Heroism, Rope Burns, Anniversary Repost

Dear Sillies,
   I'm cheating. I've been getting over a bug and have nothing new for you. Instead, I decided to see what I posted exactly one year ago. I'm pleased that my eyes met this sweet, inspiring post. It feels like a dose of what I and maybe you and the world needs now.
   I highlighted the bits that bring the post to date.
   Be good to yourselves.
   You're loved.

   Eighty four days since the Camp Fire [now 449 days], strength, unity, and resilience continue to pervade. It's a beautiful thing! At the heart of it all: children--our most unsung heroes. 
    I visit(ed) a local elementary school weekly, for work. That one school seamlessly integrated a former Paradise elementary school. And I mean, seamlessly. 2 schools in 1! With almost no time to prepare for the expansion, the kids and staff readily posted murals and artistic creations to warmly welcome their new peers.

    While playing tetherball, a girl approached to say "I'm in first grade." I believe her point was that she's in first grade and nearly my height, but she was too polite to go there. Note: She is now in second grade an undoubtedly taller than me.
   Other kids who noticed my lack of tetherball savvy suggested that I hit the ball harder. (I tried. I really did. I still lost, 15 games to 0 games.) 
   By the way, did you know that a "cheap shot" amounts to one's opponent hitting the other's body with the ball, the result of which is that the person hit by the ball is out!? Perhaps dodge-ball is a less vicious option.

   Excuse me, while I leave to ice on my rope burns.They're gone now!
   Be well, my friends.

"There are heroes all around us doing ordinary things in extraordinary ways."

True Love & Woman on the Verge of Paradise

Kindly note: I am standing closer to the camera with knees slightly bent and less of a curly top. This is to say that I appear even shorter than I am. I swear, I'm slightly taller than him. Really, I am.

Last week, very special people visited Chico; my nephew and I had such a great time. Here we are in the Chico Plaza. A snippet from Woman on the Verge of Paradise follows. It takes the reader to 2010, when I'd just said "goodbye" to my then three year old love bug.  I've learned through J. that true love takes many forms and has no end.

---

 They’d only been gone an hour when one lone tear trickled down my face. I didn’t expect or quite understand my emotional state. We had such a great, fun-loving time. I couldn’t get enough of my nephew, but I’d see him again soon.

   Why am I feeling this way? I wondered. It was as if I’d said “goodbye” to someone I loved dearly. That’s why; I had.

   But this was different than having said “goodbye” to Justin when I went away for a weekend, or having to continue to say “goodbye” to Justin every day for perhaps the rest of my life. It was a softer, warmer, much sweeter “goodbye.”

   It struck me that I had just said “goodbye” to the love of my life, the new one. Being Josiah's Auntie is pure heaven. His beautiful beaming smile, flavored with a heaping teaspoon of mischief, tickles my heart.  He adores me too. I can tell by the way he body-slams me with an elbow to my rib cage, a choke-hold taxing my windpipe, and a stinky foot pressed leisurely against my nostrils—all accompanied by ferocious laughter. 

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Please take care, my friends. 
I know that some of you are really struggling now, and my heart is with you.
Love yourself and know that you are loved. 

Memorial Day, A Child's Perspective

I've recycled a Memorial Day post from years prior. Apologies, but sometimes I said it better then than I could now. Oftentimes, I don't know what to say about something so overwhelmingly tragic as war.

And how can we possibly begin to adequately thank and pay tribute to our military? I don't know; I don't think we can...I did give it thought as a child. Back then, I was a diehard environmentalist and humanitarian (who failed to use a dictionary to check my spelling, completely naive to the fact that I'd publicize this "poem to think of" decades later). I wrote:

                                        ~Embiggen, if you'd like to read about THE SAD war~
My favorite line in the above poem is: "I think more forests should be built."

Nephew Jeremy, age 16 mos.

May it be a meaningful, peaceful and safe Memorial Day.

With gratitude and blessings to all who have served and will serve our country, and to their loved ones, for all time.