Pick your own title. . .

• Choose joy.

• Life is what happens when you’re making other plans.

• We’re all going to hell in a hand basket.

• Ignorance is bliss.

• Tomorrow is another day.

Check any of the above.  They will all fit.

I spend far more time collecting truisms, verses and pithy sayings for my art journaling than I do actually making pages.  (I also spend way too much time and money shopping for supplies than actually using them, but that’s another problem.)   I was “supposed” to have a little private time Sunday to work on my art journal.  Turned out I had not prepped the page so while I was waiting for gesso to dry, I wandered around the internet.  Found a quote I have intended to use:  “today I will choose JOY.”  I love it and it was beautifully presented.  The internet being what it is, I soon found myself shopping for jewelry and other objects that featured the saying. 

Then I needed my paint to dry, so I was reading a book.  Then the doorbell rang.  Several kids from the impromptu basketball league around the corner informed me that my bicycle had been stolen from my garage.  Yes, the doors to the garage were open.  I like them open.  Airs it out and lets the sunshine in and just feels nice.  The bicycle was old and rusty with flat tires and behind a bunch of stuff.  I was completely bewildered as to the motive.  Turns out apparently it was for “the reward” they wanted for giving me this information.  No reward. 

The Beaumont police recovered my bicycle and found the juvenile who took it.  The officers were fast, competent and completely understanding that while it was an old, sad bike, it was mine and in my garage.  One officer sternly advised me to keep the doors down.  I will comply.  I don’t like it, but I have to accept that my neighborhood is not the same one I moved into almost 40 years ago.

 

Now I am nervous.  I don’t have much that would be of value on the open market and certainly nothing for the black market.  But I do have stuff that is precious to me.  And it’s on my property.  The one I pay taxes on and utility bills for.  I am not so much afraid of theft as I am of retribution…garbage can turned over (shuddering here), paint or eggs on the garage doors that are now firmly down, broken windows or other acts of unkindness.  I don’t like living this way.

And I won’t.  Today I will choose joy.  Even with the doors down and precautions taken.  Even knowing what may be around the corner, across town, all over the country.  Today I WILL choose joy!

Thanks, God

God spoke to me today, as I was driving to Wal-Mart.  And I didn’t particularly like what He had to say.

Oh, plenty of times in my life, I have felt Him guiding me, nudging me or knew inside what He was telling me, but this time I heard the words as clearly as if there was someone in the car with me.  Which, of course, there was.

Once before I heard God speak.  That time I had my head in the dryer.  That’s another story.  But back to today.

I was entreating guidance for a situation I find myself in.  I was wrestling with a better way to behave.  I was trying to put the blame on someone else.  Then I heard it.  Clearly.  “Jerre, (God calls me Jerre and that’s okay when He does it) no one can make you do anything.”  Strong emphasis on the “make” part.

Yes, I had been trying to blame my feelings and reactive behavior on others who “made” me feel that way, act that way.   A way I am ashamed of but seem powerless to stop.  Until now.  Now, it is crystal clear that it’s up to me to stop it myself.  I was praying for guidance and God delivered in record time on Folsom Drive right past Crow Road.  And I didn’t much like it.  Puts it on me.  But of course, I knew that.  I just didn’t want to admit it.

I’m not saying that I’ll be able to change my attitude right away.  But with that kind of push, you’d better believe I’m going to try.  And I know God will be there to help.

Thanks, God.

Ah, Spring! Ah, Spring Break!!!

The worst reason for doing anything is “that’s the way it’s always been.”  Hold to those memories of the good, old days while you punch the buttons on your microwave and start the dishwasher.

This morning children across the area will bound out of bed earlier than usual, brighter than usual.  (It’s the Saturday syndrome.)  They will rush to their video games, ravage the kitchen, take to their bikes.  Spongebob will blare.   Except the teenagers who will sleep until noon.  It’s Spring Break.

And for the first time in the rememberable past, area school districts have corresponding spring breaks.   If you’re still in town, stay home and off Dowlen Road.  It’s going to be worse than the holiday shopping season.

But some people grumble, “We didn’t have any spring break when I was in school.”  Not for me either.  Not even in college.  But then, teachers wrote on chalkboards that the kids in the back couldn’t see, our keyboarding class was typing with Underwood manual typewriters and yes, we walked to school, two miles, in the snow, uphill both ways!  Girls wore dresses with petticoats and their hair in pigtails.  I really did attend a school with the desks that were attached, the desk part to the seat in front and it had a hole for an inkwell.  Our buildings were “temporary” and were old, converted Army barracks.  They had a cloak room.  Never mind, we didn’t know what a cloak was but we put our jackets and lunches in there.  That was just while the new school was being built.  It lasted three years.  I digress.

Maybe it was a kinder, gentler time.  But there were still playground bullies, who would drill you with the dodge ball, just because you weren’t popular or couldn’t hit a baseball or wore glasses.   And there were tyrannical teachers, one in particular, Mrs. Furr, who would rap your hand with the gold-colored ruler she received for teaching excellence.  And the only school shootings were done with rubber bands.  They still stung.

Now we have computers, all kinds of electronic gadgets and gizmos, different styles of teaching, different styles of learning.  And, blissfully, spring break.  It’s a good thing.  Those folks who analyze things have determined that a person’s attention can’t be held for more than about 50 minutes or something like that.  (They do not observe this rule at in-service.)  Stands to reason that you can’t keep a kid motivated with an endless stretch of school days.  Our school year also started in September and ended in May “back in the good old days” too.

As early in March as it may occur, spring break signifies the downhill slide to the end.  The days are getting longer and warmer.  It’s time for shorts and flip-flops (even though we wear them all year).  It’s baseball season. Everything seems a little brighter.  I used to put kiddie sunglasses on all my bears at West Brook when I left for spring break and tell my students that the bears went on vacation too.  Made them laugh, just part of the silliness of the season.  Thoreau said that every season is best in its turn, but that Spring is like the coming of the Golden Age, Cosmos out of Chaos.  You can’t argue with Henry.

Daniel, and probably Kayla, will be hanging with Hubba on their spring breaks because their parents still have to work.  The work life lasts some 40 plus years.  Let’em have a week now as a deposit on the future.