Tealights and Time
September 30, 2008
Our favorite restaurant closed its doors for the last time Sunday night.
We were there. Along with many other loyal and heart-broken patrons. Sometimes, no matter what we need or want, it’s just time for others to move on, to move in a new direction and begin a new adventure. It’s not always about us. Even if we wish it could be.
Believe me, if it could be, we would wave a magic wand and preserve The Bistro 22 for all time- to be there when we need comforting, be there when we want to celebrate, be there when we want quiet conversation, and always, always, when we want to trust that the food will be divine…every single time.
My husband proposed to me at this restaurant. At our table. Table Fourteen. In the cozy little seating area next to the fireplace. The entire staff knew ahead of time and went out of their way to make the night an evening of enchantment, romance and love.
We celebrated our wedding rehearsal dinner there too. Marc, the Chef, sat with John’s mother and us during the planning of the party and went through every fine detail. He treated John’s mother like a queen. We felt as if we were the most important people to ever celebrate an occasion there. He had wonderful menu selections for our guests and created special gourmet dishes for our vegetarian guests that were astounding. Wine recommendations were carefully thought through, tasted and selected and his special attention to creating unique little desserts that appealed to everyone was unparalleled. The evening was a tremendous affair, elegant and relaxed at the same time, a feat that the Bistro was well known for. The wait staff always made us feel as if we had come to their personal home for dinner. We were always made to feel welcomed, appreciated and taken care of.
John and I have often joked that our rehearsal dinner was the real wedding feast and that the next night was just for the dancing. You just can’t top the The Bistro.
As we sat there Sunday night, finished with our last supper as we were sadly calling it, John and I had time to leisurely sit at the bar and reminisce about what had made our relationship with The Bistro so different then any other place. What made it OUR place? As we discreetly could hear bits and pieces of conversations drifting by, the same words were floating to the surface with a reoccurring awareness. The ambiance. The atmosphere. The warmth. The genuine caring of the staff and owners. The ambiance, the warmth, the relaxing feel, the ambiance….
What was it, I started to wonder, that had created such ambiance-since that was what we all seemed to be coming back to?
Tea Lights and Time. Casual Elegance.
We were sitting at the bar. A beautiful oak bar with a wide granite countertop that connected in a relaxed corner shape. The chairs were comfortable and spread far enough apart as to give you elbow room and an illusion of intimacy in your conversations. Kent, the owner, took great pains to decorate the bar with a seasonal display of natural materials that would reflect the casual elegance that they were known for. In the autumn, for example, there may be golden miniature squashes with tiny brilliant orange pumpkins displayed with a few select pieces of colorful grasses or fall leaves. Surrounding and intertwining all of his displays and tucked into crystal clear wine glasses and other luminary containers were tiny white tea lights all lit up and glowing, creating dancing flickering shadows across bottles of wine, cocktail shakers and displays of artistically arranged mouth-watering food.
In the corner, on the weekends, a quiet acoustic guitar player would serenade the conversations with a backdrop of lazy ballads that would add a layer of romance, tranquility and peace to the evening. The Bistro was a haven from the chaos. A retreat from the hectic busyness that life can become.
What did it cost him to create such casual elegance? A stack of ten-cent tea lights set against a few bottles of wine and some baby pumpkins? A guitar player who played for the dollars tossed in his glass jar?
I realized that every time we had been there, he had been out there, lighting his tea lights, chatting with the customers, listening to the stories of how their day had gone, what was new in their lives, talking about the new wines he had found, pouring out a taste here, a taste there, lighting a few more little candles, making the rounds, speaking to everyone. He made us EACH feel as if WE were his favorite ones, the ones he had been waiting for all night long, but in truth, he had a genuine love for all of “his people”. He had built his restaurant on tea lights and time. He took the time to get to know each and every one of us, what we liked, what was important to us, what our stories and lives were all about.
Yes, a lot of the glow came from the lights. But the true ambiance came from a man who understood that above all…more important than the best food, the best menu, the best prices and the best wine, a great restaurant is built on relationships. It started at the top and trickled down to a staff that had the lowest turn over of any restaurant I have ever known. The exact same people were there to say goodbye to the week they left as were there when we first met them. As we said goodbye to the staff, we continuously heard how much they were going to miss working for such a wonderful boss. His relationship building skills create very loyal people in his life.
I have no doubt that in his next exciting adventure he will continue to be very successful. The ability to make people feel special, loved, relaxed and comfortable is an amazing gift and people will always flock to be near him and work with him.
What is the lesson for the rest of us? Sometimes I think we are caught up in our material world. We think our dingy surroundings dictate that we can’t create an ambiance worth remembering. It isn’t true. We can create it in our businesses, in our homes and in our relationships with just a few simple things if we will slow down, take a few minutes and get creative. A giant bag of white tea lights are only a few dollars. Nature gives us ambiance every day. And….it doesn’t cost a penny to care about someone. It doesn’t cost a single penny to take a moment, walk around, and say, “How are you? I’m so glad you are here.” Making people feel special, carrying about them, listening to them, treating them as if they are important to you takes only a moment of your time.
You might never know when a door is going to close for the last time. You might not get the chance to say farewell. I am so glad that this time we did. So glad that we had time to say thank you for the memories, for the way they touched our hearts, our families and our lives. Some of the special moments of our life happened at The Bistro and I will always carry it in my heart. It reminds me that often, we take for granted these people and these moments in our lives and also, WE have the chance TO BE one of these kinds of people for the rest of the world.
Thank You to Kent, Marc and everyone at Bistro 22 for making our memories special.
There never IS enough time to do all the things we want to do. Let’s make the most of the time we have.
Make it Special.
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Cleaning Closets
September 24, 2008
I’m cleaning out the closets and nooks and crannies behind the scenes here at the lighthouse. I have taken a break from writing. Yep, I have put down my pen and picked up the broom and started organizing and compiling and tossing and brainstorming.
Doing some of that…”Hmm..did I write that? Hmm. Wow..did I write that? Oh..gosh, yuck, did I write that??? And they still let me play in their sandbox?? Gosh, are they forgiving or what.
It’s humbling.
It is all in the name of working on THE BOOK. You know…THE Book. The one that we all have floating around in our heads that we say we are going to write but, we dabble a little here and there and some of it gets done and most of it doesn’t? Well, I went into my mental book closet today and started gathering up all of the stuff that I have already written and started to put it all together so I can actually see how much more work I have left to do.
It’s kind of like finally sitting down and paying your bills after weeks of just thinking about it. OR putting away all of the laundry that you had washed and just piled up wrinkled in the laundry baskets but never sorted or ironed. Why is it that the JUST FINISH IT is the hard part when you have already done the JUST DO IT part. I mean, I already wrote most of it. I already washed the laundry. Why is it so hard to put the darn clothes away and start to get things organized for the actual figuring out how to turn written words into a book?
I think its the same reason my closet doesn’t stay cleaned in real life either. I am a gatherer of life. An observer. I watch it, savor the moments, examine the expressions and the emotions of the people around me, I connect the dots, I wonder at the possibilities, I turn it over, watch as the snow-globe sprinkles out all of the magic that no one else sees, and then when all is finished-I put the moment aside. I record it, place it in the pile and like a child who waits for Santa, I turn my eyes to the next experience. I rarely look back. Unless forced to by a need that out ways my inborn drive to propel toward the future at warp speed. Now I want to compile all my essays and writing into THE BOOK. So that need to sit still and NOT create and just compile and task and “to do” is a need greater then writing.
I am impatient with the past. I am impatient period. I don’t like chores that slow me down or make me look backward. Going back and working on words I’ve already written is like walking into yesteryear. I have something to say today. I’m SO NOT INTO THAT NOW.
This is where self-discipline comes in I guess.
I remember feeling like this around the 16th week of training for the marathon. I had fun when I was running 5, 7, 10, and 12 miles every weekend. Around 14 miles on Saturday morning I was grumbly. By the week I had to run 16 miles I was down right bitchy. Who’s bright idea was this anyhow?
Mine.
It usually is.
Everything I have ever wanted to achieve in life has had its moments that just stopped being fun. In fact, most of them had trials that could be considered pure hell. Every single one worth remembering has had something. Every single one. So…I didn’t expect that writing a book would be any different. Not really.
I don’t have to like doing my chores. But if I want to get through to the other side, I have to put my head down and charge through. Just finish the NOT FUN part of the tasks. Like putting the clean clothes away in the closet or figuring out what to do with the stacks of written work. Get things organized. Spend the time figuring out what sections everything should go in. Line everything up all nice and pretty until it all looks good.
It’s time to put my inner kid in time out and put the grown up to work.
It’s time to get things done.
Remembering Pen Pals…
September 18, 2008
Third Grade. Small little red brick school in a backward farm town in Nowhere, Ohio. The type of school you would drive by your way to somewhere else and take a moment to gaze at the bell in the steeple and wonder if it ever rang. It didn’t. It had long ago succumbed to rust and neglect back in the days before partitions had turned the old one-roomed building into a multi-classroom efficiency for grades K through 4 in this slowly expanding community.
Mrs. Auburn lumbered past us, in her cotton printed dress and sheer stockings, in between our rows of perfectly lined desks while we waited, pencils poised for the new assignment to be explained. Each of us peered expectantly at the pages of names and addresses on the sheets of paper she placed in front of us.
Strange sounding names and stranger still places that bore no resemblance to any of our common Midwestern farm names stared back up at us giving no hint as to their reason for being there. We twittered and fidgeted and giggled as we practiced rolling the complicated names off of our tongues, teasing each other for the way they sounded to our ignorent ears.
Finished with her task, Mrs Auburn resumed her position of authority at the chalkboard, clapping her patterned smack, smack…smack,smack,smack-with her hands in her lively way which meant, without a word spoken, “Alright class, everyone be quiet, all eyes on me-I have something very important to say.”
We waited, wide-eyes and lips closed, for the unveiling of the mystery of the strange names.
“Class, you are each going to be assigned a Pen Pal. The person who’s name and address is on the piece of paper in front of you lives somewhere very far away in a far off country very different from America. They may have a different religion, they may have a different culture, they may have different family habits then you have. A Pen Pal is someone who you write letters to and learn all about them and they write to you back and learn all about you and if you are lucky, you will become life-long friends.”
I remember sitting at my desk thinking that this was the most exciting day of my entire school life so far. EVER. I couldn’t wait to get home and tell my parents about our exciting assignment and how I was going to get a new best friend who lived in a whole new country and I was going to tell her everything and she was going to tell ME everything and we were going to be best friends FOREVER and EVER and when we grew up we would save our money and travel around the world together and see each others houses and the WHOLE world.
I guess I was always one for getting a little ahead of myself. Even back then.
I sat down to write to my new Pen Pal and I poured out everything I could think of. Name, Rank:oldest of three-lived on a farm, Hobbies: reading, writing, art, music ( the list was long) what I wanted to be when I grew up: Famous actress and writer, and every bit of trivia I could think of that was important in my world at the time. Bobby Kennedy had been the first love of my life and in the fall of 1969, my heart was still broken over his death, ( I was sure I would never fall in love again) and the fact that we had just landed on the moon that summer seemed to be great news to share in a Pen Pal letter to a stranger from a far off land. I included a school picture of myself and got ready to mail it off. We had our lesson on how to properly address an envelope and off it went to its destination.
I don’t remember anymore where that destination was. Sadly, because my Pen Pal never wrote back to me. Some of the kids in the class got letters back and Mrs. Auburn had them go to the front of the class and read their letters out loud and show any pictures or any enclosures that had been included. I waited. But mine never came. I wasn’t alone. A lot of kids were in the same situation. Looking back, I have to feel sorry for Mrs. Auburn. I would have been tempted to sit up one night and make up fake letters and send them out. I wouldn’t have been able to take the heartbreak. But she was brave. She taught us a more important lesson instead. A Life Lesson.
“Well kids, no matter how much you want them to, some people just don’t write back. Don’t hold it against them. Some people just don’t like writing that much. Keep at it though. Some day someone will write back.”
I didn’t try Pen Pals again. I did do Christmas cards-but I told myself I didn’t really care if anyone sent one back. I was just sending them out for my own sake. It wasn’t the same thing.
When my kids got to be older, Pen Pals weren’t popular anymore. I was relieved. I guess the teachers finally realized it was a heartbreaking lesson. Then one day my daughter came home with her eyes all aglow. She had been assigned to send a FLAT STANLEY letter. The more she talked, the more nervous I got. It was sounding like a flat little paper doll Pen Pal (which it is) who got to travel around the world in an envelope meeting new people and getting mailed back from a myriad of exotic locations. My own Pen Pal insecurities started to rear their ugly head and I became very negative about poor Little Stanley.
“Now honey, I don’t want you to be disapointed or upset when nobody responds to Stanley. Don’t take it personally if they don’t write or e-mail you or ignore your paper doll.” My daughter looked at me as though I was crazy. I could hear her thinking: Who in their right mind ignores Traveling Flat People?
Apparently nobody.
I am happy to report that Flat Stanley had a wonderfully exciting adventure travelling all over the world and brought back many red pin pricks for the school map and grand stories to tell. He also restored my faith in Pen Pals. At least the Flat ones.
A comment to Melissa this morning on the post I wrote called the Letter to the World made me think about Pen Pals and prompted this memory. After all of these years of being sceptical about Pen Pals it is rather funny that I would enter the world of blogging and end up with Pen Pals-who actually write back- from all over the world!
Somewhere in my third grade mind I think this is what I envisioned. I would write, share some things about me…what I might feel was important and then you might write back and share somethings about you and what is important to you, we would have a conversation and a chat…
Maybe someday, some of us will meet, travel around the world and get to see how each other lives and really get to understand a lot more about this big huge world.
Why should Flat Stanley get to have all the fun?
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Dirty Dishes in the Sink
September 16, 2008
THANK GOD FOR DIRTY DISHES; THEY HAVE A TALE TO TELL.
WHILE OTHER FOLKS GO HUNGRY, WE’RE EATING PRETTY WELL.
WITH HOME, AND HEALTH, AND HAPPINESS,
WE SHOULDN’T WANT TO FUSS;
FOR BY THIS STACK OF EVIDENCE,
GOD’S VERY GOOD TO US.
Anonymous
Gas prices UP, Stock market DOWN, Money in the account dwindling, holidays coming around…….. What’s there to be grateful for?
DIRTY DISHES. A Home that needs cleaning, clothes that need washing…a car that needs to be filled with gas. Does it run? Thank God.
I almost lost my home once. A single mother facing the streets with two young children at home, wondering how we would get by. Bankruptcy knocking on the door. There but for the Grace of God goes I. We were spared that nosedive, but we haven’t forgotten. There is much to be grateful for. Do you grumble through the daily grind or see it for the blessing that it is?
NORMAL DAY, LET ME BE AWARE OF THE TREASURE THAT YOU ARE.
Mary Jean Irion
In the midst of hurricanes, flooding, storms do you praise the sunny day? Do you take a moment to see the changing leaf, the deeper green of the blade of grass, the singing of the bird as the winds die down and the clouds part? The returning of the daily task, the normal day-so taken for granted?
Do you walk with alert eyes to all that is around you, absorbing the brilliance? Are your ears open to the laughter, to the friendship, to the wisdom that the world has to share with you?
IF YOU LET YOUSELF BE ABSORBED COMPLETLY, IF YOU SURRENDER COMPLETLY TO THE MOMENTS AS THEY PASS, YOU WILL LIVE MORE RICHLY THOSE MOMENTS.
Anne Morrow Lindbergh
When you woke up this morning were you able to say you were:
Breathing fresh air through nostrils that aren’t all stuffed? Able to walk upright on legs and knees and backs that don’t wrench and ache and scream in pain? Broadcasting thoughts that stream through heads not racked with shooting arrows from migraines? Cancer free? That your family was too?
If so…then you are among the luckiest people in the world.
BEING ABLE TO BE GRATEFUL FOR HEALTH…in all flavors…IS SUCH A BLESSING…and yet, day after day somehow we forget…because we get busy.
So for today, I offer up this vow. Join me if you want to.
On this day, let me take joy in my moments. Let me take joy in the privilege of my tasks and my chores. With every dish I wash, may I remember to be grateful for the food that was served from it. May I remember those who wait for food that has no dish, no table to sit around. May my prayers be for those more in need than myself and for gratitude for the abundance that I have already been given. May I sing for joy for the health that I have and not focus on the ailments that I have been given. Might I remember that for every ache, there is someone who suffers more and I can turn my energy toward helping those whose needs are greater than my own. HELP ME TO REMEMBER THAT THE ONLY MOMENT THAT I HAVE TO GIVE AND RECIEVE FOR CERTIAN IS THIS VERY ONE AT HAND AND TO SQUANDER IT IS TO WASTE A PRECIOUS GIFT THAT WILL NEVER COME AGAIN.
May I be filled with gratitude, joy, love and happiness until I overflow into a river of abundance that can fill the earth so that we may all understand its glory.
Every day is a choice. No matter what happens out there we still have the opportunity to get up each day and see a sink full of dirty dishes or a home full of blessings. What will you choose?
WHAT THE CATERPILLER CALLS THE END OF THE WORLD, THE MASTER CALLS A BUTTERFLY
Richard Bach
I wish you many blessings today, joy in every opportunity and the sun in every face you see.
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A Letter to the World
September 11, 2008
THIS IS MY LETTER TO THE WORLD
~Emily Dickinson
This is my letter to the world
That never wrote to me
The simple news that Nature told
With tender majesty
Her message is committed
To hands I cannot see
For love of her,
Sweet countrymen,
Judge tenderly of me
Have you ever had a message you wanted to share with the entire world? Something that if you could, you would climb to the top of a mountain, or sail down a river or take out an ad or scream at the top of your lungs into the wind?
Or hire a Carrier Pigeon.
Or write a book.
Or start a blog.
When I started Life’s Little Inspirations back at our old house, our first little community center before Harry came along and built us this beautiful lighthouse, I didn’t really have a great inspired plan. I just wanted to write. I had been reading some interesting blogs, and came across free wordpress, touched a button and oops-I had a blog. So I wrote a post. There was the amazing Brett who responded only a few moments later and a blogger was born. And we… myself and an amazing number of friends and readers have created this inspiring community of Life’s Little Inspirations that has become something more then I ever would have fathomed could be possible.
This community has changed my life. It has fanned the flames of a dream and a heart’s desire that has re-awaked after thirty one years (and still happily counting) of being both a full-time career woman and mother. Yes- that dream is to be a writer, with all my heart I want that. Yet that alone is not enough.
Coming here to the lighthouse has made me understand why. It’s all very clear at the map. When Harry designed our new place, he installed google analytics, something I had never heard of, didn’t understood and won’t even pretend that I do at this point. But it has this intriguing map that I can’t tear myself away from that tells you where all of your visitors are coming from.
SO…right here and now…to all of you bigger and greater bloggers to which, what I am about to say is a drop in the bucket, and to everyone else…I wouldn’t know if these numbers are good, bad, or ugly…I can only tell you that I…am…overwhelmed. That map has opened my eyes to an amazing reality about the vastness of blogging and the smallness of our world. It has made me think that there are a few things I want to say…
My Letter to the World
Dear World,
WE-our community- has been here for less than a month. In that time, people from fifty-five different countries have been coming here to read and visit the pages of Life’s Little Inspirations.
I had no idea. Were you always there? At the old place too? Did I not fully understand the impact of one little blog, one little voice that- I thought- didn’t have very much to say? Last night, I want you to know that I sat there, at that map, for a very long, long time and I ran my cursor-shaped like an outreached hand-carefully over each and ever country-large and small- and watched as it lit up under the hand. I thought about you. I wondered what your day was like, what your thoughts were, what inspired you, what you wanted most in the world. What is our common ground? What makes you happy? What makes you sad?
I wondered which ones of you comment and those of you who don’t, why are you silent? How much more we could be, and how much more we could do if every voice from every 55 places spoke up, made their opinions count, made their situations more real to us, helped us to understand each other more clearly, bridge the gaps with respect, dignity and honest conversation?
My eyes welled up with tears and your countries became watery and I saw you through a blurry film. I realized that is how we all see each other. Through our own clouded vision. Is there a way to help each other see more clearly? Can we talk? Can we share? You are reading…I really want to know you. I know others here want to know you as well. I am reaching out to you. Will you reach out to me? Tell me about yourself. Tell me what your world is like, what your day is like, what is important to you.
I want to know. Talk to me. Talk to us.
I floated the cursor back onto my own country of America. Even here, the places that readers come from are as diverse and as far reaching in such a large stretch of land that we might as well be divided. How can we become closer? How can we bridge the gaps that divide us? Can we talk?
I thought of the post I had written on the power of words. I believe in it with all my heart. Is it the answer? Can sharing our words in a respectful manner help us to get down to the common core of values from which all love, hope and true change springs forth? Can real change and real peace happen?
I think it can.
I sat there last night staring at the map and thought about the power of bloggers to change the world one reader at a time. To make a difference. To find the common ground. To change hearts through wide open listening and bridging the gaps. The problem isn’t cultural, the problem is not caring enough to put aside our differences and reaching out to find our common ground.
When representatives from 55 countries can meet at a little blog in less than a month of starting up, that tells me that on the big ones there are huge numbers of people meeting from all over the world. I am one little voice. How many blogs are out there talking to how many people all over? What could we do if we tried?
One little thing I am committed to doing is to participate in Blog Action Day 08. I hope you will join me and make a difference in the war on poverty on October 15th. There is still plenty of time to sign up. But it is just a start. It is just one day. Let’s keep talking all 365 days a year too.
Hello world. I want you to know how much I want to hear from you. I want you to know how much I care. Please don’t leave without saying hello! Please share your world with us and tell us about yourself!
Will you please be a part of helping Life’s Little Inspirations Grow? If you enjoy reading these posts, please leave a comment and subscribe, and Digg, Stumble or spread the word any way you can. Thank you very much!
The Power of Your Secret Weapon
September 8, 2008
Sshhh…..I’m going to let you in on a little secret. Well, it’s not really that little. In fact, it’s not really even much of a secret. Powerful and successful people all over the world have been wielding this weapon since the beginning of human language.
You have heard of the Secret?
No not THAT Secret. A different Secret.
It’s the Secret of The Power of the Word.
And it belongs to you. No one can take it away from you. You own it. It is your weapon. To do with as you please.
Think carefully for a moment. How will you wield that weapon today? Your weapon has a very unique quality about it that no other weapon in your arsenal has. It has the power to shapeshift. You can turn it into a sword to cut down your opponent, a dagger to slice him through the heart, a grenade to blow him to bits with a filthy litany of expletives for grievances committed on highways or elsewhere.
Your words can turn to cubes of ice that you can coldly toss over your shoulder as a parting shot or a zinger that flings with a snap of your wrist or through barely parted teeth.
OR…
Instead of using your weapon for the battlefield, you can use its power for the cause of good instead. You can harness its energy to become a warm blanket of comfort for someone all alone and scared. Or a sheild of encourangement and strength for someone facing adversity and challenge. Your words can become a library of wisdom to inform and educate, to uplift and inspire those searching to learn. You can create bridges with your words to bring others together and help communities grow. You can be a haven of peace, A light in the darkness, a beacon of hope.
You are holding a tremendous power. You have a tremendous choice of what you can choose to do with it today.
Just by paying attention to your thoughts.
Just by opening your mouth and being careful what kind of words you allow to come out.
Take a moment to think.
Will your words:
admonish, attack, bewilder, betray, criticize, confuse, condemn, demoralize, discourage, destroy, enrage, frighten, gossip, harm, intimidate, judge, label, manipulate, neglect, ostracize, prejudge, quarrel, rage, scandalize, scream, tear down, terrify, underestimate, victimize, weaken, wound, or yell?
OR…
Will your words:
adore, affirm, beautify, bless, caress, celebrate, delight, empower, encourage, fascinate, gratify, help, honor, inspire, kiss, love, motivate, nourish, pamper, play, redeem, respect, serve, share, support,thank, trust, understand, value, validate, or welcome?
It’s your choice. It’s your secret weapon. Your VERY POWERFUL WEAPON.
Choose wisely. It can change your life.
It can change the world. What will you do with your words today?
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Giving Back to the Givers
September 4, 2008
I hope that my achievements in life shall be these-that I will have fought for what was right and fair, that I will have risked for that which mattered, and that I will have given help to those who were in need, that I will have left the earth a better place for what I have done and who I’ve been.
~C. Hoppe
Making a positive difference in the lives of others is one of the key cornerstones of Life’s Little Inspirations. Inspiring ourselves and others to be the best we can be is another. Every now and then I come across a person or two that just amazes me in their relentless and unselfish ability to give of themselves in their time and their talent and their willingness to help others.
I read their words and ideas and I think, “Gosh, this is so valuable, I am really grateful for this information, this person has really made a difference to me and they probably don’t even realize it”
Other times, it is just the kindness that strikes me, that makes something stand out, apart from the many articles and blogs I read every day. What does it for you? What sets one particular blogger or post apart and makes you feel that the writer really gave you something that was a gift?
There are a few writers lately who have been so helpful either to myself personally or to the blogging community for one reason or another that I want to give something back by just saying thank and acknowledging them by saying I think they live up to the quote above by C. Hobb- That they are leaving the earth a better place for their contribution.
Michael Martine -Remarkablogger: Did a recent post inviting new bloggers to post their blogs on his site and get some new traffic. He asked those of us who were his subscribers to help out and go visit those new places and make some comments. I was more than happy to help out with his generous request. It was the least I could do. He is constantly coming up with new ways and new informative posts to help the new blogging community and since the day I started blogging his posts have been a guiding light to show me the way. I am not sure I have ever properly said thank you. But I have read every word. Thank you Michael.
Barbara Swafford-Blogging Without a Blog: Barbara has a very generous weekly feature on her blog called New Blog of the Week. She was gracious enough to host Life’s Little Inspiration as one of her New Blogs early on when we were just starting out and it was a tremendous boost to the readership for which I have been very grateful. But it is also the endless amount of information and help that she provides week after week that truly makes her special. She is always on the look out for ways to be of help and to provide the resources that will give her community what they need to prosper.
Naomi Dunford-IttyBiz: I don’t swear. Not on the Internet anyway. Hardly ever I don’t think. SO it might seem unlikely that I would be such a huge fan of this Firecracker of Marketing. However I can’t think of a single individual that I have learned more from in a shorter period of time. And I am NOT talking about an off color vocabulary. I knew those words…I just don’t say them…here. Being around Naomi is like enrolling back in school only funner. When she writes, I take notes. I can’t believe how much information she is generously willing to write on her blog FOR FREE. When she wrote her E-BOOK I bought it the first day. I didn’t even know what the subject was about. I didn’t care. I hate e-books. Hers is the one and only that I have ever bought. But I appreciate how much she had given away already. And then her book had so much MORE in it that I learned a ton. She is a giver.
They all are. The world is a better place because of them in it.
I wish I had more to give these generous people than my thanks and to tell you how much of a difference they are making out there. Go check them out if you don’t know them.
Now it’s your turn. It’s give back to YOUR GIVERS DAY. Who are the people out there who are making an impression on you? Tell us about them. You can post a link about them in the comments so we can all go check them out. Let’s shine a light on the ones who have been been giving of themselves to others.
There are SO MANY. I have lots more. But since we all hang out in the same community, I bet some of my other favorites are yours too so don’t be shy. Lets shine that bright lighthouse light on them!
Changing Colors
September 2, 2008
At my desk in front of me is a never been used, fresh box of 64 different brilliant non-toxic Crayola Crayons with the built-in sharpener. I store them in my equally brilliant Crayola crayon box that has pictures of happy animated smiling crayons on the cover and a white rectangle name-tag space that says THIS BOX BELONGS TO: and I scrawled my name in permanent marker- Wendi.
That box of crayons is mine and I’m not sharing.
Oh…by the way…hidden in my closet where none of my kids can find it, I also have the eight Crayola color crayons that were retired in 1990 and are in the Collector’s Colors Limited Edition Collection. I’m not sharing them either.
This drives my kids crazy. (Well, my oldest two are used to me by now, but the youngest two have a ways to go) They are still of the belief that the minute you get a new box of crayons you should color with them until you have worn down all of the sharp uniform points and then run them through that tempting built-in sharpener ripping off the little bits of paper as you go until all of the crayons are short, naked, broken, discarded and none of the colors in the four cardboard boxes match up anymore or have any rhyme or reason to them and the box itself looks as if it has been flung on to a battlefield and lost.
Desecration of the crayon boxes happens all over the world. It is particularly rampant in September when less then reverent children get their new fresh crayon boxes to go back to school with all of their other school supplies. For one or two glorious giddy days, they fawn over their new prized possessions as if school supplies held the keys to all knowledge of mankind. Then, before the first homework assignments have been handed out, the shiny glow has worn off and the supplies, the markers, colored pencils and the forgotten crayons have been flung to the bottom of the desks and lockers to become part of the dreaded nightmare that is their education. It’s just all part of the stuff.
I was NOT that child.
The smell of a fresh box of crayons was and still is like the greasepaint for an actor on stage. The hope of 64 Crayola possibilities and the endless combinations and dreams that imagination could create was a fire ignited that raged with enthusiasm through out my entire being. It was the beginning of a spark that spread into a love of discovery and wonder and took in all that I learned to associate with school.
I loved school.
I loved September because September meant going to school. Not back to school. I never thought of it as going back to school. In my mind, it was moving forward in school. Advancing on a path to the next great adventure, the next door opening, the next road taken. A kaleidoscope of choices, of places to hear about, a world that unfolded before my eyes chapter by chapter, year by year.
And when each year would pause for the summer break, I was the strange and different child who would cry, sad and heartbroken, as if to discover that all of the crayons in the box were broken. I couldn’t wait for my new box of crayons and my school supplies to come and the adventure to begin again.
My school bus days are long behind me now. Except for the children of my own that get on them. Still…every year…at the first change of color in the leaves, the first hint of coolness in the breeze, a part of me yearns for a fresh box of crayons, my own new school supplies and new classes to get those learning juices going again. Even as the playfulness of summer is still fresh in my mind there is another part of me, the perpetual student, heading off to the bookstore for new books to read, thirsting for knowledge, chomping at the bit for the next discovery in the chapter of life.
It’s September. The Labor Day Weekend has been put to rest with celebration, family and good friends. The husband is off to work and the children have climbed the yellow school bus with fresh new school supplies in hand. Early this morning, I took out my own fresh journal that I felt compelled to buy and began writing down new lists, new beginnings. It’s the start of a new time of year after all. Time to begin again, wipe the slate clean. Start fresh…with a new box of possibilities…
I come up to the office and I open up the box. It has been sitting here waiting for me, as I knew it would. Just as it has been for the last several years. I carefully lift open the top and peek inside. Every crayon point is poised and ready. Every crayon in its original space. As if to say…In case of emergency…Color Here. I inhale deeply the aroma of paraffin wax and paper and shiver slightly as that childhood thrill brings a smile. My own box of possibilities. Ready any time I need it. Every day. 64 ways to begin again…with endless combinations…as far as my dreams, imaginations and desire to learn will take me.
It’s never too late.
What will September bring for you?
