What Limitation????

Lately I have heard so much about the Special Olympics and how so many people are overcoming physical disabilities and performing well beyond all expectations.

I am reminded me of an experience I had some years ago.

I had applied for a new position with a well known company.   When I spoke with the senior management individual in charge of the Information Technology services, he asked if I could fly to South Carolina to meet with him for an interview.   He had planned to be at the company’s  South Carolina location early the following week and thought it would be a good idea to meet there on Monday morning.

We worked out the arrangements for meeting and spent some time discussing how we would join up. He suggested I stay at a certain hotel and that we meet in the morning for breakfast.    When I asked how I would recognize him, he thought for a moment and then said that he would be wearing brown slacks, a yellow shirt and he would be carrying a clipboard.  We were to meet in the hotel lobby  at eight o'clock in the morning.  

At the appointed time I kept looking for someone with a yellow shirt and brown pants carrying a clipboard and finally I saw him. He indeed was carrying a clipboard had brown pants and a yellow shirt and he had only one arm. I was pretty surprised to tell the truth.  As I realized that this gentleman was the man I was supposed to meet, I wondered why he hadn't mentioned that he only had one arm, a pretty safe bet for identifying an individual.   He was the only one-armed guy in the lobby.

During the day we had an opportunity to discuss in depth the responsibilities of the position, how the company operated and the role that I would be expected to play.  There was also time for some small talk about ourselves. He told me that he had arrived in South Carolina on Saturday  as he had been invited to a weekend charity golf tournament sponsored by the Governor.   He had done very well and was very happy to end up high on the leaderboard.

As we talked, it struck me that he didn't seem to realize that he only had one arm. That's why he hadn't mentioned it when we were discussing our meeting arrangements. This incredible individual had achieved senior management status in a very large international company, was apparently a very good golfer, husband and father  and took no thought that he was what some people would call "handicapped".

In her book, Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures , Mary Baker Eddy tells of a similar situation and the effect of thinking on human situations.  She relates, “The effect of mortal mind on health and happiness is seen in this: If one turns away from the body with such absorbed interest as to forget it, the body experiences no pain.

 Under the strong impulse of a desire to perform his part, a noted actor was accustomed night after night to go upon the stage and sustain his appointed task, walking about as actively as the youngest member of the company.

This old man was so lame that he hobbled every day to the theatre, and sat aching in his chair till his cue was spoken, — a signal which made him as oblivious of physical infirmity as if he had inhaled chloroform, though he was in the full possession of his so-called senses.”

And then there is Nick Vujicic…. A limbless son was not what nurse Dushka Vujicic, and her husband Pastor Borris Vujicic had been expecting. How would their son live a normal happy life? What could he ever do or become when living with what the world would see as such a massive disability? Little did they know that this beautiful limbless baby would one day be someone who would inspire and motivate people from all walks of life, touching lives all over the world.   See Link http://www.attitudeisaltitude.com/aboutus-nick.php

Today is a good day to “put off the old man” as advised in The Bible, (Colossians 3:9)  to start looking away from limitations, lack and fear, and to emulate Nick Vujicic and  those Special Olympians who go forward every day overcoming seeming obstacles as they strive to reach their goals..  They defeat the  “I CAN’T thinking”  every day!!!

With God all things are possible.  God Bless You... and He has!

We Weren't GREEN

Checking out at the store the young cashier suggested to the older woman that she should bring her own grocery bags because plastic bags weren't good for the environment.

The woman apologized and explained. "We didn't have this  green thing back in my earlier days."

 The young clerk responded,  "That's our problem today. Your generation did not care enough to save our environment for future generations."

 She was right -- our generation didn't have the green thing in its day.  

 Back then we returned milk bottles soda bottles and beer bottles to the store. The store sent them back to the plant to be washed and sterilized and refilled so it could use the same bottles over and over. So they really were recycled.

 But we didn't have the green thing  back in our day.

 Grocery stores bagged our groceries in brown paper bags that we reused for numerous things.  Most memorable, besides household garbage bags, was the use of brown paper bags as book covers for our schoolbooks.This was to ensure that public property (the books provided for our use by the school) was not defaced by our scribblings. Then we were able to personalize our books on the brown paper bags.

 But too bad we didn't do the green thing back then.

 We walked up stairs because we didn't have an escalator in every store and office building. We walked to the grocery store and didn't climb into a 300-horsepower machine every time we had to go two blocks.

 But she was right. We didn't have the green thing in our day.

 Back then we washed the baby's diapers because we didn't have the throwaway kind. We dried clothes on a line not in an energy-gobbling machine burning up 220 volts -- wind and solar power really did dry  your clothes back in our early days.  Kids got hand-me-down clothes from  their brothers or sisters not always brand-new clothing.  And we didn't have refrigerators running 24X7, we used ice. (See June Blog - The Ice Man...).

 But that young lady is right -- We didn't have the green thing  back in our day.

 Back then we had one TV or radio in the house -- not a TV in every room; and the TV had a small screen the size of a handkerchief (remember?) Not a screen the size of the state of Montana . In the kitchen we blended and stirred by hand because we didn't have electric machines to do everything for us.

When we packaged a fragile item to send in the mail we used wadded up old newspapers to cushion it, not Styrofoam or plastic bubble wrap. Back then we didn't fire up an engine and burn gasoline just to cut the lawn. We used a push mower that ran on human power.  We exercised by working so we didn't need to go to a health club to run on treadmills that operate on electricity.

 But she's right we didn't have the green thing back then.

We drank from a fountain when we were thirsty instead of using a cup or a plastic bottle every time we had a drink of water. We refilled writing pens with ink instead of buying a new pen and we replaced the razor blades in a razor instead of throwing away the whole razor just because the blade got dull.

 But we didn't have the green thing back then.

 Back then people took the streetcar or a bus and kids rode their bikes to school or walked instead of turning their moms into a 24-hour taxi service. We had one electrical outlet in a room, not an entire bank of sockets to power a dozen appliances. And we didn't need a computerized gadget to receive a signal beamed from satellites 23,000 miles out in space in order to find the nearest burger joint.

 But isn't it sad that the current generation laments how wasteful we old folks were just because we didn't have the green thing back then?

Now friends, I hope this doesn't sound like "Self Justification" for an older generation.  It just provides a perspective.  And,  it is so good that people today are concerned enough to try to be green in light of all of the technology that has changed life in our country over the last 100 years.  

Television Comes to Chillicothe

Now Chillicothe, Ohio is not some backwoods, Johnny-Come-Lately town and as a matter of fact was the first capital of Ohio.    It lost that title mostly due to geography since it is in the lower part of the state and Columbus, the current state capital, is more in the middle the state and closer to the other major cities.

The name Chillicothe comes from the Shawnee word Chalahgawtha meaning “principal town", as it was a major settlement of that people.  The Shawnee and their ancestors inhabited the territory for thousands of years prior to the arrival of pilgrims in the country.

Modern Chillicothe was the center of the ancient Hopewell Culture from 200 BCE until 500 CE. The Hopewell Indians built earthen mounds for ceremonial and burial purposes throughout the Scioto and Ohio River valleys. The Hopewell Indian Mounds can still be seen at Hopewell Culture National Historical Park which we always called Mound City.  

So it's not because we were small town with no history and no appreciation for culture that television was such a novelty in 1948-1949. It was probably just the most exciting thing to happen there since the Indian Mounds were built.

Now I had seen a television in the early days at my Aunt Mary's lovely house in Connecticut.  Her state-of-the-art TV had a screen just slightly larger than a coffee saucer and the picture was very fuzzy. Of course it was black-and-white and contained a lot of what they called “snow” which is a technical term for “you can’t really see much of a picture".  But it was so fascinating to me.

But residents of Chillicothe did eventually get television sets. Now, not everyone got a TV since they were pretty expensive and many people decided that it was rather too expensive for what you got. To receive a signal on television you had to have an antenna on your roof pointed towards the only stations that we could receive which were in Columbus and Cincinnati.    I guess it didn't matter if the programs were very good or not, we were just so excited to see this new communications medium. The most popular in the evening shows were John Cameron Swayze's news program and Milton Berle.

Milton Berle was very popular.  His autobiography notes that in Detroit, "an investigation took place when the water levels took a drastic drop in the reservoirs on Tuesday nights between 9 and 9:05PM.  It turned out that everyone waited until the end of the Texaco Star Theater before going to the bathroom".   He is credited for the huge spike in the sale of TV sets. After Berle's show began, set sales more than doubled, reaching two million in 1949. His stature as the medium's first superstar earned Berle the sobriquet "Mr. Television".

Now a wonderful thing, maybe a phenomenon happening only in small towns like Chillicothe, showed the graciousness and generosity of the citizens. We lived across the street from the Woolums family and they were one of the first families in our neighborhood to buy a television set. We were all very curious to see what it was about and they ever so kindly open their doors to the neighbors.  On many nights there were folding chairs set up in their living room and a small group of neighbors filed in to watch Milton Berle. Now is that generous or what?  Quite different from many neighborhoods today where the houses are buttoned up tight and neighbors hardly know each other.

Some folks brought popcorn with them and it was like being in a movie theater. I'm not sure that the neighbors appreciated just how generous the Woolums family was.

Our family finally got a TV in 1950.  It was a Sylvania Halolight that had fluorescent lighting around the screen.  The purpose was to make the picture clearer and sharper.  Or it may have been a cheap trick to sell more TVs.  In any case, we were excited to have our own set.

The power of television was proven to me by the effect it had on people.  While visiting my Grandmother and Grandpa one evening, as we sat in their living room watching their new TV,  I saw an amazing transformation. My elderly grandmother, the very picture of poise and decorum, turned into a raving fanatic in the middle of a TV wrestling match. The usually gentle, serene and loving lady erupted in screams of “hit him,  hit him, come on mister,  hit him… and hit him again”, all accompanied by shaking of fists and facial grimaces.   It was a scene much funnier than even the BEST Milton Berle show.  Gorgeous George or whoever it was did miraculously overcome his adversary and all eventually ended well.   

But I will never forget that scene.  And I came to an early understanding that the power and seeming reality of the television programs can have an absolute effect on the minds of the viewers, for better or worse.

And, at midnight, the National Anthem was played and the test pattern.

   GOOD NIGHT!!!

Garden of Gratitude

A good friend of mine, Nelson Williams who lives up in North Carolina told me a story that happened to him some time ago. Nelson is a really nice guy and loved by everyone who knows him. He lives next door to an elderly lady who is a great flower enthusiast and gardener.

She was talking to him one day and told him that she was going to take a vacation and needed someone to watch over the flowers. In particular, the geraniums growing in pots on her porch and around the front of her house.

She spent quite a bit of time telling Nelson about the flowers and the importance of the spending enough time to make sure that they flourish. Apparently geraniums need a lot of help and should have good drainage and fertilizer. She also stressed the importance of “deadheading” which is pinching off the flowers that have died to make room for more blossoms and richer growth of new flowers.

Nelson, being the responsible guy that he is, took this assignment seriously. For the first few days after she left Nelson trudged over to the neighbor’s yard scanning all of the flowers in the pots for dead blossoms. He dutifully pinched off the dead ones and threw them away.

At this point in the story, Nelson got that wistful, far off look in his eyes, the kind that make you know that something profound is coming, that you are not nearly as smart as the guy talking, and that you might learn something.  Nelson was like that.

He told me that on his morning trip next door four days after he began ‘deadheading”, as he gazed at the pots he noticed how brilliant and colorful the geraniums were. He suddenly realized that he had spent the first part of the week focusing on the dead flowers, looking intently for the "dead and gone" and what he could "bury”.   He realized that he had overlooked the beauty of the entire garden, and each individual plant by looking for death instead of life. He became incredibly GRATEFUL for life and being.

While he dutifully continued to do his job and pinch off the dead blossoms every day, he had a new appreciation for the beauty of the living flowers and for how he had been so distracted by looking for the dead blossoms that he missed the show. 

In thinking about our conversation I started to realize how often in my own life I have concentrated on the dead flowers in my experience and missed some of the beauty of all the good that is going on. How often discouragement, failure, missed opportunities and fear had kept me from being grateful for life, from seeing the beautiful, the good and the true picture.  How sometimes, in my focus on acquiring or keeping money or material objects... "Things", or pursuing less than noble goals, or viewing situations negatively, I had overlooked life’s most wonderful treasures.

As a result, I can see the tremendous power in being more positive in  life, for being  more grateful for the good that surrounds us, for every loving and joyful thought,  for family, for friendship, for being alive and able to share God’s love with those around me, and with those far off who are in our thoughts.  Gratitude for seeing "Life" instead of death and its dead blossoms. 

It is surely true that:  “Seeds of Discouragement Won’t Grow in a Garden of Gratitude.”

The Ice Man and Early Biker Experience

Chillicothe, Ohio... Mid 1940s

Gee that morning sun is sure bright, and really warm for a Fall day. 

Here I am sittin’ on the curb like I had good sense.   Look at that spider on those leaves in the gutter. Should I pick him up? No, I’ll just watch.  

Wonder when the ice truck will get here?  Today is his day for our neighborhood.  I know this is the day because everyone had the ice signs in the window. All you have to do is to turn the sign up to show how many pounds you want. If you want a 25 pound block or a  50 pounder, you put the sign in the front window set up so that the amount you want is right side up.  The Iceman will look at each house to see what you want and he chips off your portion from a huge cake.

                                                         

Guess I better get up and be ready. All the other guys in the neighborhood will come running when they see the truck. We love it when the ice man cuts the block into pieces with his ice pick  because there a lot of flying ice chips and they taste so good on a warm morning like today.

Later today Herb Valentine said he would come to give me a ride.  But I could go for a ride ONLY if my Mom said it was okay.    Herb is a young black guy, about 18 years old,  that lives a couple of blocks down the street.  His Dad, Mr. Valentine walks by our house on the way home from work a lot of days and he is a special friend.  I walk with him as he goes by the house and he is always cheerful.  I had told him that I wanted Herb to take me for a ride on his new motorcycle and he agreed to tell Herb.   

Herb stopped by on his way down the street yesterday.  Even though I am just a kid, he is kind enough to have spotted a motorcycle lover waving furiously from the sidewalk every time he rode by.    Yesterday he showed me his BEAUTIFUL Indian bike.  It was a Scout or a Chief, I think.  I wasn’t so interested in the model but that it was big, and red, and had a side gear shift, and a big old seat, and it smelled like gasoline!!

                           

Later….

Well, Herb came by today.and I am sort of in trouble.   Here’s how innocent kids get in trouble.  I’m sitting on the curb and Herb pulls up.  First question, “Did you ask your Mom if you could go for a ride?”.  The answer that popped out, sort of accidentally, was, “Yep, she said it would be okay.”   Stuff like that happens to me, accidents of the mouth.

So, I jumped on behind Herb, held tight around his waist, and we took off on that Big,Beautiful, Red Monster!! I was in heaven. We cruised down Jefferson Avenue and out to Route 50.  Herb knew some wonderful back roads that were covered with the falling leaves.  The smell of the gasoline, the leaves scattering in our path and in our wake, the sun shining, the motor roaring… this must be what Heaven is like.  

We rode around for what seemed to me like a very short time, but I guess I was mistaken.  It must have been longer than I thought since when we pulled up in front of my house, a crowd had gathered.  It seems that some of the neighbors had seen little Pat get on a motorcycle with “some man” and taken off.  Not the sort of thing that Mothers want to hear.  I guess they were ready to call out the Army to look for me.  But Mom was relieved that it was Herb and that I was home.   

 Herb, in the true spirit of an experienced biker, nodded, smiled and headed for home!!

Well, another day in the big city…. Sigh….

The Milk Cart

Clip, clop, clip, clop.... Early morning in a small Ohio town, early 1940s,  clip, clop, clip, clop,  the sound of the milk cart horse’s hooves rings through the crisp fall morning air. 

This is Chillicothe, Ohio,  774 Jefferson Avenue to be specific. A small boy sits on the front steps of his modest house waiting for the milkman and the faithful horse which pulls the cart. In a small boy’s eyes is a wonderful thing to see. The big brown horse making funny noises with his lips, steam coming from his nose,  pulling the milk cart so effortlessly.

Most fascinating is that the horse knows exactly where to stop along the street to drop off the milkman. The milkman mostly walks the route, stepping  in and out of the cart as it stops in front of a customer’s house, selecting the items he will need for this house, and for one or two more houses next door or across the street.   As he steps out of the cart, the horse, slowly, dutifully starts on down the street to stop at his next appointed stop. The horse never seems to refer to a route guide, or a list of customer addresses,  but just  “knows" what to do.  

Now it is a wonderful thing, in this present time, to be able to go to the grocery store and pick up ice cold milk that's been homogenized and pasteurized and bottled or placed in sterile cartons for immediate use. But it certainly can’t match the charm of being able to sneak out of the house first thing in the morning on a cold day and to spy the bottles of non-homogenized milk in which the cream has risen up to the top of the bottle. On a really cold day the cream will have frozen and pushed the paper cap off making a really inviting pure cream “ice cream substitute” for the little boy who forgets that the penalty will be a spanking when mother finds out. It certainly proves that the boys have very short memories as this scene will be repeated a number of times with the same result each time.

The milkman quickly trots up to each customer's house to put the milk, cream or other products on the front porch, sometimes placing them into a box that is set up for this purpose. Then he goes to the next house eventually ending up back up at the milk cart where the horse, knowing the entire route, has stopped and is patiently waiting, or maybe impatiently waiting, but who can know what a horse is thinking as it stands there with his head down gazing at the ground.

  

Clip, clop, clip, clop, the horse and milk cart move on down the street.  Having observed, marveled and partaken, the boy sits back down on the porch to await the next adventure, the ice truck.

Integrity

"Be thou an example of the believers, in word, in conversation, in charity, in spirit, in faith, in purity. "
(The Holy Bible - I Timothy 4:12) 

How easy it is to take on the name of Christian but not follow with a Christlike life.

Am I changing colors to "fit in" like the chameleon? Do I put on a show for the benefit of others but fail to live the life of Love and Soul, imaging forth the Godliness that is my heritage? Am I ashamed to be different and to set the pace for others... and myself? Are my statements of faith and understanding, and my stated deeply held convictions different than what I actually demonstrate in daily life?

It is SO easy to proclaim one standard for oneself but then not live up to it in "real life".  It has been a real struggle for me.   This post is a repeat since I am revisiting the issue and reaffirming my determination to overcome judging, criticizing and seeing others as less than God's expression or perfection.

A good friend once described his definition of integrity as "The coincidence between what we SEEM to be on the outside, and what we REALLY ARE on the inside.

Today I will strive earnestly to live the life that I proclaim to live, reflect the values that I hold dearly and be a genuine follower of the example that Christ Jesus set.

Love the Bees

What a wonderful example the little honey bee sets for us.  It is always busy, never time for complaining, never criticizing, always about her business, helping the flowers to live and reproduce, providing food for others and serving faithfully.

Negative thinkers may only see the bee as something that stings, other more positive folks love the bees for the wonderful example of industriousness that they set.   If we can follow their example, and spend our hours and days loving others and supporting them, our lives will be blessed.

"Have one God and you will have no devil.   Keep yourselves busy with divine Love. Then you will be toilers like the bee, always distributing sweet things which, if bitter to sense, will be salutary as  Soul; but you will not be like the spider, which weaves webs that ensnare."  Mary Baker Eddy 

God's Little Reminders !!!!!

 There have been times when I diligently prayed to hear and feel the reassurance of God's presence. It seems that most the time we don't see a large billboard showing God’s answer but if we watch carefully and listen closely, God gives little reminders of his presence and protection.

In the mid-1980s I was running a consulting company in the Middle East. We lived in Kuwait and had a residence in Oman and traveled among most of the Middle East countries in the Arabian Gulf area frequently.

At that time there were a number of airline hijackings and it was of great concern to those of us who traveled between Europe and the Middle East and within the Middle Eastern countries. On one occasion I was in London and preparing to return to Kuwait. During that time, several Middle East airliners were hijacked and there was a threat that terrorists intended to hijack multiple Kuwaiti airliners during one week.

I became very concerned and prayed for a better understanding that Divine Love alone governs man. My prayer was mainly focused on feeling a sense of God's protection for me and for all who traveled, and to know that Love alone is the motivating power of man. Also I prayed to know that evil can't tempt God's precious children to hate or hurt anyone.

The night before I was to fly back to Kuwait I prayed and thought deeply about the Bible citation in Psalms 139, and the Psalmist’s prayer for reassurance of God’s protection and his acknowledgement that God is everywhere present and always with us, when he said: “Whither shall I go from thy spirit? And whither shall I flee from thy presence? If I ascend up into heaven, thou art there, if I make my bed in hell, behold thou art there. If I take the wings of the morning and dwell in the uttermost parts of the sea; even there shall thy hand lead me and thy right hand shall hold me.” Those thoughts calmed me and bolstered my flagging confidence.

When I arrived at the airport the next morning, I must confess that I was still somewhat concerned, but then God gave me a “little reminder”. As I walked towards the boarding gate I looked out the window of the terminal and saw the front of the huge British Airways 747 that I was preparing to board. Painted on the side of the plane, just under the cockpit window was the plane’s name…. Wings of the Morning. I thanked the Father for the wonderful reassurance and sense of relief. I boarded the plane, feeling probably like the lame man described in Acts 3 in the Bible, that Peter and John healed at the gate of the temple, “that walked into the temple with them Walking and Leaping and Praising God”, all worry left behind.

A little more grace, a motive made pure, a few truths tenderly told, a heart softened, a character subdued, a life consecrated, would restore the right action of the mental mechanism, and make manifest the movement of body and soul in accord with God. Mary Baker Eddy