!

We corresponded for a while. In one of his letters he mentioned he was coming up to New York and asked if I would go on a date with him.

I reluctantly agreed and in the back of my mind I plotted revenge. I never told my mom he was the boy who broke my baton.

I received another letter from him in which he mentioned he and a few buddies were traveling to New York in a week or two. He again asked about the date and did I have a friend who would be interested in one of his Army buddies. I said, "All of my friends have steady guys so there isn't much chance for a double date." We made plans for our date on the Saturday after he arrived in town.

Saturday arrived too quickly. I wasn't sure how I was going to handle it. I decided to just let the situation evolve.

Funny how years pass and people change. He introduced himself to my parents when he arrived, was nicely dressed and had perfect manners. I could not believe he was the boy who broke my baton. We decided on Coney Island where we would go on some rides, play ski ball, have pizza and make an attempt at winning a few stuffed animals. He still did not know that I was the girl whose baton he had broken.

He borrowed his dad's car for the evening and off we went. I must admit I had a good time. He was fun, nice to be with and had a terrific personality. He spent money as if he had a "money tree" growing in the back yard.

I couldn't help but think that after the date, my mom was going to report to his mother about our evening. I thought about this. Now was the time to tell him who I was.

While eating a slice of pizza, I asked him, "Where are your old friends from the neighborhood?"

A golden opportunity just presented itself and I told him who I was. He almost flipped. I had obviously changed because he did not recognize me. He did not, however, forget the incident and said, "I was just showing off for my friends."

I asked him for $8.50 plus tax for the first baton and $3.75 plus tax for the second baton. He offered me $15 and I took it. I also let him know that because of what he had done, I depleted my meager savings and I promised revenge if I ever met up with him again.

He just stared at me as if I were a person out of a horror= movie. "You know, I am going to let my mom know about the baton incident."

When he finally spoke, he said, "I don't blame you for feeling the way you do. I did try to find you but you didn't hang out with any of my friends and no one knew who you were. I am really sorry, please forgive me."

"Mom, there is something I must tell you. Remember the incident several years ago when I was picked for the twirling squad and my baton got bent out of shape. You asked me what happened and I never told you exactly what took place. Now, is the best time. The fellow with whom I went on the date tonight was the "tough kid" who broke my baton. All these years I plotted revenge if I ever met up with him again. He cost me so much grief. Well, tonight I made up for it. He gave me back the money for the original baton and for the replacement I had to buy."

She just stood there in amazement! "What am I going to tell his mother when I see her at work on Monday?"

"That's up to you, I said. "After all it was only a first date and I don't believe I will be seeing him again as I gave him a very hard time. I'd be surprised if he ever called me again."

A couple days went by and after work on Monday, my mom told me all about what she told her friend at work including the baton incident of so many years ago. His mother was devastated and she offered to give me back the money I had to pay out.

"My daughter already got the money back from your son plus he returned the money she had to spend on the second baton." my mom told her. His mother was relieved and hoped that her son and I would remain friends.

As I mentioned above, I only agreed to go out with him because I wanted my revenge. You see, by the time he and I got together for our date, I had already met someone else. My real boyfriend and I dated for several years and we were eventually engaged and then married.

The woman at work was so angry with my mom that she gave notice and left the job. She blamed my mom for not convincing me to give up my boyfriend and continue dating her son. "After all, he did like your daughter very much and he liked the fact that she was spunky and a real go getter."

I was cleaning out a closet a few week ago and behind some shoes hidden way in the back, I found my old baton. It was a little rusty and covered with dust. But I picked it up, dusted it off, polished it as best I could and I was 15 years old again! I was pretty good, I must say.

I didn't forget any of the routines that I practiced. Oh, I failed to mention, I became co-captain of the twirling squad.

I wonder whether my granddaughter might sometime down the road like to twirl her grandmother's baton. It might prove very interesting!

There was a man who had a little boy that he loved very much. Everyday after work the man would come home and play with the little boy. He would always spend all of his extra time playing with the little boy.

One night, while the man was at work, he realized that he had extra work to do for the evening, and that he wouldn't be able to play with his little boy. But, he wanted to be able to give the boy something to keep him busy. So, looking around his office, he saw a magazine with a large map of the world on the cover. He got an idea. He removed the map, and then patiently tore it up into small pieces. Then he put all the pieces in his coat pocket.

When he got home, the little boy came running to him and was ready to play. The man explained that he had extra work to do and couldn't play just now, but he led the little boy into the dining room, and taking out all the pieces of the map, he spread them on the table. He explained that it was a map of the world, and that by the time he could put it back together, his extra work would be finished, and they could both play. Surely this would keep the child busy for hours, he thought.

About half an hour later the boy came to the man and said, "Okay, it's finished. Can we play now?"

The man was surprised, saying, "That's impossible. Let's go see." And sure enough, there was the picture of the world, all put together, every piece in its place.

The man said, "That's amazing! How did you do that?" The boy said, "It was simple. On the back of the page was a picture of a man. When I put the man together the whole world fell into place."

As she stood in front of her fifth grade class on the very first day of school, she told the children an untruth. Like most teachers, she looked at her students and said that she loved them all the same. However, that was impossible, because there in the front row, slumped in his seat, was a little boy named Teddy Stoddard.

Mrs. Thompson had watched Teddy the year before and noticed that he did not play well with the other children, that his clothes were messy and that he constantly needed a bath. In addition, Teddy could be unpleasant. It got to the point where Mrs. Thompson would actually take delight in marking his papers with a broad red pen, making bold Xs and then putting a big "F" at the top of his papers.

At the school where Mrs. Thompson taught, she was required to review each child's past records and she put Teddy's off until last. However, when she reviewed his file, she was in for a surprise.

Teddy's first grade teacher wrote, "Teddy is a bright child with a ready laugh. He does his work neatly and has good manners. He is a joy to be around."

His second grade teacher wrote, "Teddy is an excellent student, well liked by his classmates, but he is troubled because his mother has a terminal illness and life at home must be a struggle."

His third grade teacher wrote, "His mother's death has been hard on him. He tries to do his best, but his father doesn't show much interest, and his home life will soon affect him if some steps aren't taken."

Teddy's fourth grade teacher wrote, "Teddy is withdrawn and doesn't show much interest in school. He doesn't have many friends and he sometimes sleeps in class."

She felt even worse when her students brought her Christmas presents, wrapped in beautiful ribbons and bright paper, except for Teddy's. His present was clumsily wrapped in the heavy, brown paper that he got from a grocery bag. Mrs. Thompson took pains to open it in the middle of the other presents. Some of the children started to laugh when she found a rhinestone bracelet with some of the stones missing, and a bottle that was one-quarter full of perfume. But she stifled the children's laughter when she exclaimed how pretty the bracelet was, putting it on, and dabbing some of the perfume on her wrist. Teddy Stoddard stayed after school that day just long enough to say, "Mrs. Thompson, today you smelled just like my mom used to."

After the children left, she cried for at least an hour. On that very day, she quit teaching reading, writing and arithmetic. Instead, she began to teach children. Mrs. Thompson paid particular attention to Teddy. As she worked with him, his mind seemed to come alive. The more she encouraged him, the faster he responded. By the end of the year, Teddy had become one of the smartest children in the class and, despite her lie that she would love all the children the same, Teddy became one of her "teacher's pets."

A year later, she found a note under her door, from Teddy, telling her that she was the best teacher he ever had in his whole life.

Six years went by before she got another note from Teddy. He then wrote that he had finished high school, third in his class, and she was still the best teacher he ever had in life.

Four years after that, she got another letter, saying that while things had been tough at times, he'd stayed in school, had stuck with it, and would soon graduate from college with the highest of honors. He assured Mrs. Thompson that she was still the best and favorite teacher he had ever had in his whole life.

Then four more years passed and yet another letter came. This time he explained that after he got his bachelor's degree, he decided to go a little further. The letter explained that she was still the best and favorite teacher he ever had. But now his name was a little longer. The letter was signed, Theodore F. Stoddard, MD.

The story does not end there. You see, there was yet another letter that spring. Teddy said he had met this girl and was going to be married. He explained that his father had died a couple of years ago and he was wondering if Mrs. Thompson might agree to sit at the wedding in the place that was usually reserved for the mother of the groom. Of course, Mrs. Thompson did. And guess what? She wore that bracelet, the one with several rhinestones missing. Moreover, she made sure she was wearing the perfume that Teddy remembered his mother wearing on their last Christmas together.

They hugged each other, and Dr. Stoddard whispered in Mrs. Thompson's ear, "Thank you Mrs. Thompson for believing in me. Thank you so much for making me feel important and showing me that I could make a difference."

Mrs. Thompson, with tears in her eyes, whispered back. She said, "Teddy, you have it all wrong. You were the one who taught me that I could make a difference. I didn't know how to teach until I met you."

***For those who don't know, Teddy Stoddard is the doctor at Iowa Methodist in Des Moines that has the Stoddard Cancer Wing.***

You run with them until you are both breathless. They crash ... they hit the roof .. you patch, comfort and assure them that someday they will fly.

They tug, and with each twist of the twine, there is sadness that goes with joy.

The kite becomes more distant, and you know it won't be long before that beautiful creature will snap the lifeline that binds you together and will soar as meant to soar...free and alone.

This is Rex Barker reminding you that if you have children, love them, cherish them and appreciate them. Having children is the only thing we do as humans where we are partners with God in creation. Divine energy is about unconditional love. And the only way one can truly learn this is by having children. Only a parent can internally understand what it means to constantly give and give and give - especially to an infant - without expecting anything in return.

I remember during high school when people used to tease me on a daily basis for my love of the band. My teachers and family used to mock me, trying to convince me this was an obsessive phase, and begging me to grow out of it. I faced the daily ridicule, because I loved the band. I felt they were the only ones who understood me.

I didn't have any real friends during high school. There were more than enough people I associated with, and I never had to walk the halls alone, but I never quite fit in with them. They were focused on being young and having fun. I was focused on surviving the night, and searching for a miniscule of happiness.

I spent countless hours in my room listening to their records, memorizing their lyrics. I studied the feeling that came out in his voice while singing and belting out the chords on his guitar. It was my only moment of peace, listening to them. Who knew someone could love a band so much?

It wasn't the basic music fanatic love I had for them, it was far deeper than that. His lyrics made sense to me. It gave me ease knowing someone else somewhere had gone through all of this before. Beyond that, he went through it, and he survived! He made quite a life for himself! The three of them rapidly became one of the most popular bands worldwide. Their success was huge. And there I was, following their career every step of the way, always believing myself to be their biggest fan. They gave me hope for the future.

As I grew into my twenties, it gave me great pleasure proving people wrong. It was obviously not a phase. There was definitely a higher meaning for my love of the band. They were the only thing that remained consistent in my life. I knew there was a reason for this.

One night while feeling lost and lonely, I made my evening ritual of trying to find someone to talk to. I entered a chat room. "Twenties friends" it was called, and I believed I really could have used a friend that night. I was promptly greeted by someone in a barely legible font. "Hey Christieroad2, I like your song." It was like "music to my ears" so to speak. He knew them! He knew that song! That was one of their songs. I chose it as a screen name, because I felt like a different, a better more vibrant person when I was she. She became my alias. And he recognized it, which was no small task. You would have to had been a fan to know that song from one of their lesser known albums. We chatted for a short time. We parted ways. A few nights later, he turned up in a different chat room I was in. We chatted again. The next night he again showed up in yet another room I was in, and after that he just started showing up in my IM box. That was how our friendship began.

His initial greeting came to mind time and again throughout the years. We "talked" every time we were both online together. I told him things no one else knew (or cared to know) about me. I could vent out all of my depression and frustrations to him. He was always there to "listen," to offer advice, and most importantly, to make me laugh. It didn't take long before I realized I had fallen for my best friend.

He was weary of meeting me in person. He lived in a state that was a five hour drive from me. He thought by meeting, it would "kill the simplicity." In a way, I understand exactly what he meant. As of then, we had a perfect friendship. We both knew we could depend on the other when we needed a "shoulder to lean on." We both knew how to make the other laugh. And, we both of course shared a passion for the band, Green Day. Meeting sometimes messes images up. The person you thought you knew so well turns out somehow different when they become three dimensional. And yet, I didn't care! I asked probably three times in the three years if and when he wanted to meet me. I finally had given up hope.

We remained friends. Nothing changed with our friendship, other than I was effected when he came on talking about girls he was crushing on and such. He was still my best friend. Still there for me always, including the "dreaded day."

I found out the band was finally touring. Everyone else in my life had already taken their turn coming with me to previous concerts. I had one sister left whose turn it was. When she found out the show was on a Thursday, two hours away, she said she wouldn't go. I was devastated! I had been waiting years for them to come back to town! As I pondered the thought of going alone, I checked ticket availability to find out they were sold out. I was a living, breathing anxiety attack! I was walking around for days feeling like I was suffocating. I needed the band to give me my breath of life! Remember if you will, this is the thing I love more than anything else in the universe. I mean anything! Of course, I turned to my best friend (and love of my life) Derek.

He was there for me, but he was his Derek self, teasing me and rubbing it in that he got tickets. Taunting me with things like "Hmm, I wonder who I should take. Maybe I should ask someone out, would you go to a Green Day show with someone on a date"? That's a stupid question! He was killing me. He knows of my first love of the band, but he also knows of my more-than-friendly feelings (which he told me he did not reciprocate) and yet he is going on and on!

One day while we were chatting on the IM, he told me he finally figured out what he was looking for in a woman. He listed traits and such, and I just happen to meet all his requirements. Then, in mid sentence he asked if I had any vacation time. Now, most people would be totally baffled my his lack of an attention span, but I knew, right then and there. I knew he was finally ready to meet me. He asked if I had time off, because he had two tickets to the concert and said he didn't feel right about being there if I had to miss it. They are, after all, my favorite thing in the world. The one and only thing that has kept me alive all these years. He went on to say he wanted me to come down for a few extra days, because he wanted to show me off to his friends. I thought it was the happiest day of my life.

Meeting him was amazing. I went down expecting to meet my friend, and I came home after him confessing that he loves me. It was such a gratifying feeling. We did the long distance thing for less than three months before he asked me to marry him. We've been engaged now for more than a year and a half, and our wedding is finally in sight. I will be his wife in a month. It is all because of my love of the band. I owe them everything in the world, for they brought me and my love together. Kind of funny for a phase, don't you think?!

Every day we experience a magical twilight between our dreams and waking state. During this brief period of time, our minds still remember that all things are possible. We can smoothly transition into our physical world without losing a sense of hope when we check in with our heart center first, before we even get out of bed. Our heart center is the link between body and spirit, instinct and inspiration. It doesn't take long to hold a thought of loving gratitude for the heart that beats within us. In a mere moment we can review all that we want to accomplish in the light of love. When we get into the habit of beginning our day from the heart, all of our activities glow with the infusion of conscious intent and all interactions are done with compassion.

We can restart our day right now by imagining how love and inspiration feel. As light glows from our heart center, radiating out through our bodies into the space around us, any feelings of stress or frustration seem to melt away. Now, we see each person we encounter as fellow travelers in the journey of life, and every activity becomes part of a spiritual partnership. As conscious participants in the cycle of giving and receiving, we share our light with others as we become enlivened ourselves, with our heart leading the way.

In the intersection where our body and soul meet, our physical heart beats in time with the rhythm of the universe. It does the physical work of supplying our body with life force without our attention, but for its spiritual work, we need to be conscious. When we concentrate on its rhythm and glowing light, we remember that we are spiritual beings having a human experience. Then we know that we can choose any time to check in with our heart center, and in doing so, experience the joy of being in love with life.

The words destiny or fate are often used to answer questions that have no logical explanation. Janice had never been married but had been engaged previously. Now in her thirties, she once again is engaged.

One Sunday morning Janice and her parents, along with her fiance Donald and his mother Sylvia, who was visiting from out of state, all had brunch together. When the subject of the wedding came up in conversation, Janice told Sylvia that she and Donald were planning on moving into her parent's duplex right after the wedding. Donald asked his mother if she would like to go see their new place, since it was now vacant and in the process of being fixed up. She agreed..

After brunch was over, the two families got into one car and drove to the duplex. The duplex was located in a very old neighborhood which still remained a nice area to live in. During the ride over there, Sylvia seemed very excited. Finally they reached their destination and parked the car right in front of the couple's unit. Sylvia was dead silent. Then, oddly, just as they were all about to get out of the car, for some reason she started crying.

"What's wrong?" Donald asked his mother. Everybody was concerned and nobody had any idea what the problem was. "This is the strangest happening," Sylvia answered. She then turned toward her son and told him and everybody else the most incredible story:

"Not the unit that you and Janice are moving into, but the one next door.... Your father and I used to live there. It was your first home Donald, after I delivered you in the hospital."

This is Rex Barker reminding you to look into your own lives and look for the mysterious patterns of how things happened. And what part do you think happened "randomly" or what part was part of Divine Providence: which we call fate.

The only survivor of a shipwreck washed up on a small, uninhabited island. He prayed feverishly to be rescued, and every day he scanned the horizon for help, but none seemed forthcoming.

Exhausted, he eventually managed to build a little hut out of driftwood to protect him from the elements and to store his few possessions. But then one day, after scavenging for food, he arrived home to find his little hut in flames, with the smoke rolling up to the sky.

Early the next day, however, he was awakened by the sound of a ship?s horn that was approaching the island. It had come to rescue him.

This is Rex Barker reminding you to never forget that many blessings come in disguises. Often they show up as uncomfortable or even dangerous and painful situations. And often only later, sometimes decades later, does the true purpose of something revealed. May you all be blessed with revealed blessings.

When we’re young and we dream of love and fulfillment, we think perhaps of moon-drenched Parisian nights or walks along the beach at sunset.

No one tells us that the greatest moments of a lifetime are fleeting, unplanned and nearly always catch us off guard.

Not long ago, as I was reading a bedtime story to my seven-year-old daughter, Annie, I became aware of her focused gaze. She was starring at me with a faraway, trancelike expression. Apparently, completing The Tale of Samuel Whiskers was not as important as we first thought.

“Mommy,” she whispered. “I just can’t stop looking at your pretty face.”

Little did she know how many trying moments the glow of her sincerely loving statement would carry me through over the following years.

Not long after, I took my four-year-old son to an elegant department store, where the melodic notes of a classic love song drew us toward a tuxedoed musician playing a grand piano. Sam and I sat down on a marble bench nearby, and he seemed as transfixed by the lilting theme as I was.

I didn’t realize that Sam had stood up next to me until he turned, took my face in his little hands and said, “Dance with me.”

If only those women strolling under the Paris moon knew the joy of such an invitation made by a round-cheeked boy with baby teeth. Although shoppers openly chuckled, grinned and pointed at us as we glided and whirled around the open atrium, I would not have traded a dance with such a charming young gentleman if I’d been offered the universe.

The only survivor of a shipwreck washed up on a small, uninhabited island. He prayed feverishly for God to rescue him, and every day he scanned the horizon for help, but none seemed forthcoming. Exhausted, he eventually managed to build a little hut out of driftwood to protect him from the elements, and to store his few possessions.

But then one day, after scavenging for food, he arrived home to find his little hut in flames, the smoke rolling up to the sky. The worst had happened; everything was lost. He was stung with grief and anger. "God, how could you do this to me?" he cried.

Early the next day, however, he was awakened by the sound of a ship that was approaching the island. It had come to rescue him.

"GOD works mysteriously." He knows exactly what we need. And because God loves us so much, He said, "Never will I leave you; never will I forsake you."

I just realized that while children are dogs -- loyal and affectionate -- teenagers are cats. It's so easy to be a dog owner. You feed it, train it, boss it around. It puts its head on your knee and gazes at you as if you were a Rembrandt painting. It bounds indoors with enthusiasm when you call it.

Then around age 13, your adoring little puppy turns into a big old cat. When you tell it to come inside, it looks amazed, as if wondering who died and made you emperor. Instead of dogging your doorsteps, it disappears. You won't see it again until it gets hungry -- then it pauses on its sprint through the kitchen long enough to turn its nose up at whatever you're serving. When you reach out to ruffle its head, in that old affectionate gesture, it twists away from you, then gives you a blank stare, as if trying to remember where it has seen you before.

You, not realizing that the dog is now a cat, think something must be desperately wrong with it. It seems so antisocial, so distant, sort of depressed. It won't go on family outings.

Since you're the one who raised it, taught it to fetch and stay and sit on command, you assume that you did something wrong. Flooded with guilt and fear, you redouble your efforts to make your pet behave.

Only now you're dealing with a cat, so everything that worked before now produces the opposite of the desired result. Call it, and it runs away. Tell it to sit, and it jumps on the counter.

Instead of continuing to act like a dog owner, you can learn to behave like a cat owner. Put a dish of food near the door, and let it come to you. But remember that a cat needs your help and your affection too. Sit still, and it will come, seeking that warm, comforting lap it has not entirely forgotten. Be there to open the door for it.

One day your grown-up child will walk into the kitchen, give you a big kiss and say, "You've been on your feet all day. Let me get those dishes for you."

While at the park one day, a woman sat down next to a man on a bench near a playground. "That's my son over there," she said, pointing to a little boy in a red sweater who was gliding down the slide.

"He's a fine looking boy," the man said. "That's my son on the swing in the blue sweater." Then, looking at his watch, he called to his son. "What do you say we go, Todd?"

Todd pleaded, "Just five more minutes, Dad. Please? Just five more minutes." The man nodded and Todd continued to swing to his heart's content.

Minutes passed and the father stood and called again to his son. "Time to go now?"

Again Todd pleaded, "Five more minutes, Dad. Just five more minutes." The man smiled and said, "Okay."

The man smiled and then said, "My older son Tommy was killed by a drunk driver last year while he was riding his bike near here. I never spent much time with Tommy and now I'd give anything for just five more minutes with him. I've vowed not to make the same mistake with Todd."

"He thinks he has five more minutes to swing. The truth is . . .
I get five more minutes to watch him play."

This is Rex Barker reminding you that in life it is critical to prioritize your values. Look at where you are spending most of your time. Now ask yourself, what are the most important things to you. If the two don’t match, then you have a big disconnection in your life. Try to rebalance them, and your divine soul will start to truly feel happy.

Moths are very ugly creatures. At least that is what I always thought until a reliable source told me otherwise. When I was about five or six years old, my brother Joseph and I stayed overnight at our Aunt Linda’s house, our favorite relative. She spoke to us like adults, and she always had the best stories.

Joseph was only four years old, and still afraid of the dark, so Aunt Linda left the door open and the hall light on when she tucked us in to bed. Joe couldn’t sleep, so he just lay there staring at the ceiling. Just as I dozed off to sleep, he woke me up and asked, “Jennie, what are those ugly things near the light”? (I had always liked that he asked me questions, because I was older and supposed to know the answers. I didn’t always know the answers, of course, but I could always pretend I did.) He was pointing to the moths fluttering around the hall light. “They’re just moths, go to sleep,” I told him.

He wasn’t content with that answer, or the moths near his night light, so the next time my Aunt walked by the door he asked her to make the ugly moths go away. When she asked why, he said simply, “Because they’re ugly and scary, and I don’t like them! ”She just laughed, rubbed his head, and said, “Joe just because something is ugly outside doesn’t mean it’s not beautiful inside. Do you know why moths are brown”? Joe just shook his head.

“Moths are the most beautiful animals in the animal kingdom. At one time, they were more colorful than the butterflies. They have always been helpful, kind, and generous creatures. One day the angels up in heaven were crying. They were sad because it was cloudy and they couldn’t look down upon the people on Earth. Their tears fell down to the Earth as rain. The sweet little moths hated to see everyone so sad. They decided to make a rainbow. The moths figured that if they asked their cousins, the butterflies, to help, they could all give up just a little bit of their colors and they could make a beautiful rainbow.

One of the littlest moths flew to ask the queen of the butterflies for help. The butterflies were too vain and selfish to give up any of their colors for neither the people nor the angels. So, the moths decided to try to make the rainbow themselves. They beat their wings very hard and the powder on them formed little clouds that the winds smoothed over like glass. Unfortunately, the rainbow wasn’t big enough so the moths kept giving a little more and a little more until the rainbow stretched all the way across the sky. They had given away all their color except brown, which didn’t fit into their beautiful rainbow.

Now the once colorful moths were plain and brown. The angels up in heaven saw the rainbow, and became joyous. They smiled and the warmth of their smiles shown down on the Earth as sunshine. The warm sunshine made the people on Earth happy and they smiled, too. Now every time it rains, the baby moths, who still have their colors, spread them across the sky to make more rainbows.”

My brother sank off to sleep with that story and hasn’t feared moths since. The story my aunt told us had been gathering dust in the back corners of my brain for years, but recently came back to me.

I have a friend named Abigail who always wears gray clothes. She is also one of the most kind and generous people I’ve ever met. When people ask her why she doesn’t wear more colors, she just smiles that smile, and says, “Gray is my color.” She knows herself and she doesn’t compromise that to appease other people. Some may see her as plain like a moth, but I know that underneath the gray, Abigail is every color of the rainbow.

THE MAGIC LETTER

Once again, I had run away and really do not know why. I would walk out the gate to go to school and then keep walking, and walking, and walking. I had just turned eleven-years-old the week before. It was almost dark; I was tired, scared, cold, and all alone. I had not eaten all day and was afraid to turn myself into the police. I knew I would receive another beating once I returned to the Children's Home Society in Jacksonville, Florida. There was nothing for me to do, except keep on walking.

As darkness fell, I made my way over to the city park located on Park Street. I entered the darkened area and sat down on one of the wooden benches hoping to avoid the police cars. It was cold and I began to shiver uncontrollably. All was quiet except for the passing cars in the distance.

"Well, hello young man." A voice came from behind me. I jumped, almost falling off the park bench. My heart was beating ninety miles per hour, and I could feel it thumping in the side of my neck. I gasp and I could hardly catch my breath. I looked up and saw a woman standing behind me in the shadows. "You look cold," she said. "I'm cold. I'm real, real cold." I continued to shiver. "Here wrap this around you." I watched as she took off her shawl and wrapped it around my shoulders. "But ain't you gonna be cold now?"

"I'll be okay. Is there anything else you need?” she questioned. "I sure could use some food."

"Follow me," she said. I walked with her about twenty feet, then she stopped under one of the park streetlights. She held out her hand and said, "Here, you take this letter and give it to the store owner." I looked at her outstretched arm but saw nothing in her hand. "There's nothing in your hand," I told her. "Roger, reach out and take the letter from my hand," she replied. Slowly I reached out, acting as though I was taking something from her hand. "Now close your thumb and finger and hold the paper tightly," she instructed. I closed my thumb and finger as though I were grasping the letter. "Take it to any store owner."

"It doesn't matter," she said, as she smiled. I turned and began walking toward Five Points. Several blocks down the road, I came to a store with a woman sitting behind a counter. I opened the door, walked in, and stopped directly in front of her. "Can I help you?" asked the woman. I was hesitant to talk and had no idea what I should say. Very slowly I held out my hand toward her. I watched her face to see if she might think I was crazy or something. "Is that for me?" she asked. "Yes Ma'am.” I looked down at the floor. She reached out and as her hand touched mine, I opened my tightly closed fingers and stood there waiting. She pulled back, smiled, and looked down at her hands. She immediately turned and walked to the back of the store. I began to inch toward the front door for fear she might be calling the police. Just as I made it to the front door, I stopped as I heard someone call my name. I turned around and saw the woman holding a paper plate. "Roger, here is something for you to eat."

"But there wasn't no paper. I didn't see no paper," I told her. She smiled and motioned for me to eat by twirling her finger in front of her mouth. Within two or three minutes, I had downed the entire plate of food and several coca colas. "Are you full?" she asked. "Yes Ma'am."

"Then it's time for you to go." I turned to leave when I felt her hand on my shoulder. "Here, your paper. You almost forgot your letter," she said, holding out her hand. Again seeing nothing, I held out my hand and closed my thumb and finger as though I were taking something from her. Tightly grasping nothing more than air, I walked out into the street and headed back to the park. When I arrived, the old woman was sitting on the park bench. "Did you eat?" she asked. "Yes Ma’am, and I had two coca colas too."

"Can I have the letter so I can be magic too?" I asked. She reached out, took my hand, and opened my tightly closed fingers. Whatever was being held between my fingers, she took and placed into her apron pocket. "Would you help someone if they were hungry?" she asked me. "Yes Ma'am.

"Roger, you are very lucky little boy. You will never need the magic letter," she responded. She stood up, kissed me on the forehead, removed the shawl from my shoulders, and began walking down the sidewalk. I watched as she disappeared into the darkness.

~Stories from The Life and Times of Roger Dean Kiser
Roger's short stories have also been published in:
Chicken Soup, Petwarmers & Heartwarmers and More
Visit his website at: www.RogerDeanKiser.com

One day Coyote was passing about when he saw Hare sitting before his house. Coyote thought, "In a minute I will catch you," and he sprang and caught Hare.

Hare cried, "Man Coyote, do not eat me. Wait just a minute; I have something to tell you - something you will be glad to hear - something you must hear."

"Listen, then," said Hare. "I am a hare and I am very much afraid of people. When they come carrying arrows, I am afraid of them. When they see me they aim their arrows at me and I am afraid, and oh! How I tremble!"

Hare began trembling violently until he saw Coyote a little off his guard, then he began to run. It took Coyote a minute to think and then he ran after Hare, but always a little behind. Hare raced away and soon entered a house, just in time to escape Coyote. Coyote tried to enter the house but found it was hard stone. He became very angry.

Coyote cried, "I was very stupid! Why did I allow this Hare to fool me? I must have him. But this house is so strong, how can I open it?"

Coyote began to work, but after a while he said to himself, "The stone is so strong I cannot open it."

"I will bring grass," said Coyote, "and set fire to it. The fire will enter your house and kill you."

"Oh," said Hare, "but the grass is mine. It is my food; it will not kill me. It is my friend. The grass will not kill me."

"Then," said Coyote, "I will bring all the trees of the wood and set fire to them."

"All the trees know me," said Hare. "They are my friends. They will not kill me. They are my food." Coyote thought a minute. Then he said, "I will bring the gum of the pinon and set fire to that."

Coyote rejoiced that he had thought of a plan for getting the hare. He hurried and brought all the gum he could carry and placed it at the door of Hare's house and set fire to it. In a short time the gum boiled like hot grease, and Hare cried,

"Now I know I shall die! What shall I do?" Yet all the time he knew what he would do.

But Coyote was glad Hare was afraid. After a while Hare called, "The fire is entering my house," and Coyote answered, "'Blow it out!"

But Coyote drew nearer and blew with all his might to blow the flame into Hare's house

Hare cried, "You are so close you are blowing the fire on me and I will soon be burned."

Coyote was so happy that he drew closer and blew harder, and drew still closer so that his face was very close to Hare's face. Then Hare suddenly threw the boiling gum into Coyote's face and escaped from his house.

It took Coyote a long time to remove the gum from his face, and he felt very sorrowful. He said, "I am very, very stupid."

It was an unusually cold day for the month of May. Spring had arrived and everything was alive with color. But a cold front from the North had brought winter's chill back to Indiana. I sat with two friends in the picture window of a quaint restaurant just off the corner of the town square.

The food and the company were both especially good that day. As we talked, my attention was drawn outside, across the street. There, walking into town, was a man who appeared to be carrying all his worldly goods on his back.

He was carrying a well worn sign that read, "I will work for food." My heart sank. I brought him to the attention of my friends and noticed that others around us had stopped eating to focus on him. Heads moved in a mixture of sadness and disbelief. We continued with our meal, but his image lingered in my mind. We finished our meal and went our separate ways. I had errands to do and quickly set out to accomplish them. I glanced toward the town square, looking somewhat halfheartedly for the strange visitor.

I was fearful, knowing that seeing him again would call some response. I drove through town and saw nothing of him. I made some purchases at a store and got back in my car. Deep within me, the Spirit of God kept speaking to me: "Don't go back to the office until you've at least driven once more around the square." And so, with some hesitancy, I headed back into town. As I turned the square's third corner. I saw him.

He was standing on the steps of the storefront church, going through his sack. I stopped and looked, feeling both compelled to speak to him, yet wanting to drive on. The empty parking space on the corner seemed to be a sign from God: an invitation to park. I pulled in, got out and approached the town's newest visitor. "Looking for the pastor?" I asked.

"No work," I replied. "I commute here to work from the city, but I would like to take you to lunch."

As he began to gather his things. I asked some surface questions. "Where you headed?"

I knew I had met someone unusual. We sat across from each other in the same restaurant I had left earlier. His face was weathered slightly beyond his 38 years. His eyes were dark yet clear, and he spoke with an eloquence and articulation that was startling. He removed his jacket to reveal a bright red T-shirt that said, "Jesus is The Never Ending Story."

Then Daniel's story began to unfold. He had seen rough times early in life. He'd made some wrong choices and reaped the consequences. Fourteen years earlier, while backpacking across the country, he had stopped on the beach in Daytona. He tried to hire on with some men who were putting up a large tent and some equipment. A concert, he thought. He was hired, but the tent would not house a concert but revival services, and in those services he saw life more clearly. He gave his life over to God.

"Nothing's been the same since," he said, "I felt the Lord telling me to keep walking, and so I did, some 14 years now." "Ever think of stopping?" I asked. "Oh, once in a while, when it seems to get the best of me. But God has given me this calling. I give out Bibles. That's what's in my sack. I work to buy food and Bibles, and I give them out when His Spirit leads."

I sat amazed. My homeless friend was not homeless. He was on a mission and lived this way by choice. The question turned inside for a moment and then I asked: "What's it like?"

"To walk into a town carrying all your things on your back and to show your sign?"

"Oh, it was humiliating at first. People would stare and make comments. Once someone tossed a piece of half-eaten bread and made a gesture that certainly didn't make me feel welcome. But then it became humbling to realize that God was using me to touch lives and change people's concepts of other folks like me."

My concept was changing, too. We finished our dessert and gathered his things. Just outside the door, he paused. He turned to me and said, "Come ye blessed of my Father and inherit the kingdom I've prepared for you. For when I was hungry you gave me food, when I was thirsty you gave me drink, a stranger and you took me in."

I felt as if we were on holy ground. "Could you use another Bible?" I asked. He said he preferred a certain translation. It traveled well and was not too heavy. It was also his personal favorite.

I was able to find my new friend a Bible that would do well, and he seemed very grateful. "Where you headed from here?"

"No, I just figure I should go there. I figure someone under that star right there needs a Bible, so that's where I'm going next." He smiled, and the warmth of his spirit radiated the sincerity of his mission.

I drove him back to the town square where we'd met two hours earlier, and as we drove, it started raining. We parked and unloaded his things. "Would you sign my autograph book?" he asked. "I like to keep messages from folks I meet."

I wrote in his little book that his commitment to his calling had touched my life. I encouraged him to stay strong. And I left him with a verse of scripture from Jeremiah, "I know the plans I have for you," declared the Lord, "plans to prosper you and not to harm you. Plans to give you a future and a hope."

"Thanks, man," he said. "I know we just met and we're really just strangers, but I love you."

And so on the busy street corner in the drizzling rain, my new friend and I embraced, and I felt deep inside that I had been changed. He put his things on his back, smiled his winning smile and said, "See you in the New Jerusalem."

He began his journey again. He headed away with his sign dangling from his bed roll and pack of Bibles. He stopped, turned and said, "When you see something that makes you think of me, will you pray for me?"

And that was the last I saw of him. Late that evening as I left my office, the wind blew strong. The cold front had settled hard upon the town. I bundled up and hurried to my car. As I sat back and reached for the emergency brake, I saw them....a pair of well-worn brown work gloves neatly laid over the length of the handle. I picked them up and thought of my friend and wondered if his hands would stay warm that night without them. I remembered his words:

"If you see something that makes you think of me, will you pray for me?" Today his gloves lie on my desk in my office. They help me to see the world and its people in a new way, and they help me remember those two hours with my unique friend and to pray for his ministry.

There was once a little boy who wanted to meet God. He knew it was a long trip to where God lived, so he packed his suitcase with Twinkies and a six-pack of root beer, and he started his journey.

When he had gone about three blocks, he met an old woman. She was sitting in the park just staring at some pigeons. The boy sat down next to her and opened his suitcase. He was about to take a drink from his root beer when he noticed that the old lady looked hungry, so he offered her a Twinkie. She gratefully accepted it and smiled at him. Her smile was so pretty that the boy wanted to see it again, so he offered her a root beer.

The boy was delighted! They sat there all afternoon eating and smiling, but they never said a word.

As it grew dark, the boy realized how tired he was, and he got up to leave, but before he had gone more than a few steps, he turned around, ran back to the old woman, and gave her a hug. She gave him her biggest smile ever.

When the boy opened the door to his own house a short time later, his mother was surprised by the look of joy on his face.

He replied, "I had lunch with God." But before his mother could respond, he added, "You know what? She's got the most beautiful smile I've ever seen!"

Meanwhile, the old woman, also radiant with joy, returned to her home. Her son was stunned by the look of peace on her face and he asked, "Mother, what did you do today that made you so happy?"

She replied, "I ate Twinkies in the park with God." But before her son could respond she added, "You know, he's much younger than I expected."

Too often we underestimate the power of a touch, a smile, a kind word, a listening ear, an honest compliment, or the smallest act of caring, all of which have the potential to turn a life around. People come into our lives for a reason, a season, or a lifetime... Embrace all equally!

The little country schoolhouse was heated by an old-fashioned, pot-bellied coal stove. A little boy had the job of coming to school early each day to start the fire and warm the room before his teacher and his classmates arrived.

One morning they arrived to find the schoolhouse engulfed in flames. They dragged the unconscious little boy out of the flaming building more dead than alive. He had major burns over the lower half of his body and was taken to a nearby county hospital. From his bed the dreadfully burned, semi-conscious little boy faintly heard the doctor talking to his mother. The doctor told his mother that her son would surely die - which was for the best, really - for the terrible fire had devastated the lower half of his body.

But the brave boy didn't want to die. He made up his mind that he would survive. Somehow, to the amazement of the physician, he did survive. When the mortal danger was past, he again heard the doctor and his mother speaking quietly. The mother was told that since the fire had destroyed so much flesh in the lower part of his body, it would almost be better if he had died, since he was doomed to be a lifetime cripple with no use at all of his lower limbs.

Once more the brave boy made up his mind. He would not be a cripple. He would walk. But unfortunately from the waist down, he had no motor ability. His thin legs just dangled there, all but lifeless.

Ultimately he was released from the hospital. Every day his mother would massage his little legs, but there was no feeling, no control, nothing. Yet his determination that he would walk was as strong as ever.

When he wasn't in bed, he was confined to a wheelchair. One sunny day his mother wheeled him out into the yard to get some fresh air. This day, instead of sitting there, he threw himself from the chair. He pulled himself across the grass, dragging his legs behind him.

He worked his way to the white picket fence bordering their lot. With great effort, he raised himself up on the fence. Then, stake by stake, he began dragging himself along the fence, resolved that he would walk. He started to do this every day until he wore a smooth path all around the yard beside the fence. There was nothing he wanted more than to develop life in those legs.

Ultimately through his daily massages, his iron persistence and his resolute determination, he did develop the ability to stand up, then to walk haltingly, then to walk by himself - and then - to run. He began to walk to school, then to run to school, to run for the sheer joy of running. Later in college he made the track team.

Still later in Madison Square Garden this young man who was not expected to survive, who would surely never walk, who could never hope to run - this determined young man, Dr. Glenn Cunningham, ran the world's fastest mile! (This is not an urban legend, but a real story)

This is Rex Barker reminding you if someone can achieve the remarkable feat above, how really impossible and difficult are our tasks that we have constantly been putting off and delaying. So lets get moving.

John and Mary had a comfortable home and two lovely children, a boy and a girl. John had been asked to go on a business trip to another city and would be gone for several days, so Mary decided to go along, and they hired a reliable woman to care for the children.

On their way back, as they drove into their hometown feeling glad to be back, they noticed smoke, and they went off their usual route to see what it was. They found a home in flames. Mary said, "Oh well it isn't our fire, let's go home."

But John drove closer and exclaimed, "That home belongs to Fred Jones who works at the office. He wouldn't be off work yet, maybe there is something we could do." "It has nothing to do with us." protested Mary. "You have your good clothes on lets not get any closer."

But John drove up and stopped and they were both horror stricken to see the whole house in flames. A woman on the lawn was in hysterics screaming, "The children! Get the children!" John grabbed her by the shoulder saying, "Get a hold of yourself and tell us where the children are!" "In the basement," sobbed the woman, "down the hall and to the left."

In spite of Mary's protests John grabbed the water hose and soaked his clothes, put his wet handkerchief on his head and bolted for the basement which was full of smoke and scorching hot. He found the door and grabbed two children, holding one under each arm like the football player he was. As he left he could hear some more whimpering. He delivered the two badly frightened and nearly suffocated children into waiting arms and filled his lungs with fresh air and started back asking how many more children were down there. They told him two more and Mary grabbed his arm and screamed, "John! Don't go back! It's suicide! That house will cave in any second!"

But he shook her off and went back by feeling his way down the smoke filled hallway and into the room. It seemed an eternity before he found both children and started back. They were all three coughing and he stooped low to get what available air he could. As he stumbled up the endless steps the thought went through his mind that there was something strangely familiar about the little bodies clinging to him, and at last when they came out into the sunlight and fresh air, he found that he had just rescued his own children.

This is Rex Barker reminding you that all selfless acts are rewarded. It is just sometimes we see the reward, and other times it is hidden.

Grandpa Nybakken loved life, especially when he could play a trick on somebody. At those times, his large Norwegian frame shook with laughter while he feigned innocent surprise, exclaiming, “Oh, forevermore!”

But on a cold Saturday in downtown Chicago, Grandpa felt that God played a trick on him, and Grandpa wasn’t laughing.

Mother’s father worked as a carpenter. On this particular day, he was building some crates for the clothes his church was sending to an orphanage in China. On his way home, he reached into his shirt pocket to find his glasses, but they were gone. He remembered putting them there that morning, so he drove back to the church. His search proved fruitless.

When he mentally replayed his earlier actions, he realized what happened. The glasses had slipped out of his pocket unnoticed and fallen into one of the crates, which he had nailed shut. His brand new glasses were heading for China!

The Great Depression was at its height, and Grandpa had six children. He had spent twenty dollars for those glasses that very morning.

“It’s not fair,” he told God as he drove home in frustration. “I’ve been very faithful in giving of my time and money to your work, and now this.”

Several months later, the director of the orphanage was on furlough in the United States. He wanted to visit all the churches that supported him in China, so he came to speak on Sunday night at my grandfather’s small church in Chicago. Grandpa and his family sat in their customary seats among the sparse congregation.

“But most of all,” he said, “I must thank you for the glasses you sent last year. You see, the Communists had just swept through the orphanage, destroying everything, including my glasses. I was desperate.”

“Even if I had the money, there was simply no way of replacing those glasses. Along with not being able to see well, I experienced headaches every day, so my co-workers and I were much in prayer about this. Then your crates arrived. When my staffed removed the covers, they found a pair of glasses lying on top.”

The missionary paused long enough to let his words sink in. Then, still gripped with the wonder of it all, he continued, “Folks, when I tried on the glasses, it was as though they had been custom made just for me! I want to thank you for being a part of that!”

The people listened, happy for the miraculous glasses. But the missionary surely must have confused their church with another, they thought. There were no glasses on their list of items to be sent overseas.

But sitting quietly in the back, with tears streaming down his face, an ordinary carpenter realized the Master Carpenter had used him in an extraordinary way.

Life can sometimes seem like a real drag. The work, worry, stress, chores and general boredom can really get you down.

Going to the gym, watching TV and surfing the web are all okay, but often when it comes to having real fun they just don't cut it. No wonder sometimes we all fell fed-up, tired, and like we've just swallowed a litre of sour milk.

Since our time on this planet is pretty short, it makes sense to try and squeeze a bit more fun out of life. Instead of just sticking to the boring old routine, why not try something new?

Here are 101 suggestions for how to do just that. They're probably not all for you, but quite a few of them should be.

Bookmark this page and come back to it whenever you're looking for ways to make life just that bit more enjoyable.

2. Find the tallest building in your town and go to the top to look at the view.

5. Browse through online recipes and find something interesting and new to cook.

15. Book a big house in the middle of nowhere for you and a group of friends to spend a weekend in.

30. Call an old friend you haven't spoken to for a while to see how they're doing.

33. Buy a set of boules and challenge a friend to a game. If you don't know what boules are, find out.

I just had one of the most amazing experiences of my life, and wanted to share it with my family and dearest friends:

I was driving home from a meeting this evening about 5, stuck in traffic on Colorado Blvd., and the car started to choke and splutter and die - I barely managed to coast, cursing, into a gas station, glad only that I would not be blocking traffic and would have a somewhat warm spot to wait for the tow truck. It wouldn't even turn over. Before I could make the call, I saw a woman walking out of the "quickie mart" building, and it looked like she slipped on some ice and fell into a Gas pump, so I got out to see if she was okay.

When I got there, it looked more like she had been overcome by sobs than that she had fallen; she was a young woman who looked really haggard with dark circles under her eyes. She dropped something as I helped her up, and I picked it up to give it to her. It was a nickel.

At that moment, everything came into focus for me: the crying woman, the ancient Suburban crammed full of stuff with 3 kids in the back (1 in a car seat), and the gas pump reading $4.95.

I asked her if she was okay and if she needed help, and she just kept saying " don't want my kids to see me crying," so we stood on the other side of the pump from her car. She said she was driving to California and that things were very hard for her right now. So I asked, "And you were praying?" That made her back away from me a little, but I assured her I was not a crazy person and said, "He heard you, and He sent me."

I took out my card and swiped it through the card reader on the pump so she could fill up her car completely, and while it was fueling, walked to the next door McDonald's and bought 2 big bags of food, some gift certificates for more, and a big cup of coffee. She gave the food to the kids in the car, who attacked it like wolves, and we stood by the pump eating fries and talking a little.

She told me her name, and that she lived in Kansas City. Her boyfriend left 2 months ago and she had not been able to make ends meet. She knew she wouldn't have money to pay rent Jan 1, and finally in desperation had finally called her parents, with whom she had not spoken in about 5 years.

They lived in California and said she could come live with them and try to get on her feet there.

So she packed up everything she owned in the car. She told the kids they were going to California for Christmas, but not that they were going to live there.

I gave her my gloves, a little hug and said a quick prayer with her for safety on the road. As I was walking over to my car, she said, "So, are you like an angel or something?"

This definitely made me cry. I said, "Sweetie, at this time of year angels are really busy, so sometimes God uses regular people."

It was so incredible to be a part of someone else's miracle. And of course, you guessed it, when I got in my car it started right away and got me home with no problem. I'll put it in the shop tomorrow to check, but I suspect the mechanic won't find anything wrong

Sometimes the angels fly close enough to you that you can hear the flutter of their wings...

Psalms 55:22 "Cast thy burden upon the Lord, and He shall sustain thee. He shall never suffer the righteous to be moved."

THE "I CAN'T" FUNERAL

Donna's fourth grade classroom looked like many others I had seen in the past. Students sat in five rows of six desks. The teacher's desk was in front and faced the students. The bulletin board featured student work. In most respects it appeared to be a typically traditional elementary classroom. Yet something seemed different that day I entered it for the first time. There seemed to be an undercurrent of excitement.

Donna was a veteran small-town Michigan schoolteacher only two years away form retirement. In addition she was a volunteer participant in a countrywide staff development project I had organized and facilitated. The training focused on language arts ideas that would empower students to feel good about themselves and take charge of their lives. Donna's job was to attend training sessions and implement the concepts being presented. My job was to make classroom visitations and encourage implementation.

I took an empty seat in the back of the room and watched. All the students were working on a task, filling a sheet of notebook paper with thoughts and ideas. The ten-year-old student next to me was filling her page with "I Can'ts".

"I can't kick the soccer ball past second base." "I can't do long division with more than three numerals." "I can't get Debbie to like me." Her page was half full and she showed no signs of letting up. She worked on with determination and persistence.

I walked down the row glancing in student's papers. Everyone was writing sentences, describing things they couldn't do. "I can't do ten push-ups." "I can't hit one over the left hand fence." "I can't eat only one cookie."

By this time the activity engaged my curiosity, so I decided to check with the teacher to see what was going on. As I approached her, I noticed that she too was busy writing. I felt it best not to interrupt. "I can't get John's mother to come for a teacher conference." "I can't get my daughter to put gas in the car." "I can't get Alan to use words instead of fists."

Thwarted in my efforts to determine why students and teacher were dwelling on the negative instead of writing the more positive "I Can" statements, I returned to my seat and continued my observations. Students wrote for another ten minutes. Most filled their page. Some started another. "Finish the one you're on and don't start a new one," were the instructions Donna used to signal the end of the activity. Students were then instructed to fold the papers in half and bring them to the front. When the students reached their teacher's desk, they placed their "I Can't" statements into an empty shoe box.

When all of the students papers were collected, Donna added hers. She put the lid on the box, tucked it under her arm and headed out the door and down the hall. Students followed the teacher. I followed the students. Halfway down the hallway the procession stopped. Donna entered the custodian's room rummaged around and came out with a shovel. Shovel in one hand, shoe box in the other, Donna marched the students out to the school to the farthest corner of the playground. There they began to dig.

They were going to bury their "I Can'ts"! The digging took over ten minutes because most of the fourth graders wanted a turn. When the hole approached three fee deep, the digging ended. The box of "I Can'ts" was placed in a position at the bottom of the hole and then quickly covered with dirt.

Thirty one 10 and 11-year-olds stood around the freshly dug rave site. Each had at least one page full of "I Can'ts" in the shoe box, four feet under. So did their teacher.

At this point Donna announced, "Boys and girls, please join hands and bow your heads." The students complied. They quickly formed a circle around the grave, creating a bond with their hands. They lowered their heads and waited. Donna delivered the eulogy.

"Friends, we gather here today to honor the memory of 'I Can't.' While he was with us here on earth, he touched, the lives or everyone, some more than others. His name unfortunately, has been spoken in every public building- school, city halls, state capitols, and yes, even The White House.

"We have provided 'I Can't' with a final resting place and a headstone that contained his epitaph. His is survived by his brothers and sisters, 'I Can,' 'I Will' and 'I'm Going to Right Away.' They are not as well known as their famous relative and are certainly not as strong and powerful yet. Perhaps some day, with your help, they will make an even bigger mark on the world.

"May 'I Can't' rest in peace and may everyone present pick up their lives and move forward in his absence. Amen."

As I listened to the eulogy I realized that these students would never forget this day. The activity was symbolic, a metaphor for life. It was a right brain experience that would stick in the unconscious and conscious mind forever.

Writing "I Can'ts", burying them and hearing the eulogy — showed a major educational effort on this part of the teacher. And she wasn't done yet. At the conclusion of the eulogy she turned the students around, marched them back into the classroom and held a wake.

They celebrated the passing of "I Can't" with cookies, popcorn and fruit juices. As part of the celebration, Donna cut a large tombstone from butcher paper. She wrote the words "I Can't" at the top and put RIP in the middle. The date was added at the bottom.

The paper tombstone hung in Donna's classroom for the remainder of the year. On those rare occasions when a student forgot and said, "I Can't", Donna simply pointed to the RIP sign. The student then remembered that "I Can't" was dead and chose to rephrase the statement.

I wasn't one of Donna's students. She was one of mine. Yet that day I learned an enduring lesson from her.

Now, years later, whenever I hear the phrase, "I Can't," I see images of that fourth grade funeral. Like the students, I remember that "I Can't" is dead.

Let it Go
by
Roger Campbell

Sitting at my computer, I pondered how to answer a letter from a bitter man; bitter because he refused to let go of an attitude that was robbing him of the joy of living.

Wronged by a member of his family many years earlier, this angry writer had composed a blistering letter to the relative he felt had contributed to a family breakup from which he had never recovered. Now he had sent a copy of this letter for me to read before mailing it to his supposed enemy.

He wrote well.

But the content of his letter revealed the identity of his real enemy: himself. He refused to forgive the one he blamed for his problems and this had been perpetuating his misery for years. In spite of efforts I had made in the past to help this bitter man break free from anger, he had kept coddling his contentiousness and as a result his emotional wounds refused to heal.

Millions, like my cold correspondent, move through life shackled to their sulking because they are unwilling to forgive.

How can we forgive those who’ve wronged us deeply?

Here’s a more difficult question to answer: How can we keep on forgiving when the offense is repeated again and again?

Peter once came to Jesus and asked how many times he should forgive one who had offended him. Seven times seemed sufficient to Peter, but his Lord told him to multiply that number by seventy, calling for His questioning disciple to forgive 490 times. Actually, Peter was being taught to just keep on forgiving. One who has forgiven 490 times has developed a healthy habit of living in a forgiving way.

Following this challenging lesson on forgiveness, Peter was told about a king who discovered one of his trusted servants had borrowed heavily from the royal coffers and owed him a large amount of money. Since the servant couldn’t pay what he owed, the king ordered that his family be sold into slavery and the money applied to his huge outstanding debt. Later, however, the king had a change of heart and forgave the servant, canceling his entire obligation.

Upon being forgiven, the ungrateful servant found one of his friends who owed him a small amount of money (about fifteen dollars) and threatened to have him thrown into prison if he didn’t pay up immediately (Matthew 18:23-25).

This parable teaches the first principle of forgiveness: we must forgive because we have been forgiven. But another important dimension to the lesson is added: we have never been wronged to the extent that we have wronged God. Since He offers to forgive us, we are obligated to do the same for others.

“I can never forgive her,” said an angry man, after his wife had disappointed him.

“No, you can’t,” I replied, “unless you are willing to forgive as you have been forgiven.”

A free flow of forgiveness would revive most churches and revitalize many marriages.

Barriers erected long ago would fall. Warm embraces would replace cold stares.

Nursing an old wound grieves God and barricades His blessings.

Let it go!

His name was Bill. He had wild hair, wore a T-shirt with holes in it, blue jeans and no shoes. In the entire time I knew him, I never once saw Bill wear a pair of shoes. Rain, sleet or snow, Bill was barefoot. This was literally his wardrobe for his whole four years of college.

He was brilliant and looked like he was always pondering the esoteric. He became a Christian while attending college. Across the street from the campus was a church full of well-dressed, middle-class people. They wanted to develop a ministry to the college students, but they were not sure how to go about it.

One day, Bill decided to worship there. He walked into the church, complete with his wild hair, T-shirt, blue jeans and bare feet. The church was completely packed, and the service had already begun. Bill started down the aisle to find a place to sit. By now, the people were looking a bit uncomfortable, but no one said anything.

As Bill moved closer and closer to the pulpit, he realized there were no empty seats. So he squatted and sat down on the carpet right up front. (Although such behavior would have been perfectly acceptable at the college fellowship, this was a scenario this particular congregation had never witnessed before!) By now, the people seemed uptight, and the tension in the air was thickening.

Right about the time Bill took his “seat,” a deacon began slowly making his way down the aisle from the back of the sanctuary. The deacon was in his eighties, had silver gray hair, a three-piece suit and a pocket watch. He was a godly man: very elegant, dignified and courtly. He walked with a cane and, as he neared the boy, church members thought, “You can’t blame him for what he’s going to do. How can you expect a man of his age and background to understand some college kid on the floor”?

It took a long time for the man to reach the boy. The church was utterly silent except for the clicking of his cane. You couldn’t even hear anyone breathing. All eyes were on the deacon.

But then they saw the elderly man drop his cane on the floor. With great difficulty, he sat down on the floor next to Bill and worshipped with him. Everyone in the congregation choked up with emotion. When the minister gained control, he told the people, “What I am about to preach, you will never remember. What you’ve just seen, you will never forget.”

When our four children were young, we took our first vacation to Florida and to Daytona Beach.

I remember I was in awe of the scenery when we entered Florida, that beautiful sunshine state. It was much different than we were accustomed to in our homeland state of Illinois.

The palm trees stood tall and regal and the tropical flowers among the lush greenery made me think we had arrived in a location much akin to paradise.

Arriving in Daytona, I savored my first ever glimpse of a beach. I fell in love with the ocean rolling in from somewhere out in the deep.

As our week provided unrelenting pleasures I came to love scanning the sand along the water's edge for sea shells, small sea critters and other possessions brought in and deposited as treasures at my feet.

I waded out into the water up to my shoulders, and scanned the water's floor with my feet, looking for assets transported from other mlands by the turning of the tides.

Daily our children sat in the sand, constructing castles and forts, only to watch the waves carry off their fantasies to lands where only visionaries and fairies could interpret and foretell.

Like greased babies bottoms, we stayed covered and protected from the rays. Yet my husband, whose feet had been confined for years beneath dark dress coverings, was shocked to be introduced to the sun intensified by the sand, as he walked along the beach. Soon his feet took on the appearance and pain of trapped lobsters.

I had not known the power water possessed beyond what came through copper tubing. I stood mesmerized as waves in their might rolled over themselves, again and again carrying me with them into the future where dreams lay and memories are collected.

Our children stood leery of the imposing authority, fearful of the bashing abuse, petrified of yielding, but determined to step out to conquer the strength of the deep. They soon overcame their fear, triumphant over the insults inflicted upon them. They took their stance and tasted the salty rewards.

At night, we walked the abandoned beaches looking out at the moon, reflecting off the blackness and listening to the tide bringing in more treasures. What would dawn reveal buried beneath a footstep? What creatures would we find trapped behind, gasping, searching for a lost love -- the depths of the sea.

Soon our vacation came to an end, our days swallowed up in seven rolling tides. Seven days of paradise blissfully came to an end, carried away to be stored as future treasures, memories never to be forgotten.

That vacation was many years ago and our children are all grown. Their children are now learning the beauty and might contained within great bodies of water. They are finding pleasures untold and seeking

treasures of their own. They are forming their own love affair with beaches and casting upon the waters their own dreams and visions. They are storing away albums of memories, visual pictures never to be forgotten.

My husband and I have gone on to walk other seashores, and form other love affairs with beaches around the world, but like one's first love affair, we have never forgotten our first -- Daytona Beach.

Educating for Life
by
Johann Christoph Arnold

To help speed my recovery after recent heart surgery, a friend of mine gave me a set of novels and stories by Dostoevsky and Tolstoy--a gesture I appreciated tremendously. I read these books when I was young, and memorized certain passages. They have been a beacon for me in times of struggle, also in trying to help other people. These writings are
divinely inspired and contain nuggets that point to biblical and universal truths. For me they have the same stature as the writings of the Old Testament prophets, and I think every high school student and adult should read them. After all, these books stand at the center of a true education.

Unfortunately, fewer and fewer young people have even heard of such classics, let alone read them. In recent years the American government has worked very hard to improve the public school system. The No Child Left Behind law is being hailed as one of the most significant achievements of the Bush administration. But even if those who wrote this legislation had noble intentions, their efforts are badly misguided and will have devastating results.

Nobody can truly teach by means of computers and technology. As glamorous as it looks, the fruits are bad. In fact, it seems to me that we are raising a generation of robots, with damaged and even ruined souls. Here I am reminded of the words of Jesus, "Woe to you if you mislead one of these my little ones. It would be better if a millstone is hung around your neck and you drown in the deepest sea." All of us need to take this warning seriously.

A truly valuable education has one purpose: to teach children that fulfillment can be found only in serving others. A life of service leads to community, to God, and to true nationhood. Why are we so afraid of it?

True education takes place through the influence of role models, not by means of robotic imitation. Let me give you an example: When my grandfather was a young man, at the time of the First World War, the patriotic teachers of his native Germany inspired a whole generation of students to enlist. The response was overwhelming, even if misguided. Tragically, thousands were killed. But the point remains: the country's teachers were real role models, and led their students into battle.

Years later, in Paraguay, where I grew up during World War II, the teachers I had (who were highly trained German refugees) had such enthusiasm and passion that even though we had no textbooks and no visual aids--only a blackboard--we had a first-rate education. Most of it took place outdoors in nature--in real life. But now, a half-century later, I know that my peers and I had an education that today’s millionaires would covet for their children. Sadly, they will not get it, for love or money, because we have our priorities all wrong.

I have seen on my journeys around the world, that the education I had as a child can still be found in many Third World countries in South America, Africa, and Asia. As in my day, the children of today’s developing countries live in poverty. But if they have nothing else, they still have a teacher who loves them and is determined to see their education through. Both these teachers and their pupils have a sparkle in their eyes that has been destroyed in this country--and a glow that should put us to shame. Computers and audiovisual aids are not magic. They are not even necessary to make learning become alive.

Anyone who is involved in the field of education (including parents!) would do well to ponder these words from Dostoevsky's Brothers Karamazov, which speaks about the vital importance not only of an education, but of every single day: "You must know that there is nothing higher and stronger and more wholesome for life in the future than some good memory, especially a memory of childhood, of home. People talk to you a great deal about education. But some good, sacred memory preserved from childhood--that is perhaps the best education. For if a man has only one good memory left in his heart, even that may keep him from evil...And if he carries many such memories with him into life, he is safe for the end of his days."

If one day is so important, what about a month or a year? Children are our only future. Why are we so afraid to give them the best we have?

(c) 2006 Johann Christoph Arnold

Johann Christoph Arnold is the author of ten books and an advisor to some of the world's
best private schools.

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Eating Well
by
Joseph J. Mazzella

It is hard at times to eat the right foods for our bodies when the wrong foods can taste so delicious. I am just glad that when it comes to food for the soul, the choices are a little easier to make. Imagine, for instance, that you had two types of food before you. The first one is great for you. It makes your heart healthier, your mind clearer, and your body more energetic. It makes you feel fantastic both inside and out. It also tastes delicious. You could eat it for a million years and never get tired of it. It just takes a bit of effort and a few minutes to cook each day. The second food is terrible for you. It is hard on your heart and destroys your health. It depresses your mind and steals your body’s vitality. It makes you feel miserable both inside and out. It also tastes terrible. You can eat it right away, though. It is instant and takes no effort to make. Which one would you choose?

Sadly, more people than you would think make the second choice. The second choice is acting from fear. It is choosing to feed the soul hatred, violence, negativeness, misery, pain, meanness, and loneliness. It is easy to do even though it hurts you every time you do it. It slowly poisons your life and the lives of those around you if they let it. The first choice, however, is choosing love. It is feeding the soul joy, peace, positiveness, happiness, delight, goodness, and oneness with God. It takes a bit of effort, but it brings a lot of Heaven to Earth. It enriches your life and the lives of everyone you share it with.

What you eat is up to you. Choose your foods wisely then. God wants you to eat well, not just with your stomach, but also with your heart, soul, mind, and life. Lay out a table full of all the love, joy, light, goodness, and oneness with God that you possibly can. Then pull up a chair and invite everyone to the feast.

Do you know what is the hardest instrument in the orchestra to play? The hardest instrument to play is second fiddle. While all the rest of the instruments have their own sections, the violins are divided into two parts - "first" and "second" violins.

First violins are often the stars of the show. They get the melody lines. They get to show off. They sit next to the audience.

Back behind, where they are hard to see, are the second violins. They play a supporting role. They play harmony to the first violins. Theirs is a service role. Their job is to round out the sound of the other instruments. They serve the orchestra. They do what is not glamorous so that the whole will be beautiful. Without the second violins, the orchestra would sound incomplete.

You know what the hardest role to play in life is? Second fiddle. To play second fiddle is to play a supporting role for someone else. And it is sometimes a service role; doing what is not glamorous, usually behind the scenes, so that the whole can be more beautiful.

The late Leo Buscaglia, that effervescent educator, speaker, author, and lover of life, used to tell his university students that there is a world out there dying to be loved! He challenged his students to love and often told them that serving others is the way they can find such things as happiness and joy.

He sometimes told about Joel. Leo got Joel hooked on serving. He took him to a nursing home and said, "You see that woman sitting over there? I want you to go and introduce yourself to her."

Joel was not looking forward to his nursing home visit. But he nevertheless went to the stranger and introduced himself. She looked at him skeptically and asked, "Are you one of my relatives?"

And she said, "Good. I hate my relatives. Sit down, son, and talk to me." He did and they talked.

He went back the next week. And the next. They developed a close friendship and Joel soon looked forward to his visits. He learned something about the joy of serving. About working behind the scenes. About playing second fiddle. And he made one woman's world a little more beautiful.

From the time each of my children started school, I packed their lunches. And in each lunch I packed, I included a note. Often written on a napkin, the note might be a thank you for a special moment, a reminder of something we were happily anticipating, or a bit of encouragement for an upcoming test or sporting event.

In early grade school, they loved their notes. They commented on them after school, and when I went back to teaching, they even put notes in my lunches. But as kids grow older, they become self-conscious, and by the time he reached high school, my older son, Marc, informed me he no longer needed my daily missives. Informing him that they had been written as much for me as for him, and that he no longer needed to read them, but I still needed to write them, I continued the tradition until the day he graduated.

Six years after high school graduation, Marc called and asked if he could move home for a couple of months. He had spent those years well, graduating Phi Beta Kappa magna cum laude from college, completing two congressional internships in Washington, D.C., winning the Jesse Marvin Unruh Fellowship to the California State Legislature, and finally, becoming a legislative assistant in Sacramento. Other than short vacation visits, however, he had lived away from home. With his younger sister leaving for college, I was especially thrilled to have Marc coming home.

A couple weeks after Marc arrived home to rest, regroup and write for a while, he was back at work. He had been recruited to do campaign work. Since I was still making lunch every day for his younger brother, I packed one for Marc, too. Imagine my surprise when I got a call from my 24-year-old son, complaining about his lunch.

"Did I do something wrong? Aren't I still your kid? Don't you love me any more, Mom"? were just a few of the queries he threw at me as I laughingly asked him what was wrong.

This year, my youngest son will be a senior in high school. He, too, has now announced that he is too old for notes. But like his older brother and sister before him, he will receive those notes till the day he graduates, and in whatever lunches I pack for him afterwards.

Grace for Mothers and Others
by
Roger Campbell

One of the most unforgettable calls I have ever received came from a woman I had never met. This mother had endured such severe parental pain that just hearing her describe it nearly moved me to tears. Her son, at age twenty-seven, had died in prison of Leukemia only a few months before he was to be released; a sad enough tale in itself, but that was only the tragic end of her story.

At fifteen and intoxicated, my caller’s son had ended the life of his eighteen-year-old girlfriend. As a result, he became the first fifteen-year-old in that state to be tried,

convicted, and sentenced as an adult, resulting in a thirty-year prison term. Later, however, due to his exemplary conduct and educational achievements while in prison, he would have been paroled after twelve years. Then Leukemia overruled the parole board, preventing this grieving mother from bringing her son home alive.

“How did you survive?” I asked.

“By the grace of God,” she replied.

My caller that day wasn’t the first mother to have needed the grace of God to make it through a severe trial brought on by one of her children. Nor is she the only mother to become an innocent victim of alcohol’s devastating effect on her family.

John Newton, whose father ran a bar, brought great grief to his mother, a devout woman of faith. Regardless of the bad reports about her son, she kept praying for him; often while she labored over her washboard.

John had left his home in England while very young, choosing the life of a sailor. And, the news that floated home about him wasn’t good. He had become involved in slave trading and fallen into such a vile lifestyle that the “saved a wretch like me” line in the first stanza of the hymn he later wrote is understandable.

John Newton traveled far but was never beyond the reach of his mother’s prayers. Then one day, during a storm at sea that he thought would end his life, John remembered the faith of his mother and trusted her Lord as his own.

After surviving the storm, John began to study the Bible and at the age of thirty-nine was ordained to the ministry in the little village of Olney, near Cambridge, England. His mother’s prayers had finally been answered.

Most of the congregational singing in Newton’s day consisted of Psalms set to music. John finally discovered that simple heart-felt hymns added greater impact to his preaching and when enough hymns couldn’t be found, he started writing his own. The most enduring of these has been “Amazing Grace,” which is still a favorite of millions.

More than a decade ago, (two hundred years after Newton introduced the new song to his congregation) it was number one on the music charts.

There are even “Amazing Grace” groups that meet in prisons and other places to talk about this old hymn and tell what it means to them, unaware that their favorite hymn is a washboard tune, born before it was written in the life of a praying mother who found God’s grace sufficient during a tough time.

What’s so amazing about grace? It is the vehicle of God’s love that arrives at the door of the weak and undeserving, offering forgiveness and new life. And, it’s still available to mothers and others like you and me.

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The older I get, the more I enjoy Saturday mornings. Perhaps it's the quiet solitude that comes with being the first to rise, or maybe it's the unbounded joy of not having to be at work. Either way, the first few hours of a Saturday morning are most enjoyable.

A few weeks ago, I was shuffling toward the garage with a steaming cup of coffee in one hand and the morning paper in the other. What began as a typical Saturday morning turned into one of those lessons that life hands us all, usually when we're too busy to notice till later. I turned the dial up into the phone portion of the band on my ham radio in order to listen to a Saturday morning swap net. Along the way, I came across an older sounding chap, with a tremendous signal and a golden voice. You know the kind; he sounded like he should be in the broadcasting business. He was telling whom-ever he was talking with something about "a thousand marbles."

"Well, Tom, it sure sounds like you're busy with your job. I'm sure they pay you well but it's a shame you have to be away from home and your family so much. Hard to believe a young fellow should have to work sixty or seventy hours a week to make ends meet. It's too bad you missed your daughter's "dance recital" he continued. "Let me tell you something that has helped me keep my own priorities." And that's when he began to explain his theory of a "thousand marbles."

"You see, I sat down one day and did a little arithmetic. The average person lives about seventy-five years. I know, some live more and some live less, but on average, folks live about seventy-five years.

"Now then, I multiplied 75 times 52 and I came up with 3900, which is the number of Saturdays that the average person has in their entire lifetime. Now, stick with me, Tom, I'm getting to the important part.

It took me until I was fifty-five years old to think about all this in any detail", he went on, "and by that time I had lived through over twenty-eight hundred Saturdays." "I got to thinking that if I lived to be seventy-five, I only had about a thousand of them left to enjoy. So I went to a toy store and bought every single marble they had. I ended up having to visit three toy stores to round up 1000 marbles. I took them home and put them inside a large, clear plastic container right here in the shack next to my gear."

"Every Saturday since then, I have taken one marble out and thrown it away. I found that by watching the marbles diminish, I focused more on the really important things in life. There is nothing like watching your time here on this earth run out to help get your priorities straight."

"Now let me tell you one last thing before I sign-off with you and take my lovely wife out for breakfast. This morning, I took the very last marble out of the container. I figure that if I make it until next Saturday then I have been given a little extra time. And the one thing we can all use is a little more time."

"It was nice to meet you Tom, I hope you spend more time with your family, and I hope to meet you again here on the band. This is a 75 Year old Man, K9NZQ, clear and going QRT, good morning!"

You could have heard a pin drop on the band when this fellow signed off. I guess he gave us all a lot to think about. I had planned to work on the antenna that morning, and then I was going to meet up with a few hams to work on the next club newsletter..

Instead, I went upstairs and woke my wife up with a kiss. "C'mon honey, I'm taking you and the kids to breakfast." "What brought this on?" she asked with a smile. "Oh, nothing special, it's just been a long time since we spent a Saturday together with the kids. And hey, can we stop at a toy store while we're out? I need to buy some marbles...

And so, as one smart bear once said..."If you live to be a hundred, I want to live to be a hundred minus one day, so I never have to live without you." - Winnie the Pooh.

Pass this on to all of your FRIENDS, even if it means sending it to the person that sent it to you.

And if you receive this e-mail many times from many different people, you'll know that many people care about you and treasure your friendship.

And if you get it but once, do not be discouraged for you will know that you have at least one good friend...

THE BUZZARD, THE BAT AND THE BUMBLEBEE

If you put a buzzard in a pen that is 6 feet by 8 feet and is entirely open at the top, the bird, in spite of its ability to fly, will be an absolute prisoner. The reason is that a buzzard always begins a flight from the ground with a run of 10 to 12 feet. Without space to run, as is its habit, it will not even attempt to fly, but will remain a prisoner for life in a small jail with no top.

BAT

The ordinary bat that flies around at night, a remarkably nimble creature in the air, cannot take off from a level place If it is placed on the floor or flat ground, all it can do is shuffle about helplessly and, no doubt, painfully, until it reaches some slight elevation from which it can throw itself into the air. Then, at once, it takes off like a flash.

BUMBLEBEE

A bumblebee, if dropped into an open tumbler, will be there until it dies, unless it is taken out. It never sees the means of escape at the top, but persists in trying to find some way out through the sides near the bottom. It will seek a way where none exists, until it completely destroys itself.

PEOPLE

In many ways, we are like the buzzard, the bat, and the bumblebee. We struggle about with all our problems and frustrations, never realizing that all we have to do is look up.

Sorrow looks back, worry looks around, but Faith looks up!!

"Clang, Clang, Clang!" The sound of the bells were bellowing, announcing our first dinner.

What was I doing? I was a city slicker who had never been to a dude ranch before. But there I was at the Don K. Dude Ranch in southern Colorado in August, a few years ago, during my mother-in-law's annual family vacation.

However, the next question was what in the world would we do at the ranch, or more specifically, what would I do there, as I am disabled?

As the bells continued to ring (loudly, I might add) I headed toward a building called The Mess Hall. I thought, I've only lived in large metropolitan cities, none of which had a restaurant called

He said, "Welcome to the Don K." He was speaking with a slow, southern twang as he continued, "Y'all better get some rest cuz we're hitting the trails first thing after breakfast. At the Don K. we ride horses twice each day -- in the morning and in the afternoon. I see many of you from years back, and I know y'all can ride. But the new ones, how many of you know how to ride?"

After he got his answers, the bell started to ring again indicating time for bed. At 8:30? Who ever heard of an adult going to bed at 8:30? What about TV? I quickly learned there were no televisions in any of the rooms, except for one in the main house.

Walking back to our bunk (for bed, yes, at 8:30) my mother-in-law told those of us in her family, "I don't know about this place. Maybe my family is not meant for slow country life on a ranch. But please give it a try. Besides, dinner was pretty good,

That night many of the family had problems sleeping. Maybe, it was too much fresh air. However, all were asleep in the early morning when once again those bells started clanging. Waking and stretching, I thought, "How many times will those bells -- those

I learned that the huge bell, as well as the others they had throughout the ranch, was very symbolic. Every time a guest did something special it was met with the clanging bells. Possibly the cowboys on the ranch were trying to borrow some psychology with

Pavlov's behavioral therapy techniques. I don't know, but I just wanted to have the bells ring one time for me.

I was beginning to thoroughly enjoy the ranch, as well as the slow, peaceful, beauty of the Don K. When we were not riding, we were relaxing, reading in hammocks while the children were busy playing with each other in the fields. I was beginning to love the

Each morning after breakfast the entire group of guests would break up into four divisions for our morning ride. One group was for the superior riders, a second group was for good riders, a third group was for the beginners. The fourth group -- well, that was for me and my personal cowboy, Cowboy Dan, known as C.D.

At first C.D. made sure I had the correct gear, including a helmet. Then, he had to figure out a way for me to get up on CoCo, my beautiful black horse. We finally used a wedge ladder for me to finally, and slowly, climb aboard CoCo.

Smiling with pride when I finally mounted my horse, I heard C.D. softly say "Click click, come on CoCo," as he motioned to me to softly kick my legs into CoCo's body.

We all started moving, very slowly, riding on our walking horses up and down the path. The next day, we went up and down the magnificent hills and I was beginning to have fun, and my family was having fun too. We were beginning to hope that our time at the ranch would not end.

Throughout my days of riding on CoCo, I could hear the bells ringing so often, fulfilling the Don K. tradition of ringing the bells anytime a guest did something special. It was as if the bells were saying, "Good job." I wanted the bells to ring for me, even if was just once, but how?

C.D. started teaching me to trot on CoCo. As I was concentrating on my trotting, I heard C.D. ask, "What are you going to do for the rodeo?"

"Rodeo?! What rodeo?" I thought in panic. C.D. led CoCo and me to the Rodeo Corral, that consisted of enclosed bleachers.

C.D. said, "We need to practice for the rodeo that's in two days." We practiced and practiced some more. I thought I had it down, but I was not positive. Whatever I did at the rodeo, whether I was successful or not, I knew one thing -- the rodeo was going to be

Excitement was in the air the morning of the rodeo. Each guest saddled up and rode to the rodeo. The corral's fairgrounds were very festive with balloons and ribbons. However, I did not take notice of the other decorations nor the audience, that consisted of citizens from the nearby towns, filling up the bleachers.

All of a sudden, the first group of experienced riders roared by into the corral, circling very quickly. The announcer barked over the loud speaker, "Welcome to this rodeo, the last summer for rodeos at the Don K., as the ranch will be transformed into a working ranch in the fall."

The guests and the citizens of the nearby towns who were in the audience were all shocked. The guests had worked together throughout the week, and many throughout the years, to become a team. Silence filled the air. With this announcement, the "team" would be no more -- at least not at the Don K.

Each guest vowed to make this rodeo a very special one. Just then, a cowboy clown appeared in the corral indicating, in a sense, the "show must go on." The cowboys had the adult guests start the rodeo, followed by the children guests who showed the riding skills they had achieved throughout the week.

Then C.D said, "Mike, your turn. Come on CoCo." With those words I quickly kicked CoCo on his sides. We began trotting around the barrels until I stopped about 100 yards away from the beginning. As we stopped, the rodeo clown ran towards the bell and started ringing it.

I was in shock! THE BELL WAS RINGING FOR ME! Everyone was applauding. I could even hear through the loud clapping two of the experienced riders shouting, "You can ride with me anytime!" I just blushed.

I had worked hard. However, this story is not so much about a dude ranch or a horse. It is about setting goals. Everyone needs to set goals -- whether it's as simple as getting up in the morning, hopefully with a smile, or as complicated as studying physics theory, or learning ways to overcome one's obstacles.

I thought of that as I smiled even more and gave CoCo a sugar cube for helping me achieve my goal.

Michael Segal is a social worker, writer, and motivational/ inspirational speaker. Mike has had national recognition about his "miraculous" comeback after being shot in the head as an innocent witness to a robbery. He has many short stories that have been included in anthologies, booklets, and magazines. You can visit his webpage at: http://www.inspiratationbymike.com

The American flag, fireworks, friends, picnics, chicken, hot dogs, baked beans, parades, bands and celebrations are all part of the Fourth of July. That early summer holiday, we pause to honor a time in our history with cheers, bangs, pops and whistles. This day was given to us by the blood and foresight of generations past, and it is full of promises that we must keep for the future. A happy day, at least for most of us.

"Hi," was my greeting to one of our midafternoon customers at the fireworks booth. "Are you looking for any particular display of fireworks"?

"Yes," came the reply of the fortyish-year-old man who stood on the other side of the wooden booth. "I need a firecracker."

This was my third year selling fireworks for the Chaparral High School Band Booster Club, and I took pride in my knowledge of these "treats" for the eyes and ears. Thanks to my son, I know what every one of these does or at least what it was designed to do.

"Would you like to see one of our packaged displays; or the ones here on the counter that can be bought separately"?

"Well, let me see. We have some small fountains and some large ones. Perhaps you'd like a smoke ball or a whistler."

"How old is the child"? I responded as if he'd told me it was for a child, but I didn't know that. Not for sure.

"It doesn't matter," returned a voice that now became more determined with a man's resolve to find just the right firecracker.

It was clear to me that this child was special. That the Fourth of July was special. But I found it hard to believe that just one firecracker could remedy whatever it was that came between this father and child.

I smiled. "Well, here's just the thing," I said as I held up a party popper. "This makes one pop and sprinkles a little confetti."

"Is this for the evening? Maybe a little fountain that sprinkles would be the best choice."

The man allowed his voice to shake for the first time as he brushed the back of his hand up the side of his whiskered face and across his left eye. "I . . . I want this for my son's grave and I don't want it to make a mess in the mausoleum."

If one heart could touch another, this gentle, sad man had truly touched mine. He was right, the age didn't matter; neither did all the parades, fireworks, hot dogs or celebrations. All of the Fourths of July that had ever been or ever would be didn't matter to him or to his son. All that mattered was this man's need to give someone he'd loved and lost a shared moment of declaration.

'"This is what you want." I gulped as I held up a Whistling Pete. "It whistles quite loudly, but it's what I'd get."

"Thanks," said the unnamed man as he edged a smile at me through watery eyes. "I'll take it."

I could have just given the Whistling Pete to this lonely man, but knew that it was a gift from a father to his son. His need prevailed over my selfish desire.

The man in a chambray shirt turned his back as he approached his sun-bleached burgundy Oldsmobile. He turned his head toward me and smiled gently as he clutched one Whistling Pete up by his face. He opened the car door and was gone.

If God was anywhere on July 4, 1995, he surely had one hand on the shoulder of this father as he knelt at the crypt of his son. Before the tears and silence that so gently fell in that mausoleum, one Whistling Pete sounded loudly and boldly on that day in July, and I know that it was heard in heaven.

I'm told the story is true: A woman was giving birth to a baby in an elevator at a hospital. When she complained about the location, a nurse said, "Why, this isn't so bad; last year a woman delivered her baby out on the front lawn."

But on the other hand, not all "bad luck" should be considered a bad thing! Like someone said, "When life gives you a kick, let it kick you forward."

In the 1920s, Ernest Hemingway learned something about "bad luck" and getting kicked by life. He was struggling to make his mark as an author when disaster struck. He lost a suitcase containing all his manuscripts -- many stories he'd polished to jewel-like perfection -- which he'd been planning to publish in a book.

According to Denis Waitley in his book Empires of the Mind (William Morrow and Company, Inc., 1995), the devastated Hemingway couldn't conceive of redoing his work. All those months of arduous writing were simply wasted.

He lamented his predicament to friend and poet Ezra Pound who called it a stroke of good fortune! Pound assured Hemingway that when he rewrote the stories, he would forget the weak parts; only the best material would reappear. He encouraged the aspiring author to start over with a sense of optimism and confidence. Hemingway did rewrite the stories and eventually became a major figure in American literature.

Don't pray for fewer problems; pray for more skills. Don't ask for smaller challenges; ask for greater wisdom. Don't look for an easy way out; look for the best possible outcome.

When life gives you a kick, let it kick you forward. BE INSPIRED by 50 Wonderful Stories from Steve Goodier ...

In addition to Steve Goodier's inspiration, DECIDING HOW TO LIVE is accented with the beautiful photography of Lowell McMullin. Enjoy her landscapes and artist's eye for the extraordinary.

Autumn Leaves
by
Joseph J. Mazzella

It looks like Autumn is sneaking in a bit early this year in the forested mountains of my home. Tiny splashes of red, yellow, and orange are appearing on tree after tree here. It is so beautiful. It is almost like a thousand angels with paint brushes are flying over the forests on these early September nights spreading both color and joy.

Seeing all of the beauty and color of these wonderful Autumn leaves has made me decide to do something that I haven’t done in a few years. It will probably be a few more months before I can do it, but I am going to jump in a pile of Autumn leaves again. I am going to dance in them and hear them crunch under my feet. I am going to lay down in them and feel them brush up against my face. I am going to smell them and let them invigorate my being. I am going to play in them with both the heart of a child and the appreciation of an adult. I am going to enjoy these glorious gifts from God with all my heart, all my soul, and all my mind.

It doesn’t matter if you are eight, forty, or eighty four, it is never too late to enjoy a beautiful Autumn. It is never too late to play in the leaves. It is never too late to laugh like a child. It is never too late to gaze with wonder and awe at this beautiful world that we have been blessed to live in. It is never too late to fully live your life.

May you live your own life as beautifully and wonderfully as a forest full of Autumn leaves. May you share the color of your heart and light of your soul with everyone you meet. May you bless this whole world with your kindness, goodness, and oneness with God. May you live a life of such giving, sharing, and caring that even after you pass from this world, what you did and who you were will continue to nourish the hearts and souls of those still here. May you live in love and joy today, tomorrow, and forever and may you always remember to jump in the leaves.

ONCE upon a time in Japan, there was a poor stone cutter named Hofus who used to go every day to the mountainside to cut great blocks of stone. He lived near the mountain in a little stone hut and worked hard and was happy.

One day he took a load of stone to the house of a rich man. There he saw so many beautiful things that when he went back to his mountain he could think of nothing else. Then he began to wish that he too might sleep in a bed as soft as down with curtains of silk and tassels of gold. And he sighed: "Ah me! Ah me! If Hofus only were rich as he!" To his surprise, a great voice was heard: "Have thou thy wish!"

When Hofus returned home his house had become a palace filled with beautiful things. Hofus decided to work no more, but he was not used to being idle and one day as he sat by the window he saw a carriage dash past with a prince inside. It was drawn by snow white horses.

When the stone cutter saw this, he began to feel unhappy, and he sighed: "Ah me! Ah me! If Hofus only a prince might be!" And again the same voice that he had heard on the mountain answered: "Be thou a prince!"

Straightway Hofus was a prince. He had servants dressed in crimson and gold, and for a short time he was happy, but one day, as he walked in the garden, he saw that the flowers were drooping, the grass was dry and brown. And when he rode out he felt the hot sun burn him in spite of his umbrella.

"The sun is mightier than I," thought he, and then he sighed: "Ah me! Ah me! If Hofus only the sun might be!" And the voice answered: "Be thou the sun!"

Straightway the great sun he became. He burned the grass and rice fields. He dried up the streams.One day a cloud came and rested in front of him, and hid the earth from his sight. He was angry and cried: "Ah me! Ah me! If Hofus only a cloud might be!" And the voice answered: "Be thou a cloud!"

Straightway a cloud he became. Then day after day the cloud dropped rain. The rivers overflowed and towns were swept away. Only the great rocks on the mountain side stood unmoved midst the flood. The cloud looked at them in wonder, then he sighed: "Ah me! Ah me! If Hofus only a rock might be!" And the voice answered: "Be thou a rock!"

Straightway a rock he became. Proudly he stood. The sun could not burn him and the rain could not move him. "Now, at last," he said, "no one is mightier than I."

But one day he was wakened from his dreams by a noise, "tap! tap! tap!" down at his feet. He looked and there was a stone cutter driving his tool into the rock. Another blow and the great rock shivered; a block of stone broke away.

"That man is mightier than I!" cried Hofus, and he sighed: "Ah me! Ah me! If Hofus only the man might be!" And the voice answered: "Be thou thyself!"

And straightway Hofus was himself again, a poor stone cutter, working all day upon the mountain side and going home at night to his little hut. Yet, he was content and happy and never again did he wish to be other than Hofus the stone cutter

This is Rex Barker, CS (Cutting my Own Stones) reminding you to be the best person you can be. You were divinely given a unique role in this world, and while you should always strive to improve yourself, it is also important to be content at the same time - with who you are now.