The callousness of day-to-day activities seem to dwarf moments in life that make it real, alive and special.
If life were an onion, the outer shell is work, chores and all the necessary tasks of living. The outer, crusty shell of the onion can easily overwhelm the core and inner layers where the best and most treasured memories, events and times are held.
Peel life back layer by layer, day by day, and most days aren’t really appreciated, truly experienced, or even remembered, at least by me. It’s an observation, not a condemnation.
Nature itself seems to place our mind on auto pilot to mindlessly glide through the events of the day. Continue reading Taste an Apple→
The first time I saw them was when my daughter tugged on my shirt sleeve in church. She nodded slightly to the row over from us or I wouldn’t have noticed.
Everyone was seated, and in the middle of a row of college students, one young lady was discretely using sign language to interpret for the young man sitting beside her.
He was a tall, slender guy, maybe twenty years old, with tiny hearing aids perched on each ear which were almost completely covered by his hair.
He watched her hands from the corner of his eye as she interpreted in sign language to him for the rest of the service. She nonchalantly signed the words occasionally moving her fingers in rapid succession to spell out a word or name. Continue reading Signs To See→
She was a cute little girl, about 9 years old, with her hair in corn rolls and little rubber bands at the end of each braid. She and her mother were walking up the sidewalk toward the restaurant, but her mother forgot something and stepped back to her car. The girl just stood on the sidewalk.
We were leaving, and quite frankly, I was talking to my brother-in-law as we obliviously walked past the little girl. Turnabout is fair play, because I suspect she didn’t give either of us a moment’s notice either.
She did, however, zero in like a heat seeking missile on my wife, Janet. After passing a few parked car bumpers, we realized Janet was no longer with us. We turned around and Janet was kneeling down looking the little girl eye to eye.
The little girl was mesmerized as Janet spoke to her with a compassionate, peaceful smile on her face. She stared in her eyes soaking up the gentle words and kindness that naturally flow from Janet’s spirit as they talked briefly back and forth. Continue reading You’re Pretty→
I shouldn’t have done it. Really. It wasn’t the brightest thing for sure. I rarely ever snap, but this was a clean break! I don’t even know why. Maybe it doesn’t matter. Maybe it does.
I ran into a drug store for a bottle of benadryl and started the rat like maze walk up and down every store aisle to find it. At the end of one aisle I almost walked over a little 8 or 9 year old girl who rounded a corner opposite of her mother. The mother apologized for her daughter and pulled her to her side of the aisle.
I smiled and said the customary, “Scuse me” and continued my search. I turned up the next aisle and a big, no … a huge, muscular defensive lineman guy about 24 or 25 years old was halfway up the aisle with his back to me.
All I could see, besides his highly defined arm muscles, was his sweat pants halfway down showing his underwear. They weren’t boxers either. They were whitey tighties that showed the distinct impression of what should’ve been covered up. Knowing the mother and child were one aisle over, I just reacted, nuclear reactor style. Continue reading Pull Up Your Pants→
It’ll be dark in an hour. I jump in the pickup and start driving aimlessly in the country. After a sweltering hot day, it’s cool. With both windows rolled down, it feels like heaven on earth air conditioning.
Smells of a freshly cut grass, honey suckle patches on fence rows and the scent of distant rain clouds permeate the air. Red dust flies up behind the truck. It envelops the branches of the trees looking like a Picasso painting in the rearview mirror.
A little further down a pickup pulling a trailer is in a field being loaded with hay bales from last week’s cutting. Just past that is a house where a boy rides his bike in a big circle over and over. He finally gathers his courage to take another shot to go airborne off the ramp he made from two 5-gallon buckets and a stiff piece of plywood.
It’s the South. It’s the country. It’s rural living. It’s a culture where most folks like a slower pace of life, and not being crowded in at the gills by neighbors. Continue reading Dirt Road Drive→
When Jesus healed ten people, onlyone returned to Him to say thank you. (Luke 17:11-19) Jesus even asked where the other nine were. They were all blessed. They were all miraculously healed. They all gained life over a slow excruciating death, yet only one even bothered to come back and say thank you.
That’s horrible! It’s wrong on so many levels! But then I cringe when I realize I’m not in the 10% of people who are truly grateful. I don’t always go back and say thank you. I’m ashamed of that.
I once read it’s impossible for an ungrateful person to truly be happy. Makes sense! A lot of sense! Continue reading 10% Thankful→
He whizzed by in the gas station heading to the drive through car wash around back. If I hadn’t stopped, he would’ve hit me. He didn’t even notice. His mind was on his cell phone call, not driving. I ended up waiting in line right behind him.
He got out of his truck while in line to unscrew his radio antennae. On his back window was a bumper sticker with “Coach” and his first name after that. He was still talking on his phone with great animation. Continue reading Is It Really Worth That?→
Stories about family, faith, friends and funnies. Pull up a chair. Grab a cup of coffee and laugh, cry, ponder and inspire about ordinary events of this wonderful, ever changing, bubbling pot that we call "every day life".
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