So we were dancing away today and after learning that Ranndie had gone bungy jumping for her birthday, the discussion turned to sky diving. Ange told us that her friend who skydives regularly says that if you are considering it, you really have to be willing to commit or you shouldn’t go up. I observed, “like marriage.” Rachael nodded and added, “or heroin.”
feelin’ lucky? September 22, 2010
“I feel that luck is preparation meeting opportunity.”
Oprah Winfrey
On my fridge I have a magnet that says, “Luck is believing you are lucky.”
I’ve heard people say, “You make your own luck” and I guess that’s a combination of Oprah’s comment and my magnet. Make a plan, get started toward your goals and even if things don’t turn out quite as expected, at least you’re moving in the right direction to seize opportunities that come unexpectedly. One course at college you ended up in to make up a credit might end up changing your life direction. One vacation might change your career path. Being open to surprises and taking advantage of them brings us both good luck and bad luck. Our attitude determines which, not the circumstances.
Do you choose to be lucky?
.
© Shawn Bird 2010. Free use within Rotary.
Dusty the Shadow September 20, 2010
When Dusty was a puppy, our house was divided on what to call him. The
boys voted for “Shadow.” The girls voted for “Dusty.” (After Dusty Strings Harps in Seattle, as he was likely the only Dusty I’d ever be able to afford). Over the years it has become clear that we really should have gone with the boys on this one, because Dusty really is a shadow, and it has gotten him into many interesting predicaments.
The problem with being a shadow, is that you are ubiquitous, so people don’t necessarily even notice you following along behind them. On many occasions we’ve lost Dusty, only to follow the sounds of his cries back into the garage. We nipped out there to put out the garbage or grab a tool without knowing he was behind us, and then he was stuck there, sometimes for several hours, until someone noticed him missing and started hunting for him.
He once got stuck in an under-stair cold room that way. He tried to eat his way out through the punch bowl box.
The most traumatic event happened when he was still a puppy. It was a -20 degree Celsius day in Prince George. The snow was about four feet deep in our yards. I had just finished wallpapering my daughter’s bedroom and had given Dusty a bath. He was blown dry, but still a little damp. My husband helped me put the daughter’s heavy mate’s bed into position, then the door bell rang. I went to deal with the salesman and then started on dinner.
After some time, Dusty’s absence was noted. We looked through the house calling for him, we checked the garage and the pantry. He was no where to be found. Then it hit me. When I’d been talking to the salesman at the door, he must have snuck out of the house.
I got in the car and started combing the white streets, calling for him and looking for a freshly trimmed, brown poodle against the snow. Slightly damp, he’d freeze to death out there in short order. I phoned the radio station, the SPCA and the vets offices to put out the word. The whole family was in a panic and tearful over the loss of our little dog who was only a few months old.
Many hours later, my daughter came upstairs to tell us she could hear funny noises. We listened. We couldn’t hear anything upstairs, but in the basement we could make out weak little whimpers. Where were they coming from? We combed the house again, straining our ears, trying to figure out the source of the sound. Eventually, we tracked them into her bedroom. We looked in the closet, behind all the furniture, under the dressers. No sign, and yet a faint little noise was still audible.
Suddenly we realised where he was. We pulled out one of the drawers from her mates bed and sure enough, the volume was louder. We pulled out another drawer and out scrambled a very happy puppy. Somehow when we’d lowered that heavy mate’s bed back onto the ground, he’d gotten stuck in one of the compartments. He’d been stuck there in the dark for about six hours by the time we found him.
These days Dusty still shadows us, but we’ve gotten better at checking for him before we shut doors behind us. He has also gotten much louder at letting us know he’s left out. His demanding woof is louder than OJ’s, and OJ outweighs him three times! This is a lesson. If you’re too close to the big people, you may get into situations where you’re left alone in the dark. Shout loudly, and someone will rescue you.
letters September 19, 2010
The Pear Tree offers us a meme and invites us to write this week on this image:
I was a child who loved communicating, and I loved letters. From the time I was about ten I had pen pals. My first communications from Finland came when I was assigned a pen pal from the World Association of Girl Guides and Girl Scouts International Post Box. I was matched with Kirsi who lived in Seinäjoki on the Western side of Finland. After thirty years, Kirsi and I still write each other, and amusingly, our married names are the same (except hers is in Finnish, of course). I have had opportunity to visit with her and her family twice. Her sister was an exchange student in Canada for a year, and visited us a few times during her year.
I write most people by email these days, but I still try to send a few snail mail letters every month. There is something so wonderful about finding a personal note in your mail box, like a happy greeting among the boring bills! I appreciate the extra effort required to write by hand, find a stamp, and make a trip to a mail box. I know that other people do, too. I like pulling out the calligraphy pens to make the envelope beautiful, knowing that on the letter’s journey it will bring a smile to many people.
I have trouble parting with my letters from old friends, though. I have stacks of them around the house, in big envelopes, in bundles tied with string, left under piles of research. Some special letters are numbered, set into plastic sleeves and stored in binders. They become research, or at least that what I say to counter the accusations of obsession and anal retentive organizing! Christmas cards are particularly hard, and I haven’t my mother’s knack of recycling them as gift tags in following years.
A letter is a little message from the past. One Christmas, I was tidying up when I found a Christmas card under some papers on my sideboard. I opened it up and had a little cry. It was a lovely greeting from a childhood neighbour with whom I had visited daily as a girl, and with whom I remained in touch for the rest of my life. She had passed on two years previously, and this card was like a little message from heaven from my dear Mrs. Hewlett.
Take some time to write a snail mail letter to someone today. They’ll love it!
History September 18, 2010
When I was a little girl, I loved visiting family friends whom I called Aunt and Uncle. While I was raised as an only child, they had eight kids. I loved going there to ride horses, watch papers being burned in the pot belly stove, pick cherries in the orchard, play with all the cats, follow around the old dogs, sit on the huge front porch watching the lake twinkling below or being read to. I loved bathing in the old claw-footed tub and playing dress up in the attic. I loved the morning schedule posted on the bathroom door! (One bathroom, 10 people…) There were two sons and six daughters, all older than me. For several years in the 70s their weddings were the highlight of my summer. Once when I was really little, I ate a wedding cake with walnuts and had an allergic reaction. We drove into town to our hotel to get my allergy medicine so my lips wouldn’t swallow my head and I was heart broken that they wouldn’t drive back to the wedding!
Auntie Sheila had a heart as big as the world and gave awesome hugs. Her warm presence made everyone feel at home. Uncle Fred had scary eyebrows and often freaked me out with his booming laugh. I couldn’t quite get the joke a lot of the time. (It was probably better that way, come to think of it).
Time passes and Auntie Sheila and Uncle Fred are gone now. Today their six daughters came to visit my parents. It was so lovely to catch up a bit and rekindle a bit of the magic of a big family full of stories and memories. The eldest keeps everyone on track. The youngest talks the most (just like at my house!). The banter and stories was so gloriously like it was when they were teen-agers. One expected Auntie Sheila to come out of the kitchen to add to the story, and Uncle Fred to suggest the men retire to the den to leave the women to themselves.
It is a blessing to have old friends, but when the old friends have gone, it is a special gift for the children of old friends to visit and share a bit of respect and history. I know my parents will be talking about this visit for years.
What a precious gift we give our elders when we share some time and memories with them. It’s like giving back lost friends for a little while.
Thanks girls!
knocking on heaven’s door September 16, 2010
I’m standing here on the door step
Do you see me?
My family has gathered to send me off
Hoping my departure is gentle on my final journey.
I’m knocking on the door, Lord
I answered your knock half a century ago
I know it was a blink of eye to you
but now I’m knocking on your door.
I’ve waited so long to sit at your feet
and ask a million questions.
I’ve saved up a few jokes I’m sure you’ll love.
I know you’ve got a sense of humour
because I’ve seen the giraffe and the platypus
I’m knocking.
It’s getting foggy here on the doorstep
and a little drafty.
The family is looking a little worn from the wait.
I don’t want them to hurt on my account.
Going would be so much easier than staying.
I’m knocking, Lord.
Please answer the door and bring me home.
..
for Friesens
.
wings and roots September 15, 2010
The Pear Tree offers us a meme and invites us to write this week on this image:
A glowing word shining through the text of Pride and Prejudice reminds us that it is family that is the root of our pride and our prejudices. We admire our parents and desire to emulate them, we delight in the successes of our children, we’re proud of their accomplishments. If our world is small and our world view is limited, we may be passing down our narrow-minded perspectives to our children. We don’t like fish, so we don’t feed our kids fish, and they don’t eat them so they don’t feed them to their kids. We didn’t know people of colour, so we don’t associate with them, and are uncomfortable if our kids do. Passing along prejudices generation through generation.
Education is a dangerous thing. It teaches new ways of seeing, different perspectives on life. A strong family can indoctrinate or it can elucidate. A weak child doesn’t question, but the strong child will want to know more than the parents can explain. The saying tells us to give our children roots and wings. A strong grounding in security and self-acceptance can empower the next generation to have faith in themselves and their aspirations. Children’s roots are not to tether them to the Earth but to give them the strength and allows them to believe they can push off and fly. Family is left looking into the sky after their kids. Are they aghast, full of fearful prejudice of the new world, or are they proud, clapping in delight and celebrating the new world their children are discovering?
May the pride in our roots not prejudice the height our wings can reach.
mothers September 14, 2010
Today is my mom’s birthday and I’m thinking about mothers. It seems to me that people fit into specific camps in their relationships with their mothers. Some have so many issues with their mothers that they have to keep a good distance between them in order to keep the peace. Others adore their mothers and practically live in each others’ pockets. A third group comes in between maintaining an independent distance, available for assistance and regular contact but not emeshed. I know people who exemplify each of these.
When you’re a child, your mother tends to seem like a goddess. Her devotion to you is the security that tethers your world. Of course, lots of kids find no security in their mothers due to the human frailties that so commonly destroy relationships: alcoholism, drug abuse, mental illness, etc. Others have mothers who are so fearful that their children are smothered in their affection. Others find a middle ground that allows children to explore the world while having a safe home base from which to evaluate their discoveries. Will Smith and his family were on Oprah the other day and his wife was saying that there’s a reason that in ancient cultures the boys would be removed from the village by their fathers to undergo manhood trials. Hovering mothers are a detriment to growth and independence. It was a hard lesson for her. I guess that is a lesson from the mother bears. You don’t want to get between a Mama bear and her cub, and if she has twins or triplets you know she is going to be especially grumpy! Still, eventually the Mama bear turns on those cubs and sends them off to live their own lives snarling and snapping if she needs to. Another good lesson.
What were your mother’s dreams? If she didn’t fulfill them, did she pass her dreams onto you? Did you embrace her dreams or choose dreams of your own?
Shawn L. Bird 
Yeah!! 4000!! September 21, 2010
Thank you all for reading! Today we had the 4000th visitor. I appreciate the time you take to spend part of your day with me, and I appreciate your feedback!
While we’re celebrating, here are 4000 wishes of congratulations to my high school friend Ralph Hass, voice over artist extra-ordinaire. on the 4th anniversary of his sports related blog ! Visit Ralph at http://hasthevoice.blogspot.com
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