Today I’m grateful how I’ve changed throughout my life…
even though I don’t always know where or how or when…
As Alice in wonderland said:
I know who I was when I got up this morning
but I think I must have been changed several times since then..
Friday, February 28, 2025
CHANGES
May we all be blessed to be like Alice in Wonderland
and before our life is done…
realize when it comes to fairy tales…
we’re living in the middle of one.
WORD LADDER
I like to solve word ladders…as a puzzle I think they’re great!
Did you know Lewis Carroll invented word ladders back in 1878?
Yes, the same Lewis Carroll who in 1865 I understand…
wrote a story about Alice…who followed a rabbit running late
into a wonderland.
In a word ladder you start with a word…
The object is for that word to be reversed…
by changing one letter at a time you make a chain of words…
and when you're finished there is a link between the last word and the first.
For instance let’s take the word love…
change the ‘l’ to a ‘d’ and you have dove.
Change the ‘v’ to ‘t’ and you have dote.
Then change the ‘o’ to an ‘a’ and you have date…
Change the ‘d’ to an ‘h’ and voila…
you have quickly changed love into hate.
A word ladder works in both directions…
in case that’s something you were thinking of
We can start with the word hate and using the same process
change hate back into love.
But life is not a word game is it…played with paper, pencil or pen…
and love which can quickly change to hate…
Does not change so quickly back again.
Perhaps Lewis Carroll provided a solution…
reminding us if we want to find our Wonderland…it’s is not too late…
When he wrote, ‘Oh, ’tis love ’tis love that makes the world go round…
and no where did he mention hate.
So here’s a little something inspired by Lewis and his Alice
that I’ve been thinking of…
What if the word ladder we’re creating in life
begins and ends with love.
Thursday, February 27, 2025
DAILY GRATITUDE COMPASSION
Today I’m grateful for compassion
If you think you cannot change the world..
you’re wrong…
you have a choice….
as long as you remember….
how oftentimes change begins
with one compassionate voice
COMPASSION AND CURIOSITY
May we be blessed
every hour of every day
every day of every month
and every moth of every year
to choose compassion over judgement
and curiosity over fear.
SHELTER FROM THE STORM
Today I’m channeling on of my favorite Bob Dylan songs to help me with my poem.
SHELTER FROM THE STORM
A storm has raged across this country since its inception…
swirling clouds of greed and prejudice and hate.
And as long as this storm continues…our country never will be great!
To those who have been and still feel oppressed, hopeless and forlorn…
I offer up my house to give you shelter from the storm.
To the indigenous people whose initial kindness
we repaid with savagery and scorn…
Come in, I say, I’ll give you shelter from the storm.
To anyone whose skin color we make feel like a crown of thorns…
Come in, I say, I’ll give you shelter from the storm.
To all of you who know what gender you truly are
inside the body to which you were born…
Come in, I say, I’ll give you shelter from the storm.
To those who choose to pray and love Gods of all different forms…
Come in, I say, I’ll give you shelter from the storm.
To those who choose to love each other
whose love is met with ridicule and scorn…
Come in, I say, I’ll give you shelter from the storm.
And to all of you with a disability…know this…
we all deviate a little from the norm…
Come in, I say, I’ll give you shelter from the storm.
Even though this storm has been raging for 240 years or more…
today it seems much stronger and more destructive than before.
So now more than ever we need more people
To offer a place to keep each other protected, safe and warm….
Now more than ever we need more people to say…
Come in my friends and I will give you…shelter from the storm.
Wednesday, February 26, 2025
DAILY GRATITUDE KINDNESS
Today I’m grateful for kindness…
for no matter our nationality…
be we American, French, Arabian, or Greek…
Kindness is a universal language
everyone can speak.
A LITTLE KINDER
May we be blessed to live in a world of kindness…
for kindness is the epitome of humanity…
where every person…every day
tries to be a little kinder then they think they need to be.
THE L. A. LAKERS AND WILLY MAYS
A young man frequents our bookstore looking for sports books that interest him
and…when we happens to spy them…
he asks us to hold them for him until he has enough money to buy them.
He was in the other night and immediately his gaze
fell upon a book about the L. A. Lakers and one about Willy Mays.
As he went back and forth between the two books….he looked a bit bemused…
You see, both books cost ten dollars…which made it hard for him to choose
He finally decided on Willy Mays…
and when I asked if he wanted us to hold it he said, “That would be great!
I’ll have enough money by the end of next week.”
Then looking back he said, “I guess the Lakers will have to wait.”
After he left…an older man whom I’ve never seen before…
but who obviously is kind-hearted…
brought the L. A. Laker book up to the counter saying,
“I’d like to buy this and the Willy Mays book for the man who just departed.”
I thanked this man profusely…and as I put the two books into a gift bag
I asked him if on the bag there was anything he wanted to say…
He shook his head and smiled,
“Just tell the young man when he comes back…
to enjoy the books and have a nice day.”
I don’t know if I’ll ever see this man again…
but I shall forever remember the kindness he showed that day…
when he bought a book about the L. A. Lakers
and one about Willy Mays…
Yes, in a world where hatred, greed and evil…is running rampant…
it’s a moment I’ll never forget…
the day a man I never knew spent twenty dollars on two books
to give to a man he never met.
Tuesday, February 25, 2025
DAILY GRATITUDE HOW THE EARTH WILL SPEAK TO US
Today I’m grateful for something the Navajo often discuss…
How if we are willing to listen…the Earth will speak to us…
And how we shouldn’t expect her to speak the way we do…
in the language of our words…
No…it’s up to us to learn
the language of the mountains,
the rivers
the wind…
the trees,
the flowers
and the birds.
COURAGE TO FLY ALONE
May we be blessed to learn from the birds….
who for years and years have known…
how it is safe to fly together in a group…
and how it takes courage to fly alone…
ROBINS IN THE CHERRY LAUREL TREE
Near the end of our walk the other day we were blessed to see
hundreds of robins enjoying breakfast in a cherry laurel tree.
In Florida this time of year the fruit of the Carolina Cherry Laurel
turns black and shiny and sweet….
sending a message to all the robins that…it is time to eat.
It’s no coincidence…or so from the cherry laurel we’ve been told…
that their fruit ripens at the same time the robins are in Florida
escaping the winter cold.
I imagine robins getting together before the winter snows they flee..
telling each other to have a safe trip…
and we’ll meet up down in Florida…at the cherry laurel tree.
And that is were we saw them yesterday…
jumping from branch to branch…chirping…as happy as can be…
sharing stories of their adventures while feasting on the fruit
of the cherry laurel tree.
As more robins flew into her branches…then more and more and more
the Carolina Cherry Laurel smiled at us saying,
“This is what I was created for.”
“For this is the way of nature.” She told us.
“We work together…all these robins and me…
They eat my fruit then fly off and spread my seeds
creating more cherry laurel trees.”
“And with more cherry laurel trees, “ she continued…”The circle is complete…
because then there are more cherries for more robins to come and eat.”
We stood there mesmerized…watching for a while…unable to say a word….
observing the symbiosis of nature at work…between fruit and tree and bird.
And, again, we thought how nature is trying to teach us…
the way our world is meant to be…
and we walked away hoping we could all be a little more…
like the robins and the cherry laurel tree.
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